This is from Thursday's NZ Herald ...
Live actors would be incredibly silly. It must be either puppets (like the original, the "Team America: World Police" parody movie and part of a Stargate SG-1 episode) or use 3D computer graphics models that looks similar to the puppets (like the latest Star Wars animated movie and TV show) or even a "traditional" animated show (there was a Japanese made show called "Thunderbirds 2086" made in the 1980s).Thunderbirds are go - again
The children's sci-fi series Thunderbirds is to return to television in a new series after an absence of 45 years, its creator Gerry Anderson said yesterday.
"Thunderbirds are go!" became a catchphrase for generations of schoolchildren after the original series lunched in 1965.
The puppet heroes, led by Jeff Tracy, his sons Scott and Virgil, and their friend Lady Penelope, also spawned the catchphrases "F.A.B." and "Yes, m'lady".
Based on the remote Tracy Island, the swashbuckling family rescued the innocent from disasters the world over using their fleet of Thunderbirds rescue craft - and fought intercontinental evil, particularly in the form of chief baddie The Hood.
But despite the enduring popularity of the series and massive sales for its merchandise - particularly models of the Thunderbirds aircraft - only 32 episodes were ever made, the last in 1966.
A live action movie starring Bill Paxton was made in 2004, but was critically panned and a box office flop.
However, speaking on Radio 5 Live yesterday to promote a new set of Thunderbirds stamps being issued by Royal Mail, Anderson, 81, confirmed that he is o make a new television series.
The "Fanderson" fan website said that Anderson had confirmed that "he has finalised a deal to make a new series of Thunderbirds", but that he had not given any further details.
The biggest question for the producers of the new series will be whether to cast live actors as the Tracy family heroes - or to continue, in time-honoured tradition, in "Supermarionation".
