Why Captain Scarlet?? 

Why Captain Scarlet??

From the brief amount of time I was able to spend at the Misc!MAYHEM table in San Diego (being horrendously caught up in the Heritage Comics auction going on at the same time), it was interesting talking to fans of the Gerry Anderson shows. Lots of really cool, interesting people, but we all noticed one thing: people tend to be passionate about a particular show, not about Anderson's work as a whole.

This mirrors the M!M crew as well. For example, Keith Wilson is a SUPERCAR fanatic, Anthony Taylor goes nuts for all things UFO, and I'm totally absorbed with CAPTAIN SCARLET.

Now, that's not to say that I don't care for the rest of the Anderson-universe shows. I think THUNDERBIRDS, UFO and SPACE:1999 are great. I haven't seen a lot of SUPERCAR, but I've really enjoyed what I've watched. I'm even developing a fondness for STINGRAY (despite the dopey end title music and the ridiculous pet seal). But, out of all of them, CAPTAIN SCARLET is the one that really gets me juiced.

Why? I think for me it has to do with the storyline. Of all the Anderson shows, the conflict in CAPTAIN SCARLET is most clearly defined. What was the conflict in SUPERCAR? Master Spy wanted the vehicle. OK. STINGRAY? Titan's pet fish wouldn't look at Troy Tempest for a full "marine minute". Right. But in CAPTAIN SCARLET, it was a "war of nerves" based on revenge. Earthmen had attacked and destroyed a Mysteron outpost, and the Mysterons were pissed. They saw humanity as a threat that needed taking care of, a blight on the universe that needed to be pruned. Now THIS is a conflict!

Also, in CAPTAIN SCARLET, characters died. Really died. Captain Brown blew up in the first episode...and was dead. Finally, there was a cost, a price to be paid.

And let's face it, by this time in Anderson's development, the puppets were just a lot more appealing. Gone were the oversized heads and the jerky movements. These were puppets that thought they were people.

The big criticism about CAPTAIN SCARLET seems to be the lack of characterization. It's a fair complaint. The characters weren't terribly well-defined or well-thought out. But that to me is the beauty of the concept now that we're able to do the comic book version. These characters are basically a tabula rasa that we can flesh out and develop. Gerry Anderson has given us a great sandbox to play in, and I, for one, am happy to be here.