In Review: Thunderbirds Are Go – Tunnels Of Time

Synopsis: Lady Penelope, Parker and Gordon are on a visit to an ancient temple deep in the remote Amazon. As they are being shown around the dig site by the senior scientist Professor Harold they become trapped inside the temple.

Review: This weekend we were treated to second dose of ‘Thunderbirds Are Go’ as part of the early Saturday tea time programming, and it was a pretty fun episode to boot.

After having two weeks worth of episode set in Space we come down to earth in a story, which crosses the fun elements of Indiana Jones with Thunderbirds and taking us on this thrill ride are Lady Penelope, Parker and Gordon Tracy. The comical possibilities seem endless for this story and do not disappoint. Aside from the fun moments where Gordon and Lady Penelope clash. We have a rather frightened Parker who seems to be triggering traps built within the temple to put off treasure hunters, and if that isn’t enough we have professor Harold doing the worst ever job of trying to cover his interest in the Temples gold beyond the scientific interest that he is masquerading.

The CGI sets in this story are impressive and very representative of the earthy tone that this episode is setting up. I was especially impressed with the tunnels and various traps built within the temple and how the characters triggered them as they tried to make their escape.

We have some brief appearances by the other characters on the series, who by the close of the story engage in a rescue attempt of their trapped rescinds and family. But not Kayo and Alan to be seen this week.

If there is one criticism its that the temple turned out to be more of a plot device than anything else. I’d have loved to have had a bit more of a quest story built around the temple as well as some actual recovered treasure, but sadly the shows time constraints would not really allow for that.

In regards to Lady Penelope. I still feel she is rather dated. But this was a good attempt at doing something new with her character. I was also disappointed that ITV didn’t make anything of the fact that Matt Zimmerman who voiced Alan Tracy in the original series provided his voice for the greedy professor Harold.