Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, often shortened to Captain Scarlet, is a British science fiction television series created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and filmed by their production company Century 21 for ITC Entertainment. It is the sixth Anderson series to be filmed using a form of electronic marionette puppetry dubbed "Supermarionation" combined with scale model special effects. Running to thirty-two 25-minute episodes, it was first broadcast on ITV regional franchises between 1967 and 1968 and has since aired in more than 40 other countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
Set in 2068, Captain Scarlet presents a "war of nerves" between Earth and the Mysterons, a race of aliens operating from Mars who possess partial control over matter. When a misunderstanding causes human astronauts to attack their city on Mars, the Mysterons swear revenge and launch reprisals against Earth. These are countered by Spectrum, a worldwide security organisation. In the first episode, Spectrum agent Captain Scarlet acquires the Mysterons' self-healing power of "retrometabolism" and is rendered "indestructible", being able to recover from injuries that would normally be fatal. Scarlet immediately becomes Spectrum's top asset in its fight against the Mysterons.
Captain Scarlet, the eighth of the Andersons' ten puppet series, was preceded by Thunderbirds and followed by Joe 90 and The Secret Service. In terms of visual aesthetic, it marked a departure from earlier series in its use of puppets that were sculpted to realistic body proportions. Repeated several times in the UK, it has generated tie-ins ranging from toy cars and action figures to audio plays and novels, as well as strips in the weekly children's comic TV Century 21.
Compared to earlier Anderson productions, Captain Scarlet is widely regarded as "darker" in tone and less suited to children because of its violent content, as well as its themes of alien aggression and interplanetary war. The change in puppet design has divided opinion and the decision to make the protagonist "indestructible" has been brought into question. The series has been praised for its use of a multinational, multiethnic puppet cast and depiction of a utopian future Earth. A computer-animated remake, New Captain Scarlet, first aired in 2005.
Plot
The series begins in 2068. In the first episode, the crew of the Zero-X spacecraft are investigating the surface of Mars after mysterious radio signals are found to be coming from the planet.Production documents confirm that the Zero-X is of the type introduced in the film Thunderbirds Are Go, placing Captain Scarlet in the same fictional universe as Thunderbirds (Bentley 2001, p. 59). Character biographies in Bentley's The Complete Book of Captain Scarlet also place Fireball XL5 and Stingray in this universe (Bentley 2001, pp. 46–47, 50). Episode 1. The source is discovered to be an alien city, which the astronauts destroy in a missile attack after mistaking a surveillance device for a weapon. The city's inhabitants, the Mysterons, are a collective of sentient computers that possess partial control over matter and communicate in a deep, echoing voice. After using their power of "reversing matter" to rebuild their city, they vow revenge for humanity's unwarranted aggression and declare war on Earth.
Reversing matter, also called "retrometabolism", enables the Mysterons to re-create people and objects as facsimiles that they can control. Episode 2. They use it to wage a "war of nerves" against Earth, issuing threats against specific targets (from world leaders and military installations to whole cities and continents) and then destroying and reconstructing whatever instruments are needed (whether humans or objects) to carry out their plans. The Mysterons' presence is indicated by twin circles of green light that they project onto scenes of destruction and reconstruction. Although the Mysterons are able to influence events from Mars, their actions on Earth are usually performed by their replicated intermediaries.
Zero-X mission leader Captain Black becomes the Mysterons' primary agent when they seize control of his mind.Black's transformation into a Mysteron agent is indicated by a paling of his skin combined with a deepening of his voice to match that of the Mysterons.Bentley 2001, pp. 43; 47. Prior to the events of the series, Black was an officer in Spectrum, a worldwide security organisation that mobilises all its resources to counter the Mysteron threat. Spectrum's senior agents hold military ranks and colour codenames. They are posted to the organisation's headquarters, Cloudbase—an airborne aircraft carrier stationed above the Earth's surface—where they answer to its commander-in-chief, Colonel White.In communications, Spectrum personnel use the expression "S.I.G." ("Spectrum Is Green") as their affirmative code. The negative, "S.I.R." ("Spectrum Is Red"), is rarely used in the series. Episode 19. Cloudbase is defended by Angel Interceptor fighters flown by an all-female team of pilots led by Destiny Angel. The base's computer systems are controlled by White's assistant, Lieutenant Green."Lieutenant" is generally pronounced in the British manner, (), by all but the American characters. Spectrum also incorporates a fleet of armoured Spectrum Pursuit Vehicles (SPVs), which are hidden in secret locations around the world, as well as patrol cars, maximum-security transports, passenger jet aircraft and machine gun-equipped helicopters.
Captain Scarlet becomes Spectrum's top asset in its fight against the Mysterons following the events of the first episode, in which the Mysterons attempt to assassinate the World President as their first act of retaliation.In Captain Scarlet, power from many individual nations has been vested in a world government, headed by a president and possessing its own military and security forces. Spectrum is a unified operation designed to be unhindered by interdepartmental red tape, thus providing a more efficient service (Bentley 2001, p. 43).Bentley 2001, p. 44. The Mysterons engineer a road accident that kills the original Scarlet and replace him with a reconstruction. After being shot by Captain Blue and falling to its death from the top of a tower, the reconstruction returns to life with the consciousness of the original Scarlet restored, and is thereafter free of Mysteron control.According to The Complete Book of Captain Scarlet, the Mysterons intended Scarlet's double to be "indestructible" (Bentley 2001, p. 44). This is in contrast with other reconstructions, which are permanently destroyed when killed. With his new Mysteron body, Scarlet possesses two extraordinary abilities: he can sense other reconstructions nearby; and if he is injured or killed, his retrometabolism restores him to full health, making him virtually "indestructible". As hostilities with Mars continue, Scarlet repeatedly sacrifices himself to thwart the Mysterons, secure in the knowledge that he will return to face them again.
Over the course of the series, it is found that Mysteron reconstructions are particularly vulnerable to electricity and can be identified through X-rays, which cannot penetrate their alien biology. Episode 8. These discoveries allow Spectrum to develop two anti-Mysteron devices, the Mysteron Gun and Mysteron Detector.In "Spectrum Strikes Back", it is stated that the Mysteron Gun is "the only gun that kills a Mysteron." However, other episodes show the Mysterons to be vulnerable to conventional means of destruction. Episode 9. A three-episode story arc focuses on the discovery of a Mysteron outpost on the Moon, its destruction by Spectrum, and Spectrum's efforts to negotiate with the Mysterons after converting the base's power source into an interplanetary communication device. Episode 12. Episode 17. A failed attempt to survey Mars from space, Episode 18. aborted military conferences Episode 7. Episode 22. and the sabotaged construction of a new Earth space fleet Episode 24. prevent Spectrum from taking the fight to the Mysterons, and the organisation fails to capture Captain Black on multiple occasions. Episode 4. Episode 16. Episode 18. Episode 21. In the penultimate episode, the Mysterons destroy Cloudbase itself, but this is revealed to be a nightmare dreamt by one of the Angels. Episode 31. The final episode is a clip show that leaves the conflict between Earth and Mars unresolved. Episode 32.
Production Development
When efforts to secure a US network broadcast of Thunderbirds fell through in July 1966, Lew Grade, the owner of AP Films (APF), capped Thunderbirds Series Two at six episodes and cancelled the production.Bentley 2001, p. 13. Having overseen APF's work since the making of Supercar in 1960, Grade was keen for Supermarionation to penetrate the lucrative American market and believed that a new concept would stand a better chance of landing a network sale than a second series of Thunderbirds.
Gerry Anderson was therefore required to come up with an idea for a new series. He had once been inspired by the thought of creating a live-action police drama in which the hero is unexpectedly murdered partway through the series and replaced by a new lead character.Bentley 2001, p. 14. Now returning to this idea, Anderson realised that a major selling point could be a character who is killed at the end of each episode and resurrected by the start of the next. This, coupled with contemporary theories about the possibility of life on Mars, led to the idea of an interplanetary war between Earth and its neighbour and a security organisation being called on to defend humanity.Bentley 2001, p. 5. After further thought, Anderson decided that "Scarlet" would be a suitably unusual name for the organisation's "indestructible" top agent, while his partner could be called "Blue". From this, Anderson resolved that all the personnel would have colour codenames and the organisation would be called "Spectrum".Sellers, pp. 102–103. Aware that white light is composed of—and can be broken down into—the colours of the spectrum, he named Spectrum's leader Colonel White.
Intrigued by the phrase "life as we know it", Anderson wanted to set his enemy aliens apart from the conventional extraterrestrials of 1960s TV and film. Therefore, while devising the Mysterons, he worked from a basis of "life as we don't know it", making the aliens a collective of sentient computers rather than organic life forms (though their exact nature is not explicitly stated in the series itself).Bentley 2001, pp. 5; 43. The intention was that the original Mysterons were extragalactic beings that established a base on Mars in the distant past. In the early 20th century they abandoned the planet, leaving their computers behind.Bentley 2001, p. 43.
Anderson's memories of the Second World War provided inspiration for a number of design aspects. For example, he remembered that during the Battle of Britain, RAF pilots had struggled to counter German attacks quickly, because having to take off from the ground meant that it took a long time to intercept the enemy. He therefore made Spectrum's headquarters, Cloudbase, an airborne aircraft carrier.Archer and Hearn, p. 148. According to Anderson, the Mysteron rings were inspired by a TV advertisement for wool that featured the Woolmark logo being projected onto a woman.