Region 2 DVD: pub: Carlton 37115 01613. 6 * 860 minute DVDs 32 * 25 minute episodes with extras. Price: £17.99 (UK) at HMV at the moment. Beats paying £75 for it).

check out website: www.captainscarlet.tv

I've been waiting for a long time for the shops to reduce this particular boxset of 'Captain Scarlet And The Mysterons' in price. With its original £75 price tag, one has to ask who was it targeted at? Adults or children, especially when back in 1968 when it was released it was for kids. As I bought my boxset last year before the price jumped back to its original setting, I thought it would make sense to wait until it dropped again before releasing this review.



An investigation of signals from Mars results in a pre-emptive strike at an alien base there. In front of the instigators, this base resurrects itself and the Mysterons, the beings who ran it retaliate but might now be wholly automated. First, they take possession of the Spectrum military officer, Captain Black, and later on Earth, kill two other officers, Captains Brown and Scarlet, resurrecting them to kill the World President.

Quite why Scarlet's orders were changed to kidnapping no one has ever explained. Maybe the Mysterons wanted a quiet...all right, a deep-voiced word with him first. In any case, this plot is thwarted by Captain Blue who believes he kills Captain Scarlet only for him to pull himself back together sans the mind control. Spectrum ends up with an indestructible officer as part of their desire to curtain the Mysterons deadly game of nerves.

With this series from Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's Century 21 Productions, the marionettes were built to human specification. Less caricature and ultimately, as puppeteer Mary Turner describes, harder to manipulate to act more human. As Gerry Anderson and production crew point out in the extras, if they needed action then they'd use the vehicles under the guidance of the extra-ordinary Derek Meddings and his special effects crew to do what was needed.

Considering the spectrum (sic) of vehicle choices they had to play with here from ground to air, there was no stinting in the visual action stakes. Having the Mysterons destroy before they could resurrect always ensured that there was enough set-piece explosions. Indeed, with the scale to human proportions now, the Anderson series became a guide to do miniature effects that people in the business still learn their own tricks from. Anderson gives a few secrets away in some audio commentaries although I doubt if all the helicopter action was done upside down as that castle would have been kinda heavy to turn that way.

On the final DVD there is a 50 minute feature showing how some effects were done, as well as interviews with the actors behind the voices of Captain Scarlet (Francis Matthews) and Captain Blue (Ed Bishop) and some detail about the other officers if you don't own the 1968 'Captain Scarlet Annual'. Quite why the Angels were ignored in this seemed pointless and a big gap considering how much they feature in the series and had their own comicstrip. Scarlet had one of the largest voice artistes list for all of the Anderson series. One thing I would have liked to have seen is the faces for all the vocal cast. I looked around for some of them recently and Liz Morgan is still quite a dish.

Another interesting oddity is seeing the variants for the opening introduction to each episode. Probably the most bizarre being the Japanese version using sample cuts to their own song by a children's choir at the time. Considering how much the Japanese idolise the Anderson shows, I wish more information was given as to whether they went for the original version at a later date.

The main reason to buy this boxset is the episodes themselves and they still work nearly forty years later. Even when you're told how the effects are done, it's not something you really concentrate on while watching the show, mostly because you get caught up in the action. The melding and work of the production speaks for itself. If only one part was brilliant then you'd be caught out by the rest. See it again now.

GF Willmetts