Spectrum Headquarters Forum

Posted: **Sun Apr 17, 2005 10:59 am**

Marion wrote:All I can say is that - in my opinion - the new shows lacks ‘ambience’.

And I did warn you it might not make much sense....

No, it does make sense. Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. They're well organised and maybe you've hit the nail on the head why a number of fans are going to have problems with the new series.

I guess it's always going to be a matter of personal taste in some things.

Posted: **Fri May 13, 2005 5:11 am**

Interesting…it seemed White thought the problem was the rain - but he didn’t think to share his theory with Scarlet. The rings moving in the cloud were a nice touch. I didn’t find Scarlet’s interest in Susan believable at all. Funny choice of priorities from Scarlet too - get the Colonel or go after Black. He didn’t know White had a backup plan … and Black always gets away anyway.

Re Marion’s comments - I agree the series lacks ambience. Even if the show did not have the problem of comparing it with the original I don’t think I’d have taken to it much when I was a child. I might have watched it but wouldn’t have bothered watching it again when the inevitable repeats surfaced. Once would have been enough and I don’t think I’d have minded if I missed the occasional episode the first time around either. (Which was pretty much how I felt about Joe 90 and Secret Service).

For me the problem, quite apart from the acting, is so far I don’t find any of the characters particularly likeable. In the original series I remember I didn’t care for Scarlet much when I first saw him. Seeing the show as an adult I think he’s OK - but back in the 1960s I thought he was a bore. But I adored Blue, liked the Colonel too, and I thought the other captains looked very fine. The Angels were OK too though possibly Green and Black were more interesting to me than them. At least it was easy to know who the Angels were and I really liked the Interceptors and other craft.

In the CGI series I find I don’t really care that much for any of the characters, and they’re as ugly as sin. I certainly don’t like the new Blue and old Misery Guts …I mean Destiny. I can’t tell the rest of the Angels apart - and frankly they’re not interesting enough for me to bother trying. And where are the other captains anyway? There’s something I find repellent about the Colonel in the way he sounds.
Scarlet himself is not particularly exciting, and so far seems to lack depth (definitely no pun intended!) which is surprising as initial info about the new series seemed to imply he would be more ‘human’ than the Scarlet we all remember. In a way I suppose he might be - a rather ordinary human though! In his own way he can be as boring as I first thought the original Scarlet was - but the difference is the original Scarlet seemed a stiff-upper-lip stodgy kind of ‘military man’ boring (as television likes to write them), whereas in some episodes the new Scarlet is in danger of being boring as in very average. Maybe it’s the pedestrian acting that’s at fault.
The only interesting character (and I say interesting, not always likeable) is Captain Black. The rest of the characters are just there…but sometimes he shines.

Posted: **Tue Jul 19, 2005 5:24 pm**

I have just watched the 'Rain of Terror' episode again (Tuesday afternoon repeats) and I thought some of the CGI was good - the scenery and the 'rain effects' and so forth. The interior shots of the hangar decks and machinery- (something we never saw on the original, for obvious reasons) are interesting. Speaking as a non-mechanically minded person, it's nice to see how they might be imagined to work....
I still don't think Scarlet made a very convincing job of being a 'possible boyfriend' though and the script was so corny in places as to be cringeworthy... perhaps Dr Todd has spent so long in the lab and the desert that she's lost the plot with chat-up lines?

.
The Colonel did act rather strangely - not explaining his 'cunning plan' to avoid the effects of the rain to anyone.
Captain Black missed a perfect opportunity to remove Spectrum's commander in chief - he had knocked him out and had him at his mercy, so he goes and dumps him in the desert to let the rain kill him? This isn't the merciless attitude we've come to expect from the new Mysterons - not until 'Achilles Messenger' anyway - when he chooses not to shoot Scarlet and White (again). BTW - why was Black there anyway, acting as the assistant? He'd killed the real one - in the avalanche - so why not mysteronise him and let him do the naughty tampering with the project? It may well be that White started to become suspicious when he heard about the 'new assistant' and the unfortuante accident that happened to the original man?
Maybe this epiosde would work better if it were shown earlier in the show? We'll have to wait for the DVDs to see if it makes any difference to how it reads...

Posted: **Tue Jul 19, 2005 7:03 pm**

Two bits of this episode were cut out of the MOM screening.

The first cut which I always thought there was a cut there because...Mr Van Dam telling Black ''There is no place for a man like you in this organization'' and then the scene just ending did not feel right.
But today after Van Dam tells Black that,Black hits Van Dam a back-hand slap and says ''Consider that as my resignation''.

The second cut was very small.
When White wakes up in the desert and finds that the microphone has been ripped out of his cap he says ''damn''.

Posted: **Wed Oct 26, 2005 3:20 pm**

Good to see those cut scenes in the DVD release. This story I enjoyed - even the perky Susan was a good character - adding some life and quirkiness to more serious situations. I really loved the Scarlet/Black fight in the sky. The raged Meercats were creepy.

Animation highlight - Fight in the clouds, Memorial scene at the end
Story highlight - Scarlet carrying Susan into the Med Center.

7/10

KP

Posted: **Fri Oct 28, 2005 10:41 am**

Like this one as well.

Colonel White (what again!) is great - talk about sang-froid. He is the very epitome of coolness.

I also found the rain effected meercats creepy and was suprised to see the scene in which their entrails litter the ground considering how little blood there is in this series.

Couple of concerns about the CGI in this episode though - good clouds but neither Susan nor the Colonel look wet at all and there is no interaction between the characters steps and the wet ground - if its wet enough to relect the characters then they should be kicking up water as they walk. Picky I know but its these little things that really sell the situation for me and its just not real without them.

I'm also a TV historian so I tend to analyse things as I watch - sorry

forgot to mention the way Col White gets up after he wakes up in the desert - BIG plus points for remembering his injured arm.