Pit of Peril

"Pit of Peril" is the second episode of Series One of "Thunderbirds", a British Supermarionation television series created by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson and produced by their company AP Films (APF) for ITC Entertainment. Written by Alan Fennell and directed by Desmond Saunders, it was first broadcast on ATV Midlands on 7 October 1965.
Set in the 2060s, the series follows the exploits of International Rescue, a secret organisation that uses highly developed rescue machines to save human life. The main characters are ex-astronaut Jeff Tracy, the founder of International Rescue, and his five adult sons, who pilot the organisation's primary vehicles – the "Thunderbird" machines. In "Pit of Peril", International Rescue rush to save the crew of an experimental US Army walking vehicle that has fallen into an abandoned military dump.
Since its original broadcast, "Pit of Peril" has drawn a mixed response from its production crew and critics, who note that the plot was stretched thin by the extension of the episode's running time from 25 to 50 minutes.
Plot.
The Sidewinder is a giant walker developed by the US Army for use in brushfire wars. During a field test in the African jungle, disaster strikes when the Sidewinder disturbs the crust that has formed above a burning pit, creating a fissure that swallows the vehicle. The Sidewinder comes to rest below ground, on its side and unable to move. Its crew of three – Colonel Sweeney, Frank and Johnny – are unhurt but their air and environmental systems are failing and the outside temperature is rising rapidly.
An air support unit comprising a helicopter crew and the Sidewinder relief crew assesses the situation. The leader, General Peters, states that the Sidewinder weighs over 500 tons and the equipment needed to lift it would take weeks to arrive. Lieutenant Mead volunteers to be lowered into the pit to examine the Sidewinder but can only glimpse the vehicle before he is overwhelmed by the heat and pulled back up. A plan is devised to drag the Sidewinder out of the pit using the helicopter, and Sergeant Reynolds goes in to attach a line to one of the legs. He succeeds but emerges from the pit badly burned. Mead and Reynolds are airlifted to hospital in the relief crew's helijet. The Sidewinder proves too heavy for the helicopter to pull and the line slips free.
Suddenly Peters' aide, Ralph, remembers International Rescue. This prompts Peters to transmit an emergency call that is picked up by John Tracy (voiced by Ray Barrett) on the "Thunderbird 5" space station. John has been monitoring the Army's radio traffic and has already briefed Jeff (voiced by Peter Dyneley) on Tracy Island. When John relays Peters' call, Jeff immediately dispatches Scott (voiced by Shane Rimmer), whom he has placed on standby in "Thunderbird 1", followed by Virgil and Brains (voiced by David Holliday and David Graham) in "Thunderbird 2" carrying the Mole and two Recovery Vehicles. Reaching the scene, the team survey the pit using "Thunderbird 1"s remote camera, which sights old army wreckage. They determine that the pit was originally an open-cast mine that was, following the Second World War, used as a military dump; after it was abandoned the wreckage spontaneously combusted. Brains predicts that if the rest of the crust is removed the Recovery Vehicles will be able to haul the Sidewinder out of the pit.
Wearing protective clothing, Virgil enters the pit and plants explosives around the perimeter. He is then extracted by Scott in the Mole. Brains detonates the explosives, blowing away the remaining crust. Virgil activates the Recovery Vehicles and fires their magnetic tow cables onto the Sidewinder. He then puts the vehicles in reverse, slowly dragging the Sidewinder out. One of the cables breaks off, forcing Virgil to re-attach it. Finally, the Sidewinder clears the pit.
Sweeney, Frank and Johnny recover from their ordeal. As International Rescue depart, Peters admits that he would very much like to have the organisation in his army.
Production.
"Pit of Peril" is one of several early "Thunderbirds" episodes that was originally 25 minutes long but had its running time doubled after Lew Grade, APF's chairman, was greatly impressed by the 25-minute pilot version of "Trapped in the Sky" and ordered that all episodes be extended to fill a one-hour timeslot. For "Pit of Peril", this involved adding new supporting elements in the form of the relief helijet and its crew (Lieutenant Mead, Sergeant Reynolds and Pilot Charlie) as well as a subplot in which the army personnel investigate the accident zone and attempt to recover the Sidewinder using their own equipment. Continuity errors in the set design of the army helicopter cockpit distinguish the episode's original footage from that filmed during the re-shoot.
"Pit of Peril" features only five of the regular puppet cast (Jeff, Scott, Virgil and John Tracy, and Brains) – the lowest number of any "Thunderbirds" episode, and is the only episode of the series to have no female characters. The puppets that play Colonel Sweeney and Frank first appeared as Captain Hanson and the unnamed "Fireflash" co-pilot in "Trapped in the Sky".
This episode marks the first use of the series' regular ending theme music: a modified version of the instrumental accompanying the "Thunderbird 1" launch sequence in "Trapped in the Sky". The incidental music, composed by Barry Gray, was recorded on 24 April 1965 in a four-hour studio session with a 22-piece orchestra.
A scene set inside the pit uses camera movement and a carefully timed edit to give the impression that Virgil and the Mole are in the same shot, even though they were filmed by different units: when the camera pans away from the special effects unit's shot of the Mole, its view passes through thick smoke, hiding a cut that separates this footage from the puppet unit's shot of Virgil.
Design.
The look of the Sidewinder was devised by director Desmond Saunders. The studio model used wood and card for the main body and chains of cake tins for the arms. According to effects director Derek Meddings, the model was extremely difficult to film as it was hung on wires and an under-floor "scissor mechanism" was needed to move its legs. In his book "21st Century Visions", he commented that "fortunately the script required it to fall into a deep pit within minutes of appearing, so we didn't have to move it far." The Sidewinder control room set incorporated a console normally used as part of the set of "Thunderbird 5".
"Pit of Peril" marks the first appearance of the Mole, which is also featured in the closing credits of this and all subsequent episodes. Its drill bit was wood fitted with a screw thread; the former had to be turned manually as the effects team lacked a lathe. The interior set, which re-used IR's Mobile Control console, would be made more detailed for future appearances. The episode also introduces "Thunderbird 1"s remote camera and the helijet, a type of VTOL aircraft that appears frequently in "Thunderbirds" and later Anderson series. The Recovery Vehicles, which appear only in this episode, were designed by Mike Trim in his first major design work for APF.
Broadcast and reception.
In the series' alternative two-part format that was broadcast in some UK regions, part one of "Pit of Peril" ended with "Thunderbird 1" blasting off from Tracy Island while part two began with an abridged version of a scene in which the army personnel discuss the situation while standing at the edge of the pit. Several other scenes were also shortened.
Critical response.
The episode was disliked by Gerry Anderson, who found it one of the most challenging of all "Thunderbirds" episodes. In his biography, he described it as "an absolute pig of a film. For three weeks I kept cutting and re-cutting because we couldn't get it right. One night I said to the editor, 'Let it go. Cut the negative and dub it – we can't do anything more with this.'" Several weeks later, he was surprised when Abe Mandell, head of ITC's New York office, telephoned him after seeing the finished episode and called it "wonderful". In her autobiography, Sylvia Anderson called the episode's theme of danger posed by hazardous waste "very much a contemporary problem".
Tom Fox of "Starburst" magazine gives the episode three stars out of five, calling the Sidewinder a "great but hilariously awkward invention" and likening it to the giant mechanical spider in the film "Wild Wild West" (1999). Simon Archer and Marcus Hearn describe "Pit of Peril" as one of several early "Thunderbirds" episodes that focus on "seemingly inescapable dangers on land, under the sea and in the air". For Chris Bentley, it is one of a number that use "incredible technology in a developing world as a springboard to disaster".
Hearn praises the model-work, editing and music but calls the episode a "misfire", stating that Fennell's "relatively one-dimensional plot" was ill-suited to the new 50-minute running time. He compares the plot to that of Series Two's "Path of Destruction" but regards that episode as superior in nearly all respects. Hearn and Bentley also argue that the premise is similar to that of the first episode. Bentley writes that "Pit of Peril" "somewhat slavishly follows the formula of 'Trapped in the Sky'", comparing the plight of the experimental Sidewinder to the sabotage of the new "Fireflash" airliner in that episode. He describes the Mole as being "lifted directly" from Edgar Rice Burroughs' novel "At The Earth's Core" (1914).
In a review of the series' soundtrack, Heather Phares of AllMusic cites the incidental track "The Fate of the Sidewinder" as an example of how Barry Gray's work on "Thunderbirds" "[sent] up the spy and action/adventure conventions of the '60s very stylishly and subtly." She characterises the track as "only slightly more over the top than the scores for the "James Bond" films or for TV series like "The Prisoner"".
Comics.
Before "Pit of Peril" was first broadcast, the Sidewinder had already appeared in the weekly comic "TV Century 21" as part of its regular "Stingray" comic strip. In 1991, the episode was adapted into a two-part strip for Fleetway Publications' "Thunderbirds: The Comic".