Stingray (1964 TV series)

Did You Know?

• Stingray was the first Supermarionation series whose puppet characters had interchangeable heads showing a range of facial expressions.
• The series was featured in the Supermarionation tie-in comic TV Century 21 from its first issue in January 1965.
• Two original novels were published by Armada Books: Stingray and Stingray and the Monster, written by John William Jennison under the pseudonym John Theydon.

Premise

The series is set in the mid-2060s and follows the World Aquanaut Security Patrol (WASP), a branch of the World Security Patrol responsible for policing Earth's oceans. WASP is based in the self-contained city of Marineville, located several miles inland on the West Coast of North America and connected to the Pacific Ocean via a tunnel with an ocean door. General quarters is sounded by rapid drumbeats, and in emergencies the base can be lowered into underground bunkers while fighter aircraft and interceptor missiles are launched. Personnel acknowledge commands with the phrase P.W.O.R., short for Proceeding With Orders Received. Stingray is piloted by Captain Troy Tempest, with navigator Lieutenant George Lee Sheridan, nicknamed Phones for his role as hydrophone operator. They board via injector tubes from the stand-by lounge. They answer to Commander Sam Shore, whose daughter Lieutenant Atlanta Shore works in the control tower and is enamoured of Troy. The series begins with the discovery of advanced underwater civilisations, including the city of Titanica ruled by King Titan and his Aquaphibian warriors. In the first episode, Troy and Phones are captured but rescued by Marina, a mute woman from the undersea city of Pacifica who can breathe underwater. She defects to WASP and becomes a permanent crew member, causing jealousy in Atlanta.

Characters

Captain Troy Tempest pilots the WASP's flagship submarine, the Stingray, with Don Mason providing his voice. His best friend and navigator, "Phones," whose real name is George Lee Sheridan, operates the hydrophones and is voiced by Robert Easton. The crew includes Marina, a mute young woman from an underwater race who can breathe both in and out of water. She escapes enslavement by King Titan of Titanica in the first episode and becomes Troy's love interest. Commander Samuel Shore, voiced by Ray Barrett, leads Marineville from a hoverchair due to paralysis from the waist down, an injury sustained when a hostile submersible attacked an ocean mining platform he was guarding. His daughter, Lieutenant Atlanta Shore, voiced by Lois Maxwell, works as assistant controller in Marineville Tower and competes with Marina for Troy's attention. Sub-Lieutenant John Horatio Fisher, also voiced by Ray Barrett, serves as the junior assistant controller and trains as an aquanaut in one episode. Three WSP Commanders, voiced by Don Mason, Ray Barrett, Robert Easton, and David Graham, operate from Washington, D.C., and brief Commander Shore. Admiral Jack Denver, voiced by David Graham, heads the WASP's underwater research division and attended college with Shore. Marineville's doctor, "Doc," is voiced by David Graham. Marina's father, Aphony, rules the peaceful undersea city of Pacifica. A seal pup named Oink, voiced by David Graham, becomes Marina's pet after saving the crew from a bomb. King Titan, voiced by Ray Barrett, is the tyrannical ruler of Titanica, while his inept land-based agent, Surface Agent X-2-Zero, voiced by Robert Easton, operates from a dilapidated house on Lemoy Island.

Production

In late 1962, as production on Fireball XL5 ended, Gerry Anderson decided an underwater series was the next step, inspired by childhood memories of U-boats and ocean mysteries. Lew Grade, APF's financial backer, approved the concept and commissioned 26 episodes. Anderson named the series Stingray partly from a belief that stingrays are dangerous animals and because it seemed an exciting title. APF moved from the Slough Trading Estate to a larger site on Stirling Road at a cost of £75,000, building new studios inside a converted factory with three 40 by 45 foot shooting stages. Production began in spring or June 1963 and was completed in ten months. Each episode required an average of 11 days of puppet filming and five-and-a-half days of effects filming. The total cost was approximately £1 million, with a budget of £20,000 per episode, enabling filming in Eastmancolor. Though Stingray debuted in black and white in the UK, the colour filming was intended to increase appeal in the US, where colour TV was common. Sets were repainted after NBC supplied a list of colours believed to cause problems, though Anderson considered this unnecessary. During production, APF became the UK's largest colour film consumer.

Broadcast and reception

Stingray first aired in the UK on 4 October 1964 across several ITV regions, with others picking it up later that year. Its initial broadcasts were in black and white, and it wasn’t shown in colour until December 1969. Despite minimal promotion, the series performed as well as earlier Supermarionation hits. ITV repeated it in 1981, and BBC2 ran it in the early 1990s and again in the early 2000s. In the US, it debuted in colour in 1965, was syndicated to over 100 markets, and generated more than £3 million in sales. The Sci-Fi Channel aired it in 1994 as part of its Cartoon Quest block. Robert Sellers later called it the first truly classic Anderson show, praising its special effects as remarkably durable. Daniel O’Brien labelled it perhaps the archetypal Gerry Anderson series, while Morgan Jeffery ranked it fourth among Anderson’s productions, hailing it as a top-tier kids’ adventure serial. Andrew Blair considered it the weakest of the three major Supermarionation shows, noting its shorter, lighter, and breezier tone, like a matinee adventure full of mild peril and jaunty escapades. Marcus Hearn saw it as essentially Fireball XL5 moved underwater, and Kim Newman grouped it with Supercar and Fireball XL5 as a patrol show. John Peel argued that Stingray shows Anderson’s tongue-in-cheek humour most clearly, though he found Fireball XL5 and Thunderbirds more appealing.