No, this film isn't great. There are too many changes from the original series to please fans and it is all a little bit too flash for it's own good BUT I still believe 10 years on from it's release this film remains good family entertainment.It's fast paced, it's exciting for kids (who were very much the target audience) and is a lot better than some of the dross family films we have to put up with.Yes,it would have been nice to see a bit more of the Tracey Brothers (telling which one is which is quite difficult) and making Alan younger and the star of the film isn't to everyone's taste but Sophia Miles as Lady Penelope more than makes up for it. Perhaps the only spot on bit of casting in the film.It's very much a family film but if you can get past the flaws (and it's taken me 10 years to be able to) I think you'll find a lot to like about this film.

i was surprised at how negatively received this movie was by 'Thunderbirds R Go' fanz. i mean it really wasn't all that bad. and i happen to be a babyboomer who was brought up watching the old retro TV show on Saturday mornings back in the sixties.the real debate here is probably not how faithfully this embodies the spirit of the old kidvid series, but whether are not the marionette freak show really justified a remake or a live action interpretation at all. like most retro junk entertainment the original show was what it was. it was hardly Tolstoy or high art in the first place. but babyboomers seemed to expect something better from this. only the good Lord knows why. i don't think much more could have been made out of this except to revive the Super Marionation technique and i don't see any point to that since that was what it was and couldn't be done any better than the original.the film itself is a innocent enough diversion, and in a time when children's entertainment becomes increasingly more crass and violent, it seems refreshingly wholesome and good spirited enough to be acceptable for young kids. i suppose older audiences will most likely perceive early on that no one is going to die, not even the villains and that a upbeat happy ending looms ahead. cynical, older kids will probably get impatient.for me the biggest plus here was the characterizations of Lady Penelope and her chauffeur Parker. they were faithful to the original and even included Lady P's marvelous big, pink, six wheeler, flying automobile. the actor who played Parker looked uncannily like his marionette counterpart.this film also had some very good, big budget CGI FX which utilized it's large 50 million dollar budget (eegads the movie only grossed 6 million?!oooooh. ouch.).i've always wondered how actors feel playing cartoon characters. i wondered here how Bill Paxton felt taking that a step further playing a character that was originally a puppet. personally i thought the puppet did his role better.i don't know what went wrong here with audiences and why on earth they expected more from this. i suppose more should have been done to appeal to a older babyboomer audience and not make this so much for the 'Spykids' age group.personally i don't think the film did all that bad. i think the problem was with the audience. it seems a good lot of babyboomers have been brainwashed into glorifying their entertainment drivel. if babyboomers want a more, sophisticated marionette movie, maybe they should be satisfied with 'Team America; World Police'.

I grew up watching the Thunderbirds. Watching the DVD versions show that they are more slowly paced than shows today. But, the Thunderbirds are cool. Even though they are just puppets. Miss Penelope was the coolest of them all. I think she was based on Sylvia Anderson. I am writing so much about the original, because there is so little to say about the movie. How they could talk something so cool and make it so bad is hard to imagine. There are wonderful actors in this. The story is worse then any of the original shows. It lacks humor, romance, action, adventure and coolness. How could this happen. All they had to do is take the best of the original stories. And why make Tin Tin a major character and do so little with Lady Penelope? I saw this movie twice with the hope that they would make another that would live up to the original.

The movie had a lot of imagination, but the potential was completely ignored. I would have torn up the original script and rewrite it myself. The only good thing that came of this movie was the new theme song by Busted. Despite the lack of professional actors it still kept up with the original idea of the Thunderbirds series. If only there was someone to do a remake. I will only give this a 5 out of 10 because I was feeling generous. They clearly worked hard to create this film, and it has so much fun involved with the plot that it makes a perfect film for kids and families, however, this is still not something to see for personal enjoyment.