original. Film The feature film sequels Thunderbirds Are Go and Thunderbird 6 were released in 1966 and 1968. Lew Grade had approved the production of the first film before the TV series began to air. Written and produced by the Andersons and directed by David Lane, the films were distributed by United Artists. Both were critical and commercial failures, and plans for further sequels were abandoned. In the early 1980s, episodes of Thunderbirds and other Supermarionation series were re-edited by ITC's New York offices to create a series of compilation films. Branded "Super Space Theater", this format was mainly intended for family viewing on American syndicated and cable TV. Three Thunderbirds features were produced: Thunderbirds to the Rescue, Thunderbirds in Outer Space and Countdown to Disaster. Plans for a live-action film adaptation were first announced in 1993. These eventually culminated in the 2004 film Thunderbirds, directed by Jonathan Frakes and produced by StudioCanal and Working Title Films. It was a critical and commercial failure and poorly received by fans of the TV series. TV The Andersons sold their intellectual and profit participation rights to Thunderbirds and their other productions in the 1970s. As a result, they had no developmental control over later adaptations of their works. Thunderbirds was first remade for TV in the early 1980s as Thunderbirds 2086. In this anime re-imagining, set 20 years after the original, the vastly expanded International Rescue is based within an arcology and operates 17 Thunderbird machines. It was inspired by Thunderhawks, an updated story concept by Gerry Anderson and Reg Hill that later served as the basis for Anderson's Terrahawks. Two re-edited series, based on condensed versions of 13 of the original episodes, aired in the US in 1994. The first, Thunderbirds USA, was broadcast as part of the Fox Kids programming block; the second, Turbocharged Thunderbirds, was syndicated by UPN. Devised as a comedy, Turbocharged Thunderbirds moved the action to the planet "Thunder-World" and combined the original puppet footage with new live-action scenes featuring a pair of human teenagers. As well as Thunderhawks, Anderson developed other ideas for a remake. A 1976 concept, Inter-Galactic Rescue 4, was to have featured a variable-configuration craft capable of performing rescues on land and sea, in air and in space; Anderson pitched the idea to NBC, who rejected it. This was followed in 1984 by another proposed re-imagining, T-Force, which Anderson was at first unable