This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Sadly Over-hyped

Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Highly Overrated But Still Good

In the 1960s Gerry Anderson coined the phrase "Supermarionation" (a portmanteau of "super", "marionette" and "animation") for his puppet television shows, this was one of his most successful series, and one I grew up with in childhood. Basically set in the year 2065, the story revolves around the adventures of the World Aquanaut Security Patrol (WASP), a security organisation based at Marineville, specifically with the highly sophisticated combat submarine Stingray. Captain Troy Tempest (Don Mason) is the pilot of Stingray, his navigator and hydrophone operator is Lieutenant George Lee "Phones" Sheridan (Robert Easton), and they are joined by regular crew member Marina, a beautiful mute young woman, a rescued slave, who can breathe underwater. Marineville is commanded by "hoverchair"-bound Commander Samuel "Sam" Shore (Ray Barrett), his daughter Lieutenant Atlanta Shore (James Bond's Lois Maxwell) is infatuated with Troy, but he is enamoured with Marina, there is also sub-Lieutenant John Horatio Fisher (Ray Barrett) working in Marineville's control room. The main missions of Marineville are to protect the oceans from attack and investigate strange underwater activities, and when there is trouble the alerts for "action stations", "launch stations", and "battle stations" are sounded, with Marineville safe in underground bunkers, and missiles on standby. Throughout the series the Stingray crew encounter a number of underwater races, both friendly and hostile, their most frequent enemy is tyrannical ruler Titan (Ray Barrett) of the underwater city of Titanica, with his aquatic warrior race the Aquaphibians, and his Surface Agent X-2- Zero (Robert Easton). Also starring David Graham as Oink the seal pup and Doc and Sylvia Anderson as Barry Byrne. Stingray was the first British television series to be broadcast entirely in colour throughout. There were 39 episodes of this classic show, the puppet characters are all likable, the stories all have their own charm, the music by Barry Gray, including the closing credits song "Aqua Marina" by Gary Miller, is great, and there are a good amount of exciting underwater chases, explosions and laughs to keep you watching, it is a most entertaining show for adults and children alike, a great family action adventure. Very good!

I liked Stingray a lot. It was a great Gerry Anderson show right up there with Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet.It was quite a depressing show in a way. I don't know what it is but I find anything set underwater depressing. The bottom of the ocean doesn't look like a nice place even in real life. It was quite a gloomy show. I suppose the evil villain called Titan added to the gloom.However, just when things were getting too gloomy Troy Tempest and Phones (and the beautiful Marina) went into action in Stingray to combat Titan and his evil plans. This show was a 25 minute show which was just the right length to set up a story and action.I may be crazy saying this but as a child I found Atlanta and Marina extremely beautiful which probably added to my enjoyment of the show.

Stingray ran in syndication about the time that I was in the first grade and I never missed an episode. Troy and Phones were my heroes, and I would identify with Marina as she accompanied them on their adventures. Looking back a little over thirty years later I am pleasantly surprised at how well it holds up today. I was very lucky to be able to acquire several of the (out of print) Channel 5 Video releases. I showed them to a younger friend of mine and she was literally blown away by how lifelike the marionettes were.The voice acting, while always good in Supermarionation, was best in Stingray IMO, from Ray Barrett's gruff Commander Shore to Robert Easton's perfect South Carolina accent for Phones. Lois Maxwell (James Bond's Miss Moneypenney) was absolutely wonderful as Lt. Atlanta Shore. Don Mason as the authoritative voice Captain Troy Tempest rounded out the crew.As with all of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson's productions, super-cool hardware was everywhere. Troy, Phones, and Marina would enter Stingray via "injector tubes", special seats that would drop through the floor and lower them into Stingray via the roof hatch. In an emergency, the entire city would descend below ground into a vast fortified bunker. The villian, Titan, had a fleet of "terrorfish" submarines, and one would often see Stingray "dolphin hopping" with the terrorfish in pursuit (but not for long, as Stingray always got the last laugh). All of this, of course, was underscored by the incomparable music of Barry Gray.There's plenty more that I could say about this show, but there's just not enough space here for it all. If you get a chance to see it, be sure that you do. You're in for a treat!

The four Supermarionation shows, Supercar, Fireball XL5, Stingray and Thunderbirds, were strange but cool. And often they showed some real creativity. One of my favorite bits was the alarm system in Stingray. As their base went on alert, they didn't use horns or sirens, but drum beats over the PA. As they went to higher stages of alert different rhythms would superimpose themselves over the previous rhythms. It sounded neat and was a really effective way to build up the tension. Someday I'm going to find an excuse to steal the idea.