Fireball XL5

I have read the previous comments and am delighted at how intelligent, sexy and wise all we XL-5 fans grew up to become! I too suffered from years of dirty looks from Old Boomers whenever I mentioned this show. They swore it never existed, I boldly proclaimed it did, it did! I saw it as a six-year-old so of course it imprints upon Primal Joy circuits: The now-extinct Saturday Morning Cartoon block, when you watched anything animated. But only a handful of shows like XL-5 exhibited imagination, most were machine-made Hanna-Barbara slop like Huckleberry Hound and Top Cat. Yes, back in them days, we had to wait for our TV set to 'warm up'-- thanks to a little something we used to call 'vacuum tubes' (they looked a lot like Robert the Robot!) And TVs had a smell to them too (ozone and the paper bits (!!) inside heating up)-- and we liked it!!! Reviving this show is why God created the DVD and the Internet! My only complaint is the DVDs do not have enough extras on them; they could benefit from more comments. Like from Sylvia and Gerry Anderson maybe? Anyway, if you have never seen the show-- well, decide for yourself. Okay, they're 45 year old children shows, but hey-- it's PUPPETS!! Oops, I mean, it's SUPERMARIONETTES!! If you can't like that, your strings need readjusting, baby.

My school bus got me home exactly at 4:00 and rather than dawdle and get involved in the snowball or dirt clod fight, I would head straight for the T.V. Back in those days it took about 4 minutes for the set to warm up so the only way I could catch the opening was to stay home sick from school, which I tried as often as I could. I loved this show, as did my best friends and we would re-create the episodes the next day on the school bus. My brother and sister would make it to the basement in time for the closing theme and we would all sing along. Then it was time for my other favorite, "Jonny Quest". This was my favorite hour of the day. On a recent trip to London, a friend surprised me with a video tape of two episodes. As clunky and silly as the show was it brought back so many "warm fuzzies" that I still smile to think about Captain Steve and the rest of the crew.

I was very young when I saw this show, but I still remember the special effects, especially the opening sequence of the rocket speeding down that track and the changes in the engine sounds just before it took off from the track into the air. The marionettes, especially the robot and his electronic voice. And I remember being very moved by a story involving a mermaid. The ending was sad. I would love to get this series on video. is it available?

I can't believe anyone outside of my brother or me remembers this show. There were times throughout my life when I had to question if the show ever really existed. We were so mesmerized by all of the episodes and we played XL5 for hours up on hours. I believe that for us the spaceship itself was the real focus of our enjoyment. There just wasn't anything like it at the time. Rail launching a space ship was definitely ahead of it's time.

I must admit that that I don't really remember much of the show. Robby's electro-voice saying `Fire Retro Rockets' has definitely remained with me over the years. I still get a thrill when I reminisce about the rare episodes when XL1 was employed to help save the day. I remember a friend in school had the XL5 lunch box and I used sit and study it, on the rare occasion when he would let me. It was in color! I am a father now and my children grew up on Transformers and Power Rangers. However, the looks on their faces when these characters would save the day would sometimes take me back to the days of my childhood and XL5 and for that brief moment we shared an emotion of childhood that I will always treasure. I can only hope that they will some day be lucky enough to experience the same with their children. I plan on purchasing the DVD set of XL5. I am not sure if I will try to talk the kids into watching them with me but the opportunity will be there if they choose.

It has been so long I hardly remember the show, but I do remember the begging and pleading I did to get my parents to let me watch the show. It was, at the time, my favorite television show. It was my introduction to science fiction. It is genre that I almost always prefer. I just saw a show recently, and it is still great fun. It is particularly interesting to compare this to the latter shows of the Andersons like Stingray, Thunderbirds, Capt. Scarlet, UFO, Space:1999, and journey to the farside of the sun. They always are fun to watch. I grew up being a fan of their work without always knowing it was the same producers.