"Brains is Dead" is the second story in Thunderbirds Versus the Hood, the first full-cast audio adventure from Anderson Entertainment. It was adapted from a comic strip story of the same name, originally published in TV Century 21's Thunderbirds series.
Synopsis[]
International Rescue is rocked by the death of one of their own when Brains is the victim of a seemingly motiveless murder in New York, but before the team have a chance to come to terms with this loss they find themselves facing an all-out attack against Tracy Island. Their oldest enemy is about to make his final most devastating move against them – and among his new allies is a very familiar face...
Plot[]
In New York City, Hiram Blake, a famous eye specialist, and his assistant Miss Wilshaw have finished their work for the day and are closing down. But then, two ruthless men suddenly appear and gun them down. After using Ms. Wilshaw's book of clients to confirm their intel, the gunmen proceed to set a trap to begin the utter destruction of International Rescue...
Meanwhile on Tracy Island, Brains is due for an appointment in New York with that same particular eye specialist. Scott Tracy takes him there in Thunderbird 1, and waits while Brains makes his way to Hiram Blake's centre. When he gets there, however, the two assassins ambush him. After hearing Brains' shouts for help in Thunderbird 1 with his communicator, Scott heads for the centre at once. Barging in through the front door, he see his friend strapped to a chair. Intending to free Brains, Scott turns on a light switch, but there's a sudden electrical discharge — that supposedly kills Brains!
Later, Jeff, Virgil and Alan meet Scott at the city morgue. After Scott solemnly relays the sad details of what had happened, Jeff gently assures his eldest son that there was no way he could have known that the chair Brains had been strapped to had been wired up to the mains. By this point, the bodies of Blake and Wilshaw have also been discovered, and no clue remains as to why the murderers singled Brains out for such an elaborate death-trap. Nevertheless, Jeff assures his sons that the killers will be found and brought to justice. Before then, a solemn ceremony convenes aboard Thunderbird 5, and the Tracys salute their fallen friend as they bury him in space...
But other eyes are also watching, and reporting to a temple in the Malaysian jungle, where a certain evil mastermind is listening in. A rocket retrieves Brains' drifting coffin, and it is taken to the temple, where the Hood is eagerly waiting. He reveals to to his men that Brains is not dead, but only in suspended animation. The Hood then sets to work in bringing Brains back to consciousness, using a special fluid injection, before he then proceeds to use a mind-conditioning device to brainwash the IR technician into becoming his captor's slave.
Three days later, Lady Penelope and Parker have arrived on Tracy Island to pay their respects regarding the loss of Brains. Suddenly, the shore security network gives an alarm, as two seaborne assault craft unexpectedly appear near the western beach, carrying armed mercenaries. Jeff quickly instructs Virgil, Scott and Alan to take off in their respective craft and get clear of the island. However, the troops already manage to make landfall and head straight for Thunderbird 2's hanger, intending to blast the machine to pieces with bazookas.
Virgil has just reached Thunderbird 2 and is about to take off, when the troops blast their way into the hanger and open fire on the craft. Virgil survives, but TB2 is left severely damaged in the ruins of the destroyed launch-bay, while the raiders begin to head for the northern cliff-face, their next target being Thunderbird 3.
As Parker and Kyrano move to get Tin-Tin and Grandma to the emergency shelter, Jeff and Penelope arm themselves and race to intercept the intruders and hold them off long enough for Alan to blast off. Meanwhile, Scott launches Thunderbird 1 and commences an attack on the assault craft. But somewhow the crew of the craft are able to detonate TB1's missiles before they can reach their target, and Scott is forced to pull off, baffled as to how anyone could have created a defence against the missiles that Brains had designed.
Jeff and Penelope have troubles of their own, fending off the large number of mercenaries attempting to reach Thunderbird 3's silo. Alan's blast-off is delayed due to a fuel ejection fault, so Jeff and Penelope are forced to resort to hand-to-hand combat with the troops. Although they manage to overpower the soldiers, they are just too late to prevent a rocket from being launched by the invaders, striking a direct hit on Thunderbird 3 before it can take-off from the Round House. As Parker and Tin-Tin move quickly to retrieve Alan from the crippled TB3, the remaining troops return to their boats and depart, and a mocking voice comes through on one of the captured men's radio, stating "First round to me, Tracy! Now, prepare for the final blow!"
Jeff and Penelope head over to TB2's hangar, where Gordon has already helped a dazed, but luckily not too badly hurt Virgil out of the damaged Thunderbird 2. Penelope helps Virgil to the villa, intending to set-up a makeshift infirmary, while Jeff instructs Gordon to launch Thunderbird 4 and track down the attackers to their main base of operations.
Gordon manages to locate the intruders' base, by an uncharted coral area. The yellow minisub surfaces and the IR aquanaut climbs ashore, but is shocked when he is then attacked by the supposedly dead Brains! Emerging from hiding with his men, the Hood gloatingly reveals to Gordon how he faked Brain's death and brainwashed him into divulging every secret of International Rescue. But now, the Hood has no further use for Brains, and he thus instructs the brainwashed scientist to take control of Thunderbird 4 and use it to attack Tracy Island. Overpowering the guards, Gordon grabs Brains and retreats to TB4.
However, it transpires that the Hood and his men had deliberately allowed them to escape, so that Brains can smuggle a bomb onboard the minisub to explode on the island. Luckily, Scott is able to detect the bomb with TB1's scanners, and Gordon manages to toss out the bomb just in time. Despite this setback in his plans, the Hood is unconcerned, because in three hours, Tracy Island will cease to exist...
Back at the Villa, a recovering Virgil protests that he is fine, as Parker stubbornly states that the TB2 pilot has to remain in bed for at least a day or two. Alan, meanwhile, is in the intensive care unit, but is expected to make a full recovery. Just then, Gordon arrives with Brains, much to the astonishment of Jeff and Penelope. Gordon explains how Brains was brainwashed into divulging all of International Rescue's secrets to the Hood, and Jeff decides that their best option is to try and restore Brains' mind. Using the brain-probe that Brains himself had constructed, they are able to undo the Hood's brainwashing, but just as the IR genius is starting to come around, the Tracy Villa is shaken by an earthquake, and Scott reports from Thunderbird 1 that the whole island seems to be sinking into the sea!
The slowly recovering Brains remembers that while under the Hood's control, he had been made to design an underwater craft with a special cutting machine, which the Hood is now using to slice away the top of the underwater mountain that Tracy Island is resting upon. It seems as though International Rescue is finally finished, but Brains points out that the Hood's craft is not very manoeuvrable, and would be vulnerable to a direct attack from Thunderbird 4. Gordon immediately attacks the Hood's underwater vessel before it can complete its work, forcing it to surface. Before the Hood can escape with IR's secrets, Scott attacks the submersible, destroying it and forcing the crew to abandon ship.
Upon reaching the shore, the weary and defeated mercenaries are taken prisoner by Penelope and Parker, while Jeff confronts the Hood, delivering a series of savage punches that knock the villain out cold. Now all that remains is to set about erasing all the stolen knowledge of International Rescue from the Hood's mind. Brains relishes the prospect of such poetic justice: "A return brainwashing, eh? That, Mr Tracy, is going to be my pleasure!"
A short while later, the Hood's memory of Tracy Island has been completely erased from his mind, and Jeff arranges for the arch-villain and his surviving henchmen to be handed over to the World Government to face trial. They will without doubt be imprisoned for their crimes, but Brains fears that sooner or later the Hood will break out of jail to menace the world again. Jeff assures his old friend that they can worry about that when it happens. For now, they have work to do, rebuilding Thunderbirds 2 and 3, and securing their island base against any further attacks in the future.
Cast[]
- Jon Culshaw - Jeff Tracy, Parker, Hiram Blake
- Justin T. Lee - Scott Tracy, John Tracy, the Hood, Kyrano
- Wayne Forester - Brains, Virgil Tracy
- Joe Jameson - Alan Tracy, Gordon Tracy
- Genevieve Gaunt - Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward, Grandma Tracy, Miss Wilshaw
- Andrew Clements - Captain
- Chris Dale - Space-op, assistant
- Ben Page - Commander, 2nd thug
IR Equipment Used[]
Trivia[]
- Jeff refers to Scott borrowing Thunderbird 1 for his vacation in The Perils of Penelope.
- Grandma Tracy makes her first visit to space when she attends Brains' "funeral" aboard Thunderbird 5, which she did not do in the original story.
- Brains is Dead presumably takes place after Operation Asteroids, as the whole International Rescue team know about the Hood by this point.
- The Hood uses a stimulant to revive Brains and then, uses his own brain-probe to make him his slave; whereas in the original story, the stimulant which revives Brains straight away makes him the Hood's slave.
- Lady Penelope and Parker visit Tracy Island to pay their respects regarding Brain's "death", something they did not do in the original story.
- It is clarified that Alan does indeed survive the attack on Thunderbird 3 and was put in intensive care, whereas in the original story, his fate is left unexplained.
- The Hood sends Brains back to Tracy Island taking a bomb aboard Thunderbird 4, whereas in the original comic strip, Brains and Gordon are put into a cage taking them to a pit full of snakes and stakes.
- Thunderbird 1's ability to detect bombs with its scanners was previously demonstrated in The Stately Homes Robberies.
- Gordon makes a reference to Terror from the Stars when he suggests using Brains' brain-probe to restore Brains' memory.
- As in the original comic strip, both Thunderbird 2 and Thunderbird 3 are severely damaged by the Hood's henchmen, and it is implied by Jeff that the two craft have to be completely rebuilt from scratch. Alternatively, he may simply mean that they both need extensive repairs, like how Thunderbird 2 needed reconstruction in Terror in New York City. Certainly by the time of The Space Mirror, both craft are already back in operation.
- Tin-Tin is the only main character absent throughout the story, though she is mentioned by various characters, such as Lady Penelope and Parker, who refer to her helping with rescuing Alan after the attack on Thunderbird 3.
- At the conclusion, the Hood's defeated henchmen, apparently including the murderers of Hiram Blake and Miss Wilshaw, are captured by Lady Penelope and Parker, and are subsequently sent to prison along with their leader. In the original comic strip, they seemingly perished in the Hood's submarine, leaving the Hood the only survivor.