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With an impressive array of talent lined up to help bring the project to the screen, Anderson Entertainment has launched their Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign for their new series Gerry Anderson’s Firestorm.

The Kickstarter project’s aim is to raise enough funding to make the necessary models, sets, and puppets, and to pay for the production of a pilot minisode of Firestorm – in all its Ultramarionation glory. At its lowest level, that amount is £49,280.

Firestorm was originally conceived and developed by Gerry Anderson in 2001 under the title ‘Storm Force’. The series was eventually bought by a Japanese production company and developed as an anime series. By the time it reached the screen it was quite different to the original series Gerry Anderson had put together, and the aim is to go back to those original concepts and develop them as a true Gerry Anderson production.

Firestorm will see a return to several elements that the team think are essential for a real Gerry Anderson project: practical effects, physical sets, beautifully detailed miniatures, and yes… puppets! According to Jamie Anderson, Managing Director of Anderson Entertainment and son of Gerry Anderson, MBE, “Developing Firestorm ready to be filmed in Ultramarionation has been an absolute joy. Film-making methods like practical effects, the expert use of miniatures and puppetry were pioneered by the incredibly talented teams at AP Films and Century 21 on shows like Stingray, Captain Scarlet, Space: 1999 and Thunderbirds and it will be my pleasure to bring them back to the screen for a 21st century audience.”

The base-level goal for this project is to produce a minisode of Firestorm – to introduce the audience to some of the characters, and the story and to show potential distributors and investors what the show will look like. If more money is raised, it will allow for further development of characters and storyline, introducing further scenes and explosions up to a 22 minute pilot episode if £135,000 is raised and a full 45 minute feature episode if £342,000 is raised. Rather than jumping directly from one stage to another, Anderson points out that their stretch goals will allow them to add new scenes and characters – “so every penny really does count for this campaign, and will be used to make an even better episode. It’s my hope that generations of Gerry Anderson fans from all over the world will join us for this project on Kickstarter and help us bring the UK’s own Walt Disney’s next project – Firestorm – to TV screens in the very near future!”

The production team includes BAFTA award winners Steve Begg (Effects Supervisor) and Mike Tucker (Model Effects); Star Trek‘s Michael Okuda (Visual Consultant); Battlestar Galactica‘s Eric Chu (Concept and Design); Steye Kyte (Character Design); and Andy Rolfe (Set Design). The puppets are being created by Mackinnon & Saunders, and the minisode will be directed by Terrahawks and New Captain Scarlet‘s Mark Woollard, with veteran Supermarionation director David Elliott acting as a consultant.

For more details on the project including visualisations of the characters and the ships, check out our feature here.

To back the project and for exclusive details of the voice cast go to http://www.gerryanderson.co.uk/firestorm