It’s one of those fun dates on which the month and day are the same number, and what’s more, this one’s homophonous with multiple fictional characters. Of them, we’re going with Tin-Tin, from Gerry Anderson’s marionette-based Thunderbirds.
Her dad, Kyrano, is old friends with and employed by wealthy former astronaut Jeff Tracey, founder of International Rescue, a super-high-tech operation that primarily involves Tracey’s five sons operating advanced vehicles (the Thunderbirds) to mount rescue operations that no one else can.
Born in Malaysia, after studying abroad Tin-Tin resides at IR’s secret HQ on Tracey Island and plays a wild-card role, occasionally taking part in rescue or spy missions, as well as helping resident inventor Brains with science lab stuff. She is sometimes romantically involved with youngest Tracey brother, Alan.
There is a fair amount of discussion around Tin-Tin (and her family) in terms of representation of Asian people, as well as roles for female characters. Though Tin-Tin was created to address gender imbalance, she doesn’t always get much to do. Given how cool she is — a standout even in a show that’s impossibly groovy as a general rule — the more Tin-Tin, the better.
I pulled up one of the Thunderbirds episodes that seems to score the most points for her involvement, “The Cham Cham,” in which she joins super spy Lady Penelope to investigate a possible connection between aerospace sabotage and a cabaret jazz band in residency at a ritzy alpine resort hotel. Hey, it’s a gig, and someone has to do it.
Amidst the stylish adventure, one amusing bit occurs as the two of them are surveilling a suspect who is operating a strange console covered with blinking lights:
Penelope: “What’s that machine he’s working at?”
Tin-Tin: “I don’t know…some kind of…electronic computer.”
She’s not wrong. (It’s especially funny because these characters routinely see and use the most advanced gadgets in the world, so they definitely know what a computer is. The key, of course, is that the people writing the show were from our 1960s in our timeline.)
Have a good Tuesday 🚀