Hey!, they're incriminating us.
The One With… the hillbilly agent.At last the truth about International Rescue is revealed; they are not selfless heroes, but filthy spying weasels, stealing to get ahead! Under the guise of rescuing trapped miners, they have in fact stolen some papers about a high-powered jet plane (exactly why an organisation that includes an aircraft capable of Mach 22.6 and clearly as rich as Croesus would bother with theft is glossed over by the General in charge of the organization). International Rescue must be stopped!
With a global manhunt for their secret base, International Rescue is forced to shut down, hoping to clear their names before their cover is blown. Sadly, however, it's not to be; the satellite covering the South Pacific is damaged and one of the crew is blown clear of the station by his jetpack. With only a few hours of air left, International Rescue must choose: launch this mission and blow their cover or sacrifice this man to the vast emptiness of space.
Tropes
- Abandoned Area: The titular imposters use an Abandoned Mine as their hideout. They learn the hard way (courtesy of a tin of "Ma's beans") that it's a good idea to have more than one way out.
- The Alleged Car: Subverted by Tuttle's truck. It's ramshackle, doubles as a chicken pen and is outdated by some 150 years. It also has a supercharger that leaves a fancy sports car biting the dust.
- Almost Out of Oxygen: Elliot is practically unconscious from lack of oxygen after having been adrift in space for several hours by the time Thunderbird 3 manages to find him.
- Bavarian Fire Drill: The episode begins with the Imposters completing a "rescue", and nobody doubts they really are International Rescue. It is only once they have left that anyone notices the whole scenario was staged so the fakes could break into an underground vault, and the real International Rescue are given the blame. The operation works because of International Rescue's insistence on secrecy: nobody has more than a vague idea what their uniforms or vehicles look like.
- Break the Cutie: Lady Penelope clearly has trouble navigating her way through swampland in her high heels.
- British Stuffiness: Lady Penelope could not be more uncomfortable with the personality and lifestyle of hillbilly Jeremiah.
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Everyone underestimates Jeremiah because of his simple hillbilly lifestyle... everyone except Jeff, who knows what an intelligent and capable agent he really is. Sure enough, it is Jeremiah who successfully hunts down and captures the Imposters where Lady Penelope fails.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: For a long time Jeff considers abandoning Elliot to his fate, knowing that Thunderbird 3 can be tracked when it returns to base. Eventually, however, he can't stand the guilt anymore and sends his sons to save Elliot, knowing it could well be their last ever mission.
- Clear Their Name: With the world militaries on red alert hunting for International Rescue, they can't risk leaving Tracy Island. Thus they call on their worldwide network of secret agents to catch the real villains.
- Contrived Coincidence: The monitoring satellite that went offline just happened to be monitoring the region containing International Rescue's headquarters. Fortunate indeed, otherwise they would have been caught when launching to save Elliot.
- Deconstruction: It's the darkest, most cynical episode of a highly optimistic show, where serious questions are raised about the way International Rescue operates.
- First of all, their insistence on secrecy comes back to bite them when General Lambert considers it part of the ruse.
- This episode presents Jeff Tracy with some hard dilemmas about what International Rescue is and should be. Should saving lives always come before all else? Does International Rescue blow their cover - and risk going out of business altogether - just to save the one guy? Jeff (at first) decides they shouldn't and he and the boys are clearly torn up over it. He eventually gives in anyway.
- It also deconstructs the character of Lady Penelope, who may be a calm and collected spy but is completely out of her depth in the rough-and-tumble American heartland. She ends up having a minor nervous breakdown.
- Deep South: Where the imposters are hiding. IR's local agent, Jeremiah Tuttle, is a typical hillbilly.
- Dramatic Space Drifting: One crewmember of the damaged satellite ends up drifting into space when he pushes the wrong button of his jetpack.
- Face-Revealing Turn: At the beginning, one of the villain in his International Rescue uniform has his back to the camera. He then turns, saying "I said no pictures!", and his own picture is promptly taken.
- Honor Before Reason: Of course, the Tracys eventually choose to save the astronaut over lying low.
- Inspector Javert: General Lambert.
- Lethal Chef: Ma, whose explosive beans are feared far and wide.
- Mucking in the Mud: Lady Penelope tries to apprehend the imposters by travelling through a jungle in her Rolls Royce. Unfortunately, her car gets bogged down in the mud, leaving her to walk in her high heels. Hillybilly Jeremiah's apparently run-down car does the job instead.
- Off Screen Moment Of Awesome: We never get to see Thunderbird 3 actually rescue Elliot.
- Rock Beats Laser: The unnamed driver doesn't like it at all when his fancy sports car (which he calls a, 'wagon)' is overtaken by Jeremiah Tuttle's old carriage.
- Sadistic Choice: Although there is no villain to present it, IR faces one nonetheless: leaving the astronaut Elliot to die, or rescuing him, and risking being caught.
- Smoking Is Cool: Ma smokes a pipe.
- Space Is Noisy: Thunderbird 3 blasts off in space.
