History Recap / ThunderbirdsS1E22BrinkOfDisaster

* BigShutUp: Jeff does this to Grafton when the latter whines about the train "still going too fast" after the brakes have been applied. (See also the GentlemanSnarker entry.)

--> Time.... Well, I guess that's one thing we've got ''plenty'' of.

* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Warren Grafton, the president of the monorail company; he and his associates are gangsters who use illegal ways to get their funding, such as burglary and fraud. It's also clear that Grafton cares more about making profit than the safety of his monorail until he personally is at risk.

* TemptingFate[=/=]GilliganCut: At the end of the episode, Grafton brags how he will never go to jail despite all that has happened. Cut to him and his associates in prison.
** TemptingFate is practically Grafton's defining character trait along with being a CorruptCorporateExecutive. He keeps insisting nothing can go wrong with his train to the extent that Jeff and Brains aren't wondering ''if'' an accident will happen, but ''when''.

* WomenDrivers: Averted; in sharp contrast to her previous driving experience in "Vault of Death", Lady Penelope actually drives very well in this episode, even while being chased by two crooks.

* ParachuteInATree: In "Brink of Disaster", Grafton is trying to persuade Jeff to invest in his completely automatic monorail, which is patrolled by heli-jets. One of these is struck by lightning, causing it to crash into the railway. The pilot of this jet ends up dangling from the railway by his parachute. When somebody turns up to rescue him, he tells his rescuer to contact the train first, because the automatic signals have been damaged. Without these, the train cannot stop, and is heading towards the damaged track.

* ComingInHot: The aforementioned helijet, after being struck by lightning and before crashing into the bridge.

* CollisionDamage: How the bridge gets damaged, thanks to a lightning bolt striking a helicopter that hits the bridge supports.

* CollisionDamage: How the bridge gets damaged.

* NoOSHACompliance: The monorail; everything about it is automatic, with no possibility for a human engineer to override the computer and take over control of the train. There isn't even something like a manual controlled emergency brake; Brains and Tin Tin have to make one on the spot after the train goes haywire, and it takes ''three goes'' to get it to behave like a brake rather than [[FromBadToWorse an accelerator]]. Although ''Thunderbirds'' is no stranger to this trope, this is one of the rare cases where it is lampshaded.

* NoOSHACompliance: The monorail; everything about it is automatic, with no possibility for a human engineer to override the computer and take over control of the train. There isn't even something like a manual controlled emergency brake; Brains and Tin Tin have to make one on the spot after the train goes haywire. Although ''Thunderbirds'' is no stranger to this trope, this is one of the rare cases where it is lampshaded.

* GentlemanSnarker: Jeff gets pretty snarky towards Grafton and becomes increasingly less polite about it as his patience wears off. By the time the emergency is reaching its climax, it's clear that he's absolutely ''done'' with this greedy fool.

* GentlemanSnarker: Jeff gets pretty snarky towards Grafton and becomes increasingly less polite about it as his patience wears off.

--> '''Parker''': (calmly) They appear to have gained access to Fab 1.

* MeaningfulName: The main villain is a CorruptCorporateExecutive named ''Graft''on.

When the new, fully-automated Pacific-Atlantic Monorail goes into action, it'll make its investors rich, provided it ever actually goes into action. Determined to find investors, the president of the corporation, Warren Grafton, starts hunting around, starting with the well-known Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward. While Lady Penelope has no interest in the project, she directs the president to her friend Jeff Tracy.

Unbeknownst to Lady Penelope, Grafton has taken the opportunity to case her house - and disable the alarms - prior to calling in more of his criminal friends. While Grafton takes Jeff, Tin Tin and Brains on a demonstration tour of the new monorail, the criminals break into Creighton Manor and gain access to the safe beneath the drawing room. While they succeed in removing Lady Penelope's famous jewelry collection, the safe's alarm system is on an independent circuit (thus it was not disabled by Grafton), so Penelope and Parker are alerted to their presence. Armed with machine guns, they disable the criminals' getaway car, forcing the thieves to hotwire FAB 1. Unfortunately for the crooks, FAB 1 can be remotely controlled by Lady Penelope's bedside lamp, leaving them to be locked in FAB 1 while it drives in circles around the fountain, until morning.

* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Warren Grafton, the president of the monorail company; he and his associates use illegal ways to get their funding, such as burglary and fraud and he evidently cares more about making profit than the safety of his monorail.
* DirtyCoward: During the ill-fated monorail ride, Grafton starts panicking as soon as he realizes how much danger he's in.

* MadeOfExplodium: The broken bridge in the climax isn't content with falling apart quietly. It bangs and it booms, flames, sparks and smoke leaps from every strut that falls off.

!!Thundertropes Are Go!

* NoSell: Lady Penelope attempts to deter the crooks following her twice, first with a smokescreen, then with an oil slick. The crooks are able to get past both, so Lady Penelope shoots them off the road.

Unbeknownst to Lady Penelope, the president had taken the opportunity to case her house - and disable the alarms - prior to calling in more of his criminal friends. While the president takes Jeff, Tin Tin and Brains on a demonstration tour of the new monorail, the criminals break into Creighton Manor and gain access to the safe beneath the drawing room. While they succeed in removing Lady Penelope's famous jewelry collection, the safe's alarm system is on an independent circuit (thus it was not disabled by Grafton), thus Penelope and Parker are alerted to their presence. Armed with machine guns, they disable the criminals' getaway car, forcing the thieves to hotwire FAB 1. Unfortunately for the crooks, FAB 1 can be remotely controlled by Lady Penelope's bedside lamp, leaving them to be locked in FAB 1 while it drives in circles around the fountain, until morning.

On the monorail however, things are not going as smoothly. A storm has a bolt of lightning strike a helijet into the support column of a bridge, severely damaging it. The automatic signalling equipment is damaged and the monorail will not stop (as it is fully automated, with no crew onboard) until it plunges into the abyss. The Thunderbirds race to the scene to save their family, while striving to retain their cover over the radio link.

----

* BreakTheHaughty: Happens to Grafton, twice. First, [[TemptingFate he insists the monorail is perfectly safe]] (for its cost anyway). Of course, that turns out about as well as you'd expect in a Thunderbirds episode. Then, after he's been saved, he insists he'll be able to keep his ass out of jail. This doesn't fare much better.

* MadeOfExplodium: The broken bridge in the climax isn't content with falling apart quietly. It bangs and it booms, flames, sparks and smoke leaping from every strut that falls off.

* NoOSHACompliance: The monorail; everything about it is automatic, with no possibility for a human engineer to override the computer and take over control of the train himself. There isn't even something like a manual controlled emergency brake; Brains and Tin Tin have to make one on the spot after the train goes haywire. Although ''Thunderbirds'' is no stranger to this trope, this is one of the rare cases where it is lampshaded.

* ShoutOut: The countermeasures that Lady Penelope deploys from the Rolls Royce against the gun-toting crooks are identical to those from the Aston Martin in {{Film/Goldfinger}}.

* TemptingFate / GilliganCut: At the end of the episode, Grafton brags how he will never go to jail despite all that has happened. Cut to him and his associates in prison.

* TwoLinesNoWaiting: There is the main story about the monorail disaster, and a B-story about Grafton's henchman breaking into Lady Penelope's house to rob her vault. The episode switches back and forth between the two, with both coming to a conclusion shortly after one another.

* OffTheShelfFX: The giant white button on the monorail's computer is quite obviously fashioned out of a commercial doorbell.

* WhatCouldPossiblyGoWrong: Warren Grafton keeps insisting his monorail is absolutely safe. Jeff and Brains are not convinced and are proven right.

--> (in his Cockney accent) Oh, quite so. (immediately correcting himself in an upper-class accent) Quite so.

* NoSell: The car chasing Lady Penelope rebuffs two attempts to stop them following her; the first is a smokescreen and an oil slick.