Joe 90

Joe McClaine is nine years old. He is also an agent of the World Intelligence Network, able to use the knowledge and experience of expert adults. The connection between those two lives is his adoptive father’s invention: the Brain Impulse Galvanoscope Record and Transfer, better known as the BIG RAT.

Professor Ian “Mac” McClaine can record a person’s brain patterns and transfer the relevant expertise to Joe. Special glasses keep those abilities available during a mission. A child who appears entirely ordinary can therefore become a pilot, scientist, marksman or another specialist when WIN needs him.

First broadcast in 1968, the 30-episode series followed Captain Scarlet and retained the more naturally proportioned Supermarionation puppets. Its scale is different: the McClaines’ home and their relationships are the starting point for journeys into a world of intelligence work.

Mac’s friend Sam Loover provides the connection to WIN, while Shane Weston directs its operations. Joe’s youth allows the agents to approach situations in ways an adult operative could not. It also gives the adventures an inherent tension: extraordinary borrowed skills do not make their young owner physically invulnerable.

The rotating BIG RAT is the central piece of technology, making the preparation for each assignment as memorable as the mission. Joe’s glasses are the practical link to his borrowed expertise and an immediately recognisable part of the character.

Mac’s Jet Air Car gives the family another way to move between ordinary life and unusual adventure. Like the BIG RAT, it belongs to a domestic world of invention, rather than a vast military organisation. The contrast between a country house and a secret high-technology operation is part of the series’ appeal.

Len Jones voices Joe, with Rupert Davies as Mac, Keith Alexander as Sam Loover and David Healy as Shane Weston. Sylvia Anderson’s character work and a broad supporting voice cast give the programme its mixture of family life, official procedure and colourful guest roles.

David Lane produced the series, with Reg Hill as executive producer and Tony Barwick as script editor. The model and effects teams continued to create elaborate vehicles and danger sequences, while Barry Gray’s music gave Joe a particularly energetic identity.

Discover more about Len Jones and the voice of Joe.

The Most Special Agent explains the BIG RAT and the proposed use of Joe’s abilities. Its imagined mission is presented as a demonstration of what might be possible, a distinction worth keeping in mind when following the story’s account of international relations.

Later assignments take Joe through a mixture of named and fictional countries. The World of Joe 90 examines that geography and the political assumptions behind it. Some of the programme’s cultural portrayals reflect the period in which it was made.

For a quick introduction, use the video on this page. To follow Century 21’s next experiment with espionage, continue to The Secret Service, which combines puppet characters with location filming and a very different secret weapon.

Century 21 / ITC. Produced 1967–68; 30 episodes of approximately 25 minutes. First broadcast in 1968.

Executive Producer: Reg Hill
Producer: David Lane
Production Controller: Desmond Saunders
Directors: Desmond Saunders, Alan Perry, Leo Eaton Ken Turner,
Peter Anderson & Brian Heard
Characters Created by Sylvia Anderson
Lighting Cameraman: Julien Lugrin & Paddy Seale
Supervising Art Director: Bob Bell
Art Directors: Grenville Nott & Keith Wilson
Script Editor: Tony Barwick
Supervising Visual Effects Director: Derek Meddings
Senior Visual Effects Director: Jimmy Elliott
Visual Effects Directors: Jimmy Elliott, Shaun Whittacker-Cook & Bill Camp
Music Composed and Directed by Barry Gray

Voice Cast:
Rupert Davies, Sylvia Anderson, Shane Rimmer, Keith Alexander, Gary Files, Liz Morgan, David Healy, Martin King, Len Jones, Jeremy Wilkin