WATCH THIS SPACE

The 60s sci-fi classic Lost In Space has been remade with special effects that are out of this world – and not a naff nylon costume in sight

Danger, Will Robinson! The classic 1960s sci-fi adventure Lost In Space, rebooted with a huge special effects budget for the streaming video era, boasts a catchphrase that has thrilled generations of children.

Last month Netflix announced that the show, starring Toby Stephens and Molly Parker as intrepid colonists making a new life for their family on an alien planet, will return for a second series. So now is the perfect time, if you haven’t already binged on the initial ten episodes, to get yourself well and truly Lost In Space.

SO THIS IS A REMAKE?

Well, strictly speaking, it’s a remake of a reinvention of an adaptation, which has already been remade once. The original story dates back more than 200 years, to an 1812 novel by Johann David Wyss, called The Swiss Family Robinson – about a mother and father shipwrecked on a desert island with their four strapping sons (the name Robinson is a nod to Robinson Crusoe, a bestseller from a century earlier).

The book, with its uplifting messages about co-operation and love, inspired a 1960 Walt Disney version starring Sir John Mills and Dorothy McGuire. But the US TV series that followed in 1965, running for more than 80 episodes, took a surprising new direction – with the Robinsons flung to the outer reaches of the galaxy, wearing lurid nylon tunics wi t h ne o n bi b s . Despite its hopeless special effects, it’s a show that has a lasting appeal for fans – as camp as The Avengers, as thrilling as Star Trek. A film version with Gary Oldman and Matt LeBlanc tried to recapture the magic in 1998, but missed the mark.

IF THIS IS SCI-FI, IS THE EMPHASIS ON SCIENCE?

For more than 200 years, this story’s appeal has been its educational and moral tone. Originally it was about Christian virtue, then survival skills. Above all, it is about family, a fact underlined when young Judy Robinson tells her brother Will in the new series, ‘There is a rule that is written in stone, and it is never broken. The Robinsons stick together.’ This 21st-century version has a wholesome respect for science. Maureen is an aerospace engineer and Judy is a doctor who is able, when trapped under ice, to talk her little sister through a medical procedure. Every scene has a nod to the laws of physics or chemistry. That said, students should refrain from including what they learn from the show in their exam papers: this science is strictly the Hollywood variety, where spaceships explode into flames in the vacuum of space, and families avoid frostbite at minus 60ºC by rubbing their hands vigorously.

ARE THESE CHARACTERS ALL ALONE?

Hardly. Hundreds of families have fled Earth, following a meteor strike that we see in a flashback. They are separated when the mother ship is attacked. Among the other escapees is ‘Dr Smith’, who steals the security pass and the escape pod of an unlucky colonist played by Bill Mumy – who was Will Robinson in the 60s version. She’s heartless, manipulative and self-centred, a character so conniving that the Robinsons can’t bring themselves to believe anyone could be that wicked.

Smith is played by Parker Posey, best-known for Superman Returns, and a string of award-winning independent movies. Adding to the trouble she causes is a devil-may-care smuggler called Don West (Ignacio Serricchio).

WHAT MAKES THIS VERSION SPECIAL?

The sheer spectacle. Lost In Space has CGI effects to do the biggest widescreen TV justice. And the location photography is awe-inspiring, with sweeping vistas of forests and mountains. Tune in... and get lost in it. The first series of Lost In Space is available on Netflix now.

Will Robinson and the robot who becomes his friend