Well-trusted by the commander-in-chief of Spectrum, Colonel White, Captain Scarlet is the primary agent of the organisation and is assigned the most dangerous and crucial missions.

When this attempt in New York failed, the Captain Scarlet likeness kidnapped the President from Cloudbase and flew him to England, taking him to the top of the London Car-Vu, a large car park tower.

He is not unfamiliar with gambling and drinking, even though he has apparently lost his vulnerability to drunkenness; in the episode "Special Assignment", he plays, and loses heavily at, roulette.

(This is something he does under direct orders from Colonel White and as part of an undercover mission given to him; Spectrum regulations prohibit gambling, under penalty of the guilty party being asked for his or her resignation, on grounds of its potentials both for inducing compulsions and for inflicting heavy debt that could lead to financial crimes.)

In the episode "Renegade Rocket", both men are prepared to stay in a missile base targeted by the Mysterons and die in a last-ditch attempt to stop its destruction.

Born in Winchester, England, Scarlet's mother was Ann Brightman, a British astrophysicist, while his father, Tom Metcalfe, was an American pilot who later joined the International Space Agency.

Falling down through a plasma stream, Scarlet was killed, but recovered later on in Sickbay, under the astonished eyes of Doctor Gold and other onlookers, and revealed himself to be fully free of the Mysterons' control.

Instead of being killed by the power surge, Scarlet was only harmed temporarily, and was restored to life by the genetic mutation of the Mysteron "retrometabolisation" process which makes him virtually "indestructible".

Utterly fearless and dedicated to saving the human race, for all Scarlet's heroism there is one thing that makes him very uneasy – his growing feelings for Destiny Angel,[2] the girlfriend of his late friend, Black.

In the pilot story ("Instrument of Destruction", Parts 1 and 2), it is also stated that Scarlet shared a kind of telepathic link with Captain Black, which Colonel White considers to be an advantage in the war against the Mysterons that he cannot dismiss.

In "Chiller", it was revealed that, when particularly badly wounded, Scarlet's body has the capability to separate his emotional and physical selves so that the latter can heal quicker, leaving the former as a ghostlike apparition, detectable only by its coldness.

Commentators consider the original Captain Scarlet's appearance to be based on either Cary Grant,[3] Roger Moore,[4][5] or the character's voice actor, Francis Matthews.

[7][8][9][10][11] Matthews wrote that he was hired to voice Captain Scarlet because series co-creator Gerry Anderson "had heard my Cary Grant impression on Pete Murray's [radio show] Open House and simply wanted that sound".

[13] Kyle Anderson of the website Nerdist.com writes that Matthews's take on Grant "really makes the titular hero seem like a man out of time, which works really well.

"[15] Discussing the character's depiction, Stephen La Rivière notes that "one element that was never dwelt upon, or indeed even mentioned again after the first episode, is that the protagonist we follow for the entire series is, in fact, nothing more than a duplicate, a doppelganger; the hero initially introduced to us is killed within two minutes of our first encounter with him.

"[14] Jim Sangster and Paul Condon, authors of Collins Telly Guide (2005), argue that the character's "indestructibility" reduces his credibility as a hero: "He'll survive no matter what they throw at him, which should mean that there's zero tension in anything he takes on.

"[7] Commenting on the 2000s remake, Andrew Billen noted that the new version of the character was referred to as being "virtually indestructible", arguing that the use of a qualifier made the premise more exciting and "fixed every child's main objection" to the original series.

Peel believes that the incitement to act dangerously is sustained by the series's lyrical closing theme music, which includes the lines "They crash him, and his body may burn" and "They smash him, but they know he'll return ... to live again.

"[20] These lyrics led production company Century 21 to make an alternative set of opening titles featuring a disclaimer, in the form of a voice-over by Donald Gray in character as Colonel White, warning: "Captain Scarlet is indestructible.

[19][21][22][23][24] Actor Cy Grant, who voiced the original Lieutenant Green, made several observations on the series's alleged religious symbolism.