THESE ARE SOLEY MY OPINIONS AND ARE NOT INFLUENCED FROM THE THOMAS & FRIENDS FAN BASE OR MATTEL
THOMAS & FRIENDS: RAILWAY STORIES:
REALLY HELPFUL ENGINES
After months of radio silence from Mattel since they'd announced the new show back in January 2026, we'd finally got our first look of the upcoming new show that will be uploaded to YouTube Kids and to be streamed on Netflix US in September. No word on when it'll be broadcasted on TV or streamed in other countries but one UK news broadcaster had said that it would be on Channel 5's 'milkshake' in the autumn after Mattel's official announcement earlier in the year.
So the trailer opens up with Thomas introducing himself to the audience and do I find it weird that Mattel would gladly remove any engine's English nameplate from the toys but are fine with a huge nameboard saying 'Tidmouth Sheds' in plain English. The removal of English words from an engine's nameplate was done so that Thomas can be more approached globally, at least that's what everyone in the fandom is saying. Yet, they would give the sheds a large sign showing the name of it in plain English which goes entirely against that philosophy. It can also be said for Scruffy's name, the Knapford station sign and Bruno's sides saying 'Sodor Railway'. Perhaps Mattel has a rule about this but regardless of one it just doesn't make any lick of sense to me.
But apart from that the rest of the trailer looks appealing with its CG animation, especially with it showing off its dynamic camera movements and angles which really feels fresh after four years of AEG reusing the same camera shots and angles in every episode and special. However, considering it's a trailer for the upcoming special, it doesn't really give much on what the special is all about in terms of story. In the past, trailers for Thomas specials would always try to sell you the story in a short and intriguing way, even the ones for AEG, though they'd severely lacked the intrigue. But I guess the visuals help to portray on what the story might be all about and I guess it would most likely be about Thomas being jealous of his friends Percy and Rosie for being helpful, there was a scene where Thomas looked jealous towards Percy while the Fat Controller was praising him at Knapford station and after that he tries to prove that he can be helpful too until it all got out of hand and asked his friends for help, and Gordon has a part in it too, probably as part of the story's climax for Thomas to prove just how helpful he could be. That's what I got out of it for myself.
I already have seen some reaction of Thomas being voiced by a kid once again, I don't know if he's voiced by the same kid who had voiced him in AEG's UK dub, as his voice sounded familiar after watching some of the UK dub of that show in the past, it was the singing part of the trailer that got me thinking that. Like with AEG, I don't have a problem with a kid voicing him. His character has been portrayed as a kid ever since the Railway Series and he had done childish things in the original show and AEG, like just about any kid would do. Like the time he was showing himself off to Oliver that led to him having an accident or taking James' goods train without asking and ended up being held captive at a steelworks or have him wondering off somewhere he wasn't suppose to go and get stuck in some mud. So him being voiced by a kid make some sense to me on how he's portrayed as a character and no it doesn't mean that I hate the idea of Thomas being portrayed with a young adult voice.
As with the songs, I hope it's only for the special and that they are integrated to the story because the songs that were in '
All Engines Go!' had never really felt that they were part of the story and were just only there for the sake of being there, hell some songs like '
This Was Unexpected' didn't have any connection to the story '
Hot Air Percy' because there was nothing, from my memory of watching the episode, about Percy wanting to watch the balloon show from a different perspective and most of the episode was about him and Thomas not to look inside their delivery which was the kraken balloon and then it was switched to that different perspective plot line after Percy was floating away.
Which brings me to my other hope for this reboot. I hope the stories are written well, bring out tons of variety, considering the amount of characters that we are getting from the die-cast line of toys I hope we get a story for each of them. I also hope the show and its special lacks contradiction, I know it's a big ask but it was a huge problem for me when watching AEG like that time Thomas says he can't swim or plough fields when we see him in that episode and in previous episodes where he has the power to jump and then roll around the ground away from the railway line or how Percy and Kana were trying to make the railway safe when pretty much everything they did in the past was unsafe anyway and then it was forgotten about in future stories. To me those types of contradictions just shows they had no clear vision on what they want to do with AEG. I know this is me knocking on the previous show but I still have my grievances of it.
With the variety aspect, and I will be mentioning AEG here once again, but the previous show had stories that were boring, repetitive, like Thomas and Diesel being very competitive, and some that were so oddly written because it had no idea what it wants to say like that lost container episode from the last ever season. The other problem that I have with AEG's writing is having the characters stating the moral out loud to the audience instead of letting and trusting their young audience to digest it themselves. Kids are more intelligent than society had given them credit for and shouldn't be talked down. Overall I'm not expecting anything grand, bold or cinematic coming from this reboot. Just something that is good and entertaining for both the children and parents to sit through.
But the trailer had showcased things that I'd liked such as Thomas actually looking like himself again and acting like an actual engine pulling trucks and coaches, shunting etc. and it's not just him being an engine equivalent of an UberEats. Sure not all of it, as shown in the trailer, is 100% realistic, like Thomas taking a flat wagon of eggs, butter and milk with Bruno, but the show hadn't been railway realistic since 1998 going way back to the original show's fifth season. I also like how there are people living and interacting with the engines on Sodor like Farmer McColl, who got very buff for some reason. I also like how the Fat Controller, who looks a bit slim in the trailer, is back as the head of the railway and that we're getting female railway staff too! Something that reflects Mattel's way for this show of retaining the classic Thomas look while adding in some modernity. Plus the railway looks like an actual railway instead of what it was like in AEG.
Plus the new special's run time is 30mins, according to a
Linkedln post. I don't know how they'll showcase the world in that short amount of time but I welcome that change after, and I can already feel the eyes rolling here from some people reading this, AEG's attempt at having 60mins specials. In short, because you can find my views about those specials here, Race for the Sodor Cup was mediocre, Lookout Mountain was better but was so drainingly exhausting to sit through when they didn't have a B-plot to take a break from the main story, Bubbly Build was OK with its tight focus and it's the only special that ran at 30mins and Christmas Letter Express and Sodor Sings Together were both bad as there was so much unnecessary padding that they could easily work them as episodes or half hour specials instead. I think they might showcase more world building and all in the 18 episodes of this show's first season.
There also had been rumours that the show, I think, would take place from a child's perspective and how the sets as shown from the trailer has the vibes of a toy train set with how the buildings are placed and how they look. There was something like that from the '
Thomas' Brave Adventure' book that was released back in May this year and how a Mattel rep had said in an
interview that the show will have something that a child and parent can relate too. So I think, if it's all true, we might see a live action scene to open up our story with a kid going through a situation and then after that we would guide our way into the world of Thomas through the child's imagination, kind of like how '
Shining Time Station' used to set up a Thomas story as an interval back in the day.
Also we got our first look at Deepak the Crane Truck and I do like how the show had given him a more realistic basis instead of some weird generic truck look with a crane attached to it. He looks nice and I look forward to see what his character will be in the special and the show, at least I hope he has a big part in it all. Also I love the little motif of the original S1-7 theme song in the trailer, easter egg to please older fans for sure but I love it. The title of the specials feels pretty Railway Series-esque and Bruno looks great in CGI! Also it looks like Mattel had finally ditched the idea of a US dub as the show, with this trailer being advertised towards an American audience, would have an entire UK dub.
Some long time fans might be sad that after nearly 40 years since Thomas' American debut that there won't be a US dub but we are in the days where a child can have access to things like YouTube and could end up finding a video that was uploaded by a user in the UK, Australia, Japan, New Zealand wherever and kids can end up hearing a different accent that's very different from there own.
Also we live in a world where a show like Bluey and Peppa Pig retain their own respective accents and end up become massive successes within the United States along with their, at least more to the former in my opinion, wonderful engaging stories and I hope Mattel had taken a few leaves from Bluey's book for the new reboot, and from the sounds of it from that interview I'd provided earlier it sounds like they would be doing that as they had complaints from parents about making Thomas too fast paced.
All in all, the trailer looks good, the music sounds great, feels a bit laid back instead of it being too wacky and it looks like something promising. It already looks miles better than whatever AEG was suppose to be and I still remember my first reaction to the leaked sizzle reel that came out five years ago. But this new reboot does promise me that Thomas would act more like a train and wouldn't jump off the rails, go 360 degree or uses his wheels like hands. Sure there's the body movement but honestly, as cartoony as it looks in the new show, I'll take that any day! It might not be for everyone and that's OK and I hope for some people in this fandom that if someone is critical towards it just let them have that opinion instead of trying to tell them to 'move on' like what some had been trying to do towards critics of AEG while still not moving on from BWBA.
Depending on when it'll be released in Australia, I presume it'll be broadcasted on the ABC, I'll be giving the special and episodes a watch and would give my own views about it here and like I did with AEG and BWBA, I want to give these episodes and this special a fair assessment. If it's good or bad I'll just say so.
- NWR1991
