THESE ARE SOLEY MY OPINIONS AND ARE NOT INFLUENCED FROM THE THOMAS & FRIENDS FANDOM
OFF THE RAILS
Written by
Peter Gaffney
Directed by
Campbell Bryer
Produced by
Suzie Gallo
Air Date
23/10/22 - CAN
23/01/23 - USA
16/05/23 - UK
25/02/23 - AUS
Plot
Nia must get a huge earth ball from Whiff's Recycling Plant to Norramby Beach, but all the rail lines are blocked! When the bouncy ball rolls off Nia's flatcar and begins a wild odyssey across Sodor, she tries to control every bounce with all her friends' help. Nia learns to roll with the bounces and calls on an unlikely hero at sea to save the cargo!
Just want to point out, just because they used a title from the original series doesn't mean it's a rip-off. That's NOT how it works!
So another Nia has a plan and has to create a new one because things for her were going wrong. It's the same plot as what we saw in Balloon Blunder and the Perfect Plan episode from S1, I don't if there are other episodes that showcase this plotline but if is this is what they're making Nia's character then it feels very unoriginal, shallow and boring. Even though her chasing the rubber globe ball segwayed into being her new plan it felt more like filler than development.
I much prefer the S18 episode 'Emily Saves the World' which is similar to this episode but it predated AEG and back when Mattel were actually good at Thomas' exposure to the general public. Even though the runaway globe was silly it at least had purpose as Emily was trying to show off her exciting delivery to everyone else instead of concentrating of getting it from A to B and of course it led to trouble until she'd learnt her lesson, without the need of telling the audience. This episode could've been at least about that!
The song in this episode was terrible as most of the songs at least are relevant to the episode, despite the different messaging it creates. The song though was more about the world having a mind of its own but not about trying to make a new plan, heck neither of the Nia episodes from this iteration of the show had a song about that! You think her making plans but not living up to it would've had a song by now, even though I'm not a fan of them as some are pointless additions to fill in time.
I also think the title of the episode could've been better maybe call it 'Save the World' or 'Nia's Global Blunder'. At least with those title they are at least on point whereas the original title feels like it could be anything.
This is probably the worst Nia episode that I've seen coming from this show. An unoriginal plot and you think maybe they would try something new to at least make it more interesting for the general audience? Because if you repeat these similar storylines again, again and again chances are ratings will fall because children would not be interested and if ratings fall, interest may wean off and with that toy sales may go down and we've seen that since 2017 when the original series made its run.
Series Rating:
Fast Friends - 1/10
Percy Disappear - 5/10
Ashima's Amazing Arrival - 3/10
Tri-and-a-Half-a-Lon - 3/10
Carly's Magnificant Magnet - 5/10
New Mail Engine In Town - 4/10
Hot Air Percy - 2/10
Carly's Screechy Squeak - 1/10
Shake, Rattle & Bruno - 8/10
Blackout - 2/10
Brand New Track - 5/10
Stink Monster - 3/10
Christmas Mountain - 7/10
Whiteout! - 4/10
Good as New - 4/10
More Than a Pretty Engine - 9/10
Snowplough Struttin' - 4/10
Thomas In Charge - 3/10
Kana Recharges - 3/10
The Big Skunk Funk - 3/10
Off The Rails - 1/10
Overall Rating (So far):
80/210
