Thomas and Friends

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[00:01:36] You can beat me over the head with it, I'm five.

[00:01:42] Interesting.

[00:01:45] Why are you beating five year olds over the head with it?

[00:01:47] Messages.

[00:01:48] Messages.

[00:01:49] Messages.

[00:01:50] Messages.

[00:01:51] Messages.

[00:02:11] Are we recording?

[00:02:12] We are, yes.

[00:02:13] Good evening.

[00:02:15] Good way to start, Meg's ill.

[00:02:17] I'm sorry.

[00:02:21] So forgive her, her voice.

[00:02:23] How's everyone's week been?

[00:02:24] Not great.

[00:02:25] No, well.

[00:02:28] Since last recording, but not since last episode,

[00:02:32] I've aged.

[00:02:34] Well we all have, Laura.

[00:02:36] I've aged a milestone.

[00:02:38] Oh of course, yes.

[00:02:41] And I-

[00:02:42] What did you think she meant?

[00:02:43] Well we all age.

[00:02:44] Yeah, but it was her birthday two days ago.

[00:02:46] Yeah.

[00:02:47] And I passed my upgrade, so.

[00:02:50] Well done.

[00:02:51] To anyone who doesn't know what that means,

[00:02:53] it's just after the first year of your PhD

[00:02:55] they check in to see if you've actually spent

[00:02:57] your time working.

[00:02:59] And you proved that you spent

[00:03:01] the last two months working.

[00:03:04] It was way more than that,

[00:03:05] because I genuinely-

[00:03:07] No.

[00:03:07] If I had tried-

[00:03:08] I know but it was funny.

[00:03:09] You guys really don't think I work.

[00:03:11] No.

[00:03:13] I know you do.

[00:03:14] No we don't.

[00:03:15] Yes.

[00:03:16] Yes, I do think you work.

[00:03:21] So I've had it all right week.

[00:03:24] Right so-

[00:03:25] No one asked.

[00:03:26] You asked us.

[00:03:27] Right, I want to, I know that,

[00:03:29] so I know it's really boring when-

[00:03:32] Are you gonna talk about your dream?

[00:03:34] Yeah, it's really boring when people

[00:03:36] talk to you about their dreams, right?

[00:03:38] But-

[00:03:38] It depends.

[00:03:39] I think if it's like really off the walls.

[00:03:41] No one says, oh listen to this dream I had

[00:03:44] No one goes, oh yay.

[00:03:46] They don't.

[00:03:47] I don't mind it genuinely depends.

[00:03:50] You two fine, strangers now.

[00:03:54] But I had this dream and as soon as I woke up

[00:03:56] I was like, I've gotta tell someone.

[00:03:59] I've gotta tell, and I thought,

[00:04:00] oh I've got a podcast.

[00:04:02] Maybe I'll-

[00:04:03] I'll force tons of people to listen.

[00:04:05] Yeah so-

[00:04:07] I don't know if I would describe

[00:04:08] our listener base as tons.

[00:04:10] Try and fit them all in the house.

[00:04:14] Actually that is so true, as soon as I said it

[00:04:16] I thought, I wonder what the combined weight-

[00:04:20] How much would they all cost to post?

[00:04:25] I saw today that the number of flies

[00:04:27] on the planet is equivalent to 17 million per person.

[00:04:30] So weigh it in the amount of flies.

[00:04:34] Sorry I was-

[00:04:35] No yeah, so well yeah,

[00:04:36] So basically it was very, very, very normal.

[00:04:40] I was sitting about my room.

[00:04:43] I was pottering about the kitchen

[00:04:45] and the only different thing about-

[00:04:48] I was existing in a universe

[00:04:50] where everything was the same.

[00:04:52] But Armstrong and Miller,

[00:04:55] they didn't have like their own brand of lube

[00:04:58] but they did have like a line of lube.

[00:05:00] Like they'd done some sort of like-

[00:05:03] CoLab.

[00:05:04] CoLab partnership with Jurex or something.

[00:05:08] And this wasn't normal to me in the dream.

[00:05:11] It was unusual.

[00:05:13] So like I was getting my phone out and tweeting

[00:05:16] like does anyone else think it's properly weird

[00:05:19] that Armstrong and Miller have a line of lube?

[00:05:22] Did they do only lube

[00:05:24] or were there condoms to accompany the lube?

[00:05:26] It was just lube.

[00:05:28] It was just lube with-

[00:05:29] That's not safe.

[00:05:30] With Armstrong and Miller's names on.

[00:05:32] Oh fuck, sorry.

[00:05:34] What if you need your condoms to match your lube?

[00:05:38] Well then who needs that?

[00:05:40] I don't.

[00:05:41] You know those women that like everything to be-

[00:05:43] Like it's a full underwear set.

[00:05:44] You've got to wear matching shorts.

[00:05:46] So everything in the house has to be part of a set.

[00:05:48] Well no they didn't.

[00:05:48] It was just, they were just the faces of lube

[00:05:50] except their faces weren't in it.

[00:05:53] It was just their names.

[00:05:54] And also in this scenario, Miller was a woman.

[00:05:58] So in my head I was like,

[00:06:00] oh Armstrong and Miller, that man and woman

[00:06:02] that own that lube thing.

[00:06:03] Your brain just plucked two names out of the ether.

[00:06:06] No, because they're real people.

[00:06:09] No I know, I know.

[00:06:09] But I mean like if there's no names

[00:06:11] and you've changed the gender of one of them

[00:06:14] you just, here's a duo.

[00:06:16] No but the weird thing is that

[00:06:19] until, like up until the point where I had this dream

[00:06:23] I had never seen a single episode of Armstrong and Miller

[00:06:28] and if they are not on the TV

[00:06:31] I could go for years without thinking about them.

[00:06:34] Like no offense or anything

[00:06:36] but like they're not in my-

[00:06:39] Zyte ghost.

[00:06:40] No they're not, you know?

[00:06:41] So when I woke up I was like

[00:06:42] how on earth did they get there?

[00:06:45] How did they get into my zyte ghost?

[00:06:47] How did they get into my lube?

[00:06:51] And I in the dream I walked into Meg's room

[00:06:54] and I said, Meg don't you think it's just utterly weird?

[00:06:58] That they have this thing.

[00:07:01] Why do they have this thing?

[00:07:02] And Meg said, oh because Armstrong loves to fuck.

[00:07:04] Quick poll.

[00:07:05] Because she's very funny even in my dreams.

[00:07:06] Quick poll, if it existed would you use it?

[00:07:10] Depends on the price.

[00:07:11] I don't see why not.

[00:07:12] I think, I'm not being funny

[00:07:14] but I think if that came out

[00:07:16] I would have to own it.

[00:07:18] If they were like Armstrong-

[00:07:20] Especially if it was limited edition.

[00:07:22] Yeah limited edition Armstrong and Miller Durex Lube.

[00:07:25] Sign me up.

[00:07:28] I don't see how it would be any different

[00:07:30] to any of the-

[00:07:30] Well no, you probably know.

[00:07:31] Taste of the 2000s.

[00:07:32] Ugh, brother, ugh.

[00:07:35] Ugh, gross.

[00:08:27] So enough about Lube, we're talking about Thomas the Tank Engine.

[00:08:57] They definitely need Lube.

[00:08:58] Thomas the Tank Engine themed Lube guys?

[00:09:01] No.

[00:09:02] There probably is like vehicle.

[00:09:04] Yeah that's engine oil.

[00:09:06] That's grease, that's grease.

[00:09:08] You've not been using that have you?

[00:09:10] Don't put grease in your arm.

[00:09:11] In the States there's like,

[00:09:13] the Lube is more viewed as a vehicle thing

[00:09:16] rather than a sexual thing first.

[00:09:18] Like if that makes sense,

[00:09:19] if you say Lube people think not of sexual Lube.

[00:09:22] Like lubricant.

[00:09:22] Yeah well yeah that's the full word yes.

[00:09:24] Well I know but when someone says Lube

[00:09:27] they tend to mean it in a sexual way.

[00:09:28] If someone says lubricant I'm thinking door hinges.

[00:09:31] Laura when you-

[00:09:32] That's not going in, stop.

[00:09:36] No it isn't, I don't want it to go in.

[00:09:39] Okay I don't need it to be in,

[00:09:41] I just have only just thought of it.

[00:09:43] Yeah I have thought of it.

[00:09:44] The next time.

[00:09:44] I have thought of it.

[00:09:45] Did you try it?

[00:09:46] Yes.

[00:09:47] Did you?

[00:09:48] What did you Lube it with?

[00:09:49] Lube.

[00:09:49] Oh I have Lube.

[00:09:51] Lube it with like butter.

[00:09:54] Oh God.

[00:09:54] Is that the first thing you would think of?

[00:09:56] Sorry olive oil.

[00:09:58] Because we're Northern Europe, we're Northern Europe.

[00:10:03] Did it help?

[00:10:05] Yeah.

[00:10:06] Great.

[00:10:07] Why should I keep my passengers waiting

[00:10:09] while Henry and James dawdle about all day on viaducts?

[00:10:14] You proper looks like a radio girlie

[00:10:15] do you know what I mean?

[00:10:16] No.

[00:10:17] Oh you look like a radio girlie.

[00:10:18] Do I look nice?

[00:10:20] Your nipples look amazing.

[00:10:21] Thanks.

[00:10:23] Thanks.

[00:10:24] Right.

[00:10:25] Giving Rachel and friends.

[00:10:27] Am I?

[00:10:28] Am I?

[00:10:29] She wore turtlenecks and nipples.

[00:10:30] Am I?

[00:10:31] Am I?

[00:10:32] My dad worked at radio when he was a teenager.

[00:10:34] Like he worked at BBC Radio 4 I think.

[00:10:38] Or BT Tower, I can't remember.

[00:10:40] Anyway.

[00:10:41] There's a difference between BBC Radio 4

[00:10:43] and working at the BT Tower.

[00:10:45] He worked in radio, anyway.

[00:10:47] Can we first of all agree that Thomas the Tank Engine

[00:10:50] has a banging theme tune?

[00:10:52] Yes.

[00:10:53] Biggie Smalls.

[00:10:54] What a deep groove.

[00:10:56] Meg there is referring to the Biggie Smalls

[00:10:58] Thomas the Tank Engine mashup.

[00:11:00] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[00:11:03] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[00:11:05] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[00:11:08] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[00:11:10] Release the brainstorm

[00:11:11] to make your motherfucking brain warm.

[00:11:13] A strange form, something kind of lyrical.

[00:11:15] Biggie the badman so that's kind of spiritual.

[00:11:18] Well I'm glad we trust,

[00:11:20] because our bodies got that disgusting suicide stomp in it.

[00:11:23] Do you know where you're going to?

[00:11:25] Do you like the things that I bring?

[00:11:27] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[00:11:33] Like I keep calling it Thomas the Tank Engine.

[00:11:36] It's actually called Thomas and Friends.

[00:11:37] There's actually been like six different names

[00:11:39] for it or something.

[00:11:40] Yeah.

[00:11:40] Yeah which is ridiculous just Thomas the Tank Engine.

[00:11:43] It was based on a series of books

[00:11:46] by Reverend Wilbert Audry.

[00:11:48] He was an Anglican vicar from Hampshire.

[00:11:51] The first book was published in 1945.

[00:11:56] There were 42 books in the series.

[00:12:00] It was based on real classes of locomotives.

[00:12:04] The lines were based on real lines in the British Isles.

[00:12:08] He was involved in railway preservation.

[00:12:10] He built model railways.

[00:12:13] You cannot, you cannot understate

[00:12:16] how much this man loved him a trade.

[00:12:19] He was in support of all his friends who liked engines,

[00:12:22] but strangely none of them would have room

[00:12:25] for a traction engine at home.

[00:12:26] And not only did he write Thomas the Tank Engine,

[00:12:29] he became a train.

[00:12:31] He now is a train.

[00:12:34] You can ride him around the West Coast.

[00:12:40] Hello fat face, whistle Henry.

[00:12:43] Is literally called the Thomas the Tank Engine man.

[00:12:49] I'm not joking.

[00:12:50] And he, yes, he wrote Thomas Tank Engine in the books,

[00:12:53] but he also wrote an accompanying book

[00:12:56] called The Island of Sodor,

[00:12:58] It's People, Histories and Railways.

[00:13:02] He was the J.R.R. Tolkien of railways.

[00:13:06] He-

[00:13:07] Did they get together and he go,

[00:13:08] I'm gonna name mine Mordor, you can have Sodor.

[00:13:11] That was very good.

[00:13:14] That was excellent Laura, well done.

[00:13:16] So in The Island of Sodor,

[00:13:18] It's People, Histories and Railways,

[00:13:20] Audrey explained that Sodor was politically part

[00:13:23] of the United Kingdom.

[00:13:25] While the Isle of Man had retained home rules

[00:13:27] since the 15th century,

[00:13:29] Sodor had been attached to the Duchy of Lancaster

[00:13:32] and it is therefore part of England.

[00:13:35] Although this has not been allowed to disturb

[00:13:37] the Sudrians independent lives.

[00:13:39] They also have their own language.

[00:13:43] He wrote the language of The Isle of Sodor.

[00:13:46] He is the J.R.R. Tolkien of trains.

[00:13:49] What's that?

[00:13:50] Asked Bill.

[00:13:52] Whispered Ben, it's Gordon.

[00:13:55] It looks like Gordon, but it can't be.

[00:13:59] Gordon never comes on the branch lines.

[00:14:02] He thinks them vulgar.

[00:14:03] Before trains, there wasn't as a,

[00:14:07] speaking within the UK, I don't know about globally.

[00:14:09] There wasn't a need to standardize time until trains

[00:14:13] because prior to that,

[00:14:14] so there is like a half hour difference

[00:14:16] from one coast to the other on the UK

[00:14:18] about when the sun sets.

[00:14:20] So each place used to have super, super local time.

[00:14:23] So it would be based on midday where you live.

[00:14:26] So there'd be like a 20 minute difference

[00:14:28] between here and Bristol.

[00:14:29] So the trains, the whole schedule was fucked.

[00:14:33] People kept missing their trains

[00:14:34] because it usually went off of the hub

[00:14:37] that the train came from.

[00:14:38] So it wasn't the same time as to where it was going

[00:14:41] or where it was leaving from.

[00:14:43] So everyone was like, this is fucking chaos.

[00:14:45] We need structured time.

[00:14:47] So part of the reason the UK condensed under GMT

[00:14:51] is for the trains.

[00:14:52] That's kind of crazy.

[00:14:53] Yeah.

[00:14:54] Could you imagine you, like I said this last,

[00:14:56] it's like you cross through two counties

[00:14:59] and you're like, right,

[00:14:59] everyone put your clocks back 15 minutes.

[00:15:02] Come on, motherfuckers, come on.

[00:15:04] The fictional native language of Sodor

[00:15:06] is Sudrik or Sudrian,

[00:15:08] a goidelic language similar to Manx.

[00:15:13] Anyone know what that means?

[00:15:15] Manx is what they speak on Isle of Man.

[00:15:17] All right, well there you go.

[00:15:19] It sounds like he just made another Isle of Man

[00:15:21] to be honest.

[00:15:22] It does sound like that doesn't it?

[00:15:23] Is he from the Isle of Man?

[00:15:24] No, he's from Hampshire.

[00:15:25] So the reason he was interested in trains

[00:15:28] is because he lived near a rail and...

[00:15:32] We all lived near rail.

[00:15:33] Well, he lived so close that like,

[00:15:36] when he was sleeping at night,

[00:15:37] he could like hear them outside.

[00:15:40] So this is what I'm quoting from Audrey himself.

[00:15:44] So this is from Wikipedia.

[00:15:45] Audrey could hear them from his bed

[00:15:47] listening to the coded whistle signals

[00:15:49] between the train engine and the banker,

[00:15:51] as well as the sharp bark from the locomotive exhausts

[00:15:53] as they fought their way up the incline.

[00:15:55] Audrey said,

[00:15:56] "'There was no doubt in my mind

[00:15:58] "'that the steam engines all had definite personalities

[00:16:00] "'and I would hear them snorting up the grade

[00:16:03] "'and little imagination was needed

[00:16:05] "'to hear in the puffings and pantings of the two engines

[00:16:08] "'the conversation they were having with one another.'"

[00:16:10] That's quite cute, isn't it?

[00:16:13] Yeah.

[00:16:14] I mean, it's not true.

[00:16:15] They weren't talking to each other.

[00:16:16] Don't, okay.

[00:16:17] Maybe it's not.

[00:16:18] All right, all right, all right.

[00:16:19] Well, I mean, we were talking the other day,

[00:16:21] weren't we, about how, well,

[00:16:24] I assign personalities and ages to numbers

[00:16:27] and everyone associates days with colors

[00:16:30] and that sort of thing.

[00:16:31] Not everyone, but yeah.

[00:16:32] No, but a lot of people do.

[00:16:34] So I can, I think I kind of relate to him in that way.

[00:16:37] So he's had it in his head since he was 10.

[00:16:39] Yeah, so the first books are supposed to take place

[00:16:43] in the 20s. Right.

[00:16:45] There's kind of absolutely no way of discerning that.

[00:16:49] There isn't really any indication in them

[00:16:52] that they are taking place in that time

[00:16:55] because it's all kind of old-timey, the same.

[00:16:58] Yeah.

[00:16:59] And also steam trains.

[00:17:00] Like it's taking place in the 90s.

[00:17:03] It goes up to the 90s. Yeah, yeah.

[00:17:05] And they're still, you know.

[00:17:07] The books?

[00:17:08] Yeah. Oh.

[00:17:09] Yeah. Oh.

[00:17:10] So his son Christopher did write and publish

[00:17:12] the last handful of them.

[00:17:15] But I think 42 is the original number

[00:17:18] that Reverend Wilbert Audry wrote.

[00:17:23] But yeah, when his son was very young,

[00:17:25] he would request his dad tell him these stories

[00:17:29] about the trains.

[00:17:30] And he wanted models of the trains,

[00:17:35] but due to wartime materials shortage.

[00:17:38] Yeah.

[00:17:39] You can't make trains.

[00:17:40] We need to make bullets.

[00:17:42] Oh, we were supposed to watch bullet train, weren't we?

[00:17:46] Oh well.

[00:17:47] I did today again.

[00:17:50] He could only make a tank engine,

[00:17:52] which is a smaller type of train.

[00:17:55] Yeah, I was gonna ask you,

[00:17:56] because you were like, oh, I found out

[00:17:57] what tank engine is and I didn't ask further.

[00:18:00] Is it just a little train?

[00:18:01] Kind of. Okay.

[00:18:02] So he made a tank engine model and he was like,

[00:18:07] oh, Thomas was the natural name for it.

[00:18:09] So Thomas the Tank Engine was born.

[00:18:10] So Thomas actually wasn't the first character

[00:18:12] he came up with.

[00:18:13] So a tank engine has its water and fuel

[00:18:18] in the main...

[00:18:20] Tank?

[00:18:21] Tank, yeah.

[00:18:22] So it's other types of locomotives

[00:18:25] have it in a carriage behind.

[00:18:28] Right.

[00:18:29] Tank engines have it all in one.

[00:18:32] I don't really understand how anything else could work.

[00:18:35] Like if the fuel and the water is in a different carriage

[00:18:39] from the front bit, how is that?

[00:18:41] I don't understand.

[00:18:42] Does it mean the fuel, they just transport it

[00:18:44] in a separate carriage so it can go further?

[00:18:46] Because the fuel's cold.

[00:18:48] Oh, sure, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:18:49] Because the fuel is coal

[00:18:51] and you're heating up the water.

[00:18:52] So presumably it just gets brought into the engine bit

[00:18:56] when it's needed.

[00:18:58] Presumably.

[00:18:59] We don't know, we've never been on an old timey train.

[00:19:02] I have been on a steam train actually.

[00:19:04] We've never, have you been on a?

[00:19:07] No, I like to.

[00:19:08] Every time I go to Victoria Station

[00:19:10] there's one of those steam trains.

[00:19:13] Orient Express type things.

[00:19:15] Yeah, sitting in the platform

[00:19:16] and everyone's there taking pictures of it

[00:19:19] and I like to give a side eye,

[00:19:22] hmm, losers, as I walk past.

[00:19:24] But they're so amazing and I really wanna go on one.

[00:19:28] One day Meg, have you been to the York Railway Museum?

[00:19:32] Yes.

[00:19:33] Don't scoff, it's a brilliant museum.

[00:19:36] Don't scoff!

[00:19:37] It is a really good museum.

[00:19:39] Taken straight from Cats the Musical.

[00:19:41] All his inventions are off his own back.

[00:19:46] Don't scoff.

[00:19:48] Don't scoff.

[00:19:50] Only a few people will get that

[00:19:51] but that's enough for me.

[00:19:53] I went on a school trip when I was like eight.

[00:19:58] I don't really remember it

[00:20:00] because what need do I have to go

[00:20:03] to a railway museum twice in my life?

[00:20:06] Oh, I've been loads of times.

[00:20:07] I'm not reference Will but Audrey.

[00:20:11] Will but Audrey, so.

[00:20:12] Slightly out of left field question

[00:20:13] but it popped into my head while you were talking.

[00:20:15] How do we feel about the clergy getting married?

[00:20:19] Oh, okay, I don't give a fuck actually.

[00:20:22] I thought I was having a debut there.

[00:20:23] I don't mind the marriage part, it's the other bit.

[00:20:25] Uh.

[00:20:26] Uh.

[00:20:27] The clergy bit.

[00:20:28] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:29] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:30] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:31] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:32] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:33] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:33] Very good, very good.

[00:20:36] What that willy do?

[00:20:37] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:39] Oh, she said it!

[00:20:40] I knew one of you would laugh at that

[00:20:42] and I knew it wouldn't be Laura.

[00:20:44] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:45] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:46] Ha ha ha!

[00:20:48] What's the matter Charlie?

[00:20:50] He asked the driver.

[00:20:52] He's got a flawless attraction engine

[00:20:53] in the scrap yard, Vicar.

[00:20:54] He'll be broken up next week.

[00:20:56] Gem Cole says he never drove a better engine.

[00:21:00] Do save him sir.

[00:21:01] He saws wood and gives children rides.

[00:21:05] We'll see, replied the Vicar.

[00:21:09] Gem Cole came on Saturday.

[00:21:11] The reverend's coming to see you, Trevor.

[00:21:13] Maybe he'll buy you.

[00:21:15] Do you think he will, asked Trevor hopefully?

[00:21:18] He will when I've lit your fire and cleaned you up.

[00:21:22] The Vicar and his two boys arrived that evening.

[00:21:25] Trevor hadn't felt so happy for months.

[00:21:28] He chuffered about the yard.

[00:21:32] Show your paces, Trevor, said the Vicar.

[00:21:45] Later he came out of the office smiling.

[00:21:48] I've got him cheap, Gem, cheap!

[00:21:51] Do you hear that, Trevor?

[00:21:53] Cried Gem.

[00:21:54] The reverend saved you and you live at the Vicarage now.

[00:21:57] Peep peep, whistled Trevor.

[00:21:59] So I'm gonna read you something from the Thomas Wiki.

[00:22:03] The Thomas Wiki logo looks so much

[00:22:06] like the History Channel logo.

[00:22:07] Does it?

[00:22:08] Like the font and like the picture.

[00:22:09] I always get, I was like why is this on the,

[00:22:11] oh no, it's not the History Channel.

[00:22:14] So the island of Sodor,

[00:22:16] its people, history and railways,

[00:22:18] that's out of print.

[00:22:19] So his son requested the publisher to reprint it.

[00:22:24] They said no.

[00:22:25] So he offered to buy, I know!

[00:22:28] So he offered to buy the copyright of the book,

[00:22:30] but this too has been refused.

[00:22:32] To his own son.

[00:22:33] So a new book was written by Christopher Audrey.

[00:22:37] It was published in 2005

[00:22:40] to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Railway series.

[00:22:44] So it's essentially out of print.

[00:22:49] And every year on the date of the accident,

[00:22:53] it runs again as a warning to others.

[00:22:56] Plunging into the gap, shrieking like a lost soul.

[00:23:01] Percy, what are you talking about?

[00:23:04] The ghost train.

[00:23:06] Driver saw it last night.

[00:23:08] Were, asked Thomas and his wife.

[00:23:10] They were.

[00:23:11] They were.

[00:23:12] They were.

[00:23:13] They were.

[00:23:14] They were.

[00:23:14] They were.

[00:23:15] They were.

[00:23:16] They were.

[00:23:17] They were.

[00:23:18] They were.

[00:23:19] Asked Thomas and Toby.

[00:23:20] He didn't say.

[00:23:22] Oh, it makes my wheels wobble to think of it.

[00:23:25] Huh, said Thomas.

[00:23:26] You're just a silly little engine.

[00:23:28] I'm not scared.

[00:23:29] So how are we feeling about this subject up till now?

[00:23:34] I'm gonna go into the history of the show in a minute.

[00:23:36] I think generally not a particularly strong opinion.

[00:23:44] I've not have any, I'm just like, yeah, fine.

[00:23:48] That's how I feel about marriage in the clergy.

[00:23:50] I literally have never cared less about anything in my life.

[00:23:55] I don't know what I was expecting you to ask,

[00:23:58] but it truly wasn't something that boring.

[00:24:04] I would, I've been reading a book

[00:24:06] about medieval relationships, sex and love.

[00:24:09] That is potentially why that was floating around my head

[00:24:11] because they introduced the celibacy rule

[00:24:14] for the clergy in the middle ages.

[00:24:15] What do you think of it?

[00:24:18] I think it'd be better if they all got married.

[00:24:20] It's not got an especially like

[00:24:25] an interesting background thus far.

[00:24:29] However, Elsie messaged me earlier

[00:24:32] and told me not to do too much Googling

[00:24:34] of Thomas the Tank Engine.

[00:24:36] So I'm hoping she's got some interesting stuff.

[00:24:39] Well, your question,

[00:24:40] I thought you were asking how do we feel about the show

[00:24:42] but you just mean like the general background?

[00:24:44] Yeah, cause what shocked me is that,

[00:24:48] I shouldn't really have been shocked

[00:24:50] because people that like trains

[00:24:51] tend to really like trains.

[00:24:53] I was amazed at how much was based on his real,

[00:24:58] incredible in-depth knowledge of the lines up

[00:25:02] and down the British Isles.

[00:25:06] All kinds of ships use the harbor

[00:25:08] at the big station by the sea.

[00:25:10] There are passenger ships, cargo ships

[00:25:12] and fishing boats also come here.

[00:25:14] They unload their fish on the quay.

[00:25:16] Some of it goes to shops in the town

[00:25:18] and the rest in a special train to other places far away.

[00:25:22] This is the train the railwayman call the Flying Kipper.

[00:25:27] The thing I'd like to say is,

[00:25:29] I think he's a fucking nerd,

[00:25:31] but I really can't speak

[00:25:33] to someone spending hours of their time

[00:25:35] whittling away world building.

[00:25:37] I cannot judge someone for doing that.

[00:25:39] I'll do it.

[00:25:40] Yeah, you make do it.

[00:25:42] Nerd.

[00:25:43] I mean, I kind of respect it.

[00:25:46] I was-

[00:25:47] I mean, he's monetized it effectively.

[00:25:50] He's monetized his cringe.

[00:25:52] He's made his son into the same thing he's into.

[00:25:55] And isn't that what all fathers want

[00:25:56] at the end of the day?

[00:25:57] Yes, it is.

[00:25:58] It's what all parents want.

[00:25:59] It's impressive that the train world

[00:26:01] has their own jolkin, rolkin, rolkin, tolkin.

[00:26:05] A shame you can't do that with his name though.

[00:26:08] Well, let's try.

[00:26:10] Reverend?

[00:26:11] Rev.

[00:26:12] Rev.

[00:26:12] Wev.

[00:26:13] Reverend Wevwind.

[00:26:15] Ev-

[00:26:16] Ev-

[00:26:17] Ev-

[00:26:17] It's actually really hard.

[00:26:19] It was really difficult, yeah.

[00:26:21] Well, jolkin, rolkin, tolkin

[00:26:22] is lightning in a bottle.

[00:26:23] Excuse me, jolkin, rolkin, rolkin, tolkin.

[00:26:25] Sorry.

[00:26:26] What did you say?

[00:26:27] I only did the one rolkin.

[00:26:30] Yeah, jolkin, rolkin, rolkin.

[00:26:32] It sounds like someone falling down a hill.

[00:26:34] Yeah.

[00:26:35] Do you know, me and my dad have been laughing

[00:26:38] about this for years.

[00:26:40] And a few months ago,

[00:26:41] one of my colleagues sent the tweet to our work.

[00:26:44] The original tweet.

[00:26:45] Yeah, and I was like,

[00:26:46] me and my dad laugh about this all the time.

[00:26:49] So before we go on to the topic of the TV show,

[00:26:53] Meg has a fun little drinkie that we're all gonna try

[00:26:56] even though she's ill

[00:26:56] and she's gonna have her mouth around it.

[00:26:58] Well, we're gonna have our mouths around it first.

[00:27:02] What is it, Meg?

[00:27:05] Winter Spiced Cranberry Sprite.

[00:27:08] Smells a bit like the fancy books face you get from M&S.

[00:27:12] It does.

[00:27:13] Laura's making a confused face.

[00:27:15] And some disgusting mouth noises as well.

[00:27:17] There is a drink that super reminds me of, but I...

[00:27:20] Oh, it actually does smell a bit like books,

[00:27:22] but I cannot for the life of me place it.

[00:27:24] It's not one I've had here.

[00:27:26] Oh, that's actually delicious.

[00:27:28] It is really good.

[00:27:29] I really like that.

[00:27:30] Ooh.

[00:27:30] It's really good, isn't it?

[00:27:32] It tastes a bit like kind of sherbet-y.

[00:27:35] It tastes a bit like flying saucers.

[00:27:36] Yes, I love flying saucers.

[00:27:38] I will say, second sip, it's already too sweet for me.

[00:27:41] I've become a full adult.

[00:27:43] The amount I say that these days.

[00:27:45] It's too sweet for me.

[00:27:46] It's too sweet for me,

[00:27:47] which is the off-quoted thing by my parents

[00:27:49] when I was a kid and I'm like,

[00:27:50] what are you talking about?

[00:27:51] How can anything be too sweet?

[00:27:52] Do you think that's kind of a side effect

[00:27:54] of growing up in Asia?

[00:27:55] Because a lot of Asian food and Asian desserts especially

[00:27:58] are not as sweet as we have them in the West.

[00:28:02] Laura, maybe.

[00:28:03] Especially Chinese, Japanese desserts

[00:28:07] not that sweet at all.

[00:28:08] I was literally earlier looking at

[00:28:11] where's the closest place we could get red bean taiyaki?

[00:28:15] I think it's the fish shaped ones.

[00:28:18] Which I get mixed up with.

[00:28:19] I've never had one.

[00:28:20] Which I get mixed up with tapayaki, which is.

[00:28:22] The octopus balls.

[00:28:23] The octopus balls.

[00:28:24] And it's like you don't wanna be looking,

[00:28:26] especially me, you don't wanna be getting

[00:28:27] those two mixed up.

[00:28:28] Speaking of cranberries,

[00:28:31] I wanna tell a story about a friend

[00:28:32] that I had throughout all of school

[00:28:35] and Meg had in sixth form.

[00:28:37] Luke, if you're listening, love you, you're the best.

[00:28:41] I don't know you sir.

[00:28:42] So his social media handles,

[00:28:45] he barely uses social media at all.

[00:28:49] But when he did, his handle was cranberry robots.

[00:28:54] And we said, Luke why is your name

[00:28:57] on all your socials cranberry robot?

[00:29:01] And he said, well I went onto a username generator website

[00:29:04] and it's the first one that came up.

[00:29:06] Cranberry robot was so raw,

[00:29:13] the CBBC computer game code.

[00:29:16] Yes.

[00:29:17] Did you ever play raw?

[00:29:18] No I didn't but I remember that the CBBC games

[00:29:23] had randomly generated names for people.

[00:29:25] And it was always.

[00:29:26] It was always a color.

[00:29:27] And then an animal.

[00:29:28] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:29:30] Cranberry robot is so raw.

[00:29:32] It really is.

[00:29:33] And I said to him, Luke, you know that you're allowed

[00:29:34] to choose your own.

[00:29:35] You don't have to, when you go onto the internet

[00:29:37] for the first time, you don't have to start

[00:29:39] by letting it choose your name.

[00:29:42] And I said, do you like cranberries?

[00:29:43] He said, yeah I do actually.

[00:29:45] My first one I think was Xbox

[00:29:48] because I am not original or creative.

[00:29:51] It was dumb diddy dumb.

[00:29:52] Dumb diddy dumb.

[00:29:54] And then first on throwing in, what was it?

[00:29:56] Spoonscape, I was diddy because of Dexter's sister

[00:30:00] in Dexter's Laboratory.

[00:30:02] Oh not Dexter's sister in Dexter.

[00:30:04] Dexter.

[00:30:05] No, no.

[00:30:06] Who, I was talking to my boyfriend about this

[00:30:08] the other day because we're all back on Netflix.

[00:30:10] Dexter's sister in Dexter is called Deborah.

[00:30:15] No.

[00:30:16] And I know like Dexter, so the whole,

[00:30:17] Dexter's adopted, they're not like biological siblings.

[00:30:21] But I do think it's kind of evil

[00:30:23] to have one child called Dexter

[00:30:25] and one child called Deborah,

[00:30:26] kind of like how is it evil to have one child

[00:30:29] called Ellsworth and one child called Elizabeth.

[00:30:32] Well I was supposed to also have like an S name

[00:30:34] because my family when I was a kid,

[00:30:37] it was Sharon, Simon, Sean, and I'm the youngest.

[00:30:40] And I was I think supposed to be named like

[00:30:42] Sean or Shannon or something.

[00:30:45] And then they were like, oh no,

[00:30:46] it's too close to Sharon.

[00:30:47] And I'm like so what you've done.

[00:30:49] The Kardashians of Berkshire.

[00:30:49] What you've done is just leave me as the one out

[00:30:54] with a completely different.

[00:30:55] Betty was almost well,

[00:30:58] a name in the running for Betty was Martha,

[00:31:01] but they already had Arthur so they.

[00:31:03] So your options were Ellsworth and Elizabeth

[00:31:07] or Arthur and Martha?

[00:31:10] Yeah.

[00:31:11] So I once asked my parents if I was gonna be a boy,

[00:31:13] what would I have been called?

[00:31:14] What else would you have called me?

[00:31:15] And they were like, oh I can't remember.

[00:31:17] I believe I would have been called Jack.

[00:31:20] But my parents like so.

[00:31:22] Jack Mumbi is a good name.

[00:31:24] My parents like, I say my parents,

[00:31:27] my mum likes to tell me names that she likes now.

[00:31:31] And like she's quite into

[00:31:36] like old fashioned names have come back into fashion.

[00:31:39] Mabel.

[00:31:40] Mavis, she loves Mavis.

[00:31:43] That's so cute.

[00:31:44] It's horrible we had a mouse called Mavis.

[00:31:46] I think it's really cute.

[00:31:48] That's a really good mouse name.

[00:31:50] I thought you had a.

[00:31:51] Oh if you were born now we'd call you Mavis.

[00:31:53] I'm like, well number one, if I was born now,

[00:31:55] dad would veto that.

[00:31:57] I thought you had a hedgehog called Mavis.

[00:31:59] She was called Nala.

[00:32:01] Oh was she?

[00:32:02] Okay.

[00:32:02] I had a mouse called Mavis.

[00:32:04] Yeah so sometimes I think about like

[00:32:07] me and my boyfriend have thrown around some

[00:32:10] slightly more out there names and I think,

[00:32:13] is my mum gonna hate that?

[00:32:14] And then she comes back with shit like Mavis

[00:32:17] and I'm like.

[00:32:18] Just a bit of Meg's mum lore.

[00:32:19] That hedgehog was an impulse buy.

[00:32:23] Yeah she.

[00:32:23] So it was like every other pet.

[00:32:25] I don't know if dad has ever heard this story

[00:32:28] so I'll tell it now.

[00:32:29] Oh okay.

[00:32:30] I came.

[00:32:31] Paul you better be listening.

[00:32:33] I came home from school and my mum said to me,

[00:32:38] have you noticed anything different?

[00:32:40] And I said no.

[00:32:43] And she went try.

[00:32:45] And I went through into the hallway

[00:32:51] and there was this like vivarium type thing

[00:32:55] that you'd keep a lizard in.

[00:32:56] Oh.

[00:32:57] And.

[00:32:58] That wasn't there before?

[00:33:00] That wasn't there before.

[00:33:01] Fucking hell.

[00:33:02] And I was like,

[00:33:04] I was like what the fuck is that Vicky?

[00:33:06] So I went through into the hallway

[00:33:07] and there was this cage vivarium type thing in there

[00:33:12] and I was like what have you done?

[00:33:13] Because she had this habit of impulse buying animals.

[00:33:18] I'm surprised you guys never had a chicken or something.

[00:33:21] And I went oh yeah what the hell is that?

[00:33:24] She said, she was like it's a hedgehog.

[00:33:27] And I was like what?

[00:33:29] And she'd like,

[00:33:31] when African pygmy hedgehogs,

[00:33:33] they went through that kind of,

[00:33:35] they're like fashionable.

[00:33:37] I must have missed that.

[00:33:38] She talked about getting them.

[00:33:40] I was like oh that would be so cute to have

[00:33:42] but they were really expensive.

[00:33:43] And this was like at the time where people

[00:33:45] who had their African pygmy hedgehogs

[00:33:47] and I didn't want them anymore.

[00:33:48] And she'd driven to.

[00:33:52] Brand's home?

[00:33:53] She'd driven to Brand's home

[00:33:55] to pick up this hedgehog and cage

[00:33:59] for like 60 quid.

[00:34:01] That's a long drive from your house.

[00:34:03] Yeah for a hedgehog I mean,

[00:34:05] yeah but I guess.

[00:34:06] How old were you?

[00:34:07] I was like 14, 15.

[00:34:10] And brought it home and I was like oh what's it called?

[00:34:15] And she was like oh it's called Nala.

[00:34:16] I was like oh great it's my pet now though isn't it?

[00:34:18] Because she used to go buy animals

[00:34:20] and then they were mine

[00:34:21] and I was like I never asked for this.

[00:34:23] And I said, what did dad say when you told him?

[00:34:26] And she went, I haven't yet.

[00:34:29] He'll find out when he gets old.

[00:34:30] Yeah and I was like.

[00:34:31] He'll find out in 15 years

[00:34:33] when you've got your own podcast.

[00:34:34] I said, please God let me be there when you tell him.

[00:34:39] But like when we had the mouse,

[00:34:41] we had Mavis she'd gone to the pet shop

[00:34:43] to get some rabbit food or something.

[00:34:46] And they were like selling mice in cages

[00:34:50] for like 15 pounds.

[00:34:51] You've got like the mouse and the cage.

[00:34:53] And otherwise that mouse is being frozen

[00:34:55] and sold as snake food.

[00:34:57] And she hates snakes so she came home with this mouse.

[00:34:59] I'm taking snake food away from them.

[00:35:01] We hid this mouse from my dad

[00:35:04] for about a month before he found out about it.

[00:35:07] Wow, sorry just on mice.

[00:35:09] One of my favorite lines of dialogue in any TV show ever

[00:35:12] is in Arrested Development when Michael Cera says,

[00:35:15] say what you like about America

[00:35:17] but $10 still buys you a hell of a lot of mice.

[00:35:20] Yeah.

[00:35:21] There's only so long you can hide an animal

[00:35:24] from someone that is so smelly.

[00:35:28] They are really, they piss a lot and they stink.

[00:35:31] And you can't discreetly clean a mouse out

[00:35:34] because you can't put it in like a hamster bowl

[00:35:36] or anything.

[00:35:37] You can't put the whole cage in a bath.

[00:35:38] If you don't have a bath, you can't have a mouse.

[00:35:40] And you've got to-

[00:35:41] It's good to know, thank you.

[00:35:43] Yeah because you just need to put the mouse in the bath

[00:35:45] because there's nowhere else to put them.

[00:35:47] Why can't you put them in a hamster bowl?

[00:35:49] Because they're not strong enough to move a hamster bowl.

[00:35:51] You're just caging it like a Pokemon.

[00:35:54] If you try to get that mouse out

[00:35:56] and it's not in something really big to catch that mouse,

[00:36:00] that mouse is gone.

[00:36:02] That mouse is gone.

[00:36:03] Right, okay.

[00:36:03] It's not as simple as reaching grab mouse.

[00:36:06] Right, okay.

[00:36:08] Where have you been, lazy bones?

[00:36:10] Asked Thomas.

[00:36:11] Oh dear, my system is out of order.

[00:36:13] No one understands my case.

[00:36:15] You don't know what I suffer, moaned Henry.

[00:36:19] Rubbish, said Thomas.

[00:36:20] The journey from page to screen was quite a long one.

[00:36:25] So don't laugh, I'm doing a thing.

[00:36:28] Shut up, said James.

[00:36:30] It's not funny.

[00:36:31] So in 1953, the BBC wanted to adapt the books.

[00:36:36] The story they chose to adapt is the famous one

[00:36:40] where Henry gets bricked up in a tunnel

[00:36:43] for stepping out of line.

[00:36:45] It's called The Sad Story of Henry

[00:36:47] and that is the one the BBC wanted to adapt.

[00:36:50] Audrey was not crazy about that.

[00:36:54] He had some issues with it,

[00:36:55] but he eventually relented.

[00:36:58] So this special was live.

[00:37:01] It was a live broadcast using models

[00:37:05] and it went disastrously.

[00:37:06] Yeah, that's fucking risky.

[00:37:08] So all the trains kept derailing

[00:37:11] and people had to go in with their hands

[00:37:13] to put them right.

[00:37:15] And there's no existing footage of this.

[00:37:18] There's just newspaper reports

[00:37:20] and reviews about how disastrous it was.

[00:37:23] So that doesn't exist anymore.

[00:37:28] Then in 1973, so 20 years later,

[00:37:32] Andrew Lloyd Webber wanted to make

[00:37:35] an animated musical series of it.

[00:37:38] For fuck's sake.

[00:37:39] I know.

[00:37:41] I can only imagine that Starlight Express

[00:37:44] was his consolation prize.

[00:37:46] Yeah.

[00:37:47] So- What's that?

[00:37:48] It's one of his musicals.

[00:37:50] He wanted full control of the franchise,

[00:37:52] but he basically claimed that if he did,

[00:37:54] it would make it more attractive

[00:37:56] to Americans to invest in it.

[00:37:58] And Audrey famously said,

[00:38:01] once the Americans get their hands on it,

[00:38:03] it will be vulgarized and ruined.

[00:38:05] Wow, things have not changed about American media

[00:38:09] by the British, have they?

[00:38:10] There is a lot that's been done

[00:38:12] to Thomas the Tank Engine

[00:38:14] that Audrey would not like.

[00:38:15] He hates some of it.

[00:38:16] The movie Thomas and the Magic Railroad

[00:38:19] with, who was it?

[00:38:21] Alec Baldwin.

[00:38:22] Alec Baldwin, Mara Wilson.

[00:38:24] I've seen the trailer for that.

[00:38:25] He probably would not like it

[00:38:26] and actually critics didn't like it.

[00:38:28] It was panned.

[00:38:29] Panned.

[00:38:31] So he did get this animated series.

[00:38:36] Grenada made the pilot.

[00:38:39] The backers backed out at the last minute

[00:38:41] and in the end it just wasn't made,

[00:38:42] but you can see the original drawings.

[00:38:46] They are less creepy than what we got.

[00:38:49] They're still pretty creepy, but-

[00:38:51] Was this puppets as well?

[00:38:52] Or was this just animated?

[00:38:53] No, no, this was animated.

[00:38:54] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:38:55] I don't know if you know this,

[00:38:56] but Andrew Lloyd Webber has a production company

[00:38:59] called The Really Useful Group.

[00:39:02] I did not.

[00:39:03] Yeah, all of his film versions of his musicals

[00:39:07] are by The Really Useful Group.

[00:39:09] Wait, did he make Cats?

[00:39:10] He made Cats.

[00:39:11] He made Cats, the movie.

[00:39:13] No, not the-

[00:39:15] Because you said all the movie adaptations,

[00:39:16] aren't they?

[00:39:17] Was he involved in-

[00:39:18] Well let's not split hairs.

[00:39:19] Okay, I'm just curious.

[00:39:20] So in the show, in the books,

[00:39:24] the trains are always talking about

[00:39:25] how they want to be really useful engines.

[00:39:27] They're always being praised

[00:39:28] for being really useful engines

[00:39:30] and that's where The Really Useful Group comes from.

[00:39:32] So that kind of blew my mind

[00:39:34] that that's where The Really Useful Group comes from.

[00:39:36] Stop laughing.

[00:39:36] Ha ha ha ha.

[00:39:38] The Fat Controller works his engines hard.

[00:39:43] They are very proud when he calls them really useful.

[00:39:50] I'm going to the scrapyard today,

[00:39:52] Edward called to Thomas.

[00:39:55] What? Already?

[00:39:56] You're not that old, replied Thomas cheekily.

[00:39:59] Thomas was only teasing.

[00:40:03] So Britt Allcroft was a director and producer

[00:40:08] and in 1979, so only six years

[00:40:13] after Andrew Lloyd Webber failed to make his series,

[00:40:18] she and her husband decided

[00:40:21] that they wanted to make their own series.

[00:40:23] So she was making a documentary

[00:40:26] about British Rail in 1979

[00:40:28] and she met Audrey through that.

[00:40:30] Her and her husband took four years

[00:40:33] and remortgaging their house to create 26 episodes.

[00:40:39] And that- Jesus Christ, how?

[00:40:41] They had a lot of faith in it.

[00:40:42] How much did it cost to make

[00:40:44] or how little did their house cost?

[00:40:46] I wonder.

[00:40:47] Ha ha ha ha.

[00:40:48] It looks cheap, right?

[00:40:49] Actually it doesn't, it looks, you know,

[00:40:52] they paid Ringo Starr to be in it, you know?

[00:40:54] That's why.

[00:40:56] And I didn't need to just starlet to get people to watch.

[00:40:58] Starlet?

[00:40:59] Oh, sorry.

[00:41:00] I wonder if that was at all common in like 1979

[00:41:05] or if they told their friends,

[00:41:06] oh we're remortgaging in the house

[00:41:08] and that absolutely flawed everyone they told

[00:41:10] because I don't know,

[00:41:12] remortgaging is even kind of rare now so.

[00:41:15] Yeah, I actually know quite a lot of people

[00:41:16] who've remortgaged.

[00:41:17] Nevermind.

[00:41:18] I just don't know maybe-

[00:41:19] Or borrowed money against

[00:41:20] cause it's the asset,

[00:41:21] the most common asset people have.

[00:41:24] So they founded Britt Allcroft Productions,

[00:41:27] the two of them.

[00:41:28] The director was David Mitten.

[00:41:30] So most of his credits-

[00:41:31] Aw, Mitten.

[00:41:32] David Mitten.

[00:41:34] And most of his credits are for special effects engineer.

[00:41:38] So he was behind the Thunderbirds.

[00:41:41] Oh, okay.

[00:41:42] He worked-

[00:41:43] Yeah, I can actually see that a little bit.

[00:41:46] Yeah, he's behind a lot of creepy looking things

[00:41:49] that needed special effects technicians

[00:41:51] to like practical effects.

[00:41:53] So yeah, he was responsible for the look of what?

[00:41:58] Special effects, someone to like tiny fires.

[00:42:02] It takes skill to keep a fire tiny.

[00:42:07] It does take skill to keep it tiny.

[00:42:10] So there were seven seasons between 1984 and 2003

[00:42:16] and there's only about two episodes

[00:42:18] that David Mitten didn't direct.

[00:42:20] So the way that he moved their faces

[00:42:23] was it was linked to a motor

[00:42:24] that was mounted behind the faces.

[00:42:26] Oh, I fully thought

[00:42:28] that they just had different circles they stuck on.

[00:42:30] Oh yeah, they did.

[00:42:31] I'm just talking about the eyes.

[00:42:33] Oh, I see, okay.

[00:42:34] Sorry, I should have explained that.

[00:42:38] So Ringo was the star pull.

[00:42:41] In the US, it was actually George Carlin.

[00:42:43] Yeah, I accidentally watched one of them

[00:42:44] and was like, well, huh?

[00:42:46] It's a bit unnerving, isn't it?

[00:42:47] I was expecting a Northern accent.

[00:42:49] What's, huh?

[00:42:50] Who are you?

[00:42:51] Like your smoke box, Percy, laughed James.

[00:42:54] But Gordon was still grumpy.

[00:42:56] One day I'll show you

[00:42:58] just what a big engine can really do.

[00:43:00] So what can a big engine really do?

[00:43:02] Not speak to silly little green engines for a start,

[00:43:05] replied Gordon.

[00:43:07] Engines don't swim, Henry.

[00:43:09] You were meant to deliver fish, not swim with them.

[00:43:12] You should know that by now.

[00:43:14] Yes, sir.

[00:43:15] I'm sorry, sir.

[00:43:18] When Henry arrived at the docks,

[00:43:19] Cranky the Crane looked down on him.

[00:43:22] My, my Henry, I expect you'll have some fishy tales to tell.

[00:43:27] But take my advice, have a long hose down first.

[00:43:32] But there was worse to come.

[00:43:35] Look, they've caught all this fish

[00:43:37] and a green whale too.

[00:43:39] And it's funny to me that George Carlin was the US one

[00:43:42] because we're gonna talk about this in a minute

[00:43:45] because he's quite a left leaning comedian.

[00:43:47] Is Ringo star not?

[00:43:50] Well, he's not a comedian.

[00:43:51] Okay, left leaning?

[00:43:53] Or a drummer.

[00:43:56] Thanks.

[00:43:57] I actually don't know.

[00:43:59] But Thomas and the Isle of Sodor,

[00:44:02] it's a very authoritarian show.

[00:44:05] Don't know if you've picked up on those vibes.

[00:44:07] It's a very industrious island.

[00:44:10] Yes.

[00:44:11] I've definitely picked up on the sheer quantity

[00:44:14] of industry happening on the island.

[00:44:16] Well, the docks.

[00:44:18] No, no, there's more.

[00:44:20] They're always shunting.

[00:44:21] Yeah, shunting.

[00:44:22] There's one episode where,

[00:44:25] fuck me if I remember which one,

[00:44:26] one of the trains is going around.

[00:44:29] He's really busy that day and he's going,

[00:44:31] he's going to the coal mine.

[00:44:32] He's going to the metalworks.

[00:44:33] He's going to the fuel depot.

[00:44:35] He's going to the flour mill.

[00:44:38] And he goes to the docks.

[00:44:39] And I was like, Jesus Christ.

[00:44:41] Low unemployment on this island.

[00:44:43] You know how it goes on and on about how Percy

[00:44:45] is the one that goes to the docks?

[00:44:48] There was one episode that at the end,

[00:44:51] Thomas said, Percy's like,

[00:44:54] Thomas takes him fish or something

[00:44:56] and Percy's complaining about the smell.

[00:44:57] And it's like, why are you complaining about the smell?

[00:45:00] This is what you do.

[00:45:02] This is what you do.

[00:45:04] This is how you smell, Percy.

[00:45:06] Why do you guys have sensory systems?

[00:45:09] Nose.

[00:45:10] Yeah, they do have noses to be fair.

[00:45:12] Why do they have senses?

[00:45:13] They have more nose than the humans do.

[00:45:16] Well, they're sentient, Laura.

[00:45:18] Why?

[00:45:20] Well, there would be no story without.

[00:45:21] No, I know, but like it's a question I have.

[00:45:24] It brings up the same questions as Pixar's cars.

[00:45:27] Oh well, because when Audrey was young,

[00:45:29] he would sleep and he would hear trains outside.

[00:45:31] Right, yes.

[00:45:32] And imagine them with little personalities.

[00:45:32] Right, hallucinations.

[00:45:33] Yes.

[00:45:35] Hello, duck.

[00:45:36] Going fishing.

[00:45:38] I'd take care if I were you.

[00:45:40] Why, huff duck?

[00:45:42] Well, for one thing, huff Thomas,

[00:45:44] remembering his own experience.

[00:45:45] If fish get into an engine's boiler,

[00:45:48] they always cause trouble.

[00:45:49] I think it's so funny that the trains

[00:45:52] have a bigger range of emotion than the humans.

[00:45:55] Yeah.

[00:45:57] There was one where like Ringo Starr,

[00:46:00] if you're weird saying the narrator,

[00:46:02] the narrator goes, and the people laughed

[00:46:05] and it pans to the people and the people do nothing.

[00:46:10] They can't even move their eyes.

[00:46:12] Nothing about their faces.

[00:46:13] They're so uncanny.

[00:46:14] I do think the inclusion of humans

[00:46:16] makes this even more of a question than Pixar's cars.

[00:46:20] There's no people in cars,

[00:46:22] but there's fucking people sharing this island

[00:46:24] with these sentient fucking trains.

[00:46:26] Well, when you see the people

[00:46:28] up against the faces of the trains,

[00:46:30] that's even scarier because it's like,

[00:46:31] oh my God, if you were that person,

[00:46:34] like if you were that person, right,

[00:46:37] and those sentient trains existed

[00:46:39] and they were that huge,

[00:46:41] we would revere them as gods.

[00:46:43] Were they created by an engineer?

[00:46:45] Did a person make them or did they come to this island

[00:46:48] and they found sentient trains?

[00:46:51] Well, people repair them.

[00:46:54] That's another thing I had.

[00:46:55] One of the episodes,

[00:46:56] this is like a modern day episode,

[00:46:59] they're in like the scrap yard

[00:47:01] and there's bits and pieces of trains all around.

[00:47:03] Did they view that in the same way

[00:47:05] that we would if you went to a hospital

[00:47:08] and there were bits and pieces of trains.

[00:47:10] And there were arms and legs and organs about,

[00:47:13] like there's bits of trains around you.

[00:47:15] It's just unsanitary, Laura.

[00:47:18] Well, it's just these things pose questions

[00:47:21] for me watching it.

[00:47:22] Yeah, that's true.

[00:47:23] Like they are much bigger than the people

[00:47:28] and they are sentient,

[00:47:29] so it's kind of like slavery.

[00:47:32] Well, there's a really great New Yorker article.

[00:47:36] People really hated this actually

[00:47:38] because a lot of them were like,

[00:47:41] why are you thinking this deeply about a kids TV show?

[00:47:45] Like it's really not that deep.

[00:47:46] Like, why can't you just let it be?

[00:47:48] But it was quite political as well.

[00:47:50] But she says up at the top of the article,

[00:47:54] if you think I'm exaggerating,

[00:47:56] you don't remember Thomas well enough.

[00:47:58] So I'm gonna read from this article

[00:48:00] because it is,

[00:48:01] it was a very good piece of writing actually.

[00:48:04] It's clear from his work that Audrey disliked change,

[00:48:06] venerated order and crave the administration of punishment.

[00:48:11] Henry wasn't the only train to receive a death sentence.

[00:48:15] So they're laughing because,

[00:48:19] why are you laughing?

[00:48:20] I'm now laughing.

[00:48:20] Henry wasn't the only train to receive a death sentence.

[00:48:23] I'm now laughing that the Reverend

[00:48:25] is pro capital punishment.

[00:48:27] We don't know.

[00:48:29] We don't know either way.

[00:48:30] But in one episode,

[00:48:32] Is this the time to talk about death of the author?

[00:48:34] The manager tells a show off engine named Smudger

[00:48:37] that he's going to quote,

[00:48:39] make him useful at last

[00:48:41] and then turn Smudger into a generator,

[00:48:44] never to move again.

[00:48:46] Until one day manager said

[00:48:47] he was going to make him useful at last.

[00:48:49] Smudger stopped laughing then.

[00:48:52] Why?

[00:48:53] What did he do?

[00:48:54] He turned him into a generator.

[00:48:58] He's still there behind our shed.

[00:48:59] He'll never move again.

[00:49:03] There are several RIP Smudger tribute videos

[00:49:05] on YouTube.

[00:49:07] In another episode,

[00:49:08] a double decker bus named Bulgie comes to the station

[00:49:12] and talks about the revolution.

[00:49:15] Free the roads from railway tyranny, he cries.

[00:49:18] He is quickly labeled a scarlet deceiver,

[00:49:22] trapped under a bridge and turned into a hen house.

[00:49:26] Oh my God, it's right wing.

[00:49:29] Of course it is.

[00:49:30] Did you watch it?

[00:49:31] Look, shrilled Oliver, look at Bulgie.

[00:49:35] He's a mean scarlet deceiver.

[00:49:39] Duck made good time

[00:49:40] and all the passengers caught their trains.

[00:49:45] The bridge is now mended,

[00:49:47] but not unfortunately.

[00:49:49] Bulgie and his ways.

[00:49:51] He never learned sense.

[00:49:54] He's a hen house now.

[00:49:56] No, I just filtered through.

[00:49:56] I didn't see a political message.

[00:49:59] I just saw weird trains with their faces out.

[00:50:02] Yeah, that kind of distracts you from a lot.

[00:50:04] What this says to me is that

[00:50:06] there's living metal on this island

[00:50:09] and anything they make out of it is then alive

[00:50:14] and then they're subjecting it

[00:50:15] to their right wing way of life.

[00:50:17] Yeah, because ultimately this is a show

[00:50:20] about keeping workers in line, quite literally.

[00:50:24] Because the story of every single episode,

[00:50:28] you watched a few of the more modern ones.

[00:50:30] I watched mostly classic, some middling

[00:50:33] and then some very new ones.

[00:50:35] All of the classic ones are about a train

[00:50:38] that deviates from what they're supposed to do

[00:50:42] and gets horrendously punished.

[00:50:43] Did you not notice that?

[00:50:44] The show is conformity.

[00:50:46] There's one where basically

[00:50:50] Gordon's showing off about something.

[00:50:52] He breaks down on the track,

[00:50:54] he falls into a ditch

[00:50:55] and he's sad about it.

[00:50:58] That's it, that's it.

[00:50:59] And the humans have to rescue them.

[00:51:01] And then the humans come over

[00:51:02] and there's some little boys

[00:51:04] that are really mean to him, right?

[00:51:05] Yes, and the Fat Controller, Sir Topham Hatt,

[00:51:08] he's called, he actually looks at this train

[00:51:14] that is half in the water

[00:51:16] and he's only got sevenish trains

[00:51:18] to play with by the way.

[00:51:19] He says, oh, deal with that later,

[00:51:20] just leave him there.

[00:51:21] Like what the fuck?

[00:51:22] Not a hope, said his driver,

[00:51:25] you're stuck, you silly great engine.

[00:51:27] Don't you understand that?

[00:51:31] They telephoned the Fat Controller.

[00:51:33] So Gordon didn't want to take the special train

[00:51:36] and ran into a ditch.

[00:51:39] What's that you say?

[00:51:41] The special's waiting.

[00:51:43] Tell Edward to take it please.

[00:51:44] And Gordon, oh, leave him where he is.

[00:51:47] We haven't time to bother with him now.

[00:51:49] I need to point out

[00:51:50] that every time Ringo Starr says Fat Controller,

[00:51:53] he says Fat Controller.

[00:51:56] Does he?

[00:51:57] Yeah, like he's angry about a fat man.

[00:52:00] Fancy, a really useful blue engine like Thomas

[00:52:04] becoming a disgrace to the Fat Controller's railway.

[00:52:08] I'm also saying, like the modern ones, they do.

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[00:53:09] Not refer to him as anything other than Sir Toppenhat.

[00:53:12] Oh really?

[00:53:13] Of course they don't call him Fat Controller anymore.

[00:53:16] Fat Controller?

[00:53:17] Yeah, but have you seen him?

[00:53:19] I think yeah, he looks more like the Monopoly man

[00:53:22] than the modern ones as well.

[00:53:23] It's just, they say in this article also

[00:53:25] that it looks like he spent time in colonial India

[00:53:28] and has witnessed murder.

[00:53:30] James had not seen the Fat Controller for several days.

[00:53:34] He was left alone for being naughty

[00:53:36] and was not even allowed out

[00:53:37] to push coaches and trucks in the yard.

[00:53:40] Oh dear, he thought.

[00:53:42] I shall have to stay in the shed for always

[00:53:45] and no one will see my red coat again.

[00:53:48] All because I went so fast

[00:53:50] that I made a hole in one of my coaches

[00:53:52] that had to be mended with, of all things,

[00:53:55] a passenger's bootlace.

[00:53:57] At last the Fat Controller arrived.

[00:54:00] I see you are sorry James, he said.

[00:54:03] I hope now that you will be a better engine.

[00:54:05] You have given me a lot of trouble.

[00:54:07] People are laughing at my railway

[00:54:09] and I don't like that at all.

[00:54:11] I'm very sorry sir, said James.

[00:54:13] I will try hard to behave.

[00:54:16] That's a good engine, said the Fat Controller.

[00:54:18] On Sodor, the steam trains engage in constant competition

[00:54:22] for big jobs, more work

[00:54:24] and the Fat Controller's approval.

[00:54:26] Anthropomorphized trains in literature

[00:54:28] tend to be hard workers

[00:54:30] but one Tumblr thread holds

[00:54:32] that Thomas and friends have other motivations.

[00:54:35] The show, quote,

[00:54:36] canonically takes place in a train post-apocalypse

[00:54:40] where the island of Sodor is the only safe zone

[00:54:42] in a totalitarian dystopia

[00:54:44] in which steam trains are routinely killed

[00:54:47] and their body parts are sold or cannibalized for repair.

[00:54:51] The scrap yard is full of rusty old cars and machinery.

[00:54:55] They are broken into pieces, loaded into trucks

[00:54:59] and Edward pulls them to the steelworks

[00:55:01] where they are melted down and used again.

[00:55:04] I'm Trevor, they're going to break me up next week.

[00:55:08] What a shame, said Edward.

[00:55:10] My driver says I only need some paint, polish

[00:55:13] and oil to be as good as new

[00:55:15] but my master says I'm old fashioned.

[00:55:18] Edward snorted.

[00:55:20] People say I'm old fashioned but I don't care.

[00:55:23] The Fat Controller says I'm a useful engine.

[00:55:27] That's Cars.

[00:55:28] Cars is in a post-apocalyptic, post-human world.

[00:55:32] Yeah, you're really putting it

[00:55:33] in a different perspective from what I watched it from.

[00:55:36] I'm quite poorly so I didn't really look any deeper

[00:55:39] than oh, a train.

[00:55:41] No, that one was a train.

[00:55:43] Thomas likes whistling rudely at him.

[00:55:46] Wake up, lazy bones, why don't you work hard like me?

[00:55:49] He was just going to sleep when Thomas came up

[00:55:52] in his cheeky way.

[00:55:53] Wake up, lazy bones, do some hard work for a change.

[00:55:56] The thing that gets me is that

[00:55:59] they're constantly breaking down.

[00:56:01] It's a really dysfunctional...

[00:56:03] It's actually quite representative

[00:56:05] of the current modern rail service.

[00:56:07] But the way that they're so...

[00:56:09] The Fat Controller is so unwilling

[00:56:13] to immediately solve the problems

[00:56:16] because he enjoys seeing the trains punished

[00:56:18] because it's always for some sort of slight,

[00:56:21] so like vanity or...

[00:56:26] Gluttony.

[00:56:27] Gluttony, probably not.

[00:56:30] Treachery.

[00:56:31] Treachery, exactly.

[00:56:33] They're always competing for more jobs

[00:56:34] and showing off about how useful they are.

[00:56:37] And then that is always their...

[00:56:39] What's the Greek term?

[00:56:41] Hamasha.

[00:56:42] Hamasha, that's their downfall.

[00:56:44] They fly too close to the sun.

[00:56:46] Their brakes break or something.

[00:56:50] They end up...

[00:56:51] Also sometimes it's really not their fault.

[00:56:53] It just seems like if the people who worked there

[00:56:55] had better lines of communication, they wouldn't.

[00:56:56] Oh literally, yeah.

[00:56:57] Sometimes it's just a fault in the way they work.

[00:57:00] Yeah, it's not even the trains fault,

[00:57:01] it's the fucking people who run the trains.

[00:57:04] So it's kind of like a shit morality tale.

[00:57:08] But for this reason, I like it.

[00:57:11] What has happened to me?

[00:57:12] Asked Gordon.

[00:57:13] I feel so weak.

[00:57:16] You've burst your safety valve, said the driver.

[00:57:19] You can't pull the train anymore.

[00:57:22] Oh dear, said Gordon.

[00:57:24] We were going so nicely too.

[00:57:26] And look, there's Henry laughing at me.

[00:57:31] Everyone came to see Gordon.

[00:57:34] Said the fact controller.

[00:57:35] I never liked these big engines.

[00:57:37] Always going wrong, send for another engine at once.

[00:57:40] Because you can read really deeply into it or not

[00:57:43] because we didn't, me and Meg.

[00:57:45] I think it's...

[00:57:46] But you can't.

[00:57:47] It's kind of a perfect horror.

[00:57:49] Because you always feel like there's something darker

[00:57:51] that's being hidden from you.

[00:57:52] That is true, that is true.

[00:57:54] It had really strange vibes.

[00:57:57] Which is probably why we didn't like

[00:57:59] the Americanized one that much

[00:58:01] because they got the vibe wrong.

[00:58:05] And I wanted the jank vibes.

[00:58:07] It's like the old timey 1920s hot fuzzness of it

[00:58:14] where there's something going on

[00:58:16] but you're never gonna be told what's going on.

[00:58:18] It's just a veneer of nostalgia and niceness

[00:58:23] and then sometimes a train gets bricked up for eternity.

[00:58:26] Because what the fact controller has done there

[00:58:28] is that he sacrificed an entire tunnel.

[00:58:32] He sacrificed an entire tunnel, an entire train

[00:58:33] and that is a sentient train

[00:58:35] that is going to be encaged forever.

[00:58:37] Just to punish the train,

[00:58:39] he has made this island run worse.

[00:58:44] We shall take away your rails, he said

[00:58:46] and leave you here for always and always and always.

[00:58:54] They took up the old rails

[00:58:55] and built a wall in front of himself

[00:58:57] that Henry couldn't get out of the tunnel anymore.

[00:59:02] All he could do was watch the trains

[00:59:04] rushing through the other tunnel.

[00:59:09] He was very sad because he thought

[00:59:11] no one would ever see his lovely green paint

[00:59:14] with red stripes again.

[00:59:16] As time went on,

[00:59:17] Edward and Gordon would often pass by.

[00:59:22] Edward would say, peep peep, hello.

[00:59:27] And Gordon would say, poop poop poop serves you right.

[00:59:32] Poor Henry had no steam to answer.

[00:59:35] His fire had gone out.

[00:59:40] Sudden dirt from the tunnel

[00:59:41] had spoiled his lovely green paint and red stripes anyway.

[00:59:45] He wondered if he would ever be allowed

[00:59:46] to pull trains again.

[00:59:50] But I think he deserved his punishment, don't you?

[00:59:54] Do you wanna know why he was bricked up?

[00:59:56] Yeah.

[00:59:57] He just had a nice new coat of paint

[00:59:59] and it was raining and he didn't want to get his coat wet.

[01:00:03] His green paint and nice red stripes.

[01:00:06] Red stripes, yeah.

[01:00:08] Once an engine attached to a train

[01:00:11] was afraid of a few drops of rain.

[01:00:17] It went into a tunnel and squeaked through its funnel

[01:00:20] and wouldn't come out again.

[01:00:22] So he stayed in the tunnel.

[01:00:23] They couldn't push him out.

[01:00:25] So in the end they were like,

[01:00:26] ah, fuck it, fuck you.

[01:00:27] We'll brick you in.

[01:00:29] And they leave his face

[01:00:30] so he can just see what's going through.

[01:00:32] And this, I thought this was a standalone story,

[01:00:35] but no, I watched the next episode

[01:00:38] and the trains are going past him

[01:00:42] and saying hello to him as they go past.

[01:00:44] I was like, oh, it's part of the wider story.

[01:00:49] This is canon, guys.

[01:00:50] Yeah.

[01:00:52] In a minute, Gordon would see the tunnel

[01:00:54] where Henry stood bricked up and lonely.

[01:00:56] Oh dear, thought Henry.

[01:00:59] Why did I worry about rain

[01:01:01] spoiling my lovely coat of paint?

[01:01:04] Will the Fat Controller ever forgive me

[01:01:06] and let me out again?

[01:01:08] I'm going to poop poop at Henry, said Gordon.

[01:01:11] I think a couple of episodes later

[01:01:13] they de-brick him and let him out because cruelty.

[01:01:16] They do, but like I would have preferred

[01:01:19] if he just left it as one thing.

[01:01:22] Like, oh yeah, he's dying.

[01:01:23] Yeah.

[01:01:24] I will not let Henry try.

[01:01:26] Yes, said the Fat Controller, I will.

[01:01:30] Will you help pull this train, Henry, he asked.

[01:01:35] Oh yes, said Henry.

[01:01:42] When Henry had got up steam, he puffed out.

[01:01:45] He was dirty and covered with cobwebs.

[01:01:47] Oh, I am stiff, I am stiff, he groaned.

[01:01:52] Have a run to ease your joints

[01:01:55] and find a turntable, said the Fat Controller.

[01:02:00] I think this weirdly speaks, like tell me if I'm wrong here.

[01:02:05] I think that British people have this,

[01:02:06] maybe the Europeans also have this like weird relation,

[01:02:10] like close relationship with trains.

[01:02:12] Like we view them very romantically

[01:02:14] and very like we all really seem to care about trains.

[01:02:19] Not in like a we're upset,

[01:02:21] but like we all have.

[01:02:21] We're all hurty though, fuck him.

[01:02:23] We all have like strong opinions about trains.

[01:02:25] People talk about trains a lot.

[01:02:26] This didn't exist in Singapore, like at all.

[01:02:30] Like no one fucking talked about the trains ever.

[01:02:33] The steam era is like it's a whole historical time,

[01:02:38] isn't it?

[01:02:38] Like the time of steam, like it changed everything.

[01:02:41] And it's like there's loads of paintings of trains,

[01:02:44] like Terrence Cunio has some,

[01:02:46] a mate like just gorgeous paintings of trains.

[01:02:49] I mean Singapore is older than,

[01:02:52] sorry is younger than these trains.

[01:02:54] Singapore is younger than the train tracks

[01:02:56] that you go home on.

[01:02:57] There's so much literature set on trains

[01:02:59] and films, classic films.

[01:03:01] So much British literature on trains.

[01:03:03] So yeah Singapore was born,

[01:03:05] in quote unquote got its independence

[01:03:07] from the British in 1965.

[01:03:08] So it's younger than Thomas.

[01:03:12] So Britt Orcroft,

[01:03:13] so she produced a show in the US

[01:03:15] called Shining Time Station.

[01:03:17] So this is quite a place, isn't it?

[01:03:24] Yes but it's different than I thought it'd be.

[01:03:27] Oh I bet I know what you wanna ask me.

[01:03:31] Do trains ever stop here?

[01:03:38] Well some do, steam engines,

[01:03:40] diesel engines, fire engines.

[01:03:44] Matt come here.

[01:03:46] This is my plan.

[01:03:47] I'm gonna make this old station as good as it ever was.

[01:03:52] There'll be passengers rushing around,

[01:03:54] going to far away places.

[01:03:57] It's gonna be a very busy station

[01:04:00] just like the days when my old granny used to run it.

[01:04:03] And then lots of trains will wanna stop here.

[01:04:06] Will you help me?

[01:04:07] Sure.

[01:04:08] Great.

[01:04:09] Now listen, there is a railroad engineer

[01:04:11] coming here this afternoon.

[01:04:13] And if he likes this place

[01:04:14] then maybe he'll stay and help too.

[01:04:16] So where should we begin?

[01:04:18] Which is how most Americans know

[01:04:20] what Thomas the Tank Engine is.

[01:04:22] Because it was a live action show set in a station.

[01:04:28] Ringo Starr was in it.

[01:04:30] He played a tiny little man called Mr. Conductor

[01:04:35] and he lived in the-

[01:04:37] Shoebox.

[01:04:38] No, I mean he was that small

[01:04:40] but what's it called, the Signal House.

[01:04:41] He lived in that.

[01:04:43] And in the middle of these episodes

[01:04:45] were segments from Thomas the Tank Engine.

[01:04:48] But it was a live action show

[01:04:49] but that is how most Americans know.

[01:04:51] And you may call me Mr. Conductor.

[01:04:55] Well, you're a good worker.

[01:04:56] You know who'd like you?

[01:04:58] My friend Thomas.

[01:05:00] Is Thomas living there with you?

[01:05:04] Dear me no.

[01:05:05] Thomas is a steam engine

[01:05:07] and he lives on the island of Sodor.

[01:05:10] You are interested in trains aren't you?

[01:05:13] Yes.

[01:05:14] Sure.

[01:05:15] Splendid, then I'll tell you a story

[01:05:17] about my friend Thomas.

[01:05:20] You do like stories don't you?

[01:05:22] Oh yes.

[01:05:23] Very well but first I have to find my whistle.

[01:05:29] Ah, here we go.

[01:05:35] Thomas is a tank engine

[01:05:37] and lives at a big station on the island of Sodor.

[01:05:41] He's a cheeky little engine.

[01:05:42] And Britt Alcroft also produced

[01:05:45] Thomas the Magic Railroad

[01:05:47] which was the 2002 film with Mara Wilson

[01:05:50] that had horrible reviews.

[01:05:53] Mara Wilson's Matilda right?

[01:05:55] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[01:05:56] The poor box office performance of the film

[01:05:58] caused Alcroft to resign as deputy chairman

[01:06:00] of her company in September 2000.

[01:06:03] She has not been, oh sorry the film was 2000.

[01:06:05] She has not been active in the industry since then.

[01:06:08] And I wrote underneath that,

[01:06:09] can't a girl just do the best she can?

[01:06:11] Yeah.

[01:06:12] Like she brought the world Thomas.

[01:06:14] Yeah.

[01:06:15] Wow.

[01:06:16] Alex Baldwin.

[01:06:17] I've got to find more gold dust.

[01:06:18] Peter Fonda.

[01:06:19] This is your shining time to.

[01:06:21] Mara Wilson.

[01:06:22] You're a really useful engine Thomas.

[01:06:24] And Thomas.

[01:06:30] Now that's what I call a perfect landing.

[01:06:32] Thomas and the Magic Railroad this summer

[01:06:35] share the wonder with your family.

[01:06:37] I'll save a seat for you.

[01:06:41] I wonder if Thomas hits different in the US

[01:06:43] because they have such a different,

[01:06:45] well like way back they had a similar relationship

[01:06:49] with trains and then like really, really didn't I think.

[01:06:52] Wasn't Isambard Kingdom Brunel American?

[01:06:55] I don't know what that is.

[01:06:56] Was he American?

[01:06:57] No he was.

[01:06:57] Who was the American train?

[01:06:59] He was European.

[01:07:00] Oh one of the really rich ones

[01:07:02] like Carnegie or some shit.

[01:07:04] It wasn't Carnegie.

[01:07:05] The guy that first came up with the idea

[01:07:06] for steam trains was from Newcastle I think.

[01:07:11] When we look up train Baron America.

[01:07:15] Yeah no, Isambard Kingdom Brunel is British.

[01:07:17] Of course he is.

[01:07:20] I think he was French and British.

[01:07:23] No he wasn't.

[01:07:23] He was born in Portsmouth.

[01:07:25] Oh right okay.

[01:07:26] Was his dad not French?

[01:07:27] Oh he went to school in France or something.

[01:07:31] Vanderbilt is the US one.

[01:07:34] He merged a bunch of rail companies.

[01:07:35] The bridge rail train guys.

[01:07:38] And was like one of the richest.

[01:07:41] One of the richest men ever kind of people.

[01:07:43] The Vanderbilts of New York society.

[01:07:46] I feel like we should talk about the Beeching report

[01:07:48] but I don't know enough to talk about it.

[01:07:52] I don't know anything, what?

[01:07:54] Lord Beeching in the 60s closed a lot of.

[01:07:59] Oh I do know about him.

[01:08:01] I watched a documentary with Julie Walters,

[01:08:07] one of the trio from Mamma Mia.

[01:08:09] Yeah she did a documentary where she went on the,

[01:08:12] there's a bunch of steam trains that still go around

[01:08:14] the west, sorry the Welsh coast.

[01:08:16] And she went on a bunch of them and then was talking

[01:08:18] about all the railways he closed

[01:08:21] and how it affected small town business.

[01:08:23] Oh it was massive.

[01:08:24] There was the map of what was closed is insane.

[01:08:29] It's ridiculous how much was closed

[01:08:31] and it really.

[01:08:32] Well I'm glad that you know more about it than me.

[01:08:34] I just brought it up thinking

[01:08:35] that we should acknowledge it.

[01:08:36] There's one pet cemetery in the UK.

[01:08:39] I don't wanna be buried in a pet cemetery.

[01:08:43] No one likes the Ramones, okay go on.

[01:08:46] The used to be like was on one of the rail lines

[01:08:50] for that was closed and it was featured

[01:08:52] in the documentary but I really can't remember why.

[01:08:56] I'm sorry.

[01:08:57] No it's fine we should talk about the gender politics

[01:09:01] of Thomas so I tried to get my hands on a chapter

[01:09:07] of a book by what's she called Laura?

[01:09:09] Shawna Walton.

[01:09:10] Shawna Wilton.

[01:09:12] So it's a 2009 book and the chapter in it

[01:09:17] that I think that she's most well known for is called.

[01:09:20] It's a collection of, she only wrote that chapter.

[01:09:23] Oh I see okay and what was it called?

[01:09:26] Thomas and Friends, the gender politics.

[01:09:28] No it was the really useful engine.

[01:09:30] Oh yes really useful engines.

[01:09:33] So the only women characters in the classic series

[01:09:37] are carriages that get pulled along by the mail trains.

[01:09:41] Don't forget the wife.

[01:09:42] Oh the wife of the Fat Controller?

[01:09:43] Yeah sure yeah I did forget about her to be honest.

[01:09:46] Don't forget about the wife.

[01:09:47] Sorry yes I completely forgot about the wife.

[01:09:49] So Thomas's own carriages are called Annie and Clarabel.

[01:09:59] Annie and Clarabel could hardly believe their ears.

[01:10:02] He's dreadfully rude I feel quite ashamed.

[01:10:05] I feel quite ashamed he's dreadfully rude.

[01:10:08] And to Thomas they said you mustn't be rude,

[01:10:10] you make us ashamed but Thomas didn't care a bit.

[01:10:13] That was funny, that was funny he chuckled.

[01:10:16] He felt very pleased with himself.

[01:10:19] Annie and Clarabel were deeply shocked.

[01:10:21] They had great respect for Gordon the big engine.

[01:10:24] And sometimes they get to be honest

[01:10:26] they get passed around to the other mail trains.

[01:10:28] The way you explained this the other day

[01:10:30] just list off all the features of those existing

[01:10:33] that really just makes it worse and worse.

[01:10:36] It's so bad so they get passed around

[01:10:38] the mail trains as and when they're needed

[01:10:40] and they have comments like oh he's

[01:10:42] got ever such a nice manner.

[01:10:43] Like he's pulling you along a track.

[01:10:46] You rarely see that.

[01:10:48] You got pulled.

[01:10:49] You don't you often don't see their faces

[01:10:51] like to see their faces they've got

[01:10:53] to be like uncoupled from the main tank engine.

[01:10:58] The reason that Thomas has them

[01:10:59] is because they were awarded to him

[01:11:02] for being a really useful engine.

[01:11:04] So that's fun isn't it?

[01:11:06] If you're useful you get two wives.

[01:11:09] You get a polycule of carriages.

[01:11:12] I was watching some of the classic ones

[01:11:14] and then they cause I was like oh yeah

[01:11:16] there are no women trains so far.

[01:11:18] And then one train they were like

[01:11:21] and Stephanie went and blah blah blah.

[01:11:23] And then I was like oh finally the first woman

[01:11:25] and then the narrator went he.

[01:11:27] And I was like oh nevermind.

[01:11:29] Right.

[01:11:31] So you've got Thomas you've got Percy

[01:11:32] you've got Gordon who's a cunt.

[01:11:35] Gordon was cross.

[01:11:37] Why should Henry have a new shape he grumbled.

[01:11:40] A shape good enough for me is good enough for him.

[01:11:43] He goes gallivanting off to crew

[01:11:45] leaving us to do his work

[01:11:47] and comes back saying how happy he feels.

[01:11:49] It's disgraceful.

[01:11:54] And there's another thing.

[01:11:55] Henry whistles too much.

[01:11:56] No respectable engine ever whistles loudly at stations.

[01:12:00] It isn't wrong but we just don't do it.

[01:12:03] You've got.

[01:12:04] Gordon's a cunt name though to be fair.

[01:12:06] Yeah innit.

[01:12:07] There's Henry there's.

[01:12:10] Don.

[01:12:11] No it's not Don.

[01:12:12] Where did you get Don from?

[01:12:13] I will explain in a minute if you'd like.

[01:12:15] I'm trying to remember the other ones.

[01:12:16] So in Bullet Train the characteristics

[01:12:19] of the Thomas and Friends characters

[01:12:21] come up as a central plot line in that movie

[01:12:25] because one of the characters in the movie Lemon

[01:12:29] uses the Thomas Friends characters

[01:12:32] to denote different kinds of people.

[01:12:35] I really want to see it actually.

[01:12:36] And he the only ones he describes

[01:12:39] are Gordon, Edward, Henry, Diesel,

[01:12:42] Percy, Thomas and Don is mentioned.

[01:12:45] Okay.

[01:12:46] Maybe that's a later edition.

[01:12:48] He says Gordon is strongest most important

[01:12:51] and doesn't always listen.

[01:12:52] Yes.

[01:12:53] Edward is wise and kind.

[01:12:56] Okay.

[01:12:57] Henry hardworking and strong.

[01:12:59] Percy young sweet and not all there.

[01:13:03] And Diesel's fuck in trouble.

[01:13:06] Yeah he is yeah.

[01:13:07] I think that was because Audrey was kind of.

[01:13:11] Anti Diesel.

[01:13:12] Anti Diesel yeah.

[01:13:14] Duck was waiting for his next journey.

[01:13:18] Near him stood a red bus

[01:13:20] but he didn't look friendly like Bertie.

[01:13:23] The bus growled as he gazed at the happy passengers.

[01:13:27] Stupid nonsense he grumbled.

[01:13:30] I wouldn't have brought them if I'd known

[01:13:32] and if I'd had a breakdown or something.

[01:13:34] I'm glad you didn't smile Duck.

[01:13:36] You'd have spoiled their fun.

[01:13:37] Ah, enjoyment is all you engines live for.

[01:13:40] One day railways will be ripped up.

[01:13:43] Duck felt shocked at such an idea.

[01:13:46] We have a friend called Bertie and he's a bus

[01:13:48] but he likes the railway.

[01:13:50] Sometimes he teases us about it

[01:13:52] but he'd never want to see it ripped up.

[01:13:55] Round the bus.

[01:13:56] I know Bertie.

[01:13:57] He's too small in size to be of any use.

[01:14:00] Yep just they're just Diesel's are shit stirrers

[01:14:03] and they're trying for like the whole movie

[01:14:05] to find suss out who the Diesel on the train is.

[01:14:08] What I will say about Thomas and Friends is,

[01:14:12] I mean this is in praise of Thomas and Friends.

[01:14:16] If you take out the horrible faces and the people

[01:14:22] and just have like normal train models in the set

[01:14:25] it looks gorgeous.

[01:14:27] It really looks like someone has put a camera

[01:14:30] in a really well made model railway.

[01:14:32] The lighting, it looks like they've lit it

[01:14:35] like real daylight.

[01:14:36] Yeah I like that.

[01:14:37] It's really impressive and the real steam that's going,

[01:14:41] it's they've done a great job making it look really good.

[01:14:44] I think they did a really good job of capturing

[01:14:48] sort of British countryside-ness.

[01:14:51] Except all that industry.

[01:14:53] Well.

[01:14:54] Every fucking industry.

[01:14:57] Every fucking industry yeah.

[01:14:58] Every industry and yet we don't see the grossness

[01:15:02] of any of those industries.

[01:15:04] It's just like oh look how nice.

[01:15:06] The mines aren't gross at all.

[01:15:08] How nice, look at the countryside.

[01:15:10] Forget about the mines.

[01:15:12] Forget what we ever said.

[01:15:12] What a lovely slaughterhouse.

[01:15:14] The shits from all the trains alone.

[01:15:17] Oh sometimes their faces get covered in soot.

[01:15:19] Their faces are, I mean we've said this already,

[01:15:21] but they're horrible.

[01:15:23] Like their expressions are like when the trains

[01:15:27] are looking sad, they're looking like manically sad.

[01:15:31] Like drama mask sad.

[01:15:33] Yes.

[01:15:35] They're quite scary.

[01:15:37] Yeah, they do look like the.

[01:15:39] The drama masks yeah.

[01:15:41] The, ugh.

[01:15:43] Just awful.

[01:15:44] Gordon especially just has this face I wanna hit.

[01:15:47] But I'm scared of him so I won't.

[01:15:48] That would hurt.

[01:15:49] James, Percy, Mia, and Gordon, Rebecca,

[01:15:53] and Emily, and Thomas number one.

[01:15:55] Let's go, go, go on a big world adventure.

[01:16:00] Let's go, go, go explore with Thomas and his friends.

[01:16:05] Let's go, go, go and meet new friendly faces.

[01:16:10] The world's just a train ride away.

[01:16:13] Big world, big, big adventures.

[01:16:15] Thomas and friends, big world, big adventures.

[01:16:19] Meg watched the CGI newer ones,

[01:16:22] and then I watched the 2D animation newer ones.

[01:16:25] And I watched the first season that they did CGI,

[01:16:28] which was season 13, which was I think out when we were kids.

[01:16:32] I did not enjoy the 2D animation current ones.

[01:16:36] Firstly, the reason I said is the classic episodes

[01:16:40] are like five minutes long, right?

[01:16:41] The episodes for the modern ones,

[01:16:43] the 2D animation modern ones are half an hour.

[01:16:45] No, no, I can't.

[01:16:48] No, please.

[01:16:50] When I saw they were five minutes,

[01:16:51] I was like, oh thank God.

[01:16:53] And then I was like, you, I'm sorry, half,

[01:16:56] all right, half an hour, okay.

[01:16:59] And my main comment for the new ones

[01:17:01] is they're really, really generic.

[01:17:05] Yeah, there's no,

[01:17:06] you can't really make any bad claims about them.

[01:17:09] They're like a normal amount of educational

[01:17:14] that a lot of parents are gonna want

[01:17:15] their kids to be watching.

[01:17:17] They're not entertaining if you're over the age

[01:17:21] of about five.

[01:17:23] They're not even that stimulating really.

[01:17:27] They've got some very, very boring songs.

[01:17:31] Sorry, this is the CGI one or the-

[01:17:33] Both.

[01:17:34] Oh both, okay.

[01:17:35] They're both half hours.

[01:17:36] No, I don't know how long-

[01:17:37] CGI's shorter I think.

[01:17:39] Yeah, okay.

[01:17:40] So there's also like one of the things

[01:17:42] that I kind of liked the limitation of the classic

[01:17:45] because they're models.

[01:17:46] They can't hop between the rails without it

[01:17:49] looking really strange if they did that.

[01:17:51] Whereas the 2D animation ones,

[01:17:54] they walk off the rails.

[01:17:55] They move around, they swim and I'm like,

[01:17:57] please don't do that.

[01:17:59] This isn't a comment against it

[01:18:01] but they also have like a bunch of trains

[01:18:04] representative of different human races.

[01:18:07] Okay.

[01:18:08] So there's a Japanese train called Hero.

[01:18:11] Who is voiced by a Japanese voice actor?

[01:18:13] And then there's-

[01:18:14] Is it really, really fast?

[01:18:16] No, there is a bullet train though

[01:18:17] but I didn't see them speak much.

[01:18:20] I don't know their name either.

[01:18:22] And then they've got one train that I think

[01:18:26] is supposed to be representative of like

[01:18:28] an African background.

[01:18:30] Okay.

[01:18:31] Because they've got like vague African patterning

[01:18:35] on the train.

[01:18:37] I think it's again voiced by a black voice actor

[01:18:40] but I can't speak beyond that, you know?

[01:18:42] And it was just like, okay.

[01:18:44] I mean, I get it

[01:18:44] but it's also interesting to impart races onto trains.

[01:18:47] It is a bit, you can just eliminate it.

[01:18:50] Yeah, you could just eliminate it entirely.

[01:18:52] And wanting to-

[01:18:53] Multiculturalize.

[01:18:54] Yeah, so kids see themselves reflected in me

[01:18:57] but at the same time-

[01:18:59] Trains?

[01:18:59] They're trains.

[01:19:00] Trains.

[01:19:01] Why?

[01:19:02] Like we had, did you see that we had a comment

[01:19:04] that I deleted actually on, oh sorry.

[01:19:09] Yeah, if you follow us on Instagram

[01:19:11] and you tweet racism, not tweet,

[01:19:13] if you follow us on Instagram

[01:19:16] and you comment racism, we will delete it.

[01:19:18] Yeah, it was on one of the tweenies reels

[01:19:21] and someone had said that they see Milo as black

[01:19:25] which is not an uncommon opinion at all.

[01:19:28] Oh, we spoke about that in our episode.

[01:19:29] Yeah, and Fizz I think is mixed race

[01:19:35] and it started some discussion.

[01:19:38] Nothing was that bad.

[01:19:39] And then someone commented like,

[01:19:41] oh, I hate to break it to you but they're all white.

[01:19:43] And I was gonna sarcastically reply with like,

[01:19:46] actually Milo is purple and Fizz is yellow

[01:19:49] and you can interpret these characters however you want.

[01:19:53] But clearly this person did this with a lot of reels

[01:19:55] because they had the reply feature turned off

[01:20:00] so I couldn't actually tag them in a comment

[01:20:02] so I just deleted the comment.

[01:20:02] I was like, it's actually not worth my time at all.

[01:20:06] That's the beauty of things like this

[01:20:08] is that you can actually interpret them

[01:20:11] however you want to interpret them because they aren't-

[01:20:15] You can even suggest that they're all female.

[01:20:17] No one can actually tell you no.

[01:20:19] It's a train.

[01:20:20] It's a train mate, it's a train.

[01:20:22] It's a train.

[01:20:23] Don't you see a blue train and go,

[01:20:24] oh well that train's a boy.

[01:20:27] Come on, blue train is so boy coded.

[01:20:29] Let's be honest.

[01:21:00] Thomas!

[01:21:01] She's the cheeky one.

[01:21:03] Rebecca!

[01:21:03] She's new and lots of fun.

[01:21:05] Percy!

[01:21:06] She pulls a melody.

[01:21:07] Gordon!

[01:21:08] Thunder's down the line.

[01:21:09] Emily!

[01:21:10] He really knows her stuff.

[01:21:12] Jane!

[01:21:13] Is always showing off.

[01:21:14] Nia!

[01:21:15] Wants to help and share.

[01:21:16] Tommy!

[01:21:17] Well let's say he's square.

[01:21:21] So I messaged my mum this morning.

[01:21:23] I said, with recording Thomas,

[01:21:26] do you have any insights, any memories

[01:21:28] from when I watched it?

[01:21:29] And she said, boring as fuck I hated it.

[01:21:32] And I can see why she did.

[01:21:34] If I was watching that non-stop.

[01:21:36] Yeah.

[01:21:36] I think it was just because I liked the theme tune.

[01:21:38] That was my favourite thing about it.

[01:21:40] It's everyone's favourite thing about it.

[01:21:42] The way that it uses whistles

[01:21:45] and the noise of the steam as the instruments

[01:21:50] is so cool.

[01:21:52] It really had a moment, oh god,

[01:21:54] I don't even know when the moment,

[01:21:56] the memed, that-

[01:21:57] Come on motherfuckers, come on.

[01:22:00] You know the one that was played so loud

[01:22:02] it broke the speaker.

[01:22:04] Yeah, yeah, yeah, the Harry and Ron in the car one.

[01:22:07] Yeah.

[01:22:08] So funny.

[01:22:09] Do you hear that?

[01:22:10] You're getting close.

[01:22:12] Hold on.

[01:22:16] Just briefly more on the new ones.

[01:22:19] They've aged Thomas down

[01:22:20] and got rid of all the humans in the 2D animation one

[01:22:22] which I actually think hurts it.

[01:22:24] I like the interactions between the train drivers

[01:22:27] and the trains.

[01:22:28] Yeah, I do as well because it's just so,

[01:22:32] it suggests such a horrible working environment.

[01:22:36] I don't know, there's something about

[01:22:38] there being humans there as well that is just horrible.

[01:22:41] I like it.

[01:22:42] I like it too.

[01:22:45] So the only human is the Fat Controller.

[01:22:48] Thomas isn't the focus of,

[01:22:50] most of the episodes I saw he wasn't even the focus.

[01:22:52] I'm like what are you doing?

[01:22:53] Oh yeah, in the classic one as well.

[01:22:54] Oh true actually.

[01:22:55] And then so this one episode I watched,

[01:22:58] there's really clear messages that they're trying

[01:23:00] to drive home in each of the episodes

[01:23:03] which again if it's for five year olds,

[01:23:05] that makes sense.

[01:23:05] You can beat me over the head with it, I'm five.

[01:23:11] Interesting.

[01:23:14] Why are you beating five year olds

[01:23:15] over the head with it?

[01:23:16] Messages.

[01:23:19] All of it.

[01:23:20] Take home.

[01:23:22] Merchandise.

[01:23:23] Yeah fucking, that's why there's so many of them

[01:23:25] and there's merchandise.

[01:23:28] Audrey would have hated it.

[01:23:30] Capitalist that he was.

[01:23:33] The take home is like,

[01:23:35] it's an argument between two trains

[01:23:37] about function versus fun

[01:23:40] and one of the trains is they're trying to do art

[01:23:44] and she's really creative and creates bullshit.

[01:23:47] How the fuck?

[01:23:50] Go on, I don't even need to make that point.

[01:23:51] It's a pile of stuff.

[01:23:52] Yeah I don't need to make that point, just go on.

[01:23:56] It's genuinely, she just makes a pile of stuff

[01:23:58] and calls it art.

[01:23:59] She's like I'm creative and then she invites this train.

[01:24:06] I've never seen this kind of train vehicle

[01:24:08] but I'm sure they exist.

[01:24:09] It had like a crane hook thing on a train carriage.

[01:24:14] I've seen that at the docks, not on a train.

[01:24:17] But yeah so she's very function

[01:24:19] in this little other kind of train.

[01:24:22] Sorry all that time Laura spends at the docks.

[01:24:25] I've seen it at the docks.

[01:24:28] Waiting for the sailors to roll in.

[01:24:30] You know how prominent the docks are in Singapore.

[01:24:36] I've seen it at the docks.

[01:24:38] I always love to spend time at those docks.

[01:24:41] She really does.

[01:24:42] Singapore is a shipping country.

[01:24:44] So whole.

[01:24:46] Yeah true.

[01:24:47] And I don't spend that much time at the docks.

[01:24:49] You fucking love it.

[01:24:51] You eat that shit up mate.

[01:24:53] Om nom nom nom nom.

[01:24:55] Docks.

[01:24:56] The docks.

[01:24:57] So the little fun person at the train

[01:25:02] and then the function train they're like arguing

[01:25:04] because then she goes oh why don't you try

[01:25:06] and be creative?

[01:25:07] Why don't you try and make art to the function train?

[01:25:09] And the function train makes a table

[01:25:12] and then the fun train goes that's shit,

[01:25:14] that's not art.

[01:25:15] You're wrong it needs to be creative.

[01:25:17] Art can't have function.

[01:25:19] What would you rather someone made for you?

[01:25:21] A table.

[01:25:22] Or a pile of shit.

[01:25:25] And it's just that the main debate of the episode

[01:25:28] is form versus, sorry function versus fun.

[01:25:31] But they lean so hard on fun

[01:25:34] and how if you make anything with any function

[01:25:36] it's not art.

[01:25:37] I was like this is so mean.

[01:25:39] This is so rude to this one train.

[01:25:42] That's such a weird thing to present to a five year old.

[01:25:46] For half an hour.

[01:25:47] For half an hour yes.

[01:25:49] Especially because we're trying to encourage

[01:25:50] more kids to go into STEM.

[01:25:51] Yeah.

[01:25:52] Exactly.

[01:25:53] All those engineering kids going,

[01:25:55] well I guess I'm not fun.

[01:25:57] Yeah make that table.

[01:25:58] It's true though.

[01:25:59] Also for a show about trains

[01:26:01] you really like fun over function for trains.

[01:26:04] Like.

[01:26:06] Trying to get those train kids to branch out of it.

[01:26:09] Ha ha ha.

[01:26:11] Go make piles of stuff.

[01:26:13] Ha ha ha.

[01:26:17] I did.

[01:26:18] Do you remember the grass story?

[01:26:19] Oh yeah the piles of grass.

[01:26:21] Piles of grass that's all we did.

[01:26:23] I kind of wish that if my boss is listening to this

[01:26:26] I kind of wish she gave us,

[01:26:28] she know like golden time.

[01:26:30] Yeah.

[01:26:31] Yes.

[01:26:32] Can you hear you like on a Wednesday afternoon

[01:26:34] like go make a pile of stuff Meg.

[01:26:36] What was your chosen golden time activity?

[01:26:39] I was drawing.

[01:26:39] Oh plasticine.

[01:26:40] I hate plasticine now.

[01:26:41] I don't know why I enjoyed it.

[01:26:42] We didn't have plasticine?

[01:26:43] We had plasticine.

[01:26:44] I hate touching it now.

[01:26:45] I don't know why I enjoyed it.

[01:26:46] God I wish we'd had plasticine.

[01:26:48] I think I did drawing or reading or writing

[01:26:51] because yeah.

[01:26:53] I think I showed you both these recently.

[01:26:54] It's something that was an activity that I did

[01:26:57] and the children of my area did a lot

[01:26:59] and I thought was maybe more common than it is

[01:27:01] is we'd go into the forest.

[01:27:03] Ha ha ha.

[01:27:05] And then you'd see a wolf.

[01:27:07] Ha ha ha.

[01:27:08] And they all came out.

[01:27:09] Dressed as a grandma.

[01:27:10] Ha ha ha.

[01:27:11] And they all came out different somehow.

[01:27:13] Ha ha ha.

[01:27:14] I grew up in the countryside in the UK

[01:27:16] and we'd go out into the forest and we.

[01:27:19] Well the trees were calling to you weren't they?

[01:27:20] Yeah.

[01:27:21] It was whispering.

[01:27:23] We'd go for a bear picnic.

[01:27:26] We'd go and we'd get logs

[01:27:28] and we'd arrange them.

[01:27:30] This sounds so culty almost.

[01:27:32] Arrange them in like heart shapes.

[01:27:35] Like make a triangle around a tree right?

[01:27:37] And then we'd get coniferous leaves

[01:27:40] and stick them to the outside

[01:27:41] and see who could make the best shelter.

[01:27:43] Um.

[01:27:44] I used to be young.

[01:27:45] That's our piles of grass we made shelter.

[01:27:47] I also grew up.

[01:27:48] Function.

[01:27:49] I also grew up in the countryside in the UK

[01:27:51] and I had a bike.

[01:27:53] Aww.

[01:27:53] You had a bike?

[01:27:55] Your area's less forested than mine.

[01:27:57] Yeah but we were also a bit more normal than you.

[01:28:00] You were growing barley.

[01:28:01] Yeah they'd put me to work a bit younger than you.

[01:28:04] They were like.

[01:28:05] Send me to the docks mate.

[01:28:06] I grew up in a.

[01:28:07] Got some fish.

[01:28:08] Whereas us we were like

[01:28:09] can you just fuck off to the forest

[01:28:11] maybe find your way home.

[01:28:13] I grew up in a city and had a Nintendo DS Lite.

[01:28:16] Alright.

[01:28:17] Alright.

[01:28:18] Alright.

[01:28:19] Alright kids and their technology.

[01:28:21] This is why she has no imagination.

[01:28:23] I also had a DS Lite but I think I got one

[01:28:26] when I was like.

[01:28:28] Actually no.

[01:28:29] I remember playing on it in a specific room

[01:28:32] of my junior school which must've meant

[01:28:34] I had it in year five.

[01:28:35] I had a DS.

[01:28:36] I didn't get the light.

[01:28:38] I just had the chunky one.

[01:28:39] What was the difference?

[01:28:40] I don't think I've ever seen a DS.

[01:28:42] They were chunkier basically.

[01:28:43] Oh actually no I have seen a DS.

[01:28:46] It's like yeah beveled.

[01:28:46] It's like the top bit isn't the same size as the bottom bit.

[01:28:50] Yeah.

[01:28:51] What ugly wheels you've got.

[01:28:54] They're not ugly.

[01:28:55] They're caterpillars said Terrence.

[01:28:58] I can go anywhere.

[01:28:59] I don't need rails.

[01:29:01] I don't want to go anywhere said Thomas.

[01:29:03] I like my rails thank you.

[01:29:05] So this chapter in this book we tried to.

[01:29:11] Obtain.

[01:29:12] Obtain it.

[01:29:12] We messaged.

[01:29:14] Oh God what's she called?

[01:29:15] Shawna Wilton.

[01:29:16] Sorry Shawna.

[01:29:18] But yeah you can't easily get hold of academic papers.

[01:29:23] Well usually I can but this one wasn't even on Sci-Hub

[01:29:27] which was surprising.

[01:29:28] It's got a research gate and that's just like

[01:29:30] waiting for Shawna to reply.

[01:29:32] So I wanted to like raise the intellect of this episode

[01:29:36] by quoting from Shawna Wilton 2009

[01:29:39] but we couldn't get it so just take our word for it.

[01:29:43] The original show is really sexist.

[01:29:46] There's an imposed gender hierarchical structure

[01:29:50] in the reading of the show

[01:29:52] is what I think main takeaway from the chapter is.

[01:29:56] Did anyone else not expect it to have this many issues?

[01:29:59] Like it's got a massive gender issue.

[01:30:01] It's got an issue with conformity.

[01:30:04] It's right wing.

[01:30:06] I think anything from before a certain time

[01:30:11] I'm gonna just go in going all right

[01:30:14] what are they gonna make me feel angry about?

[01:30:16] I mean yeah it was written in the 40s.

[01:30:19] I don't know.

[01:30:20] Yes I kind of did expect it to have these issues

[01:30:23] but that's because I sort of read up on this

[01:30:28] like quite years ago.

[01:30:31] So I was familiar with the problems going in

[01:30:36] but like if I hadn't,

[01:30:37] that's because I have weird interests.

[01:30:40] That's all, that's just me.

[01:30:41] I didn't expect some of the gender stuff

[01:30:43] because I very vividly remembered incorrectly

[01:30:46] like one of the blue ones being called Emily.

[01:30:50] Well in the more recent ones there is one called Emily.

[01:30:54] There is okay.

[01:30:55] Then I think I was just projecting

[01:30:56] all Thomas I had ever seen

[01:30:58] to all of Thomas that had ever existed.

[01:31:00] Do you think Emily's blue?

[01:31:01] That's your first mistake.

[01:31:03] You don't wanna do that.

[01:31:04] Yeah I don't know.

[01:31:06] I do find it a shock having grown up in the world

[01:31:10] that we've grown up in

[01:31:12] when you look back at some of the other stuff

[01:31:13] and you're presented with a,

[01:31:17] you think things are sexist now.

[01:31:18] You're presented with an attitude

[01:31:19] that is just so like unbeknownst to us.

[01:31:23] We have no idea.

[01:31:24] Shall we finish with our old favourite?

[01:31:29] Common sense media. Common sense media.

[01:31:31] So what I've done this time

[01:31:32] is we've got bad reviews from the grownups

[01:31:37] which we're going to read some sad music

[01:31:39] and we've got some good reviews from children

[01:31:41] which we're going to read to happy music.

[01:31:50] From Rocco Wallaby, 12 years ago.

[01:31:53] How reliable is the Sodor Railway?

[01:31:56] I'll admit I was a fan of the show

[01:31:57] but looking at most of the episodes from then

[01:32:00] to present day there is one thing that irks me.

[01:32:03] The constant violence.

[01:32:05] Nearly one train per episode comes off the rails

[01:32:08] or has an accident and every time,

[01:32:11] and I quote, luckily no one was hurt.

[01:32:15] What gives?

[01:32:16] Sir Topham Hatt is not at his best.

[01:32:19] Seeing as how nothing is done to prevent the accidents

[01:32:23] come to think of it, what about the engineers?

[01:32:25] Sure they perform their usual duties

[01:32:28] but ultimately fail to keep their engines on the tracks.

[01:32:32] Chucky of AceH, three stars.

[01:32:35] Two are mature.

[01:32:36] Personally I disagree with the many chads

[01:32:38] saying that this is suitable for all ages.

[01:32:40] Do you see a normal adult watching

[01:32:42] such a childish TV show?

[01:32:44] It is probably too immature for children

[01:32:46] above eight to nine years old to watch.

[01:32:48] It's a very simple TV show and can easily brainwash

[01:32:51] and hinder children from growing up.

[01:32:53] This title has too much consumerism.

[01:32:57] Joe's 31, seven years ago.

[01:32:59] It's really good for children

[01:33:00] but when you get older it's terrible.

[01:33:03] It's a cute show but there's a lot of crashes.

[01:33:06] Four stars.

[01:33:08] Allay 13, 11 years ago.

[01:33:12] Thomas is a poor role model.

[01:33:14] Awful, awful role models.

[01:33:17] Lots of nasty competitiveness between the trains.

[01:33:21] Thomas and others frequently shirk their responsibilities

[01:33:25] to compete against each other or to show off.

[01:33:28] Thomas never seems to learn a single lesson.

[01:33:31] One star.

[01:33:33] Scout H, seven years ago.

[01:33:35] Not educational.

[01:33:37] My 3.5 year old stepson would watch this all day

[01:33:40] every day with his mum.

[01:33:41] So when he came to my house I allowed him

[01:33:43] to watch one episode a day with my two year old.

[01:33:46] I sat down with them one day to watch it

[01:33:48] and realised that this show doesn't teach them anything.

[01:33:50] They don't focus in colours,

[01:33:52] letters, language or anything.

[01:33:54] The only thing it maybe does is teach behaviour

[01:33:57] but even then many of the characters

[01:33:59] are very rude to each other.

[01:34:00] He is 3.5 and can't see a single word except choo choo.

[01:34:05] So I know that him watching the show all day with her

[01:34:07] hasn't taught him anything either.

[01:34:09] The characters are cute

[01:34:10] but I would not let my child watch again.

[01:34:13] One star.

[01:34:14] Sorry but my 3.5 year old stepson

[01:34:17] is such a funny thing to say.

[01:34:19] The characters are not cute.

[01:34:21] All right, are we ready to hear from the kids?

[01:34:23] Yep.

[01:34:24] The Goat of TV

[01:34:29] Gamer Keegs YT, eight months ago.

[01:34:32] Five stars, this is all in capital letters.

[01:34:35] The Goat of TV.

[01:34:37] If I were to only watch one show for the rest of my life

[01:34:41] it would be Thomas or Sesame Street.

[01:34:43] Try not to get bored challenge impossible watching Thomas.

[01:34:47] I don't understand this boy.

[01:34:50] Alfie09, four years ago.

[01:34:52] Great for kids but there are some crashes.

[01:34:55] Thomas the Tank Engine is a very popular TV show

[01:34:58] and is aimed at kids aged three to seven.

[01:35:00] But I would say four plus

[01:35:03] because of one scene where Duck yells shut up

[01:35:06] and then bashes into trouble trucks.

[01:35:09] Other violence includes trains crashing into each other,

[01:35:12] one scene including red oil coming out of the engine,

[01:35:15] not blood, of Gordon.

[01:35:18] This title has great messages, great role models.

[01:35:20] Three stars.

[01:35:21] Music Lovers Gig, three years ago.

[01:35:25] Not bad, weird concept, interesting show.

[01:35:28] Three stars.

[01:35:29] Battle Player, four years ago.

[01:35:32] It's a great show for everyone.

[01:35:34] It has great characters, great stories, et cetera.

[01:35:39] It's better than other shows

[01:35:40] because it's never politically correct

[01:35:43] because they are trains.

[01:35:45] Polity correct.

[01:35:47] Oh sorry, sorry, polity correct

[01:35:50] because they are trains.

[01:35:52] Raminator Springs, four years ago.

[01:35:56] Educantian and good.

[01:35:59] This reminds me of Cars which is a great thing.

[01:36:02] Five stars.

[01:36:04] XTynic, two years ago.

[01:36:07] I rated five.

[01:36:08] This is very nice.

[01:36:10] This is very nice.

[01:36:11] I was kid since five to nine years in 2011 to 2015.

[01:36:16] Old, I love Thomas and friends.

[01:36:18] He has made my childhood

[01:36:20] and OG, but this is safe for kids education

[01:36:23] and good kids show.

[01:36:24] Title has great messages, great role models, five stars.

[01:36:27] And every letter, every word is capitalized.

[01:36:30] Yeah, pretty much, yeah.

[01:36:32] Someone's commented on one of the Big Little Cook reels.

[01:36:35] Just now?

[01:36:36] Yeah, just now

[01:36:37] and I think the caption is something like

[01:36:39] oh who remembers this and their comment is like

[01:36:41] thumbs up, big chef little chef.

[01:36:46] Big chef little chef.

[01:36:48] Are we done with Thomas?

[01:36:50] I feel like we really ragged on it.

[01:36:52] I actually really, really enjoyed doing the research

[01:36:56] for this one.

[01:36:57] I think the background might be more interesting

[01:37:00] than the show.

[01:37:01] I think you might be right.

[01:37:02] Because we're not five and reading politically

[01:37:06] and cultural and social anthropologically into a show

[01:37:11] is more interesting than.

[01:37:12] It is a rich text.

[01:37:13] Yeah, it is a rich text.

[01:37:15] I just think that's a bit more interesting

[01:37:16] than the actual plots of any episodes.

[01:37:19] My favorite was Haunted Henry.

[01:37:20] Me too, I liked that one.

[01:37:22] It does say a lot about the time in which it was written.

[01:37:26] I didn't watch Haunted Henry.

[01:37:28] Meg, can you explain?

[01:37:28] I've gone really period stupid.

[01:37:31] I can't remember what happens in it.

[01:37:33] I just really enjoyed it the most.

[01:37:34] They're in the dark, it's night time

[01:37:36] and they're going through the dark forest

[01:37:39] from Snow White and they come across a signal

[01:37:44] that's orange which means caution ahead.

[01:37:48] Is this not one of the classic ones?

[01:37:49] This is one of the classic ones.

[01:37:51] One of the signals is yellow which proceed with caution

[01:37:56] and there's the, I forgot what the actual job title is

[01:38:01] but one of the people that works on trains,

[01:38:04] his jacket is hung up on a tree

[01:38:07] and there's something else that also gives

[01:38:09] the impression of a person but there's no person.

[01:38:11] This sounds fucking awesome.

[01:38:14] I Googled best Thomas episodes

[01:38:16] and this was one for a lot of people.

[01:38:17] I really wanna see this.

[01:38:19] And there's a cottage nearby,

[01:38:23] oh it's one of the buildings that are near train stations.

[01:38:27] One of those little houses that are near train stations.

[01:38:29] The signal house.

[01:38:30] Maybe and the lights are on but no one's there.

[01:38:33] There's other spooky shit going on

[01:38:36] and the train and the train drivers are all spooked

[01:38:40] and they're talking to each other going,

[01:38:41] oh what's going on?

[01:38:43] Nothing was going on.

[01:38:44] They just got spooked as it turns out

[01:38:47] as the person whose jacket was left eventually finds them.

[01:38:49] He's on one of those things, those manual things.

[01:38:55] And he's like what the fuck's wrong with you?

[01:38:57] It's yellow, you should have been cautious.

[01:38:59] Why don't you listen to the instructions

[01:39:01] I left behind kind of thing.

[01:39:03] Be quiet, snapped Henry.

[01:39:05] I'm not scared but he was.

[01:39:08] A little later the fog came down.

[01:39:18] As they approached the same area

[01:39:21] they saw the amber light again.

[01:39:24] Here we go, said Henry's driver.

[01:39:32] They're unbeknown to Henry

[01:39:34] the gates mysteriously closed by themselves

[01:39:38] and the signal went red.

[01:39:40] The trucks had seen all and they were spooked too.

[01:39:43] Faster, faster, there's a ghost about.

[01:39:47] Stop, stop, yelled Henry.

[01:39:54] A mysterious figure watched Henry go by.

[01:39:58] Ahead was a landslide blocking the line.

[01:40:01] You know that sounds so good.

[01:40:03] Like watching it I enjoy the vibes,

[01:40:06] I like horror.

[01:40:08] If all the episodes were horror episodes

[01:40:10] that'd be like a horror train show, that sounds amazing.

[01:40:13] I don't like it as a show

[01:40:14] but I like it as a kind of weird little cultural artifact.

[01:40:17] Like I know that that's not what it is,

[01:40:19] it's a massive fuck off franchise

[01:40:22] but that's not how I see it.

[01:40:24] Laura did an interesting thing just now.

[01:40:25] She said it was dark, it was night time.

[01:40:31] Oh my god.

[01:40:33] Next to her she tried to convince us

[01:40:36] that dark equals night time.

[01:40:38] If it is dark, it is night time.

[01:40:43] For some reason we were discussing

[01:40:44] if it's dark at four p.m.

[01:40:46] If it's dark at four p.m. it's still daytime.

[01:40:48] It's still the afternoon, it's just dark.

[01:40:51] Just like in Iceland when it's light for half

[01:40:55] of the year, that's not one long day.

[01:40:59] One day, one night.

[01:41:03] I have a radically different calendar.

[01:41:08] I bet you can't believe I picked up on that.

[01:41:10] Yeah, that's quite amazing.

[01:41:12] I'm pissed.

[01:41:14] That's some Shaun level shit.

[01:41:16] So listen, we've done our round off of the episode.

[01:41:19] What was your favourite episode?

[01:41:21] I don't know.

[01:41:23] I mean they all roll into one.

[01:41:24] Meg, stop flicking your straw.

[01:41:26] Meg's really ill, Laura's on her period,

[01:41:28] all of us are really hungry, we've got to go.

[01:41:31] Delirium is setting in.

[01:41:33] We've got to go.

[01:41:33] I've been delirious this whole time, I'm so hot.

[01:41:36] I don't know what's going on.

[01:41:38] It's suddenly hot, it's April.

[01:41:42] So Reverend, what's your name?

[01:41:46] Reverend Trane.

[01:41:46] Wilbert.

[01:41:52] Reverend Trane.

[01:41:54] According to his biographer,

[01:41:55] the Thomas the Tank Engine man.

[01:41:58] Thank you for your contribution to the culture.

[01:42:03] Thank you Reverend Mann.

[01:42:04] What?

[01:42:05] Thank you Mr. Mann for writing.

[01:42:07] Thank you Father Trane.

[01:42:13] I mean he wrote a whole book about a fictional island,

[01:42:15] his commitment to his own cringe is just,

[01:42:18] I love you for that.

[01:42:19] Thanks for listening everyone, we're gonna go.

[01:42:21] Let's do the socials quickly.

[01:42:23] All right.

[01:42:24] You can find us on TikTok at thoughtsTVpod.

[01:42:29] Instagram at ThoughtsTV, the O is a zero.

[01:42:32] On Twitter at Thoughts underscore underscore TV.

[01:42:36] You can email us at ThoughtsTV2002 at gmail.com.

[01:42:42] Have we got any others?

[01:42:43] We have a Patreon now and we have a Discord,

[01:42:45] both of which are linked on the socials.

[01:42:50] Very impressive.

[01:42:51] You can listen to these on anywhere you get your podcasts

[01:42:56] or YouTube where you can also watch the video episodes,

[01:43:00] the Young Dracula saga, the ThoughtsTV episodes.

[01:43:03] On Patreon the episode's ad free.

[01:43:08] Yeah so if you are subscribed to our Patreon

[01:43:11] you don't have to listen to the ads

[01:43:13] that you will have to listen to

[01:43:15] on any other podcast provider.

[01:43:17] Thank you for listening.

[01:43:18] Thank you so much.

[01:43:19] Under the conditions applied.

[01:43:20] Under the conditions applied.

[01:43:22] Please ask the bill payers permission.

[01:43:24] If you are under the age of 14 please have a parent present.

[01:43:28] Right, thank you for listening.

[01:43:30] Thank you.

[01:43:31] Thank you.

[01:43:32] Good night.

[01:43:33] Sweet dreams.

[01:43:35] Music

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