It's a small but very vocal cadre searching for perceived injustices to hysterically scream about and feel better about themselves. If you're loud enough, you get press. If it's controversial, it sells magazines, paper, online hit, whatever. It's utterly impossible not to offend someone somewhere nowadays. So keep it all in perspective and you'll eat less antacids. Some changes are inevitable but the original Thomas basic premise was still good. It's the extreme monetization that bugs me. IMHO, of course.

I wonder what the next railroad related cash cow will be....

I don't know, but we could sure use some good ones. Producing events on our own is great, but it doesn't carry the marketing impact as a nationally recognized brand does. Of course, many of us can do fine working locally only provided we're operating from a sustainable strategy.

To everyone who's curious why some would consider the show to be authoritarian, please read this New Yorker piece. It goes into much more detail, citing multiple examples from the show, some of which I must say does seem pretty questionable in a modern context. You may agree, you may not, but the accusations against the current state of the show make much more sense once you've read it.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/rabbit-holes/the-repressive-authoritarian-soul-of-thomas-the-tank-engine-and-friends

You know, we could have just used this thread to discuss:

1) Statistics on Thomas revenue at our operations
2) Impact (if any) on declining Thomas revenue
3) Efforts to diversify into other revenue themes
4) Ways to make the most out of the remaining Thomas brand awareness

Just saying, look at the subject line.

It's all the product of a British writer (and minister if memory serves) from the 1940s. Of course there was going to be a devotion to duty and male-centric mindset behind the original books.
I recently talked with a Brit fan who had read all the books and he said the original books were far more specific than anything we've seen on TV, giving dates and even noting various railways on Sodor that went under and others took their place over the years. I never knew there was a richer history behind the Thomas stories; maybe I'll have to read them someday.
I get a little annoyed when someone has to change characters from something beloved. You simply cannot have people of certain demographics in charge anymore in media, so they always have to be changed.
British sci-fi staple Doctor Who recently has introduced a new Doctor who is a woman (he's always been a white male all this time). They created new shows in a glacial speed, so we won't see anything on this until October.
Similarly, many people have demanded that the next James Bond be a woman (Jane Bond?) or African in descent.
The new Magnum PI series will have a actor in the lead role who I think is Hispanic, and the "Higgins" character is going to be.... wait for it.... a woman.
Frankly, I just don't get it. That'd be like demanding that any new "Shaft" movie have an Asian character in the title role.

The original stories are really great from a railfan point of view. While the locomotives have faces, everything else is quite authentic and for the most part realistic. For example, Thomas is filling in on a branch line and a police officer writes him a citation for not having a cow catcher or side boards. When Sir Topham Hat finds out about this he goes and purchases a steam tram he "met while on Holiday" to serve that line. That tram is of course Toby and that's how Toby came to operate on the line.

So it turns out that a few episodes of this upcoming season of Thomas released early in some foreign markets and there are Spanish dubbed versions of several episodes available on YouTube. Out of curiosity I watched a few of them.

If they think what they're about to release is going to keep kids watching here, I want to know what they're smoking and where to get it. It's not even the geo-political, PC, girl power stuff that's the problem either. If anything that's down played. The animation sucks, the storytelling sucks, the writing sucks, and it's just plain boring.

They've literally gone back to almost everything Sharron Miller did as show runner a few years ago that almost killed the show the first time. It's written on such a "talk down to kids" infantile level that you're gonna have trouble getting preschoolers to stay and pay attention to this stuff. Oh and somebody had the bright idea that Thomas gets a "what did we learn today" moment at the end of EVERY SINGLE ONE of these things like it's a friggin' episode of Captain Planet.

This is your warning - if you're still relying on Thomas to save your yearly budget DROP IT NOW! and find something else. If you think the returns are diminishing now just wait till this crap hits Nickelodeon.

I can't speak for the later versions, but I read some of the original stories, shall we say, a little over fifty years ago. If the critics could occasionally ask why things were shown in the books in a particular way rather than rushing to a judgement, then they would find that the details were rooted in the reality that Rev. Awdry and his readers knew and not on political theory.

"Troublesome Trucks", for example, why should they be singled out for blame? Well, they were troublesome. Back in the forties and fifties, nearly all of the ordinary British coal trucks had loose chain couplings and no continuous brakes, and they were often unstable at high speed. All the crews had was the steam brake on the engine and the handbrake in the guards van (caboose). It took a lot of skill to control several hundred tons of freight downhill and the trucks could and did run away out of control if anything went wrong. You may like to do a google Search for "John Axon".

To make things worse, a lot of the trucks were antiquated things with wooden frames, in bad condition after WWII and the fate of S.C.Ruffy is just the sort of thing that might have happened.

These TTE threads have been eye-opening, albeit pretty far astray for RYPN. “Parktrains” post about the appeal of animation and storytelling is a beacon of light among the rest.

I finally had time to check out some details, only to discover that the multi-cultural characters actually further the cause of education about rail history and preservation.

Rajiv, one of a couple of Indian characters, is based upon the Fairy Queen. No, that’s not a name designed to trigger homophobes. The Fairy Queen is the oldest regularly operating steam locomotive in the world. Fairy Queen was built in England.

Nia, the African character, is a Kenyan-Uganda ED1 class 2-6-2 built by Vulcan Foundry. This class was built in England. Don’t worry, I am sure we will find out Nia was friends with Obama growing up in Kenya. ;-)

The new girls? HongMei is a Chinese CJ. Rebecca is a Bullied West Country Pacific. I could go on...

What an interesting way to introduce the world history of railroading. Much more RYPN-ish than Chuggington, eh?


Back to marketing...

I fully understand from what I have had read here that only lilly-white asses of straight 5th generation Americans occupy seats on US heritage railways. But just - for a moment - imagine there might be Chinese families in California. Or a vibrant Indian community in New Jersey? Or African-American families who are proud of their roots? What if Nia, HongMei, Rebecca and Rajiv created interest among these folks? What if they then came out to the local Thomas events? And spent actual American currency?

Wouldn’t it make sense to grow a railway’s business by introducing it to new customers?

Logically, I would think so, but based on the conversation here I am not so sure. It sounds like we may need to bring back Jim Crow cars for tourist train service just to make sure we don’t accidentally brush up against someone who is different from us.

We live in interesting times.

Been to a "Day out with Thomas" event, lately? I have and noted a vast diversity of clientele present. I'm sure Kelly Anderson or others who have hosted a DOWT event would be happy to back up that up.

Bottom line, there ARE people of multi-cultural backgrounds attending, and spending their hard earned dollars on these events. Your statement suggests that they are not simply because they don't have a character who they can identify with...assuming they went as far as to research the railways in their native countries, is just not true. A train ride is a train ride at the end of the day.

The inherent problem with PC-injected or "forced" inclusion is that it WILL cause alienation, otherwise known as the law of unintended consequences. If you are blatantly pandering to a certain demographic in the name of PC, you're going to alienate those who are just out for the experience, and not a political lecture. It has to be carefully balanced otherwise you're setting yourself up for failure. Good entertainment requires no politics. I think we can all agree with that.

Best,
DC

Donald -

You missed my sarcasm.

In marketing, it is widely known that inclusive advertising/content increases interest among minority demographics. US heritage railways haven’t come close to fully tapping these audiences.

I still fail to see how including female trains and trains from other countries is political. It’s human. It’s also a good way to combat Xenophobia.

Rob

robertjohndavis - I do not know if the diversification of the Thomas franchise is really a part of what you are seeing or not. I do know that, when I was recruiting for a preservation effort a few years back, one of the local gentleman who expressed a lot of interest had parents who had immigrated here from India when he was a young boy. His father had been an executive at the national railway there and he had fond memories of touring the country in a business car. Several of our discussions were focussed on how to involve more of the Indian immigrant community in our preservation effort. It is folly to ignore the large amount of Chinese and Indian immigrants, to name a few, when marketing events or recruiting volunteers because these people often come to our country with a far larger cultural connection to railroading, and even steam railroading in particular, than the average US citizen whose family has been here for three or more generations.

Here's an interesting if a bit unrelated read: http://www.spiegel.de/international/par ... 23502.html

A few takeaways from the article:
- By 2030 there will be 500 million tourists, half of which will come from the growing Chinese middle class.
- A French farmer grows fields of lavender and a Chinese company uses his fields for a tv show. Now his fields are a tourist spot for Chinese so he hires Chinese translators, expanded his gift shop, and opened a restaurant that serves Asian noodle dishes. In a good year his gift shop has revenue of several hundred thousand Euros, more than the lavender is worth itself.

That's a very specific example but in general terms we need to be the French farmer by being inclusive, not turning people (and their money) away.

Again, opinion.... Lee almost hit on it. The Thomas books are fictional fantasy, not meant to be educational tools. I believe the original series, being based on the books, was also fantasy and not meant to be educational. Strictly entertainment. As a parent, you have the responsibility to make sure your child understands what is fantasy and what isn't. Turning it into a teaching tool sort of does a disservice to the original story premise. You wouldn't rewrite Winnie the Pooh because it's not polite to get your head stuck in someone else's honey jar. These changes to make it more PC are to make it educational.

Now, can someone get this jar off my head. I seem to be stuck.

My mistake.



I think you may have glossed over what I trying to convey in my previous post. I'm referring to "forced inclusion" which, can be argued is similar to exclusion in some right. I'm not suggesting that inclusive efforts aren't successful, they certainly are and should be pursued! I'm stating that if they're arbitrarily thrust into a marketing campaign with no regard to those who may not consider themselves the target audience, you are inevitably going to alienate that potential revenue source. It's a two-way street. It has to be a strategic, balanced effort to truly be inclusive to all. If that can be mastered, you have it made. That is all.

Best,
DC