Thomas the Tank and his friends are so bitchy

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I haven't watched Thomas the Tank since I was about 7, until last week when I stumbled across some old videos in a dusty box at the back of a cupboard. I got them out and decided to watch them on an old video-player we kept.
Seeing it for the first time in adulthood, I thought Thomas the Tank was monotonous and boring, but then I started to get into it.
It has some twists in it that you don't always see coming, like a TV drama.
I didn't realise how bitchy the engines and trucks are when I was a kid. Now watching it as an adult I see it in a new light.

In the episodes there are always things going on between the trains, that it's rather amusing. I'd never thought I'd ever get into Thomas the Tank again.

Anyone feel the same?

I used to have a supervisor at work that everyone called "The Fat Controller".
Not very nice, but it was a good description of him.

I only watched Thomas on Shining Time Station when it was on PBS, but yeah some of the characters could be downright mean and nasty. And one of the engines needed his "special coal" in order to function, kind of like a drug or something.

But kid show's today - ugh! Parents have bubble-wrapped their kids to tightly that they can't stand to let them watch stuff that has any drama or conflict in it. They only want them to watch boring, brainless garbage like Peppa Pig or Dora. Nothing but babysitter shows to keep the kids quiet because the parents can't handle being parents.

That reminds me of the age ratings of kids movies nowadays.

These were all films rated U/G in the past:
-Hunchback of Notre Dame
-Watership Down
-All Dogs Go To Heaven
-Secret of NIMH
etc.
All either very violent or mature for kids movies.

Films that are PG now:
-Frozen
-Inside Out
stuff like that
Raiders of the Lost Ark was the exact same age rating as those btw.

Great show. My favorite episode was when he broke out of the military base and steamrolled an elderly couple who were having a picnic in the park.

Last edited by Syd on 03 Jul 2018, 6:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Best anime.

The show was long after my time as a child. But we sold tons of Thomas stuff at the drug store I worked at.

It was back then in the late 80s when saw the show for the first and only time. As a grown up in my thirties, just out of curiosity. Tuned in on PBS one daytime I was off.

But it was just what you said.

The rail yard had a new "kid on the block". A diesel. It was a weird primitive looking thing that didn't look like the diesel locomotive that pulled the supercheif that I road on the Sixties. I guess they were 1930's British style diesels.

But anyway the poor diesel would get bullied and taunted by all of the steam locomotives. They even sang a ditty about "he slinks in and out of the rail yard just like a little weasel. It's the [something something] diesel."

Yeah, the rolling stock at shinning time station were a real bunch of playground brats!

These days they rate a kid's movie PG for "some action".
Which makes me think "Omg that person is running, that's 'some action', that might not be suitable for young viewers!"

Or maybe it's because "they" think if the movie is rated G, no one but little kids will want to watch. When I was a kid I saw at least a couple of live-action "family" movies that had quite a bit of swearing, which they probably did just to to give the movie a PG rating to attract a larger audience. But the swears usually just made the movies look even less mature. Now it's like in reverse, where there's no swearing or even violence but they take the slightest thing and slap a PG rating on it.

There was an article calling them fascist not long ago.
https://edition.cnn.com/2017/12/22/heal ... index.html

Children now watch truly garbage stuff like Logan Paul, someone is not appropriate for children whatsoever a terrible role model.