The problem
As many people know, Thomas & Friends is a beloved children’s franchise that centers around a bunch of lovable anthropomorphic steam engines, including, but not limited to, Thomas the Tank Engine. But this is also one of the most misunderstood and mishandled franchises in modern media. Nowadays, the general public sees Thomas & Friends as a dumbed down preschool show for babies just because the engine characters are alive.

The show, which was based on a long-running British book series called the Railway Series, had it’s first seven seasons be realistic in real-life railway practice, with the sole oddity being that the train engines had faces and could speak, and yet, they would still behave like real-life machines and require human drivers to operate them. Plus, the stories would mostly treat its audiences with a level of intelligence and never play down to them. Every once in a while, the stories would also be dark and tense in tone. Not just lighthearted all the time. The near-grounded realism and the semi-complex dialogue are the real reasons why kids would be drawn to Thomas & Friends, and that’s how parents would appreciate it.

The show started being dumbed down to kids when Hit Entertainment took over in 2004, with many childish and gimmicky plot points being thrown around, and the stories strayed further away from real-life practice with the engines simply doing whatever they want without any common-sense or dialogue from their drivers. The stories also began to vary less in tone to the point where all episodes are lighthearted and ended the same way. Thomas & Friends has been publicly exposed in this way for so long that people naturally associate it with other generic preschool shows.

After toy company Mattel took over the show in 2012, a team of writers tried to undo what Hit did and make Thomas appeal to kids the same way the first seven seasons did by bringing back the grounded realism, albeit with some corporate mandates. Unfortunately, Mattel did not market the show well enough for kids to be able to watch it. Thinking it was the grounded realism that made kids lose interest, Mattel took matters into their own hands in 2018 and made the engine characters jolt their bodies around and force in fantasy sequences about trains doing lowest common denominator things a train realistically shouldn’t be doing.

Netflix picked up the North American rights to stream the show in 2020, but the changes Mattel made had already worsened Thomas’ public image. Things have gotten even worse still when a reboot, titled All Engines Go, was created with a silly 2D visual style with the engine characters literally bouncing and stretching around; it’s now treated just like Paw Patrol, Pixar’s Cars, and Blaze and the Monster Machines.

In short, Thomas & Friends’ main selling point is realistic trains that just so happen to be alive, but it is currently owned by a toy company that doesn’t know how to manage it.

The solution

Netflix, a current streaming platform for Thomas & Friends, allows filmmakers and television makers creative control over the content they make under the Netflix banner. If Netflix is ever able to buy the Thomas & Friends brand, they should create another reboot; this time, bring in experienced writers who understand the franchise and allow them complete creative control over how the show would work. If the writers do exactly what the first seven seasons of the original show did, then kids, along with long-time fans, would be drawn back in, and view counts could potentially be endless, especially if it is streamed worldwide.

Mattel solely bought Thomas & Friends to make money off of it, and it could only be a matter of time before it becomes its major undoing. If Mattel ever needs to start selling off any of their brands to cut their losses, they should sell Thomas & Friends. It doesn’t need to manage a property if it doesn’t know how to handle it well.

Netflix might not know how to handle it well either, so the only way for them to do so is to allow a team of writers creative control over it. If the writers know to make Thomas nearly-realistic again and bring back semi-complex dialogue, then kids will absolutely enjoy it. Thomas & Friends is a break from generic kids shows like Paw Patrol. It’s slower and more comfy, but not to the point where it’s just boring. More often than not, there should be exciting stories thrown around too, but not to the point where it’s overly gimmicky and cartoony.

If Mattel is ever forced to sell Thomas & Friends anyhow, Netflix should buy the franchise. Selling it to them and allowing the writers total creative control over a brand new reboot with the same overall tone as the original books and show would totally save the franchise from its current state and general misconception.