Why Does Season 8 Of Thomas Feel So Off?
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- čas přidán 3. 03. 2024
- In this video I take a look at season 8 of Thomas and try to decipher why it feels so weird when compared to all the other Thomas seasons.
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Somehow strange that S8 is 20 years old this year.
Bruh
Oh god 😟
I’m already 20 now too.
Damn I feel old now
S1 is 40 years old
With how Michael voiced the characters, its like even he had noticed how soulless season 8 seemed to be and is trying not to let those feelings of something being off take over.
I actually didn’t realize that “Chickens to School” was the name of the episode where Thomas gets tired and confused and brings everything to the wrong place, because I never read the title when I was that young. Years later, I searched chickens to school on CZcams to be goofy and found out that’s the name of the episode. The adult humans are incompetent. They just let sheep take over the market, and chickens take over a classroom. Thought it was hilarious when I was 7, but now I realize how silly it is
I used to find that episode funny as a kid too.
That episode does have ONE good moment that being when Edward roasts Gordon "I'm always helping Gordon up the hill" 😂
I will say that the ending/opening theme is great in my opinion.
@@LegendaryCaptainlol that’s what I was gonna say😂😂😂
For me ,the first 7 seasons felt like real places brought down to the size and scale of a train set
The HIT era just feels like a train set. Someone’s first train set that they bought some accessory packs for. It doesn’t feel like we’re looking at a real place
Yeah, the older season sets had that rugged gritty feel that is associated with trains and had so much detail that it really seemed like an actual small English island from the 1950’s. It really made Sodor feel like an actual place that could exist. The season 8 sets look way too clean and polished to be believable.
Time for that special special job for thomas
They tried to make the engines feel more real
I actually didn't mind the "toy" look for Thomas. I always thought that was the idea.
5:55 “if he’s a tuba player, he might be playing the tuba”
DEAR GOD…
"There's more."
"NO."
It contains the dying wish of every man here
Season 8 is very much the "2000s nostalgia" season of Thomas. Nothing stands out, but it's trapped in your memories forever regardless; albeit faint and vague.
4:37 As much as I care about Magic Railroad as my favorite childhood, I have to agree with you. Especially with the lack of engine characters and the mistreatment of the human characters.
I could compare it to the transformers movies have the characters but focus more on humans
@@blueraccoon1088 Or Star Wars when the human characters are focused on and have the droid characters be secondary.
I think the reason why it was so weird is because it was the first season of the HIT entertainment series
Simple answer:Season 8 tries to be like season 6-7 and failed while also being unrealistic as possible
It doesnt though. It’s a new team of people so it tries to be brand new, it revamps itself as a patronising, slow, children’s show. Series 1-7 is 100% it’s own era. Series 8 onwards is something deliberately new, it dumbs itself down for children
@@obiwankenobi687 Probably i was wrong
It doesn't necessarily *try* to be like season 6 and 7, but like 90% of the writer's bible info is sourced from season 6 so it has that sorta lame depressing feel to it but amplified
@@ToastTheThe Yeah your right
@@obiwankenobi687i feel like it wants to be brand new, but it also wants to maintain the so called "aesthetic" of the show (mainly seasons 6 & 7) so it's basically a knock off the classic show
You’re gonna find this hard to believe, but i actually got the hit era questions right on my first try. for the first one I scoped the industrial background, so my mind went immediately to the warf stuff they did with the skarloey crew. As for the second one, it was just a gut feeling.
I can believe it. Heck, I got them all right as well using similar strategies. I had a feeling the last one was from Percy & The Oil Painting too.
Now that I’m older, I nearly despise the Hit era, because to me, they basically just rubbed salt into the wound the franchise they gained from magic railroad.
Unlucky Tug also mentioned that the higher frame rate didn't help because it made the engines feel even more like models.
TBH, Season 6 is the worst looking Classic season with it's desaturated colors, flat lighting, matte paint and basic sets, but it still looks a lot better than all the HiT model seasons bceause it still has that classic feel and the colors don't look quite as bad either.
The cameras used in the HiT era also lack that spark that the classic series had,. I don't know how to describe it, but there's something special about the film cameras in the classic seasons that HiT's digital cameras lack.
While Seasons 6 and 7 were by no means perfect, they were still great seasons thanks to a ton of memorable episodes, still keeping the 4 and a half minute run time, Angelis’ energetic narration in Season 6, Mike and Junior’s excellent scores, and most characters still being their true selves.
Being someone born at the beginning of the 21st century, (Although I saw all the classic seasons on home media before) the Hit seasons were the ones I watched on TV for the longest time. But looking back I do see all the problems with them that are present.
I never thought much about the HiT promo images, but now looking at them from your perspective... yeeeeeah there's something about them that feels a bit creepy. Plus you describing them as liminal is honestly an accurate description. The places and characters may look familiar, but something about the lighting, contrast, staging, cleanliness of the props, and the entire vibe overall just feel kinda off. Even when compared to promotional images taken during the past seasons. They are the embodiment of 2000s nostalgia no doubt, but they do start to get unsettling once you stare at them for long enough.
When I was younger, I honestly thought S8 and S9 were the exact same season. I thought CAE was a S8 special, because S8 and S9 look the exact same!!!! I also felt like S8 and S9 were so, dry, and soooooo lifeless.
I got all the screenshots right for the classic era and couldn't guess a single one right for the right era. The hit era ones look the same. One of the major factors when it comes to the hit era is time. The classic era was dispersed over nearly 2 decades (mindblowing!!!) So they had time to refine each season, develop ideas and sets. Hence they have such a distinctive feel to them. As opposed to the hit era, each season was made one year after another, so there's no time to do thing differently.
You can tell season 11 apart from the ugly yellow tint giving everything an early morning appearance unless the scenes take place at night
The only hit era/New series where did a good with Edward.
Season 8 and really the HiT era in general feels like if Thomas was written by an AI before writing with an AI was a thing. Everything is feels artificial and corporate, there's no soul. The classic era had character and it's arguably what built the majority of the fanbase. It was either Awdry's writing or writing within his general style, and the talent of the Britt Allcroft team with folks like David Mitton, Mike O'Donnell, and Junior Campbell.
And we recently found out that Abi Grant was the true culprit of the show going downhill, and Sharon Miller (even though she wasn’t involved with this season) had been given all the blame.
Do you know where I could find more info about that? This is the first I've heard of it.
She wrote the writers’ bible.
The gold seasons of Thomas are really memorable and very into-it’s-time back then, but the HIT era just felt more colourful and saturated, my eyes kind of hurt because of how many colours are showing up
I remember as a child wanting to like season 8 because it was the new Thomas episodes at the time but I could never get on board with it, I remember thinking they had dumbed it down
Harvey saying "If he's a tuba player, he might be playing the tuba" reminds me of that one GCI clip where the narrarator says "His firebox was on fire!" Okay, thanks Harvey. I thought the tuba player would be playing the saxophone!
yay!!! one of my favourite channels, i love it whenever there's a new upload!!!!!
While Season 12 is a worse season than Season 8, I would say Season 8 did a worse job at transitioning.
Season 12 being a hybrid season of models and CGI worked because despite the CGI faces and humans, the familiar lighting and model and set designs were still very much present. Not to mention, Michael Angelis and Michael Brandon (voices that kids would've been familiar with at that point) continued to voice all the characters. Sure, they sounded a little different due to syncing issues, but they both have recognizable voices for their narration and character voices. And Hartshrone used the same themes and instruments from previous seasons. Even though the intent was to make more seasons in that style, it at least helped kids become familiar with the trains having movable faces and the humans moving in real time before having to go full CGI (unless you're Japan). Not to mention, there were at least attempts at adding some worldbuilding and new faces to the show (whether they did a good job with them or not is a completely different argument altogether).
Season 8 on the other hand did not care about alienating its audience or putting things on hold. It just decided to change everything, with the only consistencies being the usage of models and Michael Angelis narrating for the UK dub. The lighting was drastically different, the frame rate was different, the instrumentation and themes used were all 100% different, the vocabulary was more basic, and the episodes were longer. On top of that, nothing new in terms of additional worldbuilding or new faces, which gives S8 no leg to stand on in terms of what it added to the franchise' lore.
Side note: If you look hard enough at the standard gauge shots in Season 10, you can see some differences in lighting between those and shots for S8 and 9. I say standard gauge specifically because the narrow gauge sets look the exact same as they did in S9.
The frame rate was fairly similar. The classic series was shot at 24fps and the new series was shot at 25fps.
While it technically was shot in 25FPS, the episodes had interlaced frames, which doubled the frame rate to 50FPS.
@@loogiman8491 you can deinterlace it to 50fps, but the base frame rate is 25fps.
You could describe it as: 'lonely'. The drivers and crowded sidings with rolling stock made it feel busy and full of life.
Fun fact: You can tell which HIT Era season is which by Thomas iconic face
Season 8:His casual eyebrows
Season 9:His eyebrows seem bigger but the right one is bigger
Season 10: His eyebrows are raised higher
Season 11:His mouth seems… different
Season 12: …IT’S CGI
Honestly I've always felt the same for S8. It either feels like the whole series is basically B-roll turned into episodes, or was more of a test pilot series to see how the new rebrand would turn out. Also what the hell were they thinking with that GoPro fish eye camera used for tracking shots, I know that kinda carried over to season 9 but season 8 is where it was used most.
Basically all I can say about season 8 is "you did a good job, but try harder next time".
I made a recut of this series, keeping in mind how I thought Gullane would've done it. Doing stuff like cutting the length of the episodes down to four and half minutes and making the colour scheme more appealing to look at. As I kept going with making them until three months ago, I decided to shift from Series 8 to other episodes of the HIT era that I thought were worth salvaging and then adapting Railway Series stories that weren't adapted for television.
From what I remember when I was doing those episodes, my goal was to only adapt episodes from the HIT era and see what I could really fix but as time went on, I just got more pissed off with it and decided to think outside of the box with two episodes because of the reason you listed here. The transition from David Mitton and most of the original crew leaving and going off to do their own thing to HIT financing the series with a new set of people was not smooth and it certainly shows here.
In recent months, I've started to think that they would've been better off producing and releasing only Series 6 in 2003, with their favourite episodes that they made in a 26 episode lineup and then just leaving it at that, because the restraints really started to show in most episodes of both series 6 and series 7, and even thinking about it is annoying. If I had the motivation to make a Series 6 that had the Britt Allcroft Production name attached to the opening of each episode, then I would certainly do it.
Given the narrative restrictions on Season 8, I feel like the set design suffered as a result. It was deliberately basic, with lots of empty fields and mundane countryside. Some of the shots look quite nice if there are buildings or implied settlements, but mostly the sets were forced to be bland. They did eventually get better, but Season 8 was a sluggish start.
No not those promo pics... I think they played a huge part in why people think Thomas is a baby show, the simplified sets make them look rather toy like. If you show them a narrow gauge shot from Season 4 I'm sure less people will put Thomas at the same level as Peppa Pig.
The behind the scenes of Season 12 feel the creepiest to me and to blame for your weird feelings is the Writers' Bible by HIT Entertainment.
0:14 for me. It's an era of thomas that i grew up watching on discovery kids in half hour blocks. Along with season 9. But without season 6-7 in it
Nice video bro!
*Harvey:* Look and listen. If he's a tuba player, he might be playing the tuba.
*Me:* What do you mean, the tuba player won't be playing the cor anglais?
I feel like because of the limited cast, Season 8 feels empty. Like in previous seasons, there would be engines crawling all over the place with nothing to do with the plot (Like a real railway). In Season 8, there is only the main 8 and a few characters appear as side characters once and don't appear again not even in the background. It just makes Season 8 feel empty and devoid of life.
Barely acknowledging the crews don’t help either.
In my early teens on early CZcams, I always felt like I had to wait for a certain overhead behind shot to see drivers and fireman in an tender engine’s cab. It turned into a game of “can you see the crews now?”
I’m glad there’s been a lot of discussion about how the morals in the HIT era felt forced. I think it’s a microcosm of how morals feel forced in general. Now that I look back on high school, I felt like when we were taught certain morals, it was done so in a way that assumed that without constantly being reminded of what not to do, we would turn into criminals or something.
I will forever defend this era of Thomas 👊🏽 Love the older ones too!
I'm trying to remember my S8 opinions from when I last watched it (Three years ago? Oh God!!!). Entertainment wise, I thought it was OK. It's definitely a downgrade from the first 5 or 6. If anything, I think the problems started in S7. That whole season gave off a strong feeling of "Cheap". A lot of shit was going on behind the scenes there... I'm trying to put aside my views as a 30 year old and think about how the target audience would enjoy it. That's probably why I spoke highly of the HiT-era TV formats where they mix modern and classic episodes with learning segments, that was a great idea, like the "Lesson of the Day" bits at the end of BWBA episodes... In terms of S8 itself, I can definitely see it has faults, most of which probably come down to a lower budget and new priorities from the higher ups at HiT, which would explain the learning segments and the slower narrations. I think, overall, it's definitely a downgrade in comparison to the first 5, but for me, it's one of the better HiT seasons, probably tied with S11. Give me either of those over S9 and S10. Those two seasons were horrifically dull to get through.
Hi Gondarth!
Not sure if Season 8 really had a lower budget because they can afford digital cameras and they barely used stock footage.
Still don’t appreciate them phasing out the crews starting here. No matter how good I can appreciate underrated elements of the hit era now, phasing out the crews is a trait that never sat right with me
4:05 actually they did bring the rest of the characters but from that point they became secondary characters to make the main ones the steam team
You better start running
Ngl, an ARG about season 8 would be interesting
5:32 Michael Angelis' delivery was so emotionless and slow I was convinced he had depression so much so that when the news broke that he'd died I thought he'd taken his own life.
DDLC made me hyperaware of possible mental illnesses a person may have.
My favorite part of Season 8 is the theme song called the engine roll call.
Even though people might disagree with me, it's still a nice and catchy tune. It is still memorable to this day!
At his point the TV series was mostly in the hands of people who knew nothing about what Thomas was all about. I'm not saying that the new writers were bad or anything, but they clearly knew nothing about continuity from earlier seasons, or railway regulations for that matter. Abi Grant's new Thomas bible definitely didn't help either. Calling that a bible is a monstrosity, in my opinion. But they had to let Hit Entertainment take over for survival, and times had probably changed at this point, slower-paced shows were getting updated and more unrecognizable to match a modern audience. For survival, the series had to be under commandment of Hit and have pointless episodes and new characters (most of them DID have awesome real-life inspired designs, but were used way to little) be made to sell toys. That's why Season 8 feel a bit of.
Some episodes are actually OK in my opinion (in Denmark we got Seasons 8-onward in 2007, Seasons 6 and 7 were only on DVD in 2006), but this was clearly a descend into the darker age of Thomas and Friends. Thankfully, we had a few good years with the Brenner-rennaissance (sadly only Seasons 18 and 24 of those were shown in Denmark, so yeah we had the short end of the stick)
I played the "guess the season the screenshot is from" game and somehow got every single one right. Yes, including both HiT-era ones.
You’re probably not human
We all know Thomas And Friends was the inspiration for Choo Choo Charles but Gavin (Two Star Games) never specified which era or season. It could very well be inspired by season 8.
The samey cinematography is courtesy of Stephen Asquith, which was meant to give the camera movement more life.
As someone whose possible first exposure to Thomas was Season 8, I have to say… yep. It kinda sucked.
The first season I remember seeing while it aired on PBS Kids. Some episodes are pretty good and decent while others just had me sleeping.
I mean at the end of the day, You can't hate any Thomas and Friends season.
For me I don' have any problem with Season 8 and I never did. Yeah it feels left out sometimes from the faces the characters make ''Mainly Thomas as seen his sad face during the video''. But S8 is good overall. Just like every other Thomas and Friends season.
Every Thomas and Friends season is good in its own ways.
I feel like Season 8 is a little more gray and blurry, Season 10 has more hints of yellow and the colors are brighter overall
Here are my guesses: World’s strongest engine, Bulls eyes, Percy and Harold, Thomas and the colours, Thomas and the new engine.
5:31 there are worst than that. Like his boring narration in season 9-11 and his rushed narration in season 12. Maybe listen to Michael brandon even though some people don't like his narrations
One word: Simplicity
come on everyone lets Sean to 10k subscribers so it can be a milestone for him
because it didnt have sharon miller as a writer
I believe David Mitton got wind of HIT's involvement and plans for Series 8 and it sickened him. I think that speaks for itself.
Somehow some way i managed to guess every season right at least for 9 & 10 which funny thing is i recognized those just by prop styles in the back ground but they do still look very much like everything else
With that quick guessing game at the 6:30 odd mark, i got all the answers right. Even the HiT ones. I'm not even joking 😂
I think season 8 is quite balanced in quality of each episodes because the scores I ranked them are close to each other while season 9-11 are really far from each others, like if I ranked all the episodes I think season 9-11 bad episodes will come first then the whole season 8 and end with season 9-11 good episodes
Also if you asked me about season 12 I barely remember anything from it
I like season 8, it was decent like the whole hit era
Homey wake up thomasfan261 posted
Honestly, the changes remind me of 2003 Postman Pat.
I totally agree. Series 8 always felt like every action was staged, and with poor lighting/film type. My favourite was always Series 2,1, then 4, as every shot looked like a window to an actual place, and not just a poor model locomotive thrown onto a grass mat with tracks, shrubbery, and a platform, though, I was able to tell which series the shots were in, so they each sort of have a certain feel. It would have been so nice to see Series 4's desolate wilderness, with series 1's painting-esque composition, angles, detail and cool lighting, coupled to the gritty industrialism of series 2, with the camera work, and realistic dirtiness.
One of the things I didn't like from this season and onwards was the limited number of characters I mean what was the point in redusing the poblation of engines and other characters in the show
Season 12 is creepy
I'm laughing that I got all the HIT era ones right I could easily tell
It feels off. Even compared to Seasons 6 and 7 which aired only in the previous two years, and Seasons 9-11 which aired over the next three
I think most people defend season 8 because Sharon Miller wasn’t involved yet
Time flows by
6:50 I feel ashamed for actually getting them right
Here’s a suggestion: Please do a behind the scenes video on your videos where you show yourself recording the voice over. Please
Season 8 was my favourite season that season was my childhood
Personally, I think Season 8 is a decent season, but I don't think it is as good as Season 6.
And this is the season that pretty much everybody just says it's the best out of the hit era
(If I'm not mistaken)
If it isn't, then what is?
@@SammySesame who knows...
Whens the next dvd review also ur my favourite thomas uploader please answer
In my opinion S8 to S11 are my favourite seasons cause they have such clean models but S12 I don’t like the cgi faces
sean i am sorry
Well that's tough to hear. I'm in a very small minority because I grew up and have nostalgia on the HiT era. A lot of 2000s stuff I loved growing up is hated. The Star Wars prequels, pre-MCU Marvel movies, 2003 TMNT. WTF does the internet know? I personally didn't really mind the aesthetic choices. I thought the colors looked vibrant for a 2004 kids show. I think calling it a "train set" is a complement, or was the idea because as a kid, I really did feel immersed into the show. The colorful toy-like designs of the trains really wanted me to buy a Thomas train set.
When I eventually did watch the original seven seasons, I really didn't think much of it. Just the different theme song and older cameras for a 80s-90s television. But it still felt like the same show really. I first saw Thomas when it came to PBS in 2004. Don't really agree much with this guy's opinion. Sorry.
it is crazy that i went 5/5 on that game
Liminal space ahh season
To me it was always just the camera quality
The yellow happy tint of S11 doesn’t help
I wish the Show didn't continue after 2003.
The season that had all 11 seasons on the classic box
I’m really not a fan of season 8 or the HIT era. But compared to All Engines Go, seasons 8-11 look like Boy Meets World
As someone who grew up watching the HiT Entertainment Model Era, I can't help but also feel something's missing, especially Season 8. For a long time, I wasn't able to pinpoint exactly what was missing as I felt something wasn't right, but I still watched it because I was a big Thomas fanboy.
Both this video and The Unlucky Tug's Season 8 review helped me see what was different between the first seven seasons and the next five seasons or so. You described why Season 8 feels off better than I could put into words.
I get it. When doing a Direct comparison of what came before it season eight is definitely a step down. However I don’t fully consider season eight as part of a bad era of Thomas. I still think season eight is the best season out of 8-12. In fact I put season eight a lot higher on my season ranking list than anyone in the world. I can see why you think not introducing a character makes season eight pointless. But I respectfully disagree. Sometimes a slow down season to get to know the characters can be good. Because we see sides of them we’ve never see before. I know some of the sides we saw caused them to age backwards, but given what the writers had to work with (cough cough the Hit Bible) I think the season was a good effort. And I think the fact that an entire book was written so the characters would be consistent was a great idea. I just think the wrong season was chosen as the reference when writing it. But a lot of the character moments undone with the characters I never really noticed until someone pointed them out to me. Season nine was really the season we’re undoing the characters went to far in my opinion. And I noticed every single episode of season eight heck even the bad episodes have redeeming qualities sprinkled in them. Like Roasting, funny human props in the background, or just a gag with characters bumping trucks or blowing steam. Episodes like Skarloey the brave on the other hand, I couldn’t find any. But anyhow I’m gonna wrap this up before I ramble any longer. Season eight definitely has flaws but I don’t think it was entirely a disgrace to the original series.
I love the season but sometimes the visuals feels too realistic in my opinion
I don’t mind it, but I also agree…
After watching series 8 way back in 2004, I was put off from any new episode after this, there literally is nothing that stands out, Michael Angelis sounds tired here, tired of repeating the very same lines in every episode over and over and over again (No disrespect on the late actor, this wasn't his fault). - from series 3 - 7 he has energy, emotion, depth and there was a real spirit behind his narration. Also I found the stories boring as the lack of railway realism made this series feel like empty and lifeless, background activity was basically none existent. Series 1 - 7 always had something going in the background which again add some realism, after all it may be an island with fictional characters, but it was still a functioning railway, I remember watching the series as a kid and trying to look out to see who is in the background pulling/shunting trucks or coaches.
I stuck to series 1 - 7, that was Thomas The Tank Engine - Series 7 was where I felt Thomas The Tank Engine should have ended.
This is the point where it went from all ages to baby show
Initial reaction: it does???
I got every single screenshot wrong 😭😭
Season 8 being so off? Is it because Fergus didn't get to appear in it along with seasons 9, 10, 11 and 12?
No I doubt that’s the case. It would be like if people thought BoCo and Duke not appearing again being why they didn’t like season 6-onwards so much.
Hit era did Thomas okay really, like sure the new writers want to make Thomas/Paw Patrol making it for more younger audiences than like for teenagers. The three strike formula yes in some episodes they were completely boring of one character making a mistake, then makes the problem worse, and the third they learn their lesson and fixes their mistake. The point is that they’d tried to make Thomas better (at least in some episodes). Tbf I prefer Andrew Brenner and Hit Entertainment to me my favorite era of TTTE.
@Driftking0311 Give the HiT era some credit, they didn't always excel in the writing, but they definitely excelled in the marketing; Thomas' show was brought back to PBS, the network where he was previously a long-running staple as part of the Shining Time Station spin-off, the show had continued to use scale train models for several more seasons to help it stand out among other leading preschool shows that made the transition to CGi, high-quality merchandise lines like Wooden Railway, Take-Along and Trackmaster were everywhere and children and collectors couldn't get enough of them despite that fact, and DVD releases were everywhere as well. Some of them came with one or two Wooden Railway models.
6:48 HOW DID I GUESS BOTH OF THEM RIGHT OMG
S8 and 9 look exactly the same, but I can tell them apart from S10, (somehow) because S10 looks so much more desaturated and dull. I like 8 and 9 because I can have an opinion, S10 kinda sucks, and idk about 11.
In many shots of the HiT era, the lighting is so dull that Thomas’ blue barely looks blue.
Also wow
Yeah those promo pictures are very overused. Why not just use promo pics from the classic series?
£9.72 is such a specific price.