it has taken me to age 34 to twig that there are NO female characters in Thomas the Tank Engine

[sleeplessbunny]

Just that really.

I don't know if I am more astounded by the fact there are actually no female characters, or the fact that it has taken until yesterday for me to realise, despite watching it practically daily as a child. I always loved watching it (still do )

Both are quite worrying really

The original Thomas stories are not only sexist in their lack of female characters, they are quite openly anti-socialist/Marxist/social mobility (there isn't a good word for that). The trucks are one example, and there is one book about a bus who wants to change working practices on the island to be fairer. He is lambasted all the way through, and ends the story with his wheels removed, being used as a chicken coop.

There is also the recurring theme (that doesn't appear in the TV shows) of the engines being threatened with being cut up for scrap if they don't do as they are told.

YY The Small Clanger.

I wouldn't mind there being no female characters in Thomas, tbh, because the one female train (Emily) that I've seen (disclaimer: don't watch it at all these days and deliberately avoided it when DD was little because it's such godawful dull shite) was written as a bossy, shrewish know-it-all who got her comeuppance for being a 'bossy boiler'. Stereotype much? It would have been better if she hadn't been there, all we got was the message 'girls are know it alls who talk too much, don't listen, and screw up' - because she's the only female engine that message is so much more pointed than if it had been one of the male ones in that role!

Obviously the old characters need to stay the same but A A Milne didn't write about a lumpy so why couldn't that character have been a girl, or do boy toys not like playing with girl toys?

With regards to Thomas none of my DC really got into it so I don't know any of the characters.

TheSmallClanger, totally agree with you. And then there is this heavily christian undercurrent of how it is good to be obedient . . . Saying all this, my DS is obsessed with the stuff.

Can I nominate ATruth for autocorrect of the week? That was fucking funny.

What's happened to the OP, I wonder?

Both my sons (oldest now 21,youngest 13) were obsessed by Thomas. We have 2 huge boxfuls of the Thomas metal toys and a wooden Thomas trainset, not to mention all the books and other paraphanalia!!

I am out of practice now, but I used to know all their names from the original series. Not very up to date with the CGI version.

I've got loads of the books, which I bought off eBay when pg with DS2 as DS1 was obsessed with them and I would bring them out when BFing. Neither DS interested in them now. This thread is making me nostalgic :(

OK, well DD is watching a DVD of some pretty old episodes (probably the ones I remember) and there are no female characters at all as far as I can tell. I do remember Annie and Clarabel the coaches though, now I think about it. But none of the others mentioned here, suppose they must be newer, or perhaps not seen very often.

Glad to hear the newer episodes are not like that. I have never come across them on the telly (Cbeebies on a lot here ) where can I find them?

(DD is currently going through a train obsession)

I'm an 80s baby and only remember the carriages, I think the female trains were a pc addition after my time!

I was at work, btw. Not everyone can mumsnet at work!!

Loving the autocorrect ATruth

And to answer some earlier comments, I agree these old TV programmes are just reflecting attitudes at the time, I'm not expecting anything to be done about it (obv), I am just rather shocked at myself because I never noticed until now.

Daisy and Mavis come into the stories pretty early on,they are part of the original books by the Reverend.

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Daisy

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Mavis

Strange that they are both diesels....

The chicken coop bus is bulgy and he actually starts the story as a chicken coop, before being returned to service, which he hates and then being turned into a mobile veg stall.

I know far too much about Thomas and his fucking friends.

Emily (the purple engine), Dowager Hat, Annie and Clarabel. I thikn there's a female diesel in the more recent ones, too, but I may have been hallucinating over my muesli and coffee.

Emily is dark green I think. Rosie is pinky purple. Molly is yellow. Mavis is a diesel.

We are going to Drayton Manor this summer.

Emily is indeed dark green
Rosie is pinky purple
Molly is yellow
Belle is blue and fights fires
Elizabeth the truck
Mavis the diesel

DS has all of them

We got excited today as there is a new engine Caitlin she's pink and big and she's on C5 this Friday I think

We are also going to Drayton Manor this summer, most days I a, Victor and DS is Kevin sometimes Diesel 10

In one of our books the Stationmaster's Wife makes an appearance, but only to be annoyed that she has to cook breakfast again after Thomas crashed through their dining room wall and got plaster in the fried eggs.

Annie
Clarabel
Mavis
Belle
Clarabel
Daisy
Emily
Flora
Elizabeth
Henrietta
Lady
(Skarloey is male apparently )

Not forgetting Alicia Botti!

And Lady Hatt

I am 38, and I neither noticed or cared that these programmes are gender biased. MUST we feminise everything? They are trains and stuffed toys! FGS!