A single, blood-curdling scream rings through the flat. I
follow the distressing sound into the lounge. What on earth is the matter? Has
Frank hurt himself? Has Sara burnt her omelette again? Are we out of tea bags?
With a trembling finger pointed at the TV, Sara stands stock still, mouth
agape. I watch the screen for a few
moments, but my brain struggles to keep up with the audio-visual nightmare playing
before me. I slowly realise the situation is much, much worse.
What the f*ck is this?
It’s Thomas the Tank
Engine, our poor dear Thomas, taken from behind, and being made completely
CGI.
With every vicious thrust his attacker systematically removes
every shred of Thomas’s decency and charm; stripping away his regional
Liverpudlian accent, his toy model railway chic, deliberate sense of pacing and
his down-to-earth storytelling. Sara and I remain speechless, witness to this
most heinous of crimes. After it’s over, Thomas limps off the TV gang-legged
and bloody; not to his signature theme tune, but to a flaccid sing a long track
intoned by an uninterested choir. He’s barely
recognisable amidst the cheap computer graphics. No wonder his new-found voice
is tediously high pitched after an ordeal like that.
The initial sensation of helpless ennui quickly escalates to
anger. Why would they do this?
“We did this” says the current producer of Thomas the Tank Engine “Because the
majority of children's television shows need to be computer generated to appeal
to youngsters brought up on computers and videogames. CGI is aspirational for
them.” So with a whiff of self-fulfilling prophecy, Thomas the Tank Engine joins Fireman
Sam, The Magic Roundabout, Noddy, Bob
the Builder and the rest in all
looking the bloody same. You can’t shift the blame onto pre-school sponges for
enjoying the very food you’ve force-fed them, it’s like a French pate
manufacturer berating geese for being gluttons.
