Hoo boy, did Nia have it rough in terms of the fandom's reactions to when she first arrived on Sodor in the "Big World, Big Adventures" rebrand and their problems with her and why Nia felt a bit out of place among the rest of the Steam Team can be summed up in only one reason: she was a bit of a one-note character whose only trait was "Kenya...that's it." That all went away in All Engines Go!, since nowaday, she's a lot more spunky, more adventurous and has an affinity for music, making her a bit more interesting. But with that said, even if I think this new Nia is an improvement from her original series counterpart, she hasn't had the greatest track record in terms of her stories so far in the reboot and it all stems back to her now having a new one-trait personality of always trying to make a "perfect plan" which has honestly gotten really annoying very quickly.  So, would our Season 1 finale of All Engines Go actually do something new with her character?  The answer to that question is...a little.

I mean, it's literally just Nia's version of Season 16's "Thomas and the Sounds of Sodor" right down to the concept of Nia looking for some musical inspiration for a special event that is happening later in the day but fails to realize until it's too late that what makes the sounds of Sodor such a special place to live is the sounds made from everyday life on the island from the animals at the farms to the sounds that the many different engines make as they go about their work.  In the end, she ends up gathering all of her friends to help put on a special performance at the ceremony that everyone loves which...yeeeah, I have to agree with everyone at the start that a ceremony for a new bench isn't anything to write home about.  Unless it's a memorial bench to remember someone who was important to the railway or life on The Island Of Sodor in general, keep me out of it.

Final Rating: 3.5/5

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If you were to ask any longtime fan of Thomas what their thoughts were on the Brenaissance period of the original television series as a whole, they would more often than not tell you that the 2015 full-length special 'Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure' is where the era peaked. I mean, the music? The scale? The fan-service? The cinematography? Oh, man! I'm still geekin' out about it! One particular element that made the film an experience to remember was none other than Skiff himself. And be honest, when we first saw him in the trailer for the movie, we thought he looked really stupid, right? I mean, a sailboat on rails. Really? They're that desperate for toys?  Never did we expect that this little boat would turn out to be the most developed new character in that movie thus as a result, he became the standout character of the era. 

While it's great to see Skiff again after so long, it honestly left me rather confused not just because of the fact that I didn't know that there was such a thing as land sickness until I looked it up but also in the way that they retconned how Skiff received his wheel chassis from the original Thomas & Friends series.  Why? Well, if you remember the scene from 'Lost Treasure' where Thomas first meets Sailor John and Skiff on the night that they find the treasure map inside Calles Cavern, the little railboat says this line: "Sailor John gave me wheels after the ship was discovered so we could search for the treasure on land, but I wish I could be a real engine like you - not just a sailboat with wheels stuck on".  Now, I understand that we may never see Sailor John return to the franchise again due to the death of his voice actor Sir John Hurt five years ago, but after we just had an episode that paid homage to Nia's roots from the original series written by a former writer of the original series, you would think that they would've shown the same amount of respect towards another popular character from the Brenaissance Era.  

If you were to ask any longtime fan of Thomas what their thoughts were on the original television series as a whole, they would more often than not tell you that it's been many years since Sir Topham Hatt first came to Sodor as a railway engineer as he rose quickly in the company being a director at an early age and eventually chairman. His imposing appearance no less than his firm but kindly handling of both engines and staff earned him the affectionate nickname of The Fat Director. Then after nationalization when he was awarded a knighthood for his services to the railway industry, he became Sir Topham Hatt or The Fat Controller depending on which country you read or watch Thomas' adventures in.