Here we are! The last installment of The Good, The Bad & Toby - a four review series by ThomasNATION members, MeganMusketeers and MichaelSth1995. In this series, the two members took two episodes - both from Season 5, both about Toby - and explained what they think about it, and why, in two reviews - one positive, one critical.



Last time, MeganMusketeers explained why she thought the episode, "Toby & The Flood" was quite good, and now, MichaelSth1995 tells us why he thinks its... downright terrible. Which side are YOU on? Read & find out...



Read MeganMusketeers' side on the episode - why she thinks its a good one!

Hey guys, its me! In the last post of The Good, The Bad & Toby, I'm here to tell you - why Toby & The Flood was... a fail... (do you agree?)

Like I've said, I do not hate the classic series; (in fact S1 is my all time favourite) but unfortunately it just has some duds here and there. This episode is one of them. 

So It's been raining heavily for days, and the river close to Toby's branchline has risen due to the rain, and Toby has been sent to inspect the dam, which prevents the river from overflowing. Why they couldn't ask for inspectors and they ask for Harold instead, I'll never know. Oh, and a railway is built over the dam because... screw logic - am I right?



All of a sudden, the dam begins to break. 

Now, At the old wooden bridge, Percy waits anxiously for Toby, and he slowly crosses the bridge and stops... because the plot demands for him to do so. Why? If he'd run out of coal or water, it would've made sense, but this doesn't. Anyway, the dam collapses and the bridge breaks with Toby on top. How? Granted, he isn't as weighty as Percy, but he's not a sack of feathers either - another plothole!


Anyway, Percy and Harold go off to rescue Toby from going over the edge of a waterfall. Harold lowers a rope to Toby's crew... Get this, over his buffer instead of, oh I dunno, the literal bridge? That would certainly be the logical thing to do. 



And another talk-about-lack-of-logic: why a rope? Why not a chain? That would be the stronger, safer option any day. 

Now, Toby is safe; and when the rain finally stops and the dam is repaired, he's praised for his courage. Wait, what? Did I watch a different episode? Percy and Harold did all the rescuing! And Percy says he could've never been so brave, they must have forgotten about the previous episode (Put Upon Percy, to be exact.) Continuity torn to shreds, I guess.


Yeesh. The plot's a real mess right there. Unlike Snow, it does treat a serious issue like a serious issue, and Percy showing bravery to help his friend is admirable. But that's it. It is seriously flawed, plot-wise, I don't like it at all - because it all comes down to the plot, when you're looking at an episode. But there's more points as well, in this episode - its other aspects:

In my opinion, Apart from that dam, the model makers did a great job with the sets and the realistic waterfall was great too. Moreover, If there's one thing I can't fault, it's the music. Even though their S1-2 music was far superior, the music afterwards was pretty good too; not as good as Chris Renshaw but better then Robert Hartshorne. The music played the situation well and... well that's it, really. Quite good music for the situations - that's a plus point.


But, and I'll be blunt here, I intensely dislike Alec Baldwin's narration - in Season 5 it sounded like he was trying too hard, in Season 6 it sounded like he was falling asleep, as far as I'm concerned Michael Brandon is lightyears ahead of him. The UK dub on the other hand - another thing I do like about Season 5 is Angelis' amazing narration - it's superb and fits the tone perfectly. So, overall, its 50/50, I guess.

But that wasn't the worst they gave Toby for several years... (That's something for another time, though.)

Concluding, I rate it 1/5, I don't hate it as such like I do Toby's Discovery, but the story needs drastic edits.

Rating: 1/5.

But Megan didn't agree. Read her review here, if you haven't already.

ThomasNATION members, Megan and Michael start a four-review series, The Good, The Bad and Toby. They will review two episodes - one a good review, the other a critical. Both from Season 5. Both about Toby.

After Megan's positive review for Toby's Discovery, Megan takes the wheel to describe just why he feels that episode was a let-down, and not good at all. Which side do you agree with? Read on to find out why Michael thinks that episode was bad, before you decide...
This is quite an innovative series in my opinion. A good review, a critical review. Really gets both sides of the coin. Megan did a positive review of Toby's Discovery, and I'm going to tell you why I completely dislike that episode:

The start of the episodes is pretty good - (an exception, in this episode). I don't have a lot of complaints although why is the map a map of North Wales? That's bothered me since I found out; and Toby's theme mixed with Oliver's isn't as good as everyone thinks, I just don't think it works but that's just me.



The good that the episode did with the beginning, it all crumbles after they discover the mine. Compare this episode with 'Ghost Train'. Sure in that episode, Toby is being a 'wimp', but he was only pretending so as to fool Thomas. Here, - although - Toby is just plain scared, plain frightened, when really he should be wise about not being scared. This, I feel, is a violation of his character's traits - its described completely wrong. Instead of him being wise, he's scaredy and afraid - which we all know is not him.



Although props to the model crew, they did do a decent job at the mine. And the music that played during this scene was good, so kudos to Mike and Junior for that. But the main let-down of this episode is Toby's character - the way they portrayed it, and some prominent story flaws.

The ending is a bit of a slap in the face when Bertram and Toby are mentioned to be good friends then it's never brought up again; if that doesn't spell pointlessness then I don't know what does. It was completely unnecessary, especially in light of the fact that Bertram never appeared, ever again.



Bertram, a pointless merchandising character. According to Britt Allcroft, he was going to be a tank engine. But due to financing, the model was not made and so the character's model was a used Duke with Smudger's face - I say bollocks to that! 

If she had enough money for Thumper, a character that served absolutely no purpose other than merchandise, then surely she could have constructed a flipping tank engine, yeah Dennis, Hector and Hank were merchandise tools, at least they were actually interesting!



I'd like to note how we completely accuse Mattel for making characters just to sell merchandise - sure they do it. But the past wasn't all that good, either. Bertram being a prime example of that. 

Bertram's uselessness, and undeveloped character (he was just described as "brave" - ?????) added to the fact that he was purely there for merchandise, HE NEVER EVEN SPOKE, makes me hate this episode. Plus the deadly inaccuracy in Toby's character-handling...

In ending, I hate how Toby was portrayed which is a shame because I actually like the idea, it was just awfully executed. I also hate Bertram (and people complain about Bradford and Philip, AT LEAST THEY HAD PERSONALITY AND WERE DEVELOPED). 

This episode can go rot in the ground for all I care. (Quite angry there, Michael!)

It's the worst of Season 5, the worst of the Allcroft era (yes even worse than Snow and Rusty to the Rescue [it was pretty close though]) and in the top 5 worst episodes of the classic era. My rating is 0/5. 

Rating: 0/5
Megan's Rating: 4/5

Thanks for reading!


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Michael S - @MichaelSth1995
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And I love that, Toby, Henrietta and their crew are running their old line once more. It's very poetic. Anyway The Fat Controller (I'm just gonna call him that from now on) instructs Toby to take him to “seaside” in Henrietta. Because in season 5 he must have suffered a stroke making him forget pronouns and and contractions. There is no mention of Lady Hatt. My guess is she didn't want to come due to all the visits and trips that happened before in this season ended in disaster.
So this is part of it, nice work writers. The shots and atmosphere look wonderful, the mine set is laid out well. It is reasonable for Toby to be scared too, he is surrounded by dead bodies. Now a friend of mine suggested that Toby's crew and Thomas knew about Bertram and were having him on. This is backed up by the fact they are smiling while telling Toby. I like to think of this as Thomas' revenge for Toby helping Percy in “Ghost Train”. After all Thomas had already gotten Percy, albeit by accident. The “toot-toot goodbye” really sell this theory, cause I mean that's really aggressive.



Wonderful fog effects start our next scene, creaky noises made even spookier by surround sound.