- "Well, perhaps this time, one of you can be the dragon, and I'll be the handsome and almost unbearably charming knight!"
- — James offering to join in the fun, James and the Dragon
James is a red mixed-traffic tender engine who lives and works on the Island of Sodor and is the North Western Railway's number 5 engine.
Biography
James is a tender engine who lives on the Island of Sodor with Thomas and his friends. He is often seen doing odd jobs like pulling tankers or other pieces of rolling stock, as well as greeting other engines.
Personality
James is proud of his shiny red paint work, and tries to keep it as clean as possible, but is always happy to see his friends and gives them a cheerful greeting whenever he passes by. He can pull any kind of cargo, but he mostly prefers to pull coaches. He is often shown to be quite careless, as he is constantly dropping cargo he is supposed to carry. He is shown to be impatient yet reassuringly confident as shown in Night Lights, but like Gordon and Diesel, he is overall portrayed much friendlier and less temperamental than he was in the original series.
Technical Details
Basis
James is loosely based on a Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (L&YR) Class 28, a class of 0-6-0 mixed-traffic tender locomotive designed by George Hughes for the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway and built by Horwich Works between 1909 and 1912.
It was a rebuild of Aspinall's Class 27, with the addition of a Belpaire firebox, a Schmidt/"twin-plug" superheater and the extension of the footplate and front sandboxes. One Class 27, 52322, survives and is operational at the Ribble Steam Railway.
He has a Fowler tender, the same tender as Edward, Henry and Gordon.
Livery
James is painted scarlet with dark red lining, gold boiler bands, and black wheels. He has the number five on his tender.
Appearances
Audio Files
| First used | Last used | Sound Effect |
|---|---|---|
| License to Deliver | License to Deliver |
| First used | Last used | Sound Effect |
|---|---|---|
| A Quiet Delivery | Active |
In the first season episode, A Wide Delivery, James is incorrectly portrayed with Gordon's whistle sound.
| First used | Last used | Sound Effect |
|---|---|---|
| A Wide Delivery | A Wide Delivery |
In the Train School episode, Under the Meadow, James is incorrectly portrayed with a lower-pitched version of Percy's whistle.
| First used | Last used | Sound Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Under the Meadow | Under the Meadow |
Trivia
- James is named after James Furze, a friend of Edmund Ward's son.
- Since his last appearance in Thomas & Friends, James has gained notable changes:
- He gained an extra boiler band.
- His footplate is now completely red.
- His lining is now dark red instead of black.
- The lining at the back of his tender which he received in the twenty-third series was removed.
- He now has dark reddish-brown irises.
- He now has rivets across the front of his smokebox.
- His cab windows are now the same shape as Gordon’s.
- He lost his brake pipe.
- His lamp irons have disappeared.
- His siderods have been removed.
- His handrails have also been removed.
- The gap between his leading wheels and driving wheels is now larger, though the gap's length changes depending on the angle.
- The axleboxes on his tender have been removed.
- His tender is now connected with buffers and chain-link couplings.
- Only the top part of his cab is open; the rest of it has been closed off.
- He now speaks with a British accent in the US dub.
- He gained a new whistle sound in License to Deliver. From A Quiet Delivery onwards, however, James regains his whistle sound from the original series.
- In the original series, James was a part of the original and reformed Steam Team and was one of the three central characters alongside Thomas and Percy. However, in All Engines Go!, his role is significantly reduced to a secondary/supporting character. Next to Gordon, however, he is the most reccurring tender engine in the series.
- James' whistle from License to Deliver was a stock whistle sound effect. Coincidentally, James used this same whistle sound in the live show, Thomas & Friends - The Big & All Aboard Live Tours.
- In storyboards for the first season episode, A Wide Delivery, James is shown with a different cab roof which more closely resembles the shape of Gordon's. This was later changed to more closely match the shape of his original cab roof.
- James is one of the only tender engines to keep their tender wheel-configuration. The others being Emily, Hiro, and Yong Bao.
- Ironically, along with others who have four wheeled tenders, both his Motorized and Push Along model has the same wheel of tenders.
- Even though James says he prefers pulling passengers rather than trucks in the Thomas & Friends: All Engines Go (Board Book), he is mostly seen pulling trucks than passenger coaches in the show. More specifically, Annie and Clarabel are currently the only coaches he has pulled in All Engines Go.
Merchandise
- Motorized (discontinued)
- Push Along (discontinued)
- McDonald's Toys
- My First Thomas (discontinued)