who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

it's for work...and I am clueless about Thomas. There are a TON of characters i dont even know where to begin
can anyone tell me the favorites/most popular? the least popular?
if you were to buy your children a toy, which character would it be?

Message edited 7/29/2013 4:09:12 PM.

Re: who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

I think the most popular are:
Thomas, James, Percy, Henry, Gordon, Emily. They are in the song. My son also likes Harold the helicopter, Cranky the crane, he growls at Diesel (the diesels are bad or something.) The conductor is Sir Topham Hatt.
We have so many characters, but got a lot used.

Re: who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

Yes, Thomas is the most popular. He's blue. Percy (green) and James (red) round out the top 3.

If you aren't forced to watch the show with your child, they all kind of look alike. But don't tell that to my 4 year old. He can tell the difference between all the blue ones (they all look like Thomas to me). After a while you get to know the different shapes and facial expressions. Some faces are round, some are square. Some are happy, some are angry. Some of the older trains are numbered, which definitely helps.

The theme song is sung by a bunch of children, and it is like nails on a chalkboard to a lot of people. After all the times I've listened to it, I still don't know all the words, even though they have them at the bottom of the screen to sing along to.

Thomas and all the trains keep my son occupied for hours at a time some days, so we roll with it.

who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

There's also Dash, Bash, Ferdinand from Misty Island and Hiro (from Japan), Kevin & Victor who works at the Sodor Steamworks. Sir Topham Hatt is actually the owner. They don't show the conductor in the show. My son loves Diesel. I guess he's different because he's the trouble maker.
For female trains there's Mavis, Emily and Rosy.
If you're buying trains for kids I suggest getting the not so popular ones. If they are a Thomas the Train fan they will mostly likely already have the popular ones. We have 4 or 5 Thomas', 2 or 3 Percy's, etc.. all given to us as gifts.

Message edited 7/29/2013 4:56:40 PM.

Re: who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

Re: who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

Thomas and Friends

This website has a picture of each engine with their names.

There are a eight main engines, but they are not numbered 1-8.
Thomas (main character, young engine, easily sidetracked, tries to prove little engines can do big things - blue) (Annie and Clarabel are Thomas's passenger cars)
Percy (his best friend, loyal to Thomas but gullible - small green engine )
James (red - competitive and boastful)
Gordon (large, blue - thinks bigger is better, older engine who thinks he knows the right way of doing things)
Henry -(large, green engine, require special coal, breaks down a lot, but kind to other engines)
Edward (large, blue oldest of all the engines, sort of grandfatherly)
Toby (steam tram, square, brown, often unsure of himself, does not live with the other engines in Tidmoth Sheads, likes birds, and is shy)
Emily - dark green, large with a big wheel, she is bossy and thinks her way is the best.

The other engines mentioned were from movies. These are the main engines and they all have jobs on the Island of Sodor. Sir Thoppham Hat is the owner. These engines are larger guage track engines, the narrow guage engines run on smaller track and Mr. Percival is their owner. They do have men to operate the trains but they are not really featured.

hth and feel free to FM me about it.

Message edited 7/29/2013 9:37:11 PM.

who can teach me about Thomas & Friends?!?!

Thomas is on sprout channel every night at 6:15 I think