User:Lukwisnie

Hello. I'm Lukwisnie. I'm usually known as "Groovy Roadmeter." It's like a stage name. While my primary interest is Pixar's Cars franchise, I also like Thomas. If I were to compare myself to a Thomas character, I would choose Edward. Not because I'm old and wise, but because I'm kind. However, if something really gets to my nerves, I might "strike out."

A Message to CGI and HiT Haters
Over the last few years, many fans have been complaining about how HiT and CGI have "ruined" Thomas and Friends. Here, I have an essay that I hope will convince you otherwise. If it does not, you should still stop complaining about it all the time.

While this kind of stuff is kind of a thing of the past, I still feel like this essay should still be written.

CGI isn't bad
A lot of people seem to hate the new CGI Thomas, saying that it ruined the show and that the CGI switchover was a mistake. In my opinion, the CGI is better than the models and has not ruined, but improved Thomas and Friends.

The mouths can move, and I'm sure that their mouths would move if you actually saw real engines with real faces, or else they couldn't talk. I mean, you can't expect someone to talk without moving his mouth. The people and animals move and do stuff rather than just stand there and change position only when nobody is looking, for the same reason why the engine's mouths move. People don't just stand still all the time and move only when nobody is looking.

CGI also allows for more massive locations, like the Blue Mountain Quarry. I think that a set replica of the Blue Mountain Quarry would be too big for Shepperton Studios.

Any narrow gauge engine can communicate with any standard gauge engine. They're no longer limited to just Thomas and James, and seeing the same engines meet up could get boring after a while. Same thing for members of "The Pack." They can communicate with any engine, standard or narrow gauge, and vehicle, not just Thomas and Percy.

Other railways can be made into CGI, like the engines from the Arlesdale Railway or the Culdee Fell Railway. As models, they might have to be the same gauge as the Skarloey Railway engines.

A lot more detail can be seen, like some of the engines' smaller parts, like handles or those miniature pipes (at least that's what I think they are). You can also see inner workings underneath the engines rather than just a black box.

In some ways, CGI is also more "green" than models. After all, some of those models and sets might've been made out of wood, which means cutting down trees, which means less trees to turn the CO2 into oxygen, which means more CO2 in the atmosphere, which means global warming, and global warming is a problem. CGI wood is not made out of real trees, so no trees are cut down.

Sometimes, when a crash happens, the models and sets get damaged and destroyed into a state where they can't be fixed (happened with Fergus). Then means they become trash, and trash is a problem. When you do a CGI crash, anything can be fixed no matter how damaged it gets, so no trash.

While the computers used for CGI use a lot of energy, some renewable energy sources to power those computers are being used more often, like solar power.

The only two cons that CGI has is the lighting and the ability to go against realism. For the ability to go against realism, they can always choose not to. I think the lightning is the only thing that makes everyone call the CGI cheap, when there is in fact a lot of detail. That just leaves only one real con with CGI. I think it's the bad writing that's making the CGI look bad, and it's not being used to its full potential. If the writing was better, people might like the CGI more than they actually do. After all, the CGI used in Thomas and Friends is better than the CGI used in most children's shows.

And by the way, the show changed to CGI in a different "style" than most shows did. Most shows go straight from entirely the old style to entirely CGI. Thomas and Friends went from entirely models to half-models-half-CGI to entirely CGI, which slowly gets you used to CGI rather than snatching the models away and slapping CGI in front of you.

Why CGI happened?
People think that HiT switched the show to CGI to save money for greedy reasons, which is not true. It was because of bankrupcy. They were low on money and couldn't afford to keep the models anymore, so they HAD to switch to CGI. And even if they do make a lot of money, there are lots of employees that work for HiT and Shepperton Studios that have to be paid for their work, as well as the actors and narrators, toy companies that create the merchandise, as well as the TV stations that air the show and companies that translate the show into other languages (maybe not all of that, but you probably get my point).

Even if there was no bankrupcy, I think the CGI switch-over was the right thing to do. It brought the show into the 21st century and created a new breath of fresh air for the series. I do like the models, they're fine to watch, but I think they would be outdated today.

Remember, we are now living in a world where technology controls our lives. Thomas being in CGI can keep children up to date and help them get used to the technology that controls our lives.

Conclusion
I really think that all the fans who have stopped watching the show because of CGI, fans who didn't even gave it a chance, should give it a chance. If you still don't like it, stop complaining about it all the time and don't watch it. Simple as that. The models are very unlikely to come back (if they do, I would probably faint). Things change, and we have to deal with it. Nothing stays the same forever.

HiT was framed
A lot of people constantly complaining about HiT and what they did to the show. They even call them mean names, and I can't give examples because they involve cursing.

Sharon Miller
I don't think it was all of HiT that caused all that "damage," but rather, it was just one person who works for them. Her name is Sharon Miller. She has been, not only any writer, but the head writer, for the show since season 9, almost as long as HIT has owned the show. Even though she didn't work on season 8, it was HiT's first season, so "it's a start."

Anyway, back to Sharon Miller. Over the course of the series, each season has more episodes written by her than the one before it. Then came season 15, which had more episodes written by her than any other season, which explains why it's being called the worst season in the history of the show. Also, out of all of HiT's episodes from seasons 9 to 16 that introduce new characters, Sharon Miller was the writer for half of them.

It's seems like part of Sharon Miller's writing style to include three strikes and rhyming. I think each episodes that include rhyming were written by her. And since she was the HEAD writer, she can make the other writers use her writing style. If Sharon Miller has never joined the show, I don't think HiT would be getting so much hate, and probably there wouldn't be any "Thomas is for babies" kind of stuff.

Now that she has left the show after season 16, it seems like the damage that she has done is being fixed. There is a new writing style and writing staff. Three strikes and rhyming are disappearing. Old characters are starting to come back, like Duck, Bill, Ben, and Jack. Other characters are getting their classic personalities back, like Skarloey and Rheneas. Some of the new locations seem to tie with Railway Series locations, like Vicarstown Bridge. But she may come back one day, she may.

I am not trying to be mean to Sharon Miller. I mean, she probably is good at writing for other shows, just not children shows.

Apax Partners
Also remember that HiT had a parent company, Apax Partners, who also might be responsible for all the damage. It's possible that they forced HiT to do some of the bad stuff.

Despite not seeing it as a mistake, maybe they're also responsible for the CGI change. It's possible that they paid HiT only a little bit of the money that the show made, leaving them with not enough money to afford the models, so they had to go CGI. But not even that was enough, so HiT had to be sold to Mattel (yes, Mattel bought HiT, not just Thomas, for the fans who think Mattel owns Thomas). Now Apax Partners no longer owns HiT, so maybe that's the reason why season 17 is fixing all the damage.

Britt Allcroft also had flaws
A lot of the damage that HiT, or rather Sharon Miller (and maybe Apax Partners) has done has started before HiT bought the show. As for season 5, I could probably write a separate essay about it. | Here is a link to something that says practically the same stuff I would say. (Disclaimer: I am not the person who owns the blog.) In fact, he points out a lot of other useful information regarding this topic in his other posts. He also thinks that Britt Allcroft ruined the show by buying the rights from the Awdry's in the first place.

Here is some things that happened in seasons 6 and 7. Some slight personality changes occurred in the classic series. Toby's Discovery involves Toby acting scared, just like he does in the HiT era. In the beginning of Harvey to the Rescue, Edward teases Harvey when he's supposed to be kind. Skarloey and Rheneas act as young engines in a few season 7 episodes, like The Old Bridge and Rheneas and the Roller Coaster. Also, it could happen that one character gets his/her personality changed for only one episode, but then, because of that one episode, everyone else thinks that that's the character's real personality.

Thomas and the Magic Railroad also has some flaws that I don't recall test audiences forcing Britt to change. In one scene, Thomas collected some coal trucks of special coal for Henry, and Henry is not supposed to need special coal anymore. Plus, the movie portrays Sodor as a magical place. To quote from Chris Tomson's review of the movie, "Sodor's supposed to be an enchanting place to fire up a child's imagination, but it's not magical." That kind of makes the movie non-canon with the rest of the show. Also, the engines all have different whistles (and Bertie has a different horn), even Thomas'. (thankfully, the original whistles and horns returned in Season 6). And the title uses the American term railroad rather than being "Thomas and the Magic Railway." British fans have also criticized the use of Shining Time Station characters, characters from a show that hasn't been shown in Great Britain, and they were planned to be in the movie since the beginning of production.

As you can see, Britt Allcroft wasn't as perfect as everyone treats her like. I mean, she did create the show and was good at adapting Awdry's stories, but not very good at writing her own stories. Some of what HiT has done has started when Britt was still on the show. If she didn't buy the writes from Awdry, the show might still be tied to the Railway Series, and maybe Sharon Miller might've never been a writer for the show in the first place. I think why everyone is only complaining about HiT is because Sharon Miller (maybe a little bit of HiT) has created so much bad stuff, that it hides Britt Allcroft's bad stuff. After all, HiT has been working on the show for 9 years, while Britt Allcroft did only one season and one film of her own work.

According to season 5's pointless characters, I wonder if Thomas and Friends was in fact meant to be a money making show in the first place. I mean, the Railway Series has a lot of trains and vehicles that can be made into toys, thus making money. Since the show is based off of a book series that had good stories, the episodes based on those stories were also good, and that's why it didn't seem like a money maker.

Goes to show you that, sometimes, a very great show or film that is very good can turn out to be in fact created to make the studio money. Of course, there is nothing wrong with liking something that was created just to make money.

Good things that HIT has done
HiT has actually did some good things during their contribution to the series, even while Sharon Miller was the head writer.

HiT is not only in charge of the show, but also all of the merchandise. Over the years of their ownership, a Bachmann and Hornby have commissioned old characters, showing that HiT didn't forget about the classic characters. They also introduced a Thin Controller to be the controller of the narrow gauge engines, something that Allcroft has never done. Before, the Fat Controller was the controller of both the standard gauge engines and narrow gauge engines.

They created the "Down at the Station" segments, and a video about how steam engines and diesel engines work, which shows that they actually do know about railways.

So, as you can see, HiT has actually done a lot of good things for the series.

HIT getting the wrong hate
I have noticed that HIT is getting some of their hate for stuff that they didn't even do, like some changes in the appearance of characters, or animation errors (maybe not animation errors, but still, they're being blamed). Remember that HiT is not in charge of the animation. It's the animation studio (Nitrogen from s13 to s16, Arc from s17 onwards). If a character changes his/her appearance, or if you find an animation error, the blame goes to Nitrogen/Arc, not HiT.

They're also being hated for not creating episodes based on Railway Series stories. Remember that Britt Allcroft bought the television rights from the Awdry's in the first place. That means that HIT isn't allowed to make episodes based on Railway Series stories, no matter how much we beg. Some fans think that HiT created a new logo that took out "the Tank Engine" out of the original title. That was actually how it was since Thomas and the Magic Railroad, meaning that Britt Allcroft changed the show's logo, not HiT. Plus, it's not even a big deal. Changing the logo won't make the show bad. It's like the new Pepsi logo. It didn't change the recipe, it still tastes like the old Pepsi.

But one of the most surprising, shocking, crazy things that HiT is being hated for is removing YouTube videos that use footage from the show. One person even accused them of trying to control YouTube. That's like arguing and fighting with the police and calling them names for pulling you over for speeding (not saying that HiT is the police).

Removing videos is actually what HiT is supposed to do. It's following the law. After all, YouTube has to allow HiT to remove the video before they do so. The videos use footage from the show, which HiT legally owns, so that is like stealing the footage from them and claiming that you own it, which is an illegal crime. But this can be prevented if you ask them for permission first. Or try something more simple, like adding a message to the description or creidts like, "I don't own Thomas and Friends. It belongs to HiT entertainment." That way, your videos won't be deleted.

Stop complaining
I hope that the rest of the essay has convinced you that HiT and CGI are not bad, and Britt Allcroft wasn't perfect either. If it didn't, still, stop rambling on and on about it and calling HiT names. It gets as repetitive as Sharon Miller's episodes and makes the people who do like them feel bad. In fact, it gets so repetitive, that "childhood" and "models," to me, have become annoying words.

What I also find annoying is that some fans complain that the show should've ended after season 7. That is an insult to the newer fans who became fans of the show when HiT was owning it, like me. That means that if the show did end after season 7, I never would've become a fan.

You can always just stick to the episodes that you like and pretend that the ones you don't like didn't exist (it could also help to look back at your old comments and remove them).

Conclusion
Overall, HiT is not as bad as many fans are saying they are, but they're still not perfect, and neither was Britt Allcroft, and the CGI change was not a mistake.

I think this essay needs to get into the mind of every Thomas fans: mostly old ones, even ones that stopped being fans because of HiT and CGI, and especially ThomasFansVs.HIT (if he's still on the Internet).