Henry/Behind the Scenes

In real-life
The Reverend W. Awdry had a great deal of trouble with Henry. He was unhappy with C. Reginald Dalby's illustrations: he looked almost identical to Gordon, more so while he was painted blue - in Tank Engine Thomas Again Henry looked completely identical to Gordon, but this was passed off by explaining he needed to use Gordon's buffers while his were being repaired. To make matters worse, he was illustrated inconsistently, often having several different shapes within the space of a single story - in most of Dalby's illustrations Henry was occasionally portrayed incorrectly as a 4-6-0.

Awdry's original idea had been to write Henry out of the series, but by "Henry the Green Engine" he had decided to instead have Henry involved in a serious accident, allowing him to be rebuilt into a Class 5MT. As this was a real locomotive, Dalby was thus forced to be consistent.

In the Railway Series
There is a certain amount of argument over Henry's rebuild, caused by The Island of Sodor: Its People, History and Railways (TIOS), which was written to provide historical background to the Railway Series and to correct pictorial inconsistencies that had occurred in earlier volumes. The Reverend W. Awdry claimed that the pre-rebuild and post-rebuild Henry were actually two completely separate engines, although in the Railway Series Henry seemed familiar with events that happened before the crash. Henry's memory could have simply survived the rebuild, but as both sources can be considered equally canonical, the question of whether there have been two Henrys or one will likely remain unanswered.

According to "TIOS" Henry was an experimental locomotive built from plans stolen from Sir Nigel Gresley, but the wrong plans were taken and the locomotive built was so riddled with faults that the only person who could be persuaded to buy it was the Fat Controller, who, at the time, was desperate for any locomotive he could get.

"TIOS" also featured a biography of the Fat Controller, which mentioned that he was apprenticed with Stanier at Swindon Works. It is possible that this was another piece of retcon added to explain how Henry was able to be rebuilt so easily - something that even the Reverend W. Awdry admitted was "a mystery".

In Sodor: Reading Between the Lines Henry was said to look very much like a Stanier 5MT, which suggests that he is not totally identical to one of these engines. It is not clear why Christopher Awdry should have felt the need to contradict his father, but it could simply be a combination of errors and publication deadlines.

Voice Actors

 * Kevin Frank (Thomas and the Magic Railroad)
 * Keith Wickham (UK; Hero of the Rails onwards)
 * Kerry Shale (US; Hero of the Rails onwards)
 * Ryō Horikawa (Japan; first - eighth seasons)
 * Kenji Utsumi (Japan; James and the Trouble with Trees (First half))
 * Junichi Kanemaru (Japan; Calling All Engines! onwards, excluding Day of the Diesels and Edward the Hero)
 * Nozomu Sasaki (Japan; Day of the Diesels)
 * Kenta Miyake (Japan; Edward the Hero)
 * Fabrice Trojani (France and French speaking Canada)
 * Espen Sandvik (Norway; Hero of the Rails - Tale of the Brave)
 * Ambrogio Colombo (Italy)
 * Blas García (Latin America; Thomas and the Magic Railroad)
 * Luis Alfonso Padilla (Latin America; Thomas and the Magic Railroad; TV Version)
 * Ricardo Silva (Latin America; Hero of the Rails - The Great Race; excluding Tale of the Brave and the twentieth season)
 * Arturo Mercado Jr. (Latin America; twentieth season onwards, excluding The Great Race)
 * Michael Bideller (Germany)
 * Lutz Herkenrath (Germany; Audio Book 1-13 only)
 * Q. Gray (Germany; Audio Book 14-16 only)
 * Cezary Kwieciński (Poland; Hero of the Rails onwards)
 * Reinder van der Naalt (The Netherlands)
 * Dov Reiser (Israel; Thomas and the Magic Railroad)
 * Dor Srugo (Israel; fifteenth - twentieth seasons)
 * Yoli Seker (Israel; twentieth season onwards)
 * Caspar Phillipson (Denmark)
 * Henrique Reis (Brazil; Hero of the Rails onwards, excluding Tale of the Brave)
 * Ulisses Bezerra (Brazil; Tale of the Brave only)
 * Juan Navarro Torelló (Spain)
 * Jukka Voutilainen (Finland; Hero of the Rails - King of the Railway, excluding the sixteenth season)
 * Jarmo Koski (Finland; Tale of the Brave onwards)
 * Trưởng Tân (Vietnam)
 * Alexander Kotov (Russia)