Hello everyone! 🙂

Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!

It’s Day 9 of ‘Bradley’s Basement’s Advent Calendar 2025.

Shall we have one more James-focused episode in the ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ series?

‘JAMES AND THE EXPRESS’

‘James and the Express’ is the tenth episode in Season 1 of ‘Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends’. It’s based on the story of the same name from the third ‘Railway Series’ book ‘James the Red Engine’ – the fourth and final story to be exact. This is quite a nice episode.

In ‘James and the Coaches’, James got into trouble with pulling coaches and with the Fat Controller. In ‘Troublesome Trucks’, James found his redemption with pulling trucks up a huge hill and the Fat Controller commended him. Here, James gets to impress once more.

In ‘James and the Express’, Gordon boasts about being the only engine strong enough to pull the Express train from the main railway station on the Island of Sodor. James goes to fetch Gordon’s Express coaches before the big blue engine takes out the Express for the day. 😐

Later however, Gordon returns with the Express, apparently having lost his way. Or rather, it was lost for him, as he was mistakenly switched off the main line and forced onto the loop back to the station. Whilst James is amused, the passengers are very furious about it.

The Fat Controller reassures the passengers, and James is given the chance to pull the Express. He succeeds and is offered to pull the Express again by the Fat Controller. Gordon also seems very willing to pull trucks instead of the Express by the episode’s end.

Thanks for reading and watching!

Check out what Day 9 of my ‘Bradley’s Basement’s Advent Calendars for 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024 were about!

Bye for now!

Tim 🙂