The Unspoken Horrors Of Being A Carriage

This is something I started thinking about when the game released, and while I haven't bought it nor watched much footage of it (my only memories of T&F was watching the series as a very young child), this particular thought all but consumed my conscious existence.

The trains are sentient. They have faces and say words. Sure, fine. I'm operating off the assumption the locomotives can propel themselves at will. They're obviously restricted to the tracks upon which they're situated, but within that constraint they have agency; they may stop and go at their pleasure. There's a definite "self" in there making decisions.

The trailing coaches also have faces.

I have no reason to believe their intelligence is any different from, or diminished relative to, their locomoting counterparts. I believe the coaches have names. They have opinions. They too experience fear, relief, pride, and worry. They are, by every observable metric, fully conscious beings, at least at my cursory glance. And yet, they cannot move.

They go only where they are taken. They stop only when they are stopped. They choose not their route, nor their locomotive, nor their schedule, nor their passengers. The entirety of their existence is dictated by whoever couples to them that morning.

And all of that exists before considering: what do they see when they move? A coach in the middle of a consist has virtually no visual field -- it's not like they can turn their heads. Maybe a sliver of passing landscape? Even a coach at the rear of the train whose face faces outward -- perhaps the most fortunate position -- only sees what has already passed. Not one of them can see where they're going.

And yet, the coaches smile. I don't know if they can stop. Anyway, the game looks fun.

 

Some are born to lead, others are born to follow....

 

There was a story where Oliver's brake van Toad was sad about going backwards all the time. Then the trucks broke a coupling and his train ran away and he got to go forwards! He said he enjoyed it but would be fine seeing things from behind from now on

 

I think our pal Topham might have a few choice words to say about the engines' ability to stop when required....