Air date: July 7th, 1992 (UK), March 23rd, 1993 (US)
Adapted from: The magazine story "Percy Gets Jammed"
One day, James is waiting at a junction when Percy arrives with some trucks. James berates Percy for being late and that states all engines should be on time. Percy thinks James is being bossy and ignores him.
It's market day on Sodor, and James arrives at the harbour to see all the fruits from overseas. James' trucks are filled with them, and he sets off. On the way, he meets Thomas, Annie, and Clarabel resting on a siding and boasts about being reliable, but Thomas tells Annie and Clarabel that there'll be trouble ahead for boastful James.
Meanwhile, Percy is busy shunting at the yard when the stationmaster informs his driver that James' brakes are jammed and that Percy has to go and help him at once. Percy quickly sets off and soon finds James stranded on the main line, quite amused with the situation. Percy's driver soon stops the teasing and asks Percy if he can push the trucks of fruit. After irritating James one last time, Percy is coupled to the trucks and sets off, but he is on the rush and doesn't pay attention to the line. He doesn't see that the switch has failed and that he has been diverted into a siding, crashing into the buffers. In the process, Percy is covered in sticky fruit! The Fat Controller reprimands Percy and reminds him that he's not running a jam factory.
In the sheds that night, all the engines are silent and James and Percy feel sorry for themselves. At last, Thomas lightens up the mood, telling everyone that despite their "jams", they are all Really Useful Engines.
Tropes featured in the episode:
- Adaptational Personality Change: Happens to both Percy and James. Percy is portrayed unsympathetically in the magazine story, in which he laughs at James for breaking down, only for him to receive his comeuppance when he gets covered in fruit. But in here, the roles are reversed, with James being rude to Percy, which leads to his comeuppance in breaking down, followed by Percy teasing him back.
- Adaptation Expansion: The episode is based roughly on the short magazine story "Percy Gets Jammed", though it adds an opening scene with James being rude to Percy (and so provoking his teasing when his brakes jam) and adds a more upbeat ending.
- Bittersweet Ending: Percy and James have terrible incidents with the fruit, but they soon cheer up along with the other engines in the sheds after Thomas' speech about being really useful engines no matter what.
- Break the Haughty: This happens to James after boasting about how reliable he is. Thomas knew it from the start. Happens when Percy laughs at James too.
- Covered in Gunge: Percy breaking the van in front of him causes him to get covered with squashed fruit.
- Deadpan Snarker: The Fat Controller gets one at Percy.Fat Controller: Percy, you are not to blame for the points failure, but I DO NOT run a jam factory!
- Fruit Cart: What Percy crashes into while pushing some trucks full of fruit and then gets covered in smashed fruit.
- Hurricane of Puns: Percy delivers one of these to James upon finding him stuck on the line with jammed brakes. James does not take kindly to it.Percy: Got yourself in a jam, eh, James? What you might call a sticky situation?
- Jerkass Has a Point: James does have a point when he says that engines should always be on time. Of course, he was being too condescending about it, and this led him to break down with his trucks of fruit.
- No Antagonist: But for the troublesome trucks, who had a minor role in this story, there was more than one protagonist in this story, like many Thomas episodes.
- No Sympathy: James isn't interested in hearing how Percy had trouble getting on time because of the trucks. This is backfired onto him when he breaks down and is mercilessly teased by Percy.
- Rousing Speech: Thomas has one for the engines in the shed at the end of the episode.Thomas: You know, there's more than one way to get jammed. We all learned that today. [...] What's more, we also learned that sometimes when engines help each other out of a jam, things can still go wrong. [...] So that means we've learned a lot today, and therefore...
Other engines: We're really useful engines after all! - Stock Footage: Stock footage from "Thomas, Percy and the Post Train" is used, as is a deleted scene from "Heroes".
- Tempting Fate: Lampshaded by Thomas when he tells Annie and Clarabel that James' boasting will lead him into trouble, which it does.
- A Tragedy of Impulsiveness: Percy doesn't pay attention to the line ahead, thus resulting in him crashing ito the buffers, where he is covered in fruit.
