(This page counts for the TV series, as well as the Railway Series books and the Shining Time Station spin-off.)
Advertising
- Thomas, Annie, and Clarabel make a brief cameo in a commercial for the Freeview on-demand streaming service
. They can be seen at a railroad crossing the Freeview car approaches, and Thomas even blows his whistle. - Smyth's Toys:
- A CGi version of Thomas' Push Along model appears in this advert.
- A CGi version of Thomas' All Engines Go! Trackmaster model appears in this advert.
- A CGi version of Thomas' Push Along model appears in this advert
- In the 21st episode of The Brave of Gold Goldran, the Monster of the Week is a train mecha called Hell Thomas.
- In the 8th episode of Kiratto Pri☆Chan, when Emo mistakes the word "hair scrunchie" for the sound trains make, she dresses up as a yellow version of Thomas the Tank Engine.
- In Doogal, Zeebad refers to Train as "Thomas the Tank Engine" during the race.
- Off the Mark: Thomas appears in this strip.
- In Ant-Man, the title character battles Yellow Jacket on a train set with a Bachmann Thomas.
- In Bullet Train, Lemon has a particular fondness for Thomas, saying that the show helped him to understand people when he was little. This even extends to him carrying around a Thomas sticker sheet with which to mark other people he meets as other trains in the series, based on how their personalities match up to the trains, much to the chagrin of Tangerine, his brother. For example, he marks a complete blowhard as Diesel.
- In Fred Claus, during the scene where Fred fights an army of Mall Santas in a Toys R Us, various Thomas toys can be seen on the shelves.
- In Marley & Me, Patrick has a Thomas-shaped toy box and the 1997 Thomas Wooden Railway Roundhouse Set. They can be seen during the scene where Marley knocks Patrick down.
- In Son of the Stars, the man Zhengzheng attempts to leave Xinxin with has a Thomas toy among all the other toys he has for Xinxin.
- In Smile (2022), a Trackmaster Percy can be seen as a cake decoration for Rose's nephew's 7th birthday party. Percy's face is blacked out, possibly for copyright reasons.
- In Raising Steam, the Discworld's model train enthusiasts can buy a model of the Ankh-Morpork and Sto Plains Hygienic Railway chairman Sir Harry King, although his wife complains that the figure is too fat.
- Miracle Creek: At the Wards' housewarming party, the little kids run around pretend-riding Thomas trains.
- David from Rules is obsessed with a scene where the trains crash into a shed. He loves rewinding and fast-forwarding, always hitting pause right before the moment of impact.
- Jack from There's More Than One Way Home used to recite Thomas the Tank Engine scripts as a little boy.
- Experimental Film: At Clark's autism evaluation, the nurse practitioner places a Thomas toy on a bookcase to see if Clark will ask for his mother's help retrieving it.
- Language Arts: When Charles visits Cody, he's watching a Thomas the Tank Engine video in the common room after lunch.
- Alastair from On the Spectrum wears Thomas the Tank Engine pajamas.
- Are You Seeing Me?: In a letter written by Justine and Perry's father when the twins were five, he describes singing a Thomas the Tank Engine song that "makes me want to attach live jumper cables to my ears" in an attempt to calm Perry down after he hurt himself.
- 30 Rock: In "College", Jack Donaghy laments that his voice has been dragged into Thomas the Tank Engine.note
- Aliens in the Family: In "Episode 3: Cookie Makes Some Dough", Heather ends up shrinking from Snizzy's zit remover. She complains that now that she's ten inches tall, she'll never have a boyfriend. Snizzy quips, "We could always fix you up with Mr. Conductor from Shining Time Station."
- The Avengers (1960s): In "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Station", the Meccano Percy train set can be seen on a table carrying a calling card in its wagon when Mrs. Peel enters John Steed's room.
- Baby Einstein: A TOMY Wind-up model of Bulgy appears in "Baby Newton - All About Shapes".
- In the Bill Nye the Science Guy episode, "Structures", during the "Nifty Home Experiment" segment, an ERTL Sticker Face Thomas can be seen crossing a bridge made of drinking straws.
- In the Chuckle Vision episode, "Traction Attraction", ERTL models of Oliver, Edward, Trevor, Donald, Douglas, Bill, Ben, Henry, Toad, and City of Truro can be seen in one of the County Fair stalls.
- In Episode 5 of Don't Hug Me I'm Scared, Choo Choo the Transport Man is a train with a face where his smokebox would be, similar to Thomas.
- ER: In "Nobody Doesn't Like Amanda Lee'', a Thomas toy can be seen on a shelf when Dr. Peter Benton talks to Dr. Lisa Parks about his son Reese's difficulties in daycare.
- Full House: In "Be True to Your Preschool", in the scene where Jesse shows Becky the application for Bouton Hall Preschool, Nicky and Alex play with the ERTL models of Thomas and James.
- The Good Night Show: Nina and the Sproutlets have done at least two Sprout stretches based on the show, both in the fourth season - "Thomas' Clock Stretch" in "Trains" and "Time and Clocks" and "Thomas' End of the Night Stretch" in "People Who Work at Night.
- An episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien features O'Brien interviewing Alec Baldwin regarding Baldwin's narration of the fifth and sixth seasons of Thomas, wherein he tackles a controversial subject that Baldwin's voice given for James sounded gay. A brief clip from "Busy Going Backwards" is shown.
- MA Dtv 1995: The Reading Caboose is a Subverted Kids' Show talking about wild conspiracy theories, featuring George Carlin as "Ticket-Taker Sam", doubtlessly a reference to his role as Mr. Conductor on Shining Time Station.
- Rescue 911: In "Boxcar Boy", two-year-old Joey Vandergraft is seen watching Shining Time Station with his grandmother, Linda Yost.note When he goes outside to play after the show ends, he hears Steven Determan, a nine-year-old boy who accidentally got lost in a grain car when he and his friends played near it, calling for help from inside the car. Joey tells Linda that the train outside is talking to him, and when Linda goes out to investigate, she calls the emergency services, who rescue Steven.
- Seinfeld: In "The Comeback", the Shining Time Station: Bully For Mr. Conductor VHS tape can be seen at the video store.
- In the The Sooty Show episode, "Jigsaw", when Sooty finds his old toys looking for a piece of a sky puzzle, one of the toys he plays with is an ERTL wind-up walking figure of Sir Topham Hatt.
- An episode of Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego is entitled, "Mining Crime Station".
- A location from Shining Time Station is mentioned in The Noddy Shop episode "Kate Loves A Parade". Though being that both shows have the same creator, this might be a case of the shows taking place in neighboring towns or the same universe.
- An episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver covering American freight trains began by showing clips of the ending of "The Sad Story of Henry" and ended with a 4 minute Thomas parody where the Fat Controller had decided to get into precision railroading, forcing Henry to carry miles of freight cars and at best inconveniencing the people of Sodor when he had to take a rest. Sir Topham Hatt then has Henry carry 22 cars full of liquified natural gas. Henry ends up loosing a wheel at the top of a hill and blowing up a significant chunk of Sodor, and Sir Topham Hatt locks Henry up for it.
- Another episode discussing the coal industry has John refer to coal as "cocaine for Thomas the Tank Engine."
- "Weird Al" Yankovic: In the music video for "Ringtone", where he gets to the part where he says that Chinese factory workers hate his ringtone, they can be seen making several Percy toys.
- John Finnemore's Souvenir Programme:
- In Season 1 Episode 1, a small child wants to be Thomas when he grows up and is told he can't, so he decides he wants to make the TARDIS noise. After dedicating his life to achieving this, and failing, he's found by police wandering down the train tracks, and tells them he's a Really Useful Engine.
- In Season 4 Episode 4, Thomas gets a new driver who is used to normal locomotives, and is utterly horrified by sitting inside a living train.
- Early on in the Army Men game Army Men: Air Attack, you have to defend a model train from Tan army rocket fire that is basically Thomas but without the face.
- Choo-Choo Charles is a survival horror video game that puts players against Charles, a train-like monster confirmed to be a Corrupted Character Copy of Thomas.
- Gex: Enter the Gecko: In "In Drag Net", one of the things that Gex, dressed in a policeman's hat says is "Nice hat. I feel like that moron from Shining Time Station."
- The Lost Child by Free Games Jungle has Thomas toys in 2 rooms.
- Among the things that can be seen in the first level of Magical Truck Adventure are a windmill and engines that resemble Percy, Toby, and Thomas.
- In the Helluva Boss episode "C.H.E.R.U.B", a man gets run over by an engine resembling James in a commercial for the eponymous organization.
- Caddicarus has reviewed the Japanese-exclusive PS1 game, Kids Station: Kikansha Thomas to Nakamatachi.
- The Nostalgia Critic has reviewed the live-action movie, Thomas and the Magic Railroad. In his review, he not only admits that he never saw the show the movie is based on as a kid, but he also makes fun of it at many points, at one point calling it "the show PBS airs when Clifford the Big Red Dog is too intimidating".
- Bowser Junior from SuperMarioLogan enjoys Thomas and sometimes plays with the trains with his friends. In fact, Thomas has been a major plot point of quite a few episodes.
- Action League NOW!: In "Melty's Girl", when Meltman causes the Action Mobile to drive into a bookshelf and get crushed by a bowling ball, a Thomas pillow can be seen next to the wastebasket.
- In the American Dad! episode, "Toy Whorey", a Thomas-like train is one of the many toys in Steve's toy collection.
- In the Amphibia episode "Mr. X", a poster is shown for a horror movie called "Trains with Faces".
- Big City Greens:
- In "Photo Op", Tilly hijacks a Thomas-like train in an unsuccessful attempt to escape from the family portrait studio and hide out in the mall food court (as Bill tricked the family into getting their photo taken under the pretense of going to the food court).
- In "Green Christmas", during the "No Christmas at All" song, when Cricket looks at a toy display through a window, the toy train on the far left bears an uncanny resemblance to Thomas.
- Blaze and the Monster Machines: One of Starla's catchphrases is "Bust my bumpers!", which is a play on the famous "Bust my buffers!".
- Bob the Builder: In "Scrambler to the Rescue", a toy train resembling Thomas can be seen in the toy factory, and Thomas' whistle sound is used. The coaches it pulls are also similar in color to Gordon's express coaches.note
- The Cleveland Show:
- In "From Bed to Worse", when Rallo breaks his leg on purpose so he can finally sleep in Cleveland's bed with Donna, he wants Donna to read him a Thomas the Tank Engine story.
- In "Brown History Month", Rallo tells Cleveland he is a worse sell-out than "Uncle Thomas the Tank Engine"note . What follows is a cutaway showing Uncle Thomas the Tank Engine nodding and agreeing with whatever the character parodying Sir Topham Hatt says, and then insulting him when he believes he isn't paying attention.
- In the Drawn Together episode, "The Lemon AIDS Walk", a train resembling Thomas is among the characters playing badminton against the Drawn Together team.
- A train with a face akin to Thomas appears near the end of the the Evil Con Carne episode, "Ultimate Evil", where it runs over Hector and General Skarr, who have been put on the train tracks By Boskov as retribution for mistreating him.
- Family Guy: In "The Birthday Bootlegger", Stewie comes out from his first detention at Quahog Elementary School much hardened with a prison attitude. He gets violent with his teddy bear Rupert for not visiting him, telling him that he met a new friend named Thomas the Shank Engine, and he thinks it's time they met each other.
- Logorama: At the zoo, the train the Bic students, alongside Big Boy and Haribo Boy, are riding on is the logo for My First Thomas, a Thomas toy line made specifically for babies and toddlers.
- In the MAD sketch, "Thomas the Unstoppable Tank Engine", a runaway Thomas pulls a train carrying pillows, soft cheeses, and a nuclear bomb, with no brakes to stop or slow him down. Frank Barnes and Percy try to stop him from crashing.
- Pickle and Peanut: In "Runaway Train", Li'l Chugger the Face Train is a parody of Thomas.
- Robot Chicken:
- In the sketch, "Blow Some Steam" from the episode, "Hemlock, Gin, and Juice", a thief hijacks Thomas and uses him to deliver dynamite to Knapford Station for a $100,000,000.00 ransom, with Sir Topham Hatt and Percy trying to stop the thief.
- In the sketch, "The Girl on the Train" from the episode, "We Don't See Much of That in 1940's America", Megan and Scott Hipwell's kiss is interrupted by something that Scott finds creepy. Megan asks Scott if it's the way Rachel Watson spies on them from inside a train every day, but rather, Scott is referring to the engine, who is revealed to be Thomas. Thomas then tells Megan and Scott, "Don't mind me!", then laughs and makes faces at them.
- In a sketch from "Max Caenen in: Why Would He Know If His Mother’s a Size Queen", a faceless Harold the Helicopter can be seen on the table next to Derek's bed.
- A sketch from "May Cause Your Dad to Come Back With That Gallon of Milk He Went Out for 10 Years Ago" has Tom Nook tell the viewers the story of how he became the Racoon of Wall Street. In the scene where he, Timmy, and Tommy run a toy store, toys of Thomas, Annie, and Bertie can be seen on the shelves behind them.
- The Simpsons:
- In "I Love Lisa", Lisa gives Ralph a Valentine's Day card depicting a locomotive that says "I choo-choo-choose you", directly referencing a Thomas Valentine's Day card from the prior year.
- In "Postcards from the Wedge", when Bart and Milhouse find an abandoned subway car, Bart refers to it as "A Thomas the Tank Engine we can go inside". Milhouse then adds, "With no Sir Topham Hatt to tell us what we can and can't do".
- In "Hardly Kirk-ing", Milhouse spends the day impersonating his father, Kirk. At one point, a real estate agent asks him if he's looking for a casual hook-up, and he responds, "Yeah, for my Thomas the Tank Engines!".
- In "Bull-E", in Otto's first hallucination, he is seen driving the School Train and running over a Thomas-like train who says, "I'm going to die, children, and so will you someday" in a Ringo Starr-esque voice. A Reg-like crane then lifts the train and drops it into a compactor, where it gets crushed.
- In the "Treehouse of Horror XXXI" segment, "Toy Gory", during the "You Are a Rotten Kid" song, one of the toys that Bart destroys is a Thomas-like train set, which he blows up with dynamite.
- In "I Love Lisa", Lisa gives Ralph a Valentine's Day card depicting a locomotive that says "I choo-choo-choose you", directly referencing a Thomas Valentine's Day card from the prior year
- In the South Park episode, "Sponsored Content", Jimmy delivers Super School News on a Thomas the Tank Engine train.
