Web Animation / Sodor the Early Years

The title card for Series 4

Sodor the Early Years is a fan-made web series created by YouTube user WildNorWester.

The series started out making original episodes based on The Railway Series by the Reverend Wilbert Awdry, while using elements of the Television Series. Some remakes of The Railway Series stories were also included in this, the first ones being episodes 4 ("The Missing Coach") and 10 ("Super Rescue").

Later episodes had call-backs to previous events that happened prior to the release of the series. The animation is done by using Trainz Simulator and using already existing models of the characters from the television series.

The timeline for the series takes places during the 1960s through the 1990s.

The series lasted for about five seasons (six if you count Barry the Rescue Engine).

Currently, a sequel series called Sodor the Modern Years is running on the same YouTube channel. It jumped forward from the end of the Early Years to 2009. It started with a hour-long pilot called "Winds of Change". From episode 1 of this series, Railway Series style models, made by WildNorWester, were used. The Modern Years lasted for two seasons and one miniseries, but sadly, WildNorWester suffered a massive Creator Breakdown in September 2019 when his models were illegally reskinned and posted on Discord, leading to the remaining two miniseries and feature-length Grand Finale being cancelled, and the site where the models were shared was shut down, echoing a similar situation the previous year where the famous Sodor Island 3D (where most of the models for The Early Years came from) shut down due to illegal redistribution of discontinued content.

Later in July 2020, though, the final episodes were Uncancelled, but all future models (including new liveries for Peter and Olivia) will be private due to Wildnorwester no longer trusting anyone with the models, and the fact textures haven't been lockable since Trainz Simulator 12. At least, that was the plan until Wildnorwester released the new models he had made unannounced on December 1, 2020 on his DeviantArt. Word of God is that this release was due to 2020 being a particularly bad year. However, other models have been released since then on DeviantArt, Twitter and Discord.

As of the end season 2, Sodor the Modern Years moved to a mini-series format, which copies the structure of the original Railway Series books.

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Sodor the Early Years provides examples of:

• Adaptation Dye-Job: Much like in the books, Donald and Douglas both got repainted in NWR blue, but for a very different reason.
  • The Skarloey engines also gained their red color schemes midway throughout the series. However, Duncan switches back to his TV series livery in "Ode to George Carlin", as a tribute to the late comedian/narrator. Duke keeps his MSR livery until "His Grace", when he also switches to Skarloey red.
  • In a flashback episode involving Gordon, he was once green. Although, in the books, Gordon said he was painted green when he was younger.
  • Patrick ends up getting his green colour schemes when he joined the NWR (same went for Bear a bit further back, who was green for a while before this too.).
  • Oliver was in his BR colour scheme like the books, and he and Duck eventually got their true GWR green in Sodor The Modern Years.
  • BoCo and Peter both had the same colour as they do in the current day, but they had their old numbers on when they were on BR's books.
  • Averted with Diesel. He was going to be painted NWR green in the episode "Endgame" as a thank you for stopping the hoppers, but Diesel thought this didn't suit him. Duck later agrees with him. This is based on a poll WNW did a couple of years back when he wanted to do up Diesel in the green colour scheme, but most of the viewers decided against it.
  • Emily, who will be appearing in future episodes, is painted in W&S maroon instead of the green she has in the TV series.
• Adaptational Name Change: Downplayed. The North Western Railway is consistently referred to as the "North-West Railway".
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul:
  • The relationship between D199 and Bear isn't present in the series, as Patrick took over Bear's spot in "Super Rescue" (and it's unknown if the two known each other by that point).
• Alternate Continuity: The series is based during the events on the Railway Series, but back stories of some characters (eg. Patrick and Bear) are different from their original source material. Patrick got Bear's back story from "Super Rescue", while Bear got a new one, which involved turning the other way while Oliver was escaping from scrap, (this comes into play during season 4). Also some elements from the television series, such as Maithwaite (a station that wasn't in the books).
• Art Evolution: See Mid-Season Upgrade.
• Borrowed Catchphrase: Duck does this to Donald.

  Duck: Don't fuss yourself, Donald. I'll look after them (your trucks.)

• Canon Immigrant: A rather unusual case, in that it's not a character who's imported, but an episode. The series is based off the original Railway Series books, so only the first four seasons of the TV series line up with it. However, Wildnorwester adapted the TV series' season 5 episode "Duncan Gets Spooked" as a prologue to the mini-series Adeline the Phantom Engine, and released it in March 2021.
  • WildNorWester has also announced on Twitter that he will be using some TV series characters with potential for Railway Series style backstories, and has shown a model of Emily the Sterling Single engine in this style.
• Cool Old Lady: Lily was built in the 19th Century, and is wise and motherly to most other engines.
• Crossover: "Last Straw" starts out as an ordinary episode, until Atlas starts talking about how the roads around his tramway "weren't too good", so most goods was carried on river barges by tugboats. We then go into a whole episode flashback, revealing that Ten Cents from TUGS has been on Sodor since World War 2 (he mentions Hercules was preserved, and Big Mac broke away from the two during "Operation: Minnow" to distract a U-Boat, his final fate unknown). Subsequent episodes show Ten Cents still on Sodor in the present day.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Many of the characters get this, but the most noticeable candidates are Barry and Alice.
• Darker and Edgier: "Aftermath", from the first season of The Modern Years, was created to highlight grade crossing safety. The episode involves Thomas getting into a collision with a BMW (though we don't actually see the accident), the driver and passenger getting injured (in the original script, they were outright killed), and Thomas being held in his shed while the Safety Directorate carried out an investigation. It also featured a much less severe incident involving George ignoring Mavis' right-of-way and knocking her off the rails.
  • The Adeline the Phantom Engine miniseries doesn't pull punches with the Skarloey Engines being involved with Cold War era military operations, the loss of the line's original number 7, Adeline, due to sabotage and Adeline dealing with the trauma of the event after she is rescued 60 years later.
• Deadpan Snarker: Fred, following his character development.
• Dissension Remorse: Happens with Thomas and Percy in "Old Tricks". The two tank engines have a falling out after both nearly collided with each other on the same track, blaming each other for it. Then Diesel comes along and makes up insulting names for the two tank engines, making them believe they made them up for each other, but when Toby informs the two that Diesel made up those names, Thomas and Percy feel bad for believing in his lies, knowing that they wouldn't never do that to each other. Thus both made up for this as well as their argument over the near collision.
• Double Take: There's this gem in "Last Straw":
  Sir Handel: Oh, hello Atlas... ATLAS?!
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • In the first two seasons, the narration was spoken in a very fast in a way that some people find hard to understand.
  • Throughout the first season there are TRAINZ junction arrows and text bubbles all over the place, and many of the sound effects (particularly the chuffing noises as engines move about) stop and start too abruptly. This fades away as 'Wester gains experience with the software.
  • Until the fifth season of The Early Years, the cast comprised completely of WildNorWester did the narration and almost every voice, with female characters voiced by a relative of his, ANB. In season five, a full voice cast was brought aboard.
• Evolving Credits: The title sequence is repeatedly redesigned as characters are changed around and the animation improves.
• Easily Forgiven: In the upcoming trilogy, by the time Diesel works up courage to apologise to Duck for his past misdeeds, the Great Western Engine had already forgiven him. Slightly justified that Diesel has mellowed out by that point and the fact that Duck (along with Gordon) were the first to find out why Diesel escaped to Sodor in the 80s. If anything, Diesel had been the one caught by surprise, not Duck.
• Fate Worse than Death: Hopper 006 became a waste metal truck in "Endgame" as his punishment for inciting the Little Western trucks to act up.
• Feud Episode: Thomas and Percy got into one in "Old Tricks", blaming each other for nearly colliding with each other. It took Diesel's manipulations for them to reconcile.
• Fire-Forged Friends:
  • The episode "Great Western" shows how Duck and Oliver didn't get on well in their first meeting due to Duck criticizing Oliver for being late in showing up to see the engines at the sheds. It only took Oliver helping Duck after an accident with some troublesome trucks for the two to become friends.
  • Alfred had this with Henry in "Identity" and then Diesel in "First Impressions".
    • In "Identity", Alfred and Henry had a hostile meeting when Alfred took the Flying Kipper when it was supposed to be Henry's job, but became friends after Henry rescued him from a snowdrift.
    • In "First Impressions" both Alfred and Diesel got on terribly as Alfred calls Diesel rude and rough boxes on wheels. After receiving help from Diesel with the Flying Kipper and the milk tankers from Gordon's Hill, Alfred apologized and thanked him and the two are on good terms.
• Foreshadowing: Used frequently. The most obvious one is in the episode "Storm Damage", which features a couple of references to TUGS. The next episode, 'Last Straw', is a crossover with this series. On top of this, the character of Charlie Hatt had four appearances prior to this episode. In each one he was wearing a T-Shirt with a travel poster on it. Each location in the posters (New York, San Francisco, Krakatoa and Vienna) has a link to the TUGS series.
• Funny Background Event: Used fairly often. But the are one or two noticeable examples:
  • In the episode "Homecoming" where Thomas says "Morning, Lily". Duck is getting coal nearby, and sees Thomas and Lily talking, and is shocked. Thomas had told him Lily's story and he assumed the same that Thomas did, she was scrapped. But there she was, back in action.
  • In "Ode to George Carlin", Duncan the narrow gauge engine is talking about how Thomas doesn't deserve to be the star of the TV series based on them. Thomas is passing at the time, and glares at Duncan.
• I Hate Past Me: Diesel admits this in "Last Laugh" when talking to Iris about his mistake over half a century ago. He brings this up to Duck in "Troublesome Trucks" too, but both engines know that these old skills will be useful in the current day, and that it has been useful in the episode "Old Tricks".
• It Will Never Catch On: When Percy was talking to James in "The Thin Clergyman", he mentions that it'll be very unlikely that Wilbert Awdry would put all of their stories in one book as it'll be the size of a phone book. In real life, there were a a few large compilation books that contain a majority of the books, but won't be until much later.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Sheffield.
• Meaningful Name: In the episode "The Devious Way", two ballast hoppers are mentioned. Hopper number 007 helps the engines, whereas hopper number 006 is the cause of the trouble with the trucks. In the episode "Endgame", Diesel's new name is Damien meaning "one who tames, subdues", which is what WNW was building up to throughout the course of the series.
• Mid-Season Upgrade: Over the course of the series, most of the characters (mostly the ones that appeared both in the books television series) got upgraded models based on their TV counterparts. Prior to the start of the Modern Years sequel series, all of the main cast were upgraded to models based off their RWS counterparts. As such, TV-series style models are no longer being used.
  • A second upgrade happened between the events of the mini-series' Couriers & Concerns and Adeline the Phantom Engine, WildNorWester upgraded all his engine models to have 3D faces and controller-scripted eyes. The latter upgrade allows the use of a video game controller to puppet the eyes, similar to how they were made to move on the models from Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends.
• Non-Indicative First Episode: "Winds of Change", the 52-minute pilot of The Modern Years used the familiar TRAINZ models which resembled the characters in the television series. Future episodes used a completely new set of models designed to more closely resemble real locomotives.
• Noodle Incident:
  • In the episode "Runaway", it's never explained why Michelle Johnson originally ran away from home. All we know is that it's something that she thought would make her parents angry.
  • In "Winds of Change", we get two noodle incidences. One with Percy giving Shane a lecture in the main yard, and another where Henry had a near miss at the curve just before East Knapford.
• Only Known By His Nickname: As well Duck's real name being Montague, it's now revealed that Diesel got a real name, Damien, as his reward for stopping the hopper. But, Diesel mentions that he and Duck are both aware that nicknames tend to stick.
• Only One Name: Subverted. In a few episodes, where a Full-Name Ultimatum is used, the engine's surname is that of their designer. E.g. Thomas is Thomas Billinton, Gordon is Gordon Gresley and so on. This has only been shown for the standard-gauge engines.
• Red Herring: Throughout "Adeline the Phantom Engine", the Skarloey engines were trying to solve the mystery of the engine that goes by "Goose" on who might've told the ghost story of Adeline. Peter Sam first thought it was James as he sometime know that geese are brash, but that lead nowhere. Ivo Hugh first thought it might've been either of the Scottish Twins; Donald or Douglas, considering Donald seems to remember Adeline after her restoration and the fact "Goose" relates to watertype birds like "Duck" (and the fact Duck and Donald got even with each other about ducks in the first place, and it correlates to the game "duck, duck, goose). But Harris didn't think it could be them as "Goose" was only one engine; not two. It was later revealed by Ivo Hugh that it was Percy who told the story.
• Reformed, but Not Tamed: Subverted with Diesel in the Devious Way Trilogy. He has become a genuine character yes, but wishes to use his manipulation skills to help Duck and the Little Western crew, but against the trucks.
• Reformed, but Rejected: In the episode "Consequences", Lily fills Henry and Bear in on what happened on the Arlesburgh Branch back in 1922, and blames Henry for Colin crashing into some houses. Despite Henry having changed from his vanity since then, Lily still harbors a bitter grudge against him.
• Runaway Train: The troublesome trucks have caused these on a few instances.
  • In "Shakedown", they broke away from Percy on top of Gordon's Hill and were going to crash into Edward's passenger train at Wellsworth, but an inspector onboard Alice prevented this by applying the brake van's brake.
  • In "The Flying Fish", the fish vans broke away from Sheffield to pay him back for treating them harshly when he first arrived on Sodor. This led them into crashing into an old shed where Brian the brake van was inside.
• Running Gag: In The Modern Years, engines often get the names of social media sites wrong. E.g. Tweeter, Facetube and so on.
• Same Character, But Different: In "Sheffield's Secret", Sheffield is revealed to be Sixteen, the engine Wilbert once worked with.
• Shout-Out: One in the form of the Monty Python theme in one episode.
  • In "The Missing Engine", the ship Lily was sent on was called the Errant Venture, a reference to the Star Wars: X-Wing novels.
  • In "The Thin Clergyman", Bear's elaboration on the collapse of Henry's Tunnel is an homage to the "Dead Parrot" sketch of Monty Python's Flying Circus.
• Stock Footage: Footage of events from previous episodes is used, usually when referring back to the events of those episodes. However, after the Animation Bump from Trainz 2010 to Trainz: A New Era and the Art Evolution mentioned above, any flashbacks need to be re-filmed.
  • A more literal example occurred in the episode "Dime for Trouble", where public domain newsreel footage from World War 2 was used when Ten Cents is talking about his adventures during that time.
  • In an inversion,invoked WildNorWester has stated that the shot of Duck and Henry in that same episode was actually meant for a future episode of the series, and was filmed in advance to show that these events were occurring at the same time.
• Synchronous Episodes:
  • Both "Doncaster Drawn" (Tornado's departure and Gordon's return) and "Rough Start" (Olivia's debut) happened around the same time as the double header was passing by Douglas with Olivia.
  • "Dime for Trouble" and "Storm Damage" happened at the same time as the storm that Ten Cents went through to rescue Hubert was also the same one that damaged the museum Ten Cents' colleague Atlas was residing.
• To Be Continued: This is usually used at the end of the first part of a two-part episode, when there's an immediate continuation of the story in the next episode. Storylines that are not going to be immediately continued (i.e. picked up later) will often have a Sequel Hook instead.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Diesel has become less prejudiced towards steam engines. To show this change of character was at the end of "Bad Apple" where he apologized to Gordon, James, and Henry for making the names years ago, much to their shock. He apologises to Duck the following day, only to find the Great Western Engine had already forgiven him, much to his own shock.
• Very Special Episode: "Aftermath" is written to conveyinvoked a very important message about railway safety. It is also the first episode in the series to not play the usual cheerful music.
• Wham Line: From "Last Straw": "The tugboat, for its size, is the most powerful craft afloat."
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • We don't know what happened to Hopper 003 at the end of the Devious Way trilogy despite there being a violent separation when he was on Oliver's train.invoked Word of God says that we haven't seen the last of Hopper 003.
  • We also hear in an earlier episode that Ten Cents, Hercules and Big Mac have come to Britain on Operation Minnow, but only Ten Cents and Hercules have been confirmed to make it. Big Mac was distracting a U-Boat and may have been sunk or survived, but poor Ten Cents doesn't have any idea what happened
• Whole Episode Flashback: There are a few episodes that are flashbacks that involved many of the characters' back-stories. Some of these are already existing stories from the Railway Series (eg. Donald and Douglas's arrival and how their numbers were missing on purpose), but expanded a bit further. There were also some that were original that connected to the established series (eg. Thomas starting his own branchline)
• Wrap It Up: Invoked by Wildnorwester in March 2019 [1].
  • Un-Cancelled: In July 2020, Wildnorwester announced [2] that Sodor the Modern Years would return for a short season, to wrap things up.
• You Called Me "X"; It Must Be Serious: Diesel refers to Duck by his real name twice in the series. Once during the season 2 finale of STEY "Galloping Sausage", and once during the third last episode of season 2 of STMY, "Troublesome Trucks". However, the third time Diesel does it in the episode "Endgame", Diesel was using it to compare with his new name, Damien.

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