What Could Have Been / Infinity Train

Infinity Train

What Could Have Been in this series.

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A mockup of Book 5, with Amelia as its protagonist of the part, had Cartoon Network not canceled the show.

Book One

• Owen originally considered making Infinity Train a television movie. He then thought of producing it as a longer ongoing show before the network suggested telling it as a miniseries. It was also meant to solely consist of Tulip's story before Cartoon Network expanded their initial episode order from ten to twenty, at which point it became an ongoing anthology series.
  • Atticus wasn't originally envisioned as a main character, but his popularity in the pilot and the fun Owen had writing him resulted in him accompanying Tulip and One-One for the remainder of the season.
• It was initially planned for Tulip's parents to tell her that they're planning to divorce in the first episode, rather than already being separated. The conversation seen in "The Cat's Car" would have been what motivated Tulip to run away, rather than attempting to get to game design camp.
  • Even earlier in development, the start of her train journey was also going to be different. She was going to first awaken in a "Bliss Car", sitting in an actual train seat surrounded by dozens of passengers who are being mesmerized by television screens, rather than immediately starting in the snowfield car where she encounters One-One. Instead of the sky vortex seeming to forcibly absorb a passenger from within the train, said passenger exits the train to enter the portal themselves. Finally, Tulip escapes the Ghom by luring it into the Bliss Car and using the other passengers as distractions.
• The Mall Car was one of the train cars planned for Book One, though the idea of the Apex didn't yet exist at that point.
  • The episode that would have had this car revolved around One-One getting swapped with a dopplegänger laid by a giant cowbird when Tulip wasn't looking, which she would have traveled with for several cars before the egg hatched. When she runs back to get the real one at the end of the episode and asks why the mother did this, the bird's response is "Sometimes stuff just happens!"
• The shorts that became "The Train Documentaries" were originally intended to be vignettes about various background characters, such as one of the pencils in the bank seen at the end of The Chrome Car trying to write a novel.

Book Two

• MT was originally planned to be a Villain Protagonist for her Book Two plotline. She would have successfully stolen a number from a new passenger, who would then have to work with One-One to hunt her down and retrieve it, and the passenger would have succeeded in defeating her. The idea was scrapped when the writers realized they liked MT too much and wanted her to win.
• Before getting her shaved head, MT spent much of Book 2's development boasting a mohawk.
• The original theme for the second season was inspired by 1980s hip-hop music.
• Jesse's name was originally Miles, with this only being changed towards the tail-end of writing the season. One of Perry's lines in "The Parasite Car" ("Help me, Jiles and MD!") was left unaltered to serve as a reference to this.
• At the start of "The Map Car", the group would've exited a "salt" car instead of "The Green Car" previously seen in The Train Documentaries shorts. It was cut due to the associated joke (Alan Dracula refusing to leave because he wanted to continue licking the interior) running too long.
• Tulip's multi-tool was meant to play a pivotal role as MT's Achilles' Heel when dealing with the reflection officers. When it came time to write "The Toad Car", it was deemed an unneeded extra stressor, so the plot point was scrapped.
  • It was also briefly floated for the Mirror Police to have even more weapons and tools at their disposal than "The Lawbreaker", but this was similarly scrapped due to them already being a threat without them.
• An early draft of "The Lucky Car Car" had Khaki Bottoms as The Cat's assistant at the ticket stand, which included a joke about whether or not Jesse and MT could purchase him. The joke had to be scrapped due to the runtime, and he was made a brief cameo instead.
• Lucy, a minor character in Book Three, was supposed to debut in "The Mall Car". In a scene that was cut for time, she would have aided in Grace's explanation of the Apex, the young girl enthusiastically talking about sacrificing adults and taking their belongings.
• There was an extended chase scene throughout the mall at the beginning of "The Wasteland" that included Alan Dracula shapeshifting into a mall security guard, which had to be cut for time.
• In "The Tape Car", the original design for the scene of the humans submerged in the Milky Bog had shout-outs to characters such as the Batman: The Animated Series version of Bruce Wayne. This was changed due to the characters being too identifiable.
• One-One and MT were going to view Jesse's first tape in "The Number Car" and see his life on Earth, before checking his status and realizing that he's back on the train. The sequence took over five minutes, and so had to be cut.

Book Three

• Grace was originally intended to be depicted as glove-less much more often, with her declining number being fully visible during scenes such as Tuba's funeral in "The Campfire Car".
• During the montage of memories that Grace has of herself and Simon in "The Origami Car", a scene was cut depicting them sharing an awkward kiss as young adolescents.
• According to the storyboard artist "Diana Huh", in "The New Apex", during the storyboard, Grace and Simon's fight scene was originally going to be longer and extended version, but sadly, because of the scene was cut for time, the fight scene made it shorter instead, and made it into the final version.

Book Four

• While the idea of the season revolving around the relationship between two passengers was always attached to Book 4, a few ideas predated it being about two musicians in the 1980s. Among the ideas tossed around were a duo of bank robbers from the American Old West, two passengers that were desynced from each other across time, and a passenger falling in love with another one through watching their tape. They settled on the 1980s when they decided they also wanted to touch upon Amelia's character arc from prior books.

Planned Seasons and Storylines

• Book 5 had already been written in its entirety when the show was canceled and would have taken the form of a movie that would have explained how Amelia usurped the train in greater detail. Some storyboards for the proposed movie/season can be found in a brief video of the crew yearbook, with Dennis later making a mock screenshot, which is the page image, of one of the scenes.
  • One of the scenes would have had Amelia debating the morality of the train with One-One, trying to point out how non-consensual the entire process is.
• Book 5 would have focused on the theme of grief, with Books 6-8 being themed around guilt, revenge, and acceptance.
• Plots that would have been explored in future seasons include the relationship between Amelia and Hazel, and a final season that would have explored Alzheimer's disease from the perspectives of both the sufferer and a loved one.
• A Christmas Special was also planned, though details were never elaborated on beyond it being one of the episodes both Owen Dennis and Lindsay Katai wanted to do the most.

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