U.S. Title: Donald and Douglas
Air date: November 12th, 1986
Adapted from: The Twin Engines, "Break Van"
Two black twin engines from Scotland named Donald and Douglas have arrived on the Island of Sodor to help out; however, the Fat Controller had only sent for one engine. While the twins mean well, their identical appearance causes confusion and the Fat Controller has numbers painted on them; Donald's is 9 and Douglas' is 10. However, the Fat Controller still intends to send one of the engines back to Scotland.
In the yard, a Spiteful Brake Van takes a dislike to Douglas and always causes things to go wrong whenever Douglas takes it out. As a result, Douglas' trains are late and he's subsequently blamed, making him worry. Donald is angry at his twin's unfair treatment and bumps the brake van violently before threatening it. The Spiteful Brake Van starts behaving better afterwards.
One day, however, Donald reverses onto some slippery rails, but he's unable to stop and accidentally crashes into a signal box, tender first. The Fat Controller is furious at Donald for his clumsiness and tells him that he had decided to keep him and send Douglas back before this incident. Now Donald needs to have his tender mended and James will have to do his work, which the Fat Controller knows he won't like.
The Fat Controller's proven right; James is very angry about the extra work. Douglas jokes about James' incident with some tar wagons, worsening his bad mood. He takes a goods train which includes the Spiteful Brake Van, who decides to make work difficult for James and has the trucks hold back, quickly tiring James out.
Meeting Douglas at Wellsworth, James asks for his assistance in climbing up Gordon's Hill and Douglas agrees. The two engines work as hard as they can, halfway up the hill, however, James starts losing steam and Douglas accidentally crushes the Spiteful Brake Van while pushing. The Fat Controller arrives on Edward, who came with the Breakdown Train to help clear the mess and is angry that Douglas has also caused trouble. Edward stands up for Douglas, having heard what happened, and tells the Fat Controller of all the hard work Douglas did. The Fat Controller feels that Douglas went too far, but understands Douglas had good intentions and was only trying to help. The Fat Controller is now forced to make up his mind about something, but that is another story.
Tropes featured in the episode:
- Accidental Murder: Douglas accidentally kills the Spiteful Brake Van by crushing him to pieces. Notably, the Spiteful Brake Van is the only character in the entire TV series to be Killed Off for Real.
- Adaptation-Induced Plot Hole: In The Twin Engines, the Spiteful Brake Van was an NER 20-ton brake van, a type of brake van built with a wooden frame, which would have been able to be crushed the same way it was by Douglas in the story. However, the adaptation changes the Spiteful Brake Van's basis to a BR 20-ton brake van (presumably this was so the crew wouldn't have to build an all-new prop and could get away with putting a new face on a brake van they had made in the past). This however causes an issue with the Spiteful Brake Van's demise; the BR brake van it was based on had a steel frame, so Douglas shouldn't have been able to crush it to pieces as he had done in the book.
- Amusing Injuries: After being accidentally crushed by Douglas, the face of the Spiteful Brake Van can be seen with a black eye and grimace as it's lifted away.
- Another Story for Another Time: At the end, the narrator says this in regard to The Fat Controller making up his mind about something.
- Antagonist Title: This episode is Donald and Douglas' debutnote , but is named after its antagonist, the Spiteful Brake Van. Averted with the U.S. title.
- Asshole Victim: The Spiteful Brake Van. While being crushed was a particularly violent fate, he continued to cause trouble for the engines until the very end. In fact, if he didn't get James' trucks to hold back on Gordon's Hill, James and Douglas would've gotten over the top and nothing would've happened to him.
- Berserk Button: Donald's is when others cause trouble for his twin, Douglas. After he hears of the Spiteful Brake Van causing problems on his trains, he gives him a violent bump as a warning.
- Big Brother Instinct: More of a Twin Brother Instinct, but Donald is furious when he finds the Spiteful Brake Van after it causes trouble for Douglas and so bumps him across the yard.
- Big "SHUT UP!": After Douglas brings up James' incident with the tar wagons, James snaps at him to shut up as it isn't funny.
- Bully Hunter: Donald. When he learns how the Spiteful Brake Van has been messing with Douglas, he threatens him into behaving with a big bump.
- Car Meets House: Some slippery rails cause Donald to crash tender-first into the Tidmouth signal box.
- Chronic Villainy: Even after one hard bump from Donald to make him behave, the Spiteful Brake Van returns to his troublesome ways as he tells the trucks to hold James back.
- Compressed Adaptation: Donald and Douglas' introduction was edited down greatly. "The Missing Coach" was planned to be made as an episode (with even half the footage filmed) but was ditched due to its slightly convoluted plot which was feared to be too complicated for children.
- Continuity Nod: Douglas brings up James crashing into some tar wagons to embarrass him in front of Gordon and Henry.
- Didn't Think This Through: Sure, build a signal box right on the end of a siding. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
- Digital Destruction: From the restored version:
- The restored version makes it more obvious that
Donald's tender is being pulled by a wire right before his crash. - Most of the Gordon's Hill scenes from the original were edited to try and hide the fact that Douglas was incorrectly filmed with his nameplate already on, however, the remastered version doesn't, causing a
Blooper.
- The restored version makes it more obvious that
- Dub-Induced Plot Hole: Both Ringo Starr narrations merely state that The Fat Controller was making up his mind about something, but the George Carlin narration states that he was thinking about which engine to keep. Of course, "The Deputation" ends with the reveal that he keeps both engines, so then why was he deciding which one to keep?
- The Freelance Shame Squad: Gordon and Henry laugh in the background about Douglas' remarks about James' accident with the tar wagons.
- Hate Sink: While the Troublesome Trucks as a whole tend to be too silly and mischievous to really hate, the Spiteful Brake Van is straight-up unpleasant and lacks the qualities of his brethren that make them entertaining antagonists, unless he's on the receiving end of karma. He gets Douglas in trouble multiple times by making his trains late after taking a dislike to him for no explained reason, and then makes work difficult for James after sensing he was cross and wanting to make him crosser, just for the fun of it. You won’t feel sorry for the Van when he gets smashed as a result of his poor behavior.
- I Never Said It Was Poison: This exchange:Douglas I hear tell about an engine and some tar wagons.James: Shut up. It's not funny.Douglas: Well, well, well. Surely James it wasnae you. Ya didn't say.
- Jerkass:
- The Spiteful Brake Van, who goes out of his way to cause trouble for Douglas for seemingly no reason.
- Douglas, Gordon, and Henry all bring up James's accident with tar wagons and laugh at him to his face.
- The trucks, who gleefully help the Spiteful Brake Van cause trouble for James and then don't seem to care for him after Douglas crushes him.
- Jerkass Has a Point:
- When Donald angrily tells the Spiteful Brake Van that he wants to leave the latter behind because of his behaviour, the Spiteful Brake Van retorts with "You can't. I'm essential". In the time period the stories are set in, brake vans were indeed essential when delivering goods for extra braking power, as engines were not fitted with continuous braking in those days, the technology not existing. That being said, the Spiteful Brake Van would be more accurate if he said "Brake vans are essential" instead of "I'm essential".
- Maybe The Fat Controller was being a little irrational by blaming Donald for destroying the signal box despite the fact that it was a combination of slippery rails as well as the signal box being built at the end of a siding, but given how important signal boxes are to help trains run on the right lines as well as preventing accidents, he wasn't wrong to be annoyed that the signal box was damaged.
- Edward tried to praise Douglas's efforts saying he worked hard enough for three, only for the Fat Controller to retort "Two would've been enough!" as he surveyed the damage. Justified, as James' guard escaped injury or worse by a few scant seconds.
- Karmic Death: The Spiteful Brake Van was unintentionally crushed by Douglas. This is fitting considering that he was the one that caused his trains to be late.
- Kick the Dog: Douglas joking about James' incident with tar wagons after he already knew he was in a bad mood having to take on Donald's work.
- Meaningful Name: The Spiteful Brake Van is every bit a Jerkass as you'd expect.
- Name and Name: This episode's U.S. title is "Donald and Douglas".
- Oh, Crap!: As James and Douglas force their train up Gordon's Hill, the Spiteful Brake Van orders the trucks to hold back and the strain begins to crush him. When James' guard notices, he panics and warns the engines to go steady.
- Pun-Based Title: "Break Van" which involves Douglas smashing the Spiteful Brake Van into pieces.
- Reverse Arm-Fold: The Fat Controller does this in the end while thinking about something.
- Riddle for the Ages: It's never explained why the Spiteful Brake Van took a dislike to Douglas. Knowing the brake van, it was probably over an extremely petty grievance.
- Tear Off Your Face: When Edward arrives with the Breakdown Train after Douglas unintentionally crushes the Spiteful Brake Van, the Breakdown Crane can be seen lifting away the Spiteful Brake Van's face, now with a black eye and twisted into a painful grimace.
- Too Dumb to Live: The Spiteful Brake Van would have survived if he hadn't convinced the trucks to hold back James' train on Gordon's hill, which results in Douglas crushing him from behind.
- Violent Glaswegian: Donald doesn't take kindly to the Spiteful Brake Van's attitude towards Douglas, and gives him a hard bump:Donald: Ye're a muckle nuisance! It's tae leave you behind I'd be wantin'!Spiteful Brake Van: You can't. I'm essential.Donald: Och, are ya?! Ye're nothin' but a screechin' an' a noise when all's said an' done! Spite Douggie, would ya?! Take that!
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Nothing is said of the guard on the Spiteful Brake Van after he warns Douglas that he's breaking it leaving it unknown if he managed to get out or was crushed by Douglas. Presumably, he was fine though, as in The Twin Engines, he jumped clear without any mention of injury.
- What the Hell, Hero?:
- The Fat Controller tells off Donald after damaging the signal box at Tidmouth, and lets him know that if not for this incident, he would've been keeping him on the railway and sending Douglas back to Scotland.
- He also scolds Douglas for crushing the Spiteful Brake Van, as even though the brake van was rude and troublesome, Douglas' destruction now has to be cleaned up.
