Bah humbug!
- Almost every character has dead, cold eyes. Granted, it was the first film of its kind, but the effect is really unnerving.
- Would you want to be on a train while it's going down tracks that look like a roller coaster on acid?
- The scene with the puppets and the hobo ghost in general. Especially when you know his backstory - one night, he didn't make it to the engine in time and was killed on impact, and he was trying to spare the protagonist the same fate. Later in the movie, he gets hit against a wall and disintegrates.
- The bit with the music slowing down is downright creepy, if only because it happens for what seems like no reason.
- The protagonist almost falls off the train several times.
- The mood swings of the conductor can make you think he's about to physically harm the kids at any moment.
- Flat Top Tunnel. It's only seen for a brief moment, but it's pretty clear why the Hobo mentions how much of a danger it is. When the Hero Boy narrowly manages to land in the tender before the train enters the tunnel, the portal entrance is shaped like a demonic figure. Once the 1225 starts to enter, the smoke from her stack and the fire from her boiler make the eye-shaped holes in the portal entrance glow like a fiery inferno, complete with smoke for added effect, while the spikes form a sharp set of teeth. And that's not even getting into how the poor Hero Boy is almost killed just getting there.
- What makes this even more scary, if a deleted scene is to be believed, is that this tunnel is where the Hobo met his end many years ago, having failed to take note of the clearance between the roof of the train and the tunnel's ceiling. The fact his ghost is still haunting the train is frightening enough, but that he showed himself to the protagonist just minutes before they hit the spot where he met his demise can certainly leave anyone frightened.
Hobo: There is but one inch of clearance between the roof of this rattler and the roof of Flat Top Tunnel. Savvy?
