They are both socially awkward, correct people constantly, and very smart.
The other train workers are St. Nicholas's various folkloric companions.
In certain myths of St. Nicholas, he's accompanied by at least one companion on Christmas Eve. Either Knecht Ruprecht
note A man identical to St. Nick, but with an ash-covered face, Belsnickel
note A masked figure dressed in fur who shouts and scares children, or
The Krampus.The engineer is a very plump man, who could be mistaken for Santa at a distance due to being fat and jolly-looking like the stereotypical image, and always has soot on his face due to working near the engine. The engineer is Ruprecht. The man who shovels coal for the train has extremely long hair draping over his face and an even longer beard, which could be misconstrued as a mask and fur garments. When his beard is pulled, he yells unnaturally loud with a somewhat unsettling expression that would definitely scare kids. He is Belsnickel. Lastly, the Hobo is an eldritch being who seems to test the protagonist's faith and Christmas Spirit, and appears without warning throughout the film as though stalking him. He seems to exclusively appear to those who don't believe in Santa, and comes across as a sort of spiritual judge. The Hobo is Krampus.
The Polar Express was the main inspiration for the Pere Marquette 1225.
The Designer for Marquette was on the Polar Express as a child and was inspired to use that same design for the Marquette.
The sound of the bell is an ultra high sound.
As a person ages, they become unable to hear the most high-pitched sounds anymore. So that would explain the adults not hearing the sound of the bell. As for why the main character hears it even as an adult, let's say his hearing ability is superhuman.
- OOO! Good one!
- It's an interesting theory, but it doesn't explain why the Hero Boy couldn't hear it until after he decided that he believed in Santa Claus, and meant it. Or why, as he says, it rings for everyone else he knows that still truly believes.
The reason that Christmas "doesn't work out for him" is that Malcolm, Reese, and Francis have always ruined Christmas for him. Lois hasn't been shown to completely cancel Christmas before, but she's threatened it. Maybe in this
Malcolm in the Middle /
The Polar Express world, she HAS completely canceled Christmas. Besides, the two have an uncanny resemblance.
The Hobo is Santa Claus himself.
Santa can take on a completely different appearance, and he can be in two places at once. He appears first to the Boy as the Hobo because he knows that the Boy won't believe his true form early on, and is preparing him to believe. This is either weird or awesome, your call.
The North Pole is not on Earth, it's a different planet entirely. The fact that, for several hours, it's five minutes to midnight refers to North Pole time, which runs slower than Earth time.
- Adding on to this, the Conductor usually works on a different route, but was called in as a relief for the Polar Express that year because the usual conductor, who just so happens to be Maetel, was unavailable because she was travelling with Tetsuro at the time. This explains why he seems so cranky: he was yanked from his normal route and had to put up with a bunch of kids, but ultimately suffered through it for Maetel's sake.
A true visit from Santa is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
This is why the poor boy never received a gift before the events of the movie, and why the parents don't wonder who puts the presents under the tree. He doesn't deliver to every house every year, but only to a lucky few. Most of the time, the parents put the gifts under the tree. The poor boy's parents didn't do this, so that's why he never got a present before his turn for a Santa gift came up.
The Hobo is Jack Frost
Some viewers of the film believe that the Hobo is not a ghost, but is actually the mythological figure, Jack Frost. This is due to the fact that the Hobo has the ability to appear and dissapper into the snow, and at one point he effortlessly managed to move on the top of a moving ice-covered train with a child on his shoulders in the middle of a blizzard. Moreover, at several points over the course of the movie, the Hobo is seen suddenly appearing to help the main character and the Conductor from the snow, one notable occurence is when the train is sliding over ice. Then there's the fact that he calls himself the "King of the North Pole", something that would make sense if he was Jack Frost as the North Pole is in perpetual winter. The Hobo also appears to be a bit of a mischievous being, much like Jack Frost himself.
- It certainly makes a lot of sense, especially considering the fact that the Hobo clearly isn't human, as he manages to appear and disappear into the snow. He also helps Hero Boy many times, one time grabbing him from falling off the train, another time tapping the manual brake wheel on the speeding runaway observation car with his cup before disappearing.
- Moreover, one of Jack Frost's defining mythological traits is that he enjoys helping children, much like the Hobo hilmself.
The Conductor is Hero Boy grown up and sent back in time by Santa.
The Conductor has many, many moments when he acts as if he just knows whats going to happen, as if he's seen it before. Why else would he signal the train to leave Hero Boy and Billy? He already knew that they would still make it on.
Add to that, what if Hero Boy's wish to Santa was "to always believe"? Santa would make a grown up who believes his magical train conductor. Time manipulation is obviously at play in the film, why couldn't Santa wait for Hero Boy to grow up, possibly even die, then send him back in time to when the Polar Express came into existence?
This would also explain why the Conductor acts with such indifference to Hero Boy in most of their interactions. How would you treat your disbelieving younger self?
Finally, Tom Hanks is the motion-capture for Hero Boy, the motion-capture/voice of the Conductor and the voice of Hero Boy as an adult narrator at the beginning and end of the film.
Think about it: The Express has an oddly varying number of cars, it seems to be magic (or Time Lord technology), and it made it be five minutes to midnight for multiple hours. TARDIS, much? And doesn't "The Conductor" sound like a Time Lord name? Hell, he might be Miss Frizzle's brother.
- And the Hobo could be another incarnation of the same Time Lord, hitching rides on the locomotive of his past/future self, just for a lark. His offhandedly claiming to be the owner of the train could be more than mere arrogance.
Think about it: Hero Boy boards this magical train that suddenly appears out of nowhere, like Giovanni did, and goes on this long and very strange journey where almost no time actually seems to pass. At least one of the other passengers on the train is confirmed to be Dead All Along; who's to say that most of the others weren't children who'd recently died and were being given one last Christmas before they moved on? Sure, Hero Boy returns home alive after learning his lesson, but so did Giovanni.
The Polar Express is financed and administrated by American Class I railroads.
The railroads dispatch the train over their tracks, and the cities they go through clear the roads under the guise of roadwork. The only thing the North Pole owns are the coaches. Each year, a different steam locomotive pulls the train. So, one year it could be Pere Marquette 1225, another year it could be Union Pacific 844 or Santa Fe 3751.
Railwaymen not informed about the train's existence spread stories of a ghost train that runs every year on Christmas Eve.
- Who's to say that LNER Class A3 4472 Flying Scotsman pulled the Polar Express during it's ill-fated U.S. tour in the 1970's? (And who's to say that CSX makes an exception to it's "no steam" rule to allow the Polar Express to run over their right-of-way?)
The Back to the Future references are certainly apparent. The Flux Capacitor in the train's engine and the similar exit of Santa's Sleigh, plus BTF3 featuring a time traveling locomotive. This is why the train is always at 11:55 throughout the film, it's simultaneously traveling over the distance and going back in time to keep on schedule, hence the conductor's concerns only manifest when the train is stopped from moving prior to reaching the North Pole, where the magic of Christmas is at its purest.
"That know-it-all kid"'s name is Timmy.
In one of the bonus games, one of the children on the Naughty List is named Timmy. Maybe "that know-it-all kid" got on the Naughty List because he opens his gifts before Christmas.
Hero Boy/Chris and Hero Girl/Holly reunite and become a married couple long after the events of the movie.
Admit it guys, you saw them as being a potential couple ever since you first watched the movie. Then, Hero Boy/Chris wrote a kids' book based off his experience under the pen name of "Chris Van Allsburg" (the name "Lisa" is an alias for Hero Girl/Holly).
There are several "Polar Express" trains running worldwide.
It's not just an American phenomenon - a British one also runs, for instance, pulled by a top-link locomotive from British Railways (and, after the end of steam, a preserved locomotive; Flying Scotsman and Mallard have both pulled it since 1968, as have numerous other preserved express locomotives such as 35005
Canadian Pacific, 46229
Duchess of Hamilton and even 60163
Tornado.)
Specifically, he's a
Composite Character of the Christian interpretation of Satan (A
Jerkass who pretenses to be a "king" despite being
trapped in a frozen, wind-swept wasteland.) and the ancient Hebrew interpretation of Satan. (A "prosecutor" who tempts people as a
Secret Test of Character but is ultimately on the side of good.)
The sack of presents almost hitting the tree was a scripted event, the star falling off the tree was not.
Considering that loading the presents is something the elves have done many times before, it's unlikely that they'd start descending before they'd cleared the tree unless they knew they'd need to gain altitude. The "more altitude" incident is staged so they can show off the Flying Elves. However, that year, there are four children in the bag that were not planned for, and as a result, the bag couldn't just "barely" clear the tree's star like usual, they actually hit it, leading to an emergency team retrieving the star. They'd have one in case, so that's not surprising.
The Polar Express is still up and running.
Every Christmas Eve the magical train takes children to the North Pole to see Santa Claus in person. And considering how many children the Express has taken over the years, it's possible that these children's parents rode the train themselves when they were children themselves. In fact, Chris/Hero Boy and Hollie/Hero Girl children had been on train just like their parents when they were their age.
