Thomas & Friends: All Engines Go (partially found pitch pilot of Canadian animated series; 2019)

The final show's logo.

Status: Partially Found

All Engines Go is a Canadian animated series which is a reboot of the children's television show Thomas & Friends that aired from 1984-2020. The series has been airing on Cartoon Network (as part of Cartoonito) and Netflix since September 2021. It is animated by Nelvana and produced with Mattel Television. 104 11-minute episodes and two 60-minute specials across four seasons are currently planned for the series, with 20 2-minute-and-5-second shorts were released. Originally, the series was to be 2 series with 52 episodes each, but it was later expanded into four 2-part series with 52 episodes each for broadcast.

History

In 2020, Mattel announced that a reboot of the show Thomas & Friends 104 11-minute episodes and two 60-minute specials were greenlit for the Thomas & Friends television series over two seasons (this was later changed to 26 episodes over 4 seasons). Before the series had an official title, All Engines Go Series 1 and 2 were commonly referred to as Series 25 and 26 respectively and was carried over to some promotional material and marketing.^[1] This was later confirmed to be a separate series entirely by the series' head writer, Rick Suvalle.

Pitch Pilot

In 2019, a pilot was produced to pitch to Mattel that featured vastly different designs to the final product, most notably the shape of the noses and smaller irises as well as different whistle designs.^[2] These clips were featured in a Cartoonito sizzle reel by mistake. It is unknown how Cartoonito got the footage, or if they have owned the pilot. It is most likely from Mattel and most likely won't be released officially. It was unknown who was in the test animation other than Thomas and Gordon, and the only known location in the pilot is Tidmouth Sheds. However, a full storyboard of the pilot was accidentally uploaded online and was later reposted onto YouTube.