- “Double bouncing buffers!”
- ―Percy
Percy and the Haunted Mine is the thirteenth episode of the sixth series.
Plot
The stations are preparing for a Best Dressed Station competition and Percy has to collect some trucks from Maithwaite. On the way, he has to stop by an old mine. He is spooked when he sees a mine chimney sinking into the ground and when he tells Donald and Douglas, they claim it is the naughty gnomes which makes him feel even more scared.
Later, when Percy is to collect garden gnomes for a station, he sees the warehouse sink and is convinced it is the naughty gnomes. He bumps some trucks and garden gnomes fall out. Percy is terrified and runs back to Lower Tidmouth station, where the Fat Controller explains that in fact the gnomes were garden gnomes and that the buildings were just sinking into old mine shafts. Percy then returns to the mine to pick up the gnomes, learning that they were not scary like he thought they were. The next day, Lower Tidmouth wins the Best Dressed Station competition, due to the fact that they had the garden gnomes.
Characters
- Percy
- Donald and Douglas
- Sir Topham Hatt
- Thomas (cameo)
- Henry (cameo)
- Gordon (cameo)
- James (cameo)
- Toby (cameo)
- Duck (cameo)
- Oliver (cameo)
- Stepney (cameo)
- Stephen Hatt (cameo)
- Bridget Hatt (cameo)
- Jeremiah Jobling (cameo)
- Cyril the Fogman (cameo)
- Farmer Trotter (cameo)
- The Storyteller (cameo)
- Nancy (deleted scene cameo)
Locations
- Lower Tidmouth
- Dryaw
- Callan
- Maron
- Tidmouth Sheds
- Maithwaite Quarry Mine
- Tidmouth Bay
- Maithwaite (mentioned)
Trivia
- A scrap Thomas and Lorry 2 model are seen at the mine.
- Several of the miniature garden gnomes were preserved by The Coffey Man Preservation after they were all sold from the Prop Store in Los Angeles. The miniatures later made special appearances in the Thomas Creator Collective videos.
- Large scale models of the garden gnomes were used in the close-up shot of Percy when he reverses away from them.
- Thomas does not speak in this episode.
- This episode aired in Hungrian on Labor Day 2009.
- When the quarry mine is first shown, the garages next to the shed in the sixth season song, Boo! Boo! Choo-Choo can be seen next to the scrap model of Thomas.
- A small sample of Boo! Boo! Choo-Choo can also be heard when Percy learns that the garden gnomes were not scary.
- This episode never aired in the US in 2006, it only aired on Spills and Chills on DVD and VHS and Thomas' Halloween Adventures on DVD.
- This episode marks the first appearance of Maron station since the first season episode, Dirty Objects and the first appearance of it in its new form.
Goofs
- In the long shot of Percy leaving Tidmouth Sheds, the steam platform blows steam too late.
- In the close-ups of Percy during the scene of the Fat Controller telling him about the gnomes (except when he says "Garden gnomes?") the sky is grey.
- The narrator said that Percy "buffered up" to the trucks, but he stopped some distance away from them.
- When Percy enters Dryaw and when he leaves to return to the vans, his steam platform is visible.
- The narrator says that Percy steamed back to Lower Tidmouth station, even though he had not come from there in the first place. The Fat Controller had not even told Percy to take the garden gnomes to Lower Tidmouth station before that.
- The shot of Percy puffing towards the mine and the narrator says; "Percy hoped the signal at the junction would be green" is an alternate shot of Percy racing away after the mine's chimney has sunk, due to one of the mine's buildings being visible on the left.
- In the first shot of the gnomes tumbling out of the vent van, the film was cut as there is a fade effect causing more gnomes to appear all of a sudden.
Merchandise
- Wooden Railway - Haunted Mine
- Books - Percy and the Haunted Mine and Percy and the Haunted Mine (Germany only)
- Magazine Stories - The Most Beautiful Station and The Haunted Mine