Kevin’s Cranky Friend (Thomas & Friends)

Kevin’s Cranky Friend is the season premiere of season 17 of Thomas & Friends, and the 389th episode overall.

Summary
Feeling that Cranky is being overworked, Sir Topham Hatt has Kevin work at Brendan Docks to help Cranky. But Cranky doesn’t want Kevin’s help.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) This episode, along with the special “King of the Railway”, redeemed the series after its decline in quality during S8-16.
 * 2) The new CGI animation is a major upgrade from the CGI animation in S13-16.
 * 3) The characters who were flanderized in S8-16 have been redeemed and got their old personalities back.
 * 4) Mark Moraghan’s narration is very well-done and is pretty soothing to listen to.
 * 5) Good voice acting, as to be expected.
 * 6) Kevin helping Cranky work at Brendan Docks is a creative idea and feels like a breath of fresh air since this concept has not been done before, and it only uses the three-strike formula from S8-16 very infrequently.
 * 7) Plenty of funny moments, such as Cranky dropping a net full of lettuce on James, Henry and Sir Topham Hat, Kevin falling into the ocean and a crab pinching Kevin’s nose after being saved by Cranky.
 * 8) Two wonderful morals, the one moral being:
 * 9) *“Don’t be afraid to ask for help”.
 * 10) *And the other being: "Never judge those of their appearance" (the same moral that would be used for the Learning with Thomas sequence for "Heart of Gold").
 * 11) This episode also shows Cranky's sympathetic side as we see that he really does feel bad for Kevin when Sir Topham Hatt scolds Kevin.

The Only Bad Quality

 * 1) As mentioned in WIR #9, Sir Topham Hatt blames Kevin for the incidents at the docks.

Reception
Kevin’s Cranky Friend received a 4.6 on IMDB, but however received positive reviews.