Infinity Train Season Two Review
Don’t stop me if you’ve heard this one before. I reviewed the first season of Infinity Train last year, and you can read all about it. But if you’re short on time here’s what it’s all about:
Magic Train. Infinite Rooms. Grow as a Person or Stay Forever.
Given that last bit, you might forget that this is a show for kids. But like a lot of great children’s fiction, this show can be enjoyed by audiences of all ages. Each season of the train follows different protagonists. The first season’s protagonist, Tulip, completed her time on the train, but the second season’s protagonist will look startlingly familiar to fans of the first season. This story follows Tulip’s reflection, Metal Tulip or MT for short, as she tries to find her own way on a train that just wasn’t designed for her. Along the way she meets human teen Jesse and a deer(?) named Allen Dracula.
What do you mean you’re confused?
Confusing set-up aside, the season makes the most of its characters. I praised the first season for creating a show where growing and reflecting (see what I did there?) on ones mistakes is the point of the show, not just a checkbox to be filled in on the way to punching a bad guy in the face or becoming the very best like no one ever was. The show itself and the train it is about are designed to force character growth. But MT’s season asks an important question: how do you grow when you don’t fit the story around you?
See, the train is for human passengers from the “real” world. They receive magic numbers that go down as they learn and confront their mistakes. MT isn’t human, has no number, but still wants to be free. This makes her a perfect stand in for communities of people who feel like outsiders. Many LGBTQ+ fans have been able to relate to a character who is told she must behave in a certain way, even if it feels all wrong. MT is hunted like a criminal for daring to leave behind the role that was assigned to her, and I think there’s some subtext there, too, about LGBTQ+ or mentally-ill people forced out of their homes for being different in a world that criminalizes homelessness. I can’t be sure what creator Owen Dennis had in mind, but I think it’s telling that he chose to make this season’s protagonist a literal mirror person. MT invites audiences to see themselves in her, even as she struggles to be seen as her own person.
That idea that there’s more going on beneath the surface is mirrored (I just can’t help myself) in Jesse, who insists on positivity and fun but feels guilty underneath, and Allen Dracula who… I simply don’t have the words to describe.
I don’t want to make it seem like this season is obsessed with darkness (though it has its fair share). There’s also joy and silliness and the little moments of friendship that made the first season so delightful. But this season also grew up in a way that the first season couldn’t.
Season Two scores 4.5 mysterious deer out of 5. The whole series is streaming on HBOMax.