James is a red mixed-traffic tender engine who lives and works on the island of Sodor, being the North Western Railway's number 5 engine. He is part of the steam team; an ensemble cast of main characters that many of the franchise's stories revolve around.

James was built by Horwich Works sometime between 1912 and 1913, designed as an experimental variation of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway Class 28 Locomotives with a front pony truck installed at the front and 5'6" sized driving wheels instead of the class's usual 5'1". Unlike many other engines at the time, James was fitted with wooden brake blocks, which didn't produce the results they had hoped for, leading him to be sold to the North Western Railway.

On the first day of him arriving to Sodor in The Railway Series, James was severely damaged in a crash when his trucks pushed him down the line and his wooden brake blocks caught fire. After being recovered from the wreck, James was sent to get repaired, where he would be fitted with functional brakes and gained his Fowler tender. Interestingly, he wouldn't be painted in his splendid red coat until after his accident, with his first appearances in both RWS and the movie The Adventure Begins depicting him with a black livery with red lining and boiler bands.

In The Railway Series, when he returned from the Works, James become a vain, narcissistic, and self-important engine who would frequently cause enough trouble for The Fat Controller to threaten to paint him blue at one point- something that would make him feel deeply resentful, as he's very proud of his red coat. James' ego would continue to cause trouble for himself and others throughout the entirety of the franchise, which has stopped him from following the advice of others and lead to his frequent teasing to backfire on him multiple times.

As stated before, James is quite narcissistic, vain, boastful, and full of pride for his splendid red paintwork. He has a tendency to frown upon those he thinks are old-fashioned, weak, slow or dirty, causing him to have many rivalries with several engines that sometimes causes him to act out. It's difficult for others to prevent James from getting into trouble, even when they make his penny drop by scolding him.

Due to his vanity and self-importance, James can often act selfish, rude, and stubborn until he gets his way. From picking on other smaller engines, to making false accusations and refusing to take accountability for an accident, James frequently acts with entitlement, leading him to lose the favour of others when his antics cause confusion and delay. Although James is usually able to shrug off the complaints of multiple mildly annoyed peers or a singular critic, he easily submits and backs down against large, angered groups and/or significant authority figures.

James is also prone to pulling to occasional joke on other engines, whether it's to get out of jobs he dislikes doing, or just because he thinks it's fun. However, he is capable of realizing when the jokes he pulls on other engines go too far, and this part of his personality seems to die down after the movie Tale Of The Brave.

Even with all this said, James is known to have a caring side of him that wishes to help anyone who's in a time of need. Even though he dislikes pulling trucks, he's a hardwork engine who desires to be responsible, reliable, and useful to The Fat Controller and his railway. Although his layers of vanity hide it well, James is capable of realizing when he's crossed a line, quietly mourning when an accident of his causing leads to himself or others getting hurt.

Despite how inflated his ego and sense of external confidence is, James tends to be more of a follower when it comes to his involvement with the two other big tender engines of the NWR. He rarely makes his own initiatives, and in the off chances he does, they're often shot down for centering around him and not anything more prudent.

Even if he wouldn't admit it himself, James has a deep sense of vulnerability to him, and may even go through extreme lengths to prove his worth when he feels threatened. What James fears the most is being useless and incapable of succeeding, and he deeply desires to be a valuable part of Sodor's railways. Whether or not he's in denial of the type of engine he is, James wants to go above and beyond to prove to himself and everyone else that he's the best.

I know humanizations are often frowned upon in the TTTE community, for whatever reason, but for me personally I think it's just another way for me to explore James' character in a new way. Plus, I don't believe we need to be completely grounded in the source material at all times anytime we want to be creative with it, I think there's plenty of room for us to have fun with these characters and imagine what they'd be like as humans!

[Insert human!James reference here]

This is my personal design for a James humanization! His full name is James [middle name] Hughes, and he is a gay, transgender man of Filipino descent. I imagine him to be in his mid-to-late 20's, compared to Henry and Gordon who I believe would be early-to-mid 30's (and Edward being in his late 20's to early 30's.) He presents himself in a very flashy manner and is very proud of his looks, but deep down deals with feelings of inadequacy, which leads him to act out in ways that further inflate his ego, and may or may not get him in trouble with his boss in the process.

Because I imagine James' 'true design' to have the navy blue lining he had in some RWS books instead of the black he has in the TV show, his jacket reflects this, with having navy blue lining on a jacket that's primarily red, with some yellow accents. He also

The large burn scar on his right leg came from the crash he had on his first day working for the North Western Railway- something that still brings him immense physical suffering. Despite this, he still insists on wearing high heeled boots, despite how much pain it causes him, all in the name of vanity.