Season Review: Infinity Train Book 4 – Duet

Infinity Train has had a rough ride over its two years and four seasons of existence. Starting out as airing its first two story arcs across two separate weeks on Cartoon Network (the recordings of which I still have on my DVR!) before being shuffled over to HBO Max for its next two, but then being unceremoniously cancelled only halfway through creator Owen Dennis’ plans for eight seasons. Book 1: The Perennial Child aired from August 5th to 9th in 2019, starring Ashley Johnson as Tulip Olsen, an aspiring game designer dealing with her parents’ divorce but mysteriously finds herself on a weird train made for giving people life lessons. After that finished, Book 2: Cracked Reflection, aired January 6th through 10th, focusing on Tulip’s mirror duplicate, also voiced by Johnson, as she tried to escape the train to obtain her right to exist. Lastly, Book 3: Cult of the Conductor, aired from August 13th to 27th on HBO Max, this time giving the spotlight to the Apex, two humans who formed a cult to stay on the train and take it over. However, despite all the network and higher up shenanigans, including axing the show because of it not being child friendly enough, the series has managed to obtain a very tight knit following that has only grown since news of the cancellation came out, with a dedicated group to rival the zeal of the #RestoretheSnyderVerse crowd. But, if just for the moment, we come to the premature end of the track with Book 4: Duet.

Whereas Books 2 and 3 took characters in minor roles from the seasons before them and made them the protagonists (Mirror Tulip shows up in Ep 7 of Book 1, while the Apex debuted in Ep 6 of Book 2), Book 4’s protagonists, Ryan and Min-Gi, begin their stories at the start of the season. Much like Book 1, this season starts in the normal world, even making use of its whole first chapter to establish their history as close friends who drifted apart before coming back together right before being sucked into the train. The difference between it and Book 1’s beginning is that it had to introduce the whole concept of the train, the cars, the numbers on passengers’ hands, and the mystery that was beginning to unfold, whereas here, the main crux of this season is solely the fractured friendship between Ryan and Min-Gi. As such, it’s a much lighter story than previous seasons, especially Book 3, which took the story in its darkest moments and themes. This shift in tone partially makes sense once it becomes apparent that this is a prequel, taking place decades before Tulip’s arrival and shortly before major moments of certain characters’ backstories that would go on to define the train in the present day. The prospective Book 5 was meant to run parallel to this story, centering on more of the history of Book 1 antagonist Amelia and how she took control of the train for her own ends.

Essentially, what we get out of this season in particular is still a self-contained story like the ones we’ve gotten before. We have our group of characters trying to learn lessons and better themselves while facing certain death in incredibly imaginative peril. The struggles between Ryan and Min-Gi, two friends hopeful to start a band but torn apart due to parental expectation and their own respective dysfunction, is as heartwarming as it is heartbreaking. However, it being as disconnected from Books 1-3 as it is means that it loses the momentum set up by those story arcs. This isn’t exactly a flaw, mind you, as this is just the beginning of a separate overall arc connected to at least Book 5, but then you have to consider that this is the last season we’ll be getting for the foreseeable future. It’s thankfully not a cliffhanger ending and wraps up the story it’s focusing on nice and neatly (more neatly than Book 3’s at least), but in the context of being the “final season” that HBO Max advertised it as (incorrectly or not), it kinda just ends up somewhat souring a perfectly fine season that was meant to lead into something bigger. As such, it’s no surprise that most of the talk I see about Infinity Train is less about this season and more about the cancellation, overshadowing a perfectly good story in its own right.

As a fan of this series since seeing its pilot years ago, and then growing to love it even more once it officially started, I enjoyed this season immensely on its own…but I feel I can also safely say that it is probably the lowest in my rankings for the series overall. Part of that is by default, since it feels a bit incomplete, part of that is because of the reasons mentioned before about having less mystery to it than previous seasons, and part of it is that it feels much smaller in scale than the rest, being less focused on cracking the greater problems within the train (though there are major hints and connections that were meant to be explored later) and being pretty much entirely about the human element between these two friends. And I’d be lying if I said the fact that it is possibly the FINAL season didn’t have something to do with that too. And yet, its nature of being the most recent AND being directly connected to the next planned season (which is supposed to be a movie, so…not a season, I guess?) probably means I’ll rewatch it the quickest if confirmation of making that next book ever comes around! And above all else, I still wholeheartedly recommend this entire series to anyone who will watch it. If it’s taught me anything, it’s that the door to a better future just needs you to want to do better. Until the next ride, fellow passengers.