Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is a comic story written by Dennis Hallum with input by Tony Baxter, and drawn by Tigh Walker. It features Abigail Bullion, Barnabas T. Bullion, Jason Chandler, Jr, George Willikers, Onawa, Billy the Disney Goat and the Thunderbird. Bodaway appears in flashbacks.
Description[]
Returning to Rainbow Ridge, near Big Thunder Mountain, the adventurous and reckless Abigail Bullion (daughter of widely-disliked mine-owner and entrepreneur Barnabas T. Bullion) discovers strange goings-on in her father's mine, a gang of robbers whose motives may not be so base as it appears, and a small tyrant abusing his authority over the mine-workers…
References[]
- The story takes place in 1878.
Continuity[]
- The comic story bases itself on Walt Disney World's version of the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad ride (1980), and particularly the 2019 additions to its storyline, such as Barnabas T. Bullion as a character. It does present a slight conflict with them, however, as Bullion mentions having worked on the mine for 22 years by 1878, placing its opening in 1856, as opposed to the date given in the ride, of September the 3rd, 1848 as the beginning of Bullion's operations.
- Jason Chandler, Jr is one of the miners at the Bullion Mine. Jason Chandler, Snr., an inventor, and a fellow Society of Explorers and Adventurers member to Barnabas T. Bullion, was created in the 1970's by Tony Baxter for the unmade Discovery Bary ride, and had been mentioned to be from the Big Thunder area in the “chronicles” by Did You Hear The One About… (1992), while also appearing in the unreleased film The Discovery Bay Chronicles. He had been reintroduced in the 2013 updates to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad through a letter written by him to Bullion.
Behind the scenes[]
Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was released in 2015 by Marvel as part of the Disney Kingdoms series/events.
The eventual redemption of Barnabas T. Bullion in the story was reportedly suggested in private talks to writer Dennis Hallum by Imagineer Tony Baxter, with whom it sat somewhat unhappily that Bullion (who posseses Baxter's likeness as a joke from Baxter's fellow Imagineers) should be an irredeemable crook. The redemption arc also served to separate Bullion from Henry Ravenswood as a character, which could only be a positive.