The Family Tree Car

**Overview**
Gallery
Transcript

## **Guide**

"**The Family Tree Car**" is the 2nd episode of Season 2 of *Infinity Train* and the 12th episode overall. It aired on January 6, 2020.

## Synopsis

Mirror Tulip and Jesse climb down a real live family tree.

## Plot

M.T. and Jesse climb down through the hole Alan Dracula fell through and discover that they are atop a giant tree. The tree is composed of branches that have living alcoves to family members of the Gillicuty and the Trumbleshanks families who despise one another, but are forced to share the tree due to one of their members marrying one another. M.T. wants to reach the bottom to find Alan while Jesse wants to make peace with the families. However, his obsession with conceding the points of both sides only leads to more conflict between the families. They realize that the more they argue, the more the tree encompasses them and turns Jesse into wood. When they begin to compliment one another, the tree leaves them alone and they reach the bottom where Alan climbs the tree up with suction cup feet. With no other option, M.T. decides to bring Jesse with her and get his number down from 32, only to learn his starting number was actually 31, much to her chagrin.

## Features

### Characters

* Mirror Tulip
* Jesse Cosay
* Alan Dracula
* Tulip Olsen (mentioned only)
* Gillicuty Family (debut)
* Trundleshank Family (debut)

### Locations

* Wasteland (not seen)
* Infinity Train
	+ Family Tree Car

## Trivia

* **End tag:** M.T. looking at her reflection in her hand while on board the Infinity Train.
* While being turned to wood, Jesse worries about being called Pinocchio, the titular character from Carlo Collodi's famous, *The Adventures of Pinocchio*, commonly simplified as just *Pinocchio*. Incidentally, MT's quest to become a real person throughout the season mirrors Pinocchio's own quest to become a real boy, with both even encountering a group of misbehaving children along the way.

### Continuity

* Jesse's "friend" Troy Snootily Banks later appears in "The Toad Car".
* The song "When I Look At You, I See Me" that Jesse tries singing to the denizens of the Family Tree Car reappears in the Book Three episode "The Musical Car", wherein it is a big musical number in the play "Empathy Goes" written by Jesse himself.

### Behind the scenes

* Owen Dennis describes Lindsay Katai's specialty as writing "old-timey people who have to talk to each other," which is utilized heavily in this episode.
* This episode was themed around the lesson of learning to not fight: the writing team's thought was "who fights more than a family?" which manifested as a literal family tree where everyone was fighting.
* The Trundleshanks are intentionally written as "rougher around the edges" than the Gillicutys to emphasize the two families' conflict.
* The "ptooey!" line was originally used a lot more in the episode.
* The story of kids collecting eraser bits comes from an experience Lindsay Katai had in school.
* The crew have speculated on how exactly Nathanial Trundleshank died on the toilet seat: Owen Dennis thinks he broke the seat and lacerated his legs thus bleeding out, Madeline Queripel thinks he ruptured a blood vessel from sitting down too hard, and Lindsay Katai thinks he broke his hip and a shard travelled to his brain.
* At one point there were six twins (sextuplets) in the Gillicuty family, but it was changed to quadruplets since the point still got across.
* Owen Dennis questions in the DVD commentary if this episode implies the family tree residents are people who died in the real world and became a family tree in the Infinity Train. Lindsay Katai maliciously responds "That's an excellent question, thank you for that question," evoking Dennis' frequent response to similar inquiries on his Twitter, essentially admitting she does not know.
	+ She proceeds to question how trees come together when someone gets married, to which Dennis responds that it is a fantastic question.
* Jesse smelling his own hands was a character trait added by Jacob Winkler, who felt Jesse would do it as a very experiential person.
* Why does M.T. flicking Jesse's forehead make a metal sound? Says Owen Dennis: "That's a great question, thanks for that question."

### Error

* In the end credits, Laraine Newman is credited as being the voice of two Trundleshank members Maise and Bree despite neither characters making an appearance in the episode. Wilbur and Leona Trundleshank, who do have speaking roles, have uncredited voice actors.

## Gallery

*Click here to view this page's gallery.*

## References

1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 Book 2 DVD Commentary: "The Family Tree Car"

Infinity Train (pilot)

**Book One**
The Grid Car • The Beach Car • The Corgi Car • The Crystal Car • The Cat's Car • The Unfinished Car • The Chrome Car • The Ball Pit Car • The Past Car • The Engine

**Minisodes**
The Green Car • The Tiny Wizard Car • The Kaiju Car • The Tech Support Car • The Snow Car • The Hill Car • The Movie Theater Car • The Cross-Eyed Ducks Car • The Minecart Car • The Wedding Cake Car

**Book Two**
The Black Market Car • **The Family Tree Car** • The Map Car • The Toad Car • The Parasite Car • The Lucky Cat Car • The Mall Car • The Wasteland • The Tape Car • The Number Car

**Book Three**
The Musical Car • The Jungle Car • The Debutante Ball Car • Le Chat Chalet Car • The Color Clock Car • The Campfire Car • The Canyon of the Golden Winged Snakes Car • The Hey Ho Whoa Car • The Origami Car • The New Apex

**Book Four**
The Twin Tapes • The Iceberg Car • The Old West Car • The Pig Baby Car • The Astro Queue Car • The Party Car • The Art Gallery Car • The Mega Maze Car • The Castle Car • The Train to Nowhere