"There's a battle outside and it's ragin'!"

Trainy has a tense conversation with "The Man"

Image: Sony Pictures Television

By now the whole world knows the misbegotten saga of the HMS Boaty McBoatface*. The state-of-the-art British scientific research ship was given that name in a cheerful public referendum only to have the will of the people cruelly stomped in the dust by "The Man" and replaced by the staid and stoggy HMS Sir David Attenborough, as described in this very sober-minded article. Not that there's anything wrong with Sir David, but he just ain't Boaty.

But the voice of the masses will not be stilled. There's a movement moving my friends, and a new world's a-comin' so don't stand in the doorway, don't block up the hall, man.

In Australia, a defiant racehorse has taken on the noble name of Horsey McHorseface. Even the UK's immovable establishment buckled and threw a sop to the unruly populace milling angrily in Trafalgar Square by conferring the name Boaty McBoatface on a little robot yellow submarine. (Shouldn't its name have been 'Ringo' though?)

But now Sweden has once again lived up to its motto ("Sweden: Best place in the world") and decided to stand shoulder to shoulder with the common man and woman and officially, irrevocably, and undeniably name their newest express train on the Stockholm-Gothenburg line Trainy McTrainface.

"I can guarantee with my life that the train will be called Trainy McTrainface," said MTR Express marketing chief Per Nasfi in an effort to allay Swedish fears. "I imagine that some people were quite delighted to get some revenge for the Boaty McBoatface thing."

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*Yes, I know the proper designation is RSS, not HMS. Consider it artistic license taken with Britain’s hoary traditions for the greater good.