Shark Bytes

It's serious virtual

czjz

Back when I was a little kid, Michelangelo and Donatello would eat nothing but pizza all day long, and nobody was concerned with child obesity.

My, how the times have changed...

Let em watch the Classic Episodes on Noggin, along with The New Zoo Revue (with Doug and Emmyjo), classic Electric Company with Tom Lehrer singing his little ditty about the parts of speech (Silent E, L-Y, etc) the Original Zoom Show, etc ad infinitum

One of my most cherished artifacts from my childhood is the 45rpm record of the Sesame Street theme song b/w Rubber Ducky. I played that record daily, usually many times over each day. It is mono and has a lot of scratches on it, but it still plays and every once in awhile I pull it out and play just for the memories.

For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, a 45rpm record was made out of vinyl and was the 'old school' equivalent of a CD single. One song per side, played on a record player (something else that has gone away with the advent of modern technology). Maybe not as convenient as a CD but definitely warmer and fuzzier!

Sesame Street has never jumped The Shark
in 38 seasons, until Season #39. I
didn't mind when they suddenly made CG1
animated versions of the Tweedle Bugs a
few years ago, but for this season,
Sesame Street has taken the smallest
step backwards since remaking in ribbon
effects "The Number Song". What's next,
a terribly drawn introduction sequence
for the 40'th Anniversary Special? I'm
sorry, Sesame Workshop, but this time,
Sesame Street has gone too far. If the
actual voices of Ernie & Bert including
Frank Oz see the new Claymation version
of their original Muppet counterparts,
I imagine Jim Henson must be rolling
over in his grave. I'm sure this error
will be corrected if enough loyal fans
of Sesame Street write a petition to
bring Ernie & Bert back to Muppet form
on the show, the way they were meant to
be seen. Don't mess with the classics.
ERNIE LAUGHS ("Che-he-he-he-he-he-he!")
BERT LAUGHS ("AAH-AH-AH-AH-AH-AH-AH!")
RICK.

You think the elephant and his voice are annoying, but Elmo and his voice aren't? Weird.

The annoying elephant...that friggin' voice is like alcohol in an open wound.

Elmo is like garlic: a little goes a long way, or there is no such thing as too much.

I must be a parent in the minority, becuase I grew up in the Kermit era, but I like Elmo alot.

Cookie Monster is the best character ever, but he works best when playing off of another human or muppet. He was even on The Colbert Report, talking about his cookie addiciton in the 70s and 80s. Too funny.

Jumped when Cookie Monster denigrated cookies as a "sometimes food". Party pooper!

WHile I agree, (I personally hate Elmo's world), it was added because ratings were in the toilet and the show wa rying to stay on the air. ELmo is supposed to represent a 3 or 4 year old's speech habits. My nieces love that part of the show which is the only reason why I tolerate it. Iwould love a return to the old format, but in this day and age of computer animation, kids just weren't responding to real adults. One solution, turn off the tv and read real books if you want your kids to learn to read. Go out and talk to real people!

You all are really negative about this! Sesame street is based loosley on the Voulentary State Curriculum of New York which states that kids must learn a whole slew of different concepts at a certian age. Im glad SS tackled the Death of Hooper because they did it in such a non denominational way. We all like to think that we all have the same feelings on death but we dont. This isnt communisim. We are allowed to have our opinions. Its good for kids to learn about those types of things. Another thing everyone needs to keep in mind is that the shows age range changed over the years. The age group went from 2-9 to 2-4 viewing age. Back in the day of Mr. Hooper, there were kids up to age 9 watching the show due to limited childrens television choices.(70's-early to mid 80's)
SS was also very wonderful because it was the first show to depict children of all races living in an urban setting (something that had never been done before!)
And the elmo show was released because again, the age range changed on the show. Elmo was chosen for his childlike qualities and started doing a 'routine' because very young preschool age children benefit from daily repitition. I dont like elmo either but SS is just trying to keep up with what benefits children the best.

Thanks, Max. I think that's one of the best brief explications I've read of what constitutes the real difference between the Henson and post-Henson "Street". Most children's programming today is patronizing to a degree that's actually insuting, and I don't just mean to an adult's intelligence either.

Perhaps if Sesame Street ever does jump the shark, it'll be by trying to turn everything into a brainwashing session.

Sesame Street as I remember it as a kid was all about getting young children to really explore the world around them. It was random fun and a real treat to see Jim Henson's imagination played out on the TV. No one worried about kids 'getting the wrong idea' with stuff like Cookie Monster or Bert n Ernie, because there wasn't this assumption that kids are all inherently stupid like you see in modern kid's shows.

I believe that 'Child Psychologists' have ruined kid's TV. After all they're the ones who keep insisting that crap like Barney, Dora the Explorer, and the cracked-out Teletubbies are 'tailored to a child's mind.' Yeah, maybe if your child has an extra chromosome or two.

The fact is that kids are not stupid. Naive maybe, uneducated definitely, but I believe Children's shows should encourage kids to think and be creative. Not just belt out songs that consist of one word repeated to the jingle-bells theme A La Elmo. Or giggle and yell 'Again! Again!' like the Teletards.

The war against obesity is getting so ridiculous that there is no guarantee that Cookie Monster will never become the veggie monster. I'm not saying we should all pig out on junk food, and yes, I do think kids should eat right, but it's wrong to ruin a classic character all over politics. I grew up with cookie monster and was not encouraged to eat nothing but cookies by him. I knew cookies were a "sometimes food" for people, but he could eat lots of them because he was a cookie monster. As for the so-called "obesity epidemic" which spurred this destruction of a classic character, I see for myself proof that kids aren't as fat as they make them out to be. There are a lot of kids in my area, and very few of them are as fat these anti-obesity fanatics make them out to be.

Sesame Street is still great. I grew up on it, and now my 2-year-old adores it. I watch it with him a lot, and I've never seen anything about it that I would classify as "jumping the shark." Elmo isn't really that bad, frankly, and Elmo's World is my kid's favorite part of the show.

Also, to those of you who are talking about Veggie Monster: try watching the show (or check out Snopes.com). This whole Veggie Monster business is an urban legend. They incorporated fruits and veggies into Cookie Monster's diet because of rampant child obesity, but he mostly still just eats cookies. There is no Veggie Monster.

I saw some newer episodes of this program not too long ago. and I don't think it's all THAT bad - I even kind of LIKE little red Elmo! hee hee hee! and the Spanish word of the day is kind of fun too. so I don't think it's really JTS at all- it's just quite different from when it first began, that's all.