Jim (Con't): Gillian and her husband David go back to the third week of January 2005. That's a long ways back to have been reading. When they started, their daughter was barely a month old and now she'll be six at the end of the year. In that same time, Dona and I have become parents, Rebecca's had her first child and Trina's become a grandmother. Ruth has a whole football stadium full of grandchildren. So a lot of us are watching children's programming today and contrasting it with childhood offerings -- for better or worse. Ty's going to start.
Ty: I read Gillian's e-mail on Wednesday, I think she sent it Tuesday. And I made a point to Tivo Sesame Street. Of children's shows still in production, Sesame Street was my favorite. I loved the real kids, the Muppets and the adults. And it holds up for young kids, I'm sure. But I really think it's a pre-K show. I'll be honest, I was in third grade and still watching it. And I know that's old for the show. But I really loved it and it was something worth watching on TV. It really seems, sorry, dumbed down to me today. Kat's "Kat's Korner: It's not easy being assembly lined" is going up later this morning and her point in that about Elmo is so true. All he is is cute. That's the only reason he's on the show. I can't think of a greater insult to Sesame Street. Can you imagine them casting any adult or child just because they were 'cute.' Elmo's dumbed down the show.
Jim: Kat's review is illustrated by a painting Betty's daughter did of Kermit the Frog. I want to be sure to include that in this roundtable.
Jim: (Con't): Ruth, for the 2 or 3 people in the world who don;t know who Kermit is, why don't you explain.
Ruth: Surely. My children were Sesame Street kids. They were the generation the show was made for. It was still experimental then and hadn't become as standardized as it would become. Educational TV did exist -- despite the efforts of some Sesame Street supporters to pretend otherwise. And there were a few quality productions, children's productions, on TV. But Sesame Street did raise the bar. It was also the MTV of its day due to the pace which was not normal for TV or children's TV at that time. In fact, in terms of pacing, it was most like the TV show Laugh In. Both shows had sight gags and brief skits. Sesame Street also had cartoons. Kids loved it. And Kermit was one of the regular muppets. There was also Bert and Ernie which Sesame Street, today, wants us to know is not a same-sex couple. If you insist, PBS. There was Big Bird who really was the star muppet, he got the most time. And there was Oscar the Grouch. But I have left out one. Anyone want to guess.
Jess: COOKIE MONSTER!!!!
Ruth: And done in the Cookie Monster voice, very good Jess. Cookie Monster was huge. In fact, my oldest son did not go to kindergarten because of Cookie Monster. All the children were in a large auditorium -- with the parents -- and they were handed one of five cards and then told to break up into different groups based on the cards. My son got Big Bird. He started to cry. He wanted to be Cookie Monster. The mother next to us, her daughter had Cookie Monster. She traded cards with my son and all was well again and I was thanking the woman and the daughter -- who honestly loved Big Bird, it turned out -- when a teacher or teacher's aid walked up, pulled the Cookie Monster card from my son's hand and thrust it at the little girl who did not want to give up her Big Bird card. The other mother and I tried to reason with the woman, explaining that the kids had made a trade and both were now happy. Not good enough. And as the woman began bellowing, I said, "Screw this." Seriously, I said that. I was a young mother of the Age of Aquarius. So I said, "Screw this," took my son's hand and we left. We were already looking at homes in Connecticut, my husband and I, and knew we would be moving in a few months. So with that starting off so poorly, a strange woman screaming at the children and their parents, I decided my son did not need to go to kindergarten. But my point was that Cookie Monster was hugely popular. That imitation that Jess just did, a lot of kids have done it over the years.
Jess: I'd agree with Ruth. We were a PBS family in my house. That's all we could watch on TV except for Saturday morning cartoons. And there were strict rules on those that eased up as we got older. But it was PBS on the TV all the time except Saturday mornings if the TV was on. Cookie Monster was my favorite. Oscar the Grouch was my sister's favorite. This was probably the early 90s, maybe end of the 80s. And I also agree with Ty's point and Kat's that Elmo's worthless. He's got nothing to offer. Big Bird was a leader, Oscar the Grouch was a grump, Cookie Monster was uncontrolled hunger, Ernie was laid back and Bert was rigid. Everyone was about what they did.
Elaine: I'll jump in here, if we haven't been on Sesame Street too much?
Dona: No, it's one of the most watched and one of the longest running TV shows. Feel free to jump in.
Elaine: Okay. Yeah, I think Elmo is honestly dangerous. I think he's destructive. As Kat, Jess and Ty have pointed out, the characters were about what they did. All Elmo does is say, basically, 'I'm so cute. Love me.' Now some might argue that it would be even more offensive if Elmo were a girl muppet. I don't think so. I don't think at that age and with Elmo's high pitched voice, that a real difference is being made between boy and girl by the young viewers. I also think it is dangerous to send a message to children that they must be lovable. I honestly see him as the end of Sesame Street if they don't find a new character, a new breakout character, quickly. He is exactly what Sesame Street was created to combat.
Jim: Alright. Thank you for that perspective, Elaine. Ruth pointed out that there were other shows on TV when Sesame Street began airing. I will take her word for it, I wasn't born back then, but does anyone want to toss out any show?
Trina: I will. CBS had Captain Kangaroo. That show, starring Bob Keeshan as the Captain, was on forever and a day. It aired every morning, Monday through Friday. I watched it in the early 60s and it was on before that. But it was a really good show, a quality show, like Ruth was talking about. It seems like six of the kids were able to watch it, six of my husband and my kids. Mike and his younger sister didn't see it because CBS had axed it by the time they were born. The older kids all saw it and loved it.
Jim: When did it air?
Trina: CBS Morning News grabs some of its airtime today.
Jim: Okay. And it was Monday through Friday and Dallas texted it started in 1955. It's a shame CBS doesn't care enough to air children's programming today. Basically, they air three hours of programming on Saturday.
Ava: Three hours of children's programming a week. Some CBS stations air it all on Saturdays, some air part of it on Sundays. It's lousy programming, boring and CBS should pay children for watching it. A new lineup starts September 11th. CBS doesn't produce the current programming and won't be producing the new line up.
Jim: Is there any reason to be excited about children's TV?
C.I.: Friends at ABC swear their block of programming, which they also won't be producing, is really going to be something. I'm not impressed, Ava's not impressed. The only show that right now has promise is Ocean Mysteries. And it's a magazine show, they all are. They won't do quality programming, they'll do cheap magazine shows with stories geared towards 'youth' that will pretend to fulfill the educational mandate the FCC requires. It's really sad. What we saw of Ocean Mysteries made it appear to be a strong program and that might be in part due to the fact that Jeff Corwin is the host. He, of course, has hosted Animal Planet's The Jeff Corwin Experience and Corwin's Quest. Ocean Mysteries will please fans of those programs.
Jim: And NBC?
Ava: The less said the better.
Jim: Alright. There are no fun cartoons on the broadcast networks these days. Whatever happened to those? Betty, you favorite fun cartoon?
Betty: I'd go with Scooby Doo.
Cedric: As would I. The Scooby gang -- original, leave out that crappy Scrappy Doo. Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy, Scooby and the Mystery Machine. That was my favorite cartoon growing up. And I'll be really honest here, I'd see reruns of Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids and want to like it, Bill Cosby was on NBC at the time with his huge sitcom, but I couldn't stand that show. The Scooby gang was always worth watching. And, to be honest, after awhile you really didn't care who did whatever. You were just watching to see Scooby and Shaggy get scared and for Velma to lose her glasses.
Wally: Which she was always doing. And usually, as she stumbled around blind without them, a ghost or ghoul would be close to grabbing her but she'd never know.
Ann: I think the reason that show was so popular was because you had different lead characters. A lot of children's shows were so vanilla and the characters were basically all the same. Like that stupid show with the four or five women who are fairies. You can't tell 'em apart because they're the same character. With Scooby Doo, each of the characters had a distinctive personality. And I'd also argue that the show was helped by the memorable theme song.
Marcia: I was going to say that. I really think the best children's shows have memorable themes. I'm a syndication baby. I watched the old shows after they were cancelled. So when I was a little girl, I was watching The Bugaloos and things like that. When The Pink Panther cartoons were pulled off network and sent to syndication, I discovered the show. But the best shows have a memorable theme: "The Bugaloos, the Bugaloos, they're in the air and everywhere . . ." Or how about, "Josie and the Pussycats, Long tails and ears for hats, guitars and sharps and flats . . ." The best shows tend to have these songs you love singing. And that includes "Sunny days . . ." The Sesame Street theme.
Jim: Betty, you kicked that off but did you want to add anything?
Betty: I think, in terms of Scooby Doo, they covered it. The show most like Scooby Doo that my children have enjoyed is The Magic School Bus. All the characters have their own personalities. Phoebe's different from Keesha who's different from Ralphie, etc. And the only adult is Ms. Frizzle -- that's Lily Tomlin's voice, by the way. They go on adventures and it's exciting and it's got a cute theme song sung by Little Richard. My kids have all loved it and my only complaint it's always on -- NBC or Fox -- and this show stopped making new episodes right before my first child was born. It seems like with the show having proven to be such a long and lasting hit, they would have gone back and made some more episodes.
Jim: Rebecca, Kat, Isaiah and Mike haven't spoken at all.
Dona: And Stan.
Jim: Thank you, and Stan. So let me start with Rebecca.
Rebecca: I'm thinking of Ty right now and Sesame Street and, if I'm remembering right, your grandparents didn't have cable, Ty?
Ty: No, they did not. All we had was what aired over the airwaves.
Rebecca: I couldn't make it. I mean maybe with syndicated shows. But that would be it. The network offerings are disgusting. We've got satellite and get Cartoon Network and all that. So our daughter can watch whatever and, of course, we've got a ton of DVDs as well. Gillian is in Ty's situation, right. They don't have cable.
Jim: No, they don't. They had just gotten married and started their family, right out of college, they've got student loan debt and everything else. So they depend on broadcast TV.
Rebecca: I don't know how you do that. There is PBS which is great when the kids are pre-K but after that it's a bit too juvenile. Myself, as an adult I used to like to watch the Saturday cartoons. Especially in the 70s. I especially loved NBC because they did a cartoon movie one year. On Saturdays.
Kat: For me, the 70s were The Muppet Show. More than any other show, that was the one I tried to catch. It was syndicated, a half-hour variety show. You never knew who the guest host would be. Maybe Lily Tomlin, maybe Madeline Khan. Maybe Diana Ross. You never knew. After that? I don't know that there was "a" cartoon. I remember blocks of them. I also loved Lance Link, alive action show starring monkeys.
C.I.: Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp.
Kat: Thank you. It was a funny show. And it had monkeys. Not to be Nicholas Cage in Ghost Rider or Jeri in Strangers With Candy, the movie, but it had monkeys.
Jim: Okay, Isaiah?
Isaiah: Part of the reason that the networks can get away with not airing Saturday morning cartoons is that so many cartoons air on Sundays on Fox's prime time schedule. If you're talking cartoons, at some point, you have to talk The Simpsons. That's probably my favorite cartoon and it's been on so long that it does include my childhood. And it also fulfills Marcia's syndicated requirement.
Marcia: Absolutely. And that's another show I never watched until it started airing in syndication.
Jim: Stan? Mike?
Mike: I'll go. Pee Wee's Playhouse. It was off the air but my brothers had taped it -- back in the VCR days. So I watched all the episodes that way. I loved the show. And that was a bit of a problem actually because of Pee Wee's 'scandal' that led to the show being pulled by CBS. But it was a great show and I loved everyone on it, Pee Wee, Cowboy Curtis, Reba the Mail Lady and Jambi.
Stan: That was a great show. I loved it. I loved the cartoons that Pee Wee would show, I loved the talking objects like Chairee and the real life people like Cowboy Curtis and Miss Yvonne. That was really a great show and it let you play along with things like the secret word.
Mike: I forgot about the secret word. Yeah, there were a lot of great things about that show.
Ava: And let me jump in to note that Pee Wee's Playhouse, or a show like it, could be done today and fulfill both entertainment and educational requirements instead of the cheaply made 'news' 'magazine' shows for 'youths' that ABC's forcing off on people.
Jim: Okay and that's going to end our look at children's TV programming.
