Saturday I made a post concerning coming to terms the changes and evolution of Sesame Street by using the Kübler-Ross stages of grief.
The post was spawned on after getting to a point where you can only see the sardonic and subversive, politically incorrect humour potential in the show. That comprised the second half of the post. I note that it was the second half of the post because the first half of the post got posted to LJ’s metaquotes
As of this posting it now has 212 comments. Making it the 3rd most popular thread of the month.
Granted most of the thread is (as Robin Williams put it so well in “Dead Poet’s Society”) a trip down ‘Amnesia Lane’
Nostalgia is running rampant on the threads discussing what sections and pieces of Sesame Street that they miss the most.
I am so happily amused at this. When I tuned into Sesame Street in my early 20s (let’s say late 80’s into the early 90’s) it felt NOTHING like the show I’d grown up on. I hated it. Grover had been replaced with Elmo (who so sorely needed to die), Kermit and Ernie were gone. The show just felt wrong.
Now the beauty right now is not just seeing the number of posts on the metaquote thread who happily support my views. What makes me giddy is the number of them from people who are currently about 24-28. Let’s do the math. 24 years ago is 1984. Peak age for Sesame Street is 4-8.. So that’d be about 1988-1992.
That’s right.. the people who absolute agree with me today about how much the show isn’t Sesame Street (and let me tell you I’ve had two declarations of love for me for my post)… are making their judgement based on the airings of the show that were not my Sesame Street.
It’s amazing to contemplate that the importance of my post wasn’t so much the anathema and anger towards the changes but towards the path to accepting why the show must inevitably change and it’s okay.
Well, not that I mind becoming the target of affection for disliking the show at one time.
At Least Doctor Who has been improving with age 🙂
