Little things we've noticed

[YellowYahooey]

Haven't really paid attention to how many more season 16 episodes need pages on the wiki, but of the three humans to start believing in Snuffy that season - Gordon, Maria, and Linda - Gordon seems to be the one most enthusiastic about seeing that Snuffy is real.

There's an episode where Gordon is about to get in the car with Susan and Big Bird calls him over to his nest to see Snuffy, only for Susan to mention they're late and both Gordon and Big Bird agree he should meet Snuffy at a later time. And there's one where Big Bird is invited to Snuffy's cave and Big Bird invites Gordon to go with him, only for Granny Bird to call and invite Big Bird over that same night, and when Gordon asks for directions to the cave, Big Bird has trouble describing (couldn't Big Bird walk Gordon to the cave at a later time?), and of course there's episode 2042, where Gordon expects to meet Snuffy and sits by Oscar's can, doing all he can to make sure he doesn't miss seeing Snuffy (and still misses out, while Oscar ends up seeing him instead).

I haven't noticed any guides involving Maria or Linda trying to see Snuffy. There is episode 1966, where Maria willingly goes to Big Bird's nest when told Snuffy is there, and I'm thinking she actually hesitates a bit before entering the door (despite believing Big Bird now). There's probably some instances not yet guided, though. And maybe it was hard to write Linda believing in Snuffy (and I might be wrong - after all, they were able to write for her for the three decades she was a regular). It's also interesting with Maria, as in season 15, she was sometimes shown having signs of believing in Snuffy already, or at least was less mean/annoyed when Big Bird brought him up.

It sounds like the more Big Bird brought up Snuffy in conversation, the more the adult cast realize that he does exist. Snuffy started off as Big Bird's imaginary friend, and by the early 1980s, Big Bird was trying every tactic he could to try to prove Snuffy's existence, and by the mid-1980s, the adults started to realize he truly does exist. After a part of him is revealed to the cast on the 17th season premiere, it was official - the adults now get to see Snuffy. And this led to future episodes where his little sister, Alice, started to appear occasionally.

It's too bad Mr. Hooper never got a chance to see Snuffy in action.

In the last day I've been watching some YouTube videos of people reading some of the books inspired by Follow That Bird, including Count All the Way to Sesame Street, and one of the only FTB-inspired books I couldn't find such reading videos of is Big Bird Visits the Dodos, but I saw a few images of pages in a Google search. And I noticed something in both Count the Way and Visits the Dodos that does not appear in the finished film, something that must have been cut (whether filmed or just in the scripts).

Both books show the Dodos having messy table manners. This probably would have been part of the montage from Big Bird's letter. Seems like it'd be an interesting concept, though I wonder if it would have been hard to do right on film.

Just want to know, was "Count All the Way to Sesame Street" a Little Golden Book?

 

[minor muppetz]

Just want to know, was "Count All the Way to Sesame Street" a Little Golden Book?

Yes.

 

[minor muppetz]

Maybe it's just me, and maybe this is something for its own thread, but it seems like Oscar seeing Snuffy in episode 2042 is more epic than any other time before episode 2096 where Snuffy is seen by anyone besides Big Bird. And that's only going by the guide at Muppet Wiki.

There had been other times when a character saw Snuffy for the first time (it seems this started to really happen in season 14), yet they don't really seem as epic. Maybe it's because most of those instances end with the characters believing they had imagined him or Big Bird mistakenly thinking they had seen something else (Bob had two instances of seeing Snuffy but mentioned items Big Bird didn't know he had at the time), or otherwise going back to the status quo. And of course with it being okay for the kids to see Snuffy that's not a big deal (though what about Muppet characters who are basically children?).

Maybe it's because I knew about the various stuff before I actually saw the scenes (I think the time Telly saw Snuffy is the only one I saw without knowing about the scene first - and that didn't seem so epic). But then again, I had read fan posts from people who remembered the time Oscar met Snuffy, one later episode of the season where Oscar and Snuffy interact has been on YouTube for some time, and I haven't actually seen the episode (well, it was broadcast the year I was born, maybe I did), just read the guide.

I don't know. Maybe someday I'll see the scene and see that it's not as epic as I expected (when I saw the sunset scene in episode 1966, it was a little less epic than I was expecting, though still somewhat impressive).

 

[minor muppetz]

Recently, I've noticed that various recurring sketches/identities of Grover took a bit of a break during seasons 11-20. During the 1970s, we got a good number of Waiter Grover, Super Grover, Professor Grover, and Marshall Grover, then in the 1980s those were scarce, and then in the 1990s most of them made a comeback and were seen in a lot more sketches.

During seasons 11-20, we only got two new Super Grover sketches (in the "Adventures of Super Grover" variety - season 19 also had a segment with Super Grover and Elmo talking about same and different, and he at least showed up as Super Grover in Follow That Bird), four Waiter Grover segments (one really part of The Leslie Mostly Show, and only two with Mr. Johnson), I don't think any Marshall Grover segments, and only two Professor Grover segments.

Of course, Camp Wannagohoma premiered in season 12, and we got all three of those sketches in the 1980s. I think the first two premiered in season 12 while the third premiered in season 20. Then again, Monsterpiece Theater is like an honorary recurring Grover segment, Grover was in four out of the eight MT segments that premiered during seasons 11-20. And most of the salesman Grover segments with Kermit premiered in the 1980s (depending on if you want to count those as a recurring segment).

Waiter Grover and Monsterpiece Theater are both things associated with the early years, but they seemed to be most common in the 1990s than the 1970s-1980s (well, only one Monsterpiece Theater segment aired in the 1970s). Before season 21, there were usually only one or two Monsterpiece Theaters a season, if there were any at all that season, but seasons 21-25 had an average of five new ones a season, while seasons 26-30 had a smaller amount per season, but by then there was a big back catalog of segments. With Waiter Grover, as well as Mr. Johnson, we got a bit in the 1970s then barely any in the 1980s, with only one Mr. Johnson segment taking place outside the waiter format, and then in the 1990s, we both got a lot more new waiter segments and we started to see Mr. Johnson in a ton of segments outside of Charlie's Restaurant.

The first time Lefty was referred to by name outside of the sketches with his boss was in a 2009 book, where Grover refers to him by name. And then in the 50th anniversary special, the two interact and Grover again refers to him by name as if he knows him well. But both characters have experience as salesman, maybe that's how they know each other (though Grover is a less shady salesman).

 

[crackmaster]

When the show started to rot in the 90s (because of competition with Barney and the overprofilitation of Elmo) the cartoons started to get better. When I say better, I mean more memorable and memetic.

 

[D'Snowth]

This is one little detail from FTB that I doubt means anything to anyone else here, but I always found it cool as a kid that when everyone is watching the news about Big Bird running away from the Dodos on TV in Hooper's Store that they have the set tuned into channel 2, because our local PBS has always been channel 2 (on cable, that is; it was 15 on analog). For me, it kind of felt like a little mythological Easter egg.

 

[minor muppetz]

I've just seen a screenshot of the end credits for episode 1320, showing the "Jim Henson's Muppets" credit, which only lists Frank Oz, Jerry Nelson, and Richard Hunt, as it had for most of the 1970s seasons. I would have thought Michael Earl and Brian Meehl would be credited. Makes me wonder if they were eventually credited by the end of the season (of course this was a special end credits sequence, maybe they were in the regular season 11 credits).

Thinking more, I wonder if either performer did the puppetry for Osvaldo. Not sure if it's known who did the characters physical puppetry, but it would make sense if it was one of those two, as they and Caroll Spinney were on set full-time that season.

Thinking more about it, it would be cool if the wiki could determine the first time Michael Earl was heard as Snuffy (I don't suppose the scripts would clue us in as to when he was first inside Snuffy). I've always assumed that Earl first performed Snuffy sometime in season 10 and that his first vocal performance as the character was in his first season 11 appearance, and I could be right, but it's possible he could have first been heard as Snuffy later in season 11 or even at the end of season 10. I guess when somebody is able to watch all episodes of that era until they get to Michael Earl as Snuffy (and I hope it's before the one lost episode of season 11, though I don't know off-hand whether the guide mentions him being in that episode).

 

[Oscarfan]

Thinking more, I wonder if either performer did the puppetry for Osvaldo.

There's special credits for the Puerto Rican actors in the episodes; Bob Payne gets credited for performing Osvaldo.

 

[MuppetSpot]

There's special credits for the Puerto Rican actors in the episodes; Bob Payne gets credited for performing Osvaldo.

I’m curious on why Sonia remembered Richard Hunt performing Osvaldo?

 

[Oscarfan]

Osvaldo popped up a bunch of times later with the same VO actor; Richard probably performed him in those instances, so that took over her memory.