Sesame Street Season 46 Episode 4613 - The Princess Story

[Phillip]

Episode 4613 - The Princess Story
HBO Premiere: Saturday April 2, 2016
PBS Premiere: Monday October 17, 2016

Rosita helps Abby and Zoe think outside the 'fairy tale' box as they imagine and make up a story together. Also featuring Cookie Monster's Star Smores parody and Elmo the Musical-Prince Elmo. Brought to you by the letter P and the number 4.

This street story is originally from Season 44, Episode 4418.

If you saw "The Princess Story" please like this post and share your thoughts below.

 

[antsamthompson9]

The only new thing was the cold open with Grover. It was funny. But it was a missed opportunity to debut Jen's Zoe. It's just driving me crazy that we have no idea if Zoe will ever show up this season when she has a new performer.

 

[Pig'sSaysAdios]

The only new thing was the cold open with Grover. It was funny. But it was a missed opportunity to debut Jen's Zoe. It's just driving me crazy that we have no idea if Zoe will ever show up this season when she has a new performer.

Well this pic seems to show that Zoe will be in at least one street scene or cold open this season: https://www.instagram.com/p/1_Vw9ERgh4/

 

[D'Snowth]

Once again, the show wasn't on HBO today, so I caught it On Demand instead . . . did they move it to a new time already or something?

Anyway, so what season is this repeated from?

I started watching, but I had to stop, and you guys know why. How many times in the past has the show done sketches and inserts involving a princess in a tower well enough without the need of excessive chromakey and CGI? I can think of at least three off the top of my head, and I'm sure there's more.

 

[Pig'sSaysAdios]

Anyway, so what season is this repeated from?

Season 44.

I started watching, but I had to stop, and you guys know why. How many times in the past has the show done sketches and inserts involving a princess in a tower well enough without the need of excessive chromakey and CGI? I can think of at least three off the top of my head, and I'm sure there's more.

The fairytale characters have been used way too much since about season 40. Also yeah, I agree with you on the CGI, it was pretty excessive in this episode.

 

[D'Snowth]

The fairytale characters have been used way too much since about season 40.

That's something a lot of us have agreed on as one of the show's weaknesses in recent years; that and the overabundant use of celebrity guests to the point that they turned Word of the Day into a daily celebrity showcase, and almost every street scene having a celebrity guest star -- it was just a bit much.

That, and one thing I've brought up too, was the increasingly presence of fantasy on the show. That's not to say that there's never been a level of fantasy on the show, but in the old days, more Muppet characters were grounded in reality - whether they're a dull lecturer like Herbert Birdsfoot, or an absent minded scientist like Dr. Nobel Price - they were more or less like the kind of characters you may relate to in a real life scenario. In recent years, however, more and more we've seen characters like talking animals, talking vegetables, and talking minerals on the street; not necessarily a bad thing at all, but it has been noticeable.

 

[D'Snowth]

How many times in the past has the show done sketches and inserts involving a princess in a tower well enough without the need of excessive chromakey and CGI? I can think of at least three off the top of my head, and I'm sure there's more.

How coincidental that SST happened to upload one of those inserts I was thinking of:

See how much more believable and real that looks compared to CGI?

 

[Pig'sSaysAdios]

See how much more believable and real that looks compared to CGI?

Yes, but it's not as lively or colorful. Kids have shorter attention spans now than they used to and the show has to keep the kids interested and to do that they have to occasionally resort to cartoonish effects.

 

[antsamthompson9]

Once again, the show wasn't on HBO today, so I caught it On Demand instead . . . did they move it to a new time already or something?

Are you watching it on regular HBO or HBO Family? That might have something to do with it.

 

[Drtooth]

That's something a lot of us have agreed on as one of the show's weaknesses in recent years; that and the overabundant use of celebrity guests to the point that they turned Word of the Day into a daily celebrity showcase, and almost every street scene having a celebrity guest star -- it was just a bit much.

While I don't like the "kids don't know who celebrities or what we're parodying" logic, I'm glad they've toned it down. That and the fairy tale characters since the 90's. They've been waaaaay overdoing it and I get the feeling why they're doing it and I just don't like it. It's somehow to keep the characters as pure role models, so they pass all the drama and conflict onto hyperactive versions of fairy tale characters. Plus there's also that "you know the story and we can use that to teach you" thing which seems either a brilliant turn or lazy. Baby Bear did start out as one of those but became his own thing, mainly due to Rudman needing a character of his own. I'm very mixed about the fantasy angle. They always had some level of fairy tale and magic elements, but they were tempered with Looney Tunes style gags and encroachment of reality humor. It's been more cartoony since the 90's and the ATC era, but they push it too far recently. And I can't even blame that on the creation of Abby. That was a long time coming and would happen with or without that character.

See how much more believable and real that looks compared to CGI?

I'm ambivalent about CGI backdrops. It surely seems like something Jim would experiment with at some point. I think it works specifically for the segments that use them, where they would spend a minor fortune and have to constantly reuse backdrops otherwise. I mean, they purposely made an episode where Telly has to babysit a duck to reuse the Telly Duck puppet from the Peter and the Wolf special, they used that ugly Mouse Zoe puppet from Abby in Wonderland for a season. They're going to reuse the heck out of anything that costs that much time and money. The segments they use those CGI drops for are the fantasy based segments like ETM and Crumby Pictures where they'd need to constantly change settings. I get that. I'd love to see a fixed series of sketches that use a practical backdrop over and over to make it worth their money, but with segments that have ever changing scenery, of course they'll go for the cheaper alternative.

But it does make it look a little cartoony, I agree.