Where are all these classic Sesame Street episodes coming from?

[MikaelaMuppet]

Nah. She was in plenty more through season 12. What we've come to learn is that each season, she would come by and stay for a few weeks worth of shows before going back to Hawaii.

My bad then. I thought that it was her last episode.

 

[sesamemuppetfan]

This must have been Buffy's last episode.

My bad then. I thought that it was her last episode.

Surely you know about the Hawaii trip 1 season later?

 

[MikaelaMuppet]

Surely you know about the Hawaii trip 1 season later?

Yes.

 

[YellowYahooey]

This episode from late in Season 13 also has just two street scenes, one on each end if the broadcast:

Episode 1690

muppet.fandom.com

There seems to be a correlation with the four episodes with very minimal street scenes. They were all supposedly taped late in a season, as they were aired in March, April or May. I wonder if this is due to having blown through the show's budget by that point, and shows filled with virtually all inserts was considered a case of budget mode?

 

[Oscarfan]

It could either be a budgetary thing or a "we exhausted all our ideas for material" thing.

 

[YellowYahooey]

It could either be a budgetary thing or a "we exhausted all our ideas for material" thing.

I had a rough idea on those two scenarios being the reason for the lack of street scenes. The CTW had to commit to filling the hour.

I like the idea of the scenario of exhausting all of the producers' ideas for street scenes, and it would make sense. I personally think each season had a certain focus/theme, and by the time they got around to taping shows scheduled for broadcast in April and May, the producers' ideas were pretty much exhausted, and left with little to contribute regarding the season's theme. However, the season finale had some more street scenes - if true, they wanted to save the best for last.

I do know Season 19 focused on love and relationships, as Maria's actress was pregnant, declared she was in love with Luis, and got married. Season 15, as per Muppet Wiki, focused on computers and the issue of death.

 

[hooperfan]

A lot of episodes look like really awesome segments, and it looks like there are a number of ones that don't seem to feature very much as far as new or clever material. Glad that we were lucky to get shows like "the President is coming" or "Oscar's Brother Visits" rather than ones that may only have 3 minutes of material that I'd find fascinating.

 

[hooperfan]

Speaking of fascinating:

https://t.co/RpbK2o6X6K

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1177994326590328833

 

[Oscarfan]

I'm sure there's some report out there from 1969 justifying the episode count, but really, I have no idea why they chose to do 130 episodes a year. I think they should've knocked that down ages ago - more money for better shows (I mean, presumably more money).

 

[YellowYahooey]

I'm sure there's some report out there from 1969 justifying the episode count, but really, I have no idea why they chose to do 130 episodes a year. I think they should've knocked that down ages ago - more money for better shows (I mean, presumably more money).

Agreed. The 130-episode count, by Season 3 or 4, consisted of 20 repeat episodes from two seasons ago, and I personally think the scenes were more about teaching kids the fundamentals, sometimes with a song, while the latter two scenes were linked together for a short storyline. At least the show did get their act together by the latter half of the 1980s when all of the scenes would link together to form a full storyline, even though I never cared for that format, but I may be in the minority for my comment.

I think the show was better off airing fewer episodes in a season, airing once per weekend, in the first place. Something that wouldn't happen until the HBO deal took effect. I don't know why there were hour-long episodes filled with mostly inserts and animated segments by the time the 80s rolled around. In the initial seasons, there were so many street scenes, but by the 80s, you would have, at season's prime, five or six street scenes max.

I think episodes with fewer street scenes would be commonplace by the final two months of the season, as I observed in several episode guides for the episodes aired in March, April and May - particularly with Season 13. It was becoming more and more common for an episode to start off with a recycled street scene (labeled an insert) or a cast or muppets segment, and then multiple segments before the first street scene of the episode.