Your Thoughts: The Street We Live On

[Dantecat]

Great Special!!!! I liked it very very much. It was so amazing when I saw a very little bit of old-vintage skits.

 

[Censored]

I just saw it. The best I can say about it is, "nice try." Very little of it was about the old days. A lot more of the old days could be seen from the Noggin episodes than the few clips that they showed on this special. Grover was supposed to show Elmo the "Sesame Street he never knew" that was "before he was born." Yet, aside from the VERY brief scene of Mr. Hooper, all of the scenes were from Elmo's time. You can even see Elmo in the wedding of Maria and Luis. It didn't really make sense. I found it funny that when observing Miles' adoption, Grover said, "Gordon is still bald. Some things never change." I'm thinking, "Go back a little further in time, and everyone will see how much Gordon has changed. LOL Interesting that Gordon once again has a goatee beard, like he did on his first season there.

On the positive side, they actually did show a clip of the original Gordon at the end (if you remember, that was a high point of debate on here). Of course, it was very quick as a clip to represent the first season and nothing was said about it. David got just a little air time. As usual, his name was never spoken. It was also kind of interesting to see an extended version of "Dance Myself To Sleep" with celebrities, although it did not come close to matching the magic of "Put Down The Ducky" in its extended version.

I guess it was okay for what it was worth, but it could have been so much more.

 

[Baughdie Howes]

Clearly, I'm not the only one who feels let-down and lied-to

"L" is for "LIE" and for "LET DOWN".
"R" is for "RIP OFF".
"F" is for "FALSE ADVERTISING".

I was thoroughly LET DOWN, RIPPED OFF and sucked in by the FALSE ADVERTISING of the 35th Anniversary "Sesame Street" special. "35 years in the making"? HA!

The previous anniversary specials have delivered what they promised: true retrospectives and commemmorations of the history of the show. This latest one was nothing more than a typical episode, with the occasional old clip thrown in whenever they felt all the old alumni would be feeling so alienated they'd switch off. Clearly, this special was aimed solely at creating something they could release on home video, which the rugrats who currently scream for Elmo would demand their parents purchase for them.

Why else would they have wasted so much time on segments which make up most of the content of the episodes which currently air every day on PBS? And why else would they have hung the whole thing on Elmo's World?

Oscar was right when he called him "the little red menace". And putting his creator in charge of the anniversary special was a monumentally stupid move, because it would mean that the whole thing would revolve around him, instead of all the other people who were and are involved with the show. Tacking on that final retrospective of clips, with no regard for the ACTUAL year in which a particular segment was created, was yet another half-***** attempt to placate the millions of us who grew up in the years before the little red menace took over the whole thing.

The 35th Anniversary special was typical of what's wrong with "Sesame Street". Sesame Workshop is perfectly happy to take the millions of dollars it gets in sponsorships and merchandising, but not to spend it on anything which cannot lead directly to more merchandising cash. The show now has a much smaller cast, a small cluster group of Muppets (which centre on that little red menace who brings in so many merchandising dollars for them), the same few segments aired every day (most of which were created in the past 5 years, so they don't have to pay residuals to all those people who created the earlier segments).

To top it all off, they don't even create new episodes every year any more! The same handful of episodes have been airing on PBS for TWO YEARS now!

The thing that bothers me the most is that they LIED to us. If you're going to promote something as a 35th Anniversary special, do NOT then deliver a standard episode, with a handful of old clips tossed in to try to appease the millions of us who grew up with the show.

I am thoroughly disgusted and let down. They LIED to us! I can't say it often enough or strongly enough. I don't think I'll be the only one who will be boycotting their products from now on. Clearly, they don't deserve our support, because all they care about is making money.

 

[McFraggle]

There could have been more about the old days, but I did like the clips at the end of all the old shows through the years.

 

[Censored]

"L" is for "LIE" and for "LET DOWN".
"R" is for "RIP OFF".
"F" is for "FALSE ADVERTISING".

I was thoroughly LET DOWN, RIPPED OFF and sucked in by the FALSE ADVERTISING of the 35th Anniversary "Sesame Street" special. "35 years in the making"? HA!

The previous anniversary specials have delivered what they promised: true retrospectives and commemmorations of the history of the show. This latest one was nothing more than a typical episode, with the occasional old clip thrown in whenever they felt all the old alumni would be feeling so alienated they'd switch off. Clearly, this special was aimed solely at creating something they could release on home video, which the rugrats who currently scream for Elmo would demand their parents purchase for them.

Why else would they have wasted so much time on segments which make up most of the content of the episodes which currently air every day on PBS? And why else would they have hung the whole thing on Elmo's World?

Oscar was right when he called him "the little red menace". And putting his creator in charge of the anniversary special was a monumentally stupid move, because it would mean that the whole thing would revolve around him, instead of all the other people who were and are involved with the show. Tacking on that final retrospective of clips, with no regard for the ACTUAL year in which a particular segment was created, was yet another half-***** attempt to placate the millions of us who grew up in the years before the little red menace took over the whole thing.

The 35th Anniversary special was typical of what's wrong with "Sesame Street". Sesame Workshop is perfectly happy to take the millions of dollars it gets in sponsorships and merchandising, but not to spend it on anything which cannot lead directly to more merchandising cash. The show now has a much smaller cast, a small cluster group of Muppets (which centre on that little red menace who brings in so many merchandising dollars for them), the same few segments aired every day (most of which were created in the past 5 years, so they don't have to pay residuals to all those people who created the earlier segments).

To top it all off, they don't even create new episodes every year any more! The same handful of episodes have been airing on PBS for TWO YEARS now!

The thing that bothers me the most is that they LIED to us. If you're going to promote something as a 35th Anniversary special, do NOT then deliver a standard episode, with a handful of old clips tossed in to try to appease the millions of us who grew up with the show.

I am thoroughly disgusted and let down. They LIED to us! I can't say it often enough or strongly enough. I don't think I'll be the only one who will be boycotting their products from now on. Clearly, they don't deserve our support, because all they care about is making money.

I agree with you. I was trying to be a little positive about it, but it really did not have much to recommend it. One reason I'm not too upset is because I really didn't expect that much; I know how Sesame Workshop operates and if it would have truly been a real tribute to the old days, I would have been very surprised.

 

[dwayne1115]

right on booo sesmae workshop bbbbbbb disny booo tto them i want the old days back.

 

[ssetta]

I think I do agree that it could have had more old clips, like "Count It Higher", for one example. But the fact that they made an effort to do this special does prove that the people at Sesame Workshop know that there is a market out there for classic Sesame Street fans like us.

 

[Baughdie Howes]

Funny, they managed it really well in the past. The 20th and 25th Anniversary shows were excellent. I remember it was really something to see Jon-Jon all grown up and sporting an Air Force uniform.

What's happened to him since then? What's happened to some of the other original children on the show? What's happened to Linda and Olivia and Ruthie? I know David isn't spoken of at all; that's pretty much a given. But what of the others?

The thing that hurts the most, apart from their lying to us to get us to watch this latest special, is that Sesame Workshop doesn't seem to want to acknowledge all those people from the show's past...other than with a half-***** "We wish to thank all those people who worked on the show over the past 35 years" credit at the very end of the credit roll.

I realize they wanted to reinvent the show a few years ago, to take into account that most of their core viewing audience now already knows its basic alphabet and number skills, but turning their backs on all that went before is NOT the way to do it!

 

[drmusic_99]

My expectations were low, and the show only slightly exceeded them. (It was a nice surprise to see "Mahna-Mahna" at the end, even if stupid WTVS DID run a voice-over over it.) But I almost fell over when I saw this:

During the Baker #10 bit, when they showed the 10 wind-up toys... one of them was Pinocchio, from the old Rankin-Bass series, "The New Adventures of Pinocchio"! In fact, that very toy is pictured in the book, "The Enchanted World of Rankin-Bass."

I'd also just like to observe that Gordon with a goatee means that for the very first time, the Gordon on the show resembles the Gordon that came with my Fisher-Price Play Family Sesame Street.

 

[Baughdie Howes]

P is for Pinocchio and for Pest...

But I almost fell over when I saw this:

During the Baker #10 bit, when they showed the 10 wind-up toys... one of them was Pinocchio, from the old Rankin-Bass series, "The New Adventures of Pinocchio"! In fact, that very toy is pictured in the book, "The Enchanted World of Rankin-Bass.

So I'm not the only one who noticed this!

I remember watching that old Rankin-Bass "Pinocchio" series when I was a really little kid. That old toy is worth a fortune today, because it's such a good likeness that it's almost identical to the original Animagic character used in the series.

Given how antsy Sesame Workshop is about displaying characters it doesn't own, I wonder what would happen if Rankin-Bass (which is still operational, according to www.rankinbass.com) were to send them a nice letter, asking for a royalty and for a "Pinocchio character toy is copyright Rankin-Bass" credit in all the home video releases of the special...