Sesame Street > Spongebob Squarepants

Hello, it's me, Michael, again. I think this will be my last post on Tales of the Kids, as Marcy is making a speedy recovery, and is already up and about on the blogging scene, and I believe, eager to get back to the two topics she knows best (i.e., Caitlynn and Miles). As my last post for this month, I've decided to talk about kid shows. Everybody loves those, right?

My favorite show during my childhood was Sesame Street. That was quality entertainment. I felt myself grow smarter watching it. I knew all the names of the muppets and the actual people. And I loved all the songs that they did, such as Cookie Monster's C is for Cookie and the twenty-something little segments they did that tried to drill the alphabet and numbers 1-20 into our tiny child heads. Sesame Street is a classic. (well... in my eyes.)

Now generations older than me will say the Looney Tunes gang were the best group of cartoon characters to come into our living rooms. Other shows, like Popeye, Johnny Bravo, Postman Pat, Catdog, Beakman's World, Pokémon, Bob the Builder, The Magic School Bus, Teen Titans, Pinky and the Brain, Scooby Doo, Blue's Clues, Rugrats, The Powerpuff Girls, Flowerpot Men, Animaniacs, The Jetsons and The Flintstones, and Cow and Chicken, also hold a very special place in the hearts of many teenagers and grown-ups around the world, who followed these wacky characters and storylines back when they still had trouble controlling their bladders, eating their vegetables, and learning their seven times table.

There are a couple shows which I do not see the appeal in, though, yet these shows seem to be mightily popular amongst our very-young youth nowadays. The first is Thomas the Tank Engine (or nowadays, called Thomas and Friends).

The whole idea was just really boring to me. If I wanted to nap after school, I would find Thomas on TV and fall asleep on the sofa to the sound of his repetitive and hypnotizing choo-choo-choo-choo. Their voices were just so monotone, even when the trains were excited, even when the Fat Conductor (which by the way, isn't a very nice name) was angry. The citizens were like Lego people, static, uninteresting, unvaried. The faces on the trains were always so sour, their seemingly forcéd smiles made me depressed. Also, in the actual episodes, these trains were overly competitive, and engaged in sly malefactions all with the aim of being the best tank engine in the land, even if it implied it was a dog-eat-dog world. That's not the kind of life lesson you want to send out to kids. Plus, there also seem to lack the presence of many female roles - what is this, 1930s rural England? (Well, yes, on second thought. It's exactly that.) And let's not forget the fundamental peculiarity, in that putting faces on trains is just creepy.*

As for Barney and Friends, I trust I don't have to elaborate much on why he's extremely creepy. After all, he is an overgrown purple lizard that demands hugs and kisses from a different group of multiethnic children every episode, and over the course of his career as some sort of preschool teacher/"friend"/daycare center supervisor, has never shown any desire to alleviate Baby Bop of her unhealthy attachment to that filthy yellow towel she calls her 'blankie', and has never advised BJ, Baby Bop's protoceratops brother, to seek medical help for his severe case of jaundice.*

And speaking of the color yellow, last but not least, there's Spongebob Squarepants. I didn't like this show when it first came out, and the reruns everyday on the kids channels don't make this sponge look any cuter. To start off, nothing make senses in the show. I'm all for creativity, but come on! First, the squirrel breathes in a squirrel-sized astronaut suit - from where she gets the oxygen to last a lifetime, God knows. Second, how does a pineapple actually grow at the bottom of the salty sea, to a size and with such immobility, that actually enables a friggin' sponge to live in it? Third, how is it that the ditsy squirrel, is the same size as the cynical, sadistic squid, and also the same size as the bossy, emotionally unstable sponge, and the intellectually devoid starfish? The squirrel, the sponge, the squid and the starfish are all disproportionate!

Speaking of which, Patrick also promotes idiocy, shirtlessness, and a dangerously carefree lifestyle, that verges on subconscious narcissism. Also, Spongebob teaches kids to use words like 'idiot', 'jerk' and 'moron' (except in reference to himself, of course, which I find is probably most appropriate). The lyrics to the theme song don't mean anything, the story lines don't mean anything. The show's a mind-numbing, IQ-lowering, directionless, overly advertised, random-in-a-cheesy-way, noneducational, waste of time.*

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*Whether you like a cartoon or not all depends on your personal taste. I hope I have not offended or caused severe mental damage to anyone with my outspokenness in any way. But extensive tirades suffused with intense hatred are sort of my blogging specialty.



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