OT: I never could appreciate Pee Wee's Playhouse or SpongeBob Square Pants...

Mr. Potter

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The earlier thread about commercials made me think of these things. Could someone explain the allure?

Shabbat Shalom
 
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Bison13

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The earlier thread about commercials made me think of these things. Could someone explain the allure?

Shabbat Shalom
mostly agree on both, I dont let my kids watch sponge bob but as an adult there are some episodes that have some humor
 

91Joe95

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The earlier thread about commercials made me think of these things. Could someone explain the allure?

Shabbat Shalom

More of a Barney and Wiggles fan?



 

Classof09

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I don’t get the appeal of ‘adult cartoons’. Family Guy? American Dad? I know they’re popular, but not my style.

As the father of an 11 month old, I guess I’m going to have to learn to like Paw Patrol, PJ Mask, etc. None of these seem on par with Saturday morning cartoons from my childhood tho.
 
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Nittany1865Farmer

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Part of the problem with watching cartoon shows for today is the pace is faster and situations switch so rapidly that for us older people, it makes your head hurt because our attention spans are longer than the average child today. Shows like Scooby-Doo and others could never succeed with today's youth because it took the whole show to reach a conclusion and it doesn't use the seizure-inducing graphics which hyper-stimulate your brain to overload all the time.
 

Bison13

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I don’t get the appeal of ‘adult cartoons’. Family Guy? American Dad? I know they’re popular, but not my style.

As the father of an 11 month old, I guess I’m going to have to learn to like Paw Patrol, PJ Mask, etc. None of these seem on or with Saturday morning cartoons from my childhood tho.
PBS has some good ones, Daniel tiger, hero elementary, super why, etc...
Also Netflix has some good ones
 
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91Joe95

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I don’t get the appeal of ‘adult cartoons’. Family Guy? American Dad? I know they’re popular, but not my style.

As the father of an 11 month old, I guess I’m going to have to learn to like Paw Patrol, PJ Mask, etc. None of these seem on or with Saturday morning cartoons from my childhood tho.

Tom and Jerry. I forgot how often Tom actually clobbered Jerry. My daughter loved it.
 

OaktonDave

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I don’t get the appeal of ‘adult cartoons’. Family Guy? American Dad? I know they’re popular, but not my style.

As the father of an 11 month old, I guess I’m going to have to learn to like Paw Patrol, PJ Mask, etc. None of these seem on or with Saturday morning cartoons from my childhood tho.
My son was into Wow Wow Wubbzy and the Wiggles. I was good with the Wiggles; if nothing else the Aussie had some appeal. Wubbzy? The theme song is a horrible memory I just can't shake. He later discovered Looney Tunes and couldn't believe they pre-dated me.
 

Thorndike2021

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I agree with Pennst8. It's like, some of my generation loved the Hair Bear Bunch and HR Puff N Stuff...I hated that schitt. Give me Bugs, Space Ghost, Rocky and Bullwinkle, Underdog, and a couple more.

My son loved Pee Wee's Playhouse. I watched it with him sometimes. It wasn't horrible. I liked Ren and Stimpy, Angry Beavers, and Beavis and Butthead better though.
 
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Midnighter

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More of a Barney and Wiggles fan?




I took my daughter to see the Wiggles in DC and Emma does all the heavy lifting for those dudes. She taps, does Irish dance, sings in French, and does sign language throughout. Heard she hung it up recently though to focus on her PhD.

 

Classof09

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Lots of good ones when I grew up. Looney Tunes, Batman, Tom and Jerry, Flintstones, etc. And I remember family shows of my youth being better than today’s offerings - Home Improvement, Boy Meets World, Hangin With Mr. Cooper, Step By Step, Family Matters, etc.
 
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TiogaLion

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The earlier thread about commercials made me think of these things. Could someone explain the allure?

Shabbat Shalom
I don't know much about pee-wee but spongebob is great. He and Patrick are the absolute best friends out on adventures and like many unsupervised children tend to get into some trouble but they always regret and make it right. Those two would often get into fights with each other, but like all good friends always found a way to work it out.

The writers would occasionally throw in a reference for adults, but that just goes over the heads of the young ones and for the older ones the references are extremely mild when compared to almost all other media.
 

bbrown

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I agree with Pennst8. It's like, some of my generation loved the Hair Bear Bunch and HR Puff N Stuff...I hated that schitt. Give me Bugs, Space Ghost, Rocky and Bullwinkle, Underdog, and a couple more.

My son loved Pee Wee's Playhouse. I watched it with him sometimes. It wasn't horrible. I liked Ren and Stimpy, Angry Beavers, and Beavis and Butthead better though.
Pee Wee's Playhouse was always good to wake and bake too. ;)
 

Quint526

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I don’t get the appeal of ‘adult cartoons’. Family Guy? American Dad? I know they’re popular, but not my style.

As the father of an 11 month old, I guess I’m going to have to learn to like Paw Patrol, PJ Mask, etc. None of these seem on par with Saturday morning cartoons from my childhood tho.
Yeah…the cartoons now are generally not as good. My favorite will always be Tom and Jerry. Great production for the animation and music. Just fun and so well done.

When our son was younger, we watched a lot of Yo Gabba Gabba. It was whacked. It was for toddlers, but Adults could enjoy it. Great guest stars from sports and entertainment to sing or dance for the kids. The Roots even performed on an episode.

As mentioned, check out PBS. They have good programs. When you child gets a bit older, I’m sure they still play Arthur.
 

bbrown

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Yeah…the cartoons now are generally not as good. My favorite will always be Tom and Jerry. Great production for the animation and music. Just fun and so well done.

When our son was younger, we watched a lot of Yo Gabba Gabba. It was whacked. It was for toddlers, but Adults could enjoy it. Great guest stars from sports and entertainment to sing or dance for the kids. The Roots even performed on an episode.

As mentioned, check out PBS. They have good programs. When you child gets a bit older, I’m sure they still play Arthur.
+1. Looney Tunes and Bugs was my entry into a lot of classical music.
 

psykim

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At first PeeWees Playhouse was quite funny. I watched it with my kids about 30 years ago. However, soon enough signs of his emotional/sexual difficulties came out-there were prolonged kissing scenes in his second movie which had nothing to do with the movie and sure did not appeal to 5/6 year olds-soon after he was arrested for inappropriate sexual conduct in a movie theatre. I have no idea what happened to him but his early stuff was pretty funny and harmless but deteriorated into sexual themes which the average 4 to 6 year old-the intended audience-did not really need or appreciate. I have no idea if he did further shows as my sons lost interest and i kept them away from watching him after he was arrested and his problems came to my attention.
 

ApexLion

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PeeWee's Playhouse was brilliant as a send up of a kids morning show with a postmodern interpretation - deconstructing an early television show and recasting it with an experimental cast and dialogue. Ultimately, its all make believe but it was dream like, frenetic, very much in tune with kids' imaginations.

Yes Paul Rubens had issues off camera but he and the cast was very talented - S. Epatha Merkerson, Laurence Fishburne, Natasha Lyonme and of course Phil Hartman.
 

STPGopherfan

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At first PeeWees Playhouse was quite funny. I watched it with my kids about 30 years ago. However, soon enough signs of his emotional/sexual difficulties came out-there were prolonged kissing scenes in his second movie which had nothing to do with the movie and sure did not appeal to 5/6 year olds-soon after he was arrested for inappropriate sexual conduct in a movie theatre. I have no idea what happened to him but his early stuff was pretty funny and harmless but deteriorated into sexual themes which the average 4 to 6 year old-the intended audience-did not really need or appreciate. I have no idea if he did further shows as my sons lost interest and i kept them away from watching him after he was arrested and his problems came to my attention.
I think it has much to do with it's origins.Pee Wee's Playhouse didn't start as a childrens show.

I remember hearing rumors that the adult theatre 'event' was staged. That he wanted out. Most of it sounds far fetched, but knowing how the show started, maybe the he wanted out part was correct.
 

Nitwit

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Were you on the right or the left of that photo? :cool:
I believe I blew out the birthday candles which was a recurring event on the show. I was selected from the audience to take part because my birthday was very close to the date the show was being broadcast. I may have been attending as part of a boy scout group visit but I don’t recall that specific detail. Anyway that was it for me until I was about 26 years old when I did a 10 minute interview on a mid day news show on channel 17 in Philadelphia about some sort of economics policy but I won’t go into the details of that here.
 
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Edh85

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The earlier thread about commercials made me think of these things. Could someone explain the allure?

Shabbat Shalom
I hated Sponge Bob at first, but you have to give it some time and really listen to the dialogue. I'm a big fan now and I'd put it up there with the Bugs Bunny cartoons. Lots of similarities in my book, especially the variety of characters, along with the dialogue. Plankton is really, really funny.
 
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