The Day Sesame Street Died 

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"You've got to remember that you're not merely writing for children. You're writing for the unfortunate people; mothers, fathers, aunts, uncles, grandfathers, grandmothers... who've got to read the children the stories aloud. Not just once, but over and over and over again." - The Rev. W. Awdry, Creator of "Thomas & Friends"

"Who's your favorite vampire?" "Probably that purple dude from Sesame Street." "He doesn't count." "Oh, I assure you, he does..."

My four year old does not call the show Sesame street, he calls it Elmo. It really shows how dominant the character became.

I agree. Before Elmo, Sesame Street characters were fun but never made kids feel like they were being talked to in an extremely simplistic and therefor different way than their own parents would communicate with them. Elmo always felt like a form of condescension, even if kids couldn’t identify exactly what that was.

If you watch Sesame Street in 2023 it literally feels like the Elmo and friends show . At least in the 90s it felt like the Elmo and big bird show and friends lol.

This should really be called ‘How HBO ruined Seasame Street’

Big bird singing at Jim Henson's funeral makes me cry everytime

Snuffy and the two aliens that had a conversation with a ringing telephone were my favorite characters

Elmo is effectively everything Jim Henson didn't want the Muppets to turn into.

As someone who grew up watching Sesame Street during the "new" era, I had no idea the old era was so meditative and deep

This show started 3 months after I was born in 1969. So I can say that it has literally been running for my entire life. And I started watching it when I was 2-3 years old. It is sad what has become of it. It is directly responsible for me being able to read before I even started school.

I was 16 in 1969 and found Sesame Street to be a relaxing way of winding down after school. My fave is, and always was, Grover.

I think Elmo is more of a symptom than a cause of Sesame Street's decline. He's a good character, and I see why the kids like him so much, but the show runners didn't have to make him the focus of nearly every episode. To answer your question (which is tough because it's hard to pick just one), my favorite Sesame Street Muppet would probably have to be Cookie Monster.

I feel as though Elmo as a character wasn't the root of the issue but was definitely representative of a growing problem of trying to make it more entertaining than educational.The move to HBO was the final nail in the coffin, because finally they were saying the quiet part out loud: it is no longer about education. It is about money.

Sesame street had a rule that they wouldn’t have kids on who were actors, but now almost every kid is an actor on the show

Man, you nailed it. Even watching the segments you presented and observing my emotional response, there was a warmth and 'community' and sense of belonging to those scenes. The modern ones are a 'show', not a community.

This video honestly hit me harder than I expected. I forgot that Sesame Street isn't even on PBS anymore. That feels so wrong to me. Now, and especially back then, it felt like a show that needed and deserved to be on public broadcasting for any kid to be able to see relatively easily assuming they had a TV at home. Edit: Okay, it actually seems that it's still on PBS to a certain degree. Doesn't really change my original comment though. Sesame Street never should have been on anything other than PBS IMO.

This hit home for me. I'm a 70s baby, so I grew up loving Grover and watching Sesame Street as a poor Black girl from Tennessee. I fell in love with reading, numbers, and music because of this show. When my son was born, it was the beginning of the Elmo years, and I tried to hold on to a bit of what survived from my time. It's sort of sad that the next generation will never have what I had back then.

As a kid growing up in a tiny town in rural Iowa, the "city street" setting was more foreign to me than all the crazy monsters lol.

Anyone with kids should get DVDs or downloads of all the classic Sesame Street episodes as well as other CTW classics like The Electric Company and 3-2-1 Contact. Can't rely on streaming because platforms will make media disappear to save a dollar.

I’m at that age where I remember before and after Elmo took off. He definitely took over to the point where it felt less Sesame Street and more Elmo and his amazing friends.

That’s actually heart breaking to know Sesame Street got moved to HBO, to me that feels like the heart and soul of the show are just completely dead. The main point from the start was to help educate inner city children who might never have access to something like cable, and now the only way to watch it is through a premium subscription

Oh my gosh this brings back memories! I remember watching Sesame street in 1970 and in my retrospectascope. It truly was amazing, I’m not entering the Elmo issue as I stopped watching it mid 70s. However the ‘vibe’ it had back then highlights how much the world has changed since then, I was born in 67’ so I’m 57 this year and old Sesame Street did have an amazing impact on me that I only realise today. Every clip of the early stuff was literally my childhood. Now I’m gonna have a little cry. Have a great day.

The depth of my loathing of Elmo and new Sesame Street is so great that I can't even bring myself to watch this, even though I am excited to see that you have made it. I am sure I would agree with every word. It's just too painful to think about how much we have lost.

For me, the loss of Kermit was far worse than anything related to Elmo. Many segments of the show revolved around Kermit doing parodies of regular television shows, such as news reports. These helped children associate Sesame Street with other they might see on television. I watched children learn from the earliest days of Sesame Street to the present. In the early days, letters, numbers, colors, shapes, diversity, and other important life lessons were presented in a way children could relate to. Segments were short, while the show was long enough to repeat the lessons multiple times to reinforce each one. Now the show is too short, and depends far too much on cartoons. The multiple lessons are no longer presented in the way they previously were. With the number of choices available on cable and online, Sesame Street no longer attracts and holds the attention of children, as it used to do.

Sesame Street had adults that were smart and could be trusted. They made mistakes but would own up to their mistakes. Modern children's television either remove the adults or dumb them down. I watched the show well into my early teens. It was comforting when I was home sick. Thank you for bringing back some of my childhood memories. You also broke me showing Big Bird at Jim Henson's funeral. I was crying my eyes out.

My kids quit watching when Elmo came on. They would get up and leave the room, and then they eventually quit watching it, while still continuing to watch Mr. Rogers and the Electric Company and other PBS shows. They don't turn it on for their own little children now.

I grew up with Sesame Street in the 80s and thought it was funny how Elmo slowly started taking over everything with the show. I always felt like Elmo was the "replacement" for Grover, who basically was disappearing once Elmo became huge. I always felt like there was an "old" and "new" Sesame Street, and this video basically nails exactly what I felt but couldn't exactly put my finger on. Great job.

I was a 3-year-old New Yorker in 1969, and I think that I pretty much discovered the show. I went absolutely crazy over what must have been its very first episodes, and of course what attracted me was that it took place in an urban setting that I recognized and never thought I would see on TV, and the people looked just like people in my neighborhood. Later, in about 1972, my Dad starting writing music for Sesame Street, and the feeling of it was sort of like finding out he was writing poems for Mother Goose.

I don't think Elmo ruined Sesame Street, In the earlier seasons he was in he added something different both in age and personality to the other muppets on the show. And he had great comedic and emotional chemistry with the adult characters. The problem is when they decided to make Elmo the star. Because Sesame Street was never supposed to have a star. It's an ensemble show that still manages to have you deeply care about the characters while also being very funny and educational. Which isn't easy. Now Sesame Street still has a lot of characters but they're not evenly fleshed out due to this shift that was never fully formed. I know it was because of Elmo's popularity but Big Bird was also very popular and he never really recieved this same treatment. I like Elmo alot in his earlier seasons because that's when the show was still an ensemble show. I think the problem was once Elmo's World happened and they started to shift the show to be like Elmo's World throughout the whole show. I miss all the other characters. I'm glad they started to bring Grover back more consistently but we barely see a lot of the classic characters. Zoe even barely has any screentime now if it's not to bring back the Rocco conflict. Zoe used to be way more fleshed out besides a source of anger for Elmo. It feels like a lot of the characters now exist because of their relationships to Elmo. And they've have had a lot of their depth removed. Thank you for talking about this in such a thoughtful way.

This is a wonderful evaluation Ive tried to convey to people. So great. There was a sense of gravitas to old SS. Im 50 and grew up with kermit as kind of SS’s emissary. He was like a dad, silly, sarcastic, kind, frustrated, pensive, serious, wise, empathetic, level headed, but always comforting and someone to look up to, especially towards maturitty. Elmo totally engrained infantalization in the show.

Wow this made me so sad. I grew up loving this show. I had no clue they destroyed it so badly.

Glad I got to be a child in the 80's. Elmo as we know him was just beginning when I was 6. He was just another character, not so irritatingly omnipresent. Big Bird will always be the star of the show for me. I really miss the more realistic, working class neighborhood, too.

Elmo's World should've become its own show and left Sesame Street alone. They would've gotten their loud and energetic show for preschoolers while still maintaining their main show aimed at families.

I remember that brick wall/door exit as a child it literally blew my mind how amazing that was. I wanted to go look for a redbrick wall and do it myself. And early snufflupagus with the bulging yellow/green eyes was nightmare fuel.

Another beloved property destroyed by short-sighted corporate greed.

My favorites were always Ernie and Bert, even as a little kid. They just hung around in their apartment, Ernie cracking a joke or getting into some weirdly charming antics and Bert would be slightly annoyed, but they were always great friends. And that was when Elmo's world was in the height of its popularity.

The beauty of the internet is that I have been able to watch classic Sesame Street with my children without needing to deal with the new stuff at all. For anyone who thinks children can't relate to those older episodes - They can absolutely relate to them. They have a harder time with the modern episodes, actually.

Poor Frank Oz man. One of the only original muppet performers still working today, has just had to watch it whittle itself away. And he stays all because he feels it’s what one of his best friends would want. And I think that’s true, Jim would want especially this show to continue, but I don’t think he’d want it to continue like this.

That was an AWESOME explanation of the original Sesame St. I grew up with Maria, Bob, and Gordon. Grover is/was my favorite muppet. He is the one who made me laugh the most!!! The "Near and Far" explanation where he runs back and forth STILL makes me giggle. We can't forget Super Grover!! I felt a lot of the songs had actual feeling and warmth to them. They were fun and goofy but still well done. I agree wholeheartedly with your take on old vs new.

I love how people are like “Well Elmo didn’t do it exactly, it was the writers/production/whatever” like Elmo isn’t literally a just a puppet

I clicked this thinking it would just be someone hating on elmo for a laugh. This actually hit pretty hard, I sort of just stopped thinking about sesame street when I grew up. Seeing Bigbird sing at Jim Henson's funeral is something I never new about and it brought a tear to my eye.

Mr Hooper dying was so moving. I’ll never forget it.

To me, Elmo reduced what was a vehicle for children to explore and understand a big and complex world into a medium for the satisfaction of infantile self will. He wasn't the only one, but the first in a string of characters who represented the show's shift from an educational tool into something that validated the mindset of doting parents and placated children.

My mom is pissed that they removed all those episodes. She's been babysitting, and the kids LOVE sesame street. But all they have is what feels like a small handfull of bite sized episodes. I still think it's a lot better than most other children's shows, though, and my parents are even learning things while they watch.

A great rundown. I agree with others it may not be Elmo exactly that was the downfall, but i would definitely agree it is what Elmo represented that is the issue. Famously, the original adult cast was purposely treated as equals to prevent anyone from hijacking the show and becoming the "star" of Sesame Street. Unfortunately, they forgot to do the same thing with the Muppets. It became Elmo's World, not Sesame Street!

It was the breaking down of stereotypes that I really came to appreciate. After spending a couple of sick days watching the deliciously retro 'TV Land,' it was shocking to realize how many criminals and shady characters were portrayed by people of color in the late 60s/70s. On Sesame Street, we got to see everyone as just regular people with similar joys and fears as their neighbors, and always modeling kindness and respect to one another. With the cancerous Disney-fication of kids entertainment, multiple 24/7 cartoon networks, and the commercial coopting of little minds as a consumer tool, the idea of educating kids got thrown into the back seat and eventually out the window like a greasy fast food bag.

As a 35 year old who has never watched Sesame Street. I had no idea there were real live characters. I bought my daughter a tickle me Elmo in the late 2000s I thought he was sesame street 😂

I think this video reveals what makes Bluey so beloved. It's as much for children as adults, it doesn't avoid difficult conversations, and it has adults making mistakes and owning them. I think Bluey's massive popularity speaks to this generational divide in kids shows.

Finally someone with an insightful critique on modern Sesame Street. The show is basically unwatchable for adults now. By catering to current day children, there's a need for Elmo and Abby to hog up 80% of the screentime to keep up with their increasingly short attention spans. Can't have slow-paced sketches or educational sections anymore, too boring for kids! Also no more old-school muppets like Kermit, Oscar or even Grover cause kids can't relate to them! Bluey is now the new go-to show for both kids and adults imo

Man something about this video is almost nostalgic and mesmerizing. I grew up in the 90s ,born in 91 I remember elmo slowl claim to fame and the tickle me elmo craze that had my mother buying like 3 of them for hundreds of dollars. But what i remember and felt most watching this is a part of me that feels idk how to describe it well, but alive, young , inspired, wishful. When I was a under the age of 5 i was super adventurous even into my teens I was. But as a kid i remember crying wishing I could find Sesame street- when I first went to school and at some point started experiencing bullying from students and neglect by the adults--- dreamed about finding Sesame street and just having one day like the way those kids did. The way they played at the park all laughing and happy, the way the adults treated them and the funny awesome monsters--- I remember one day jipping school as a kid terrified, i sought out Sesame street after i found a city map. Eventually I found Sesame street and it wasn't what was from the show--- but just a normal ghetto street that was creepy and dangerous. I remember bursting into tears and a woman coming out her house and asking me what was wrong, i can't even remember what i told her all i can remember is the image of that street and realizing i'd never find Sesame street-- I was trapped in the reality of the real world and no one was going to save me.

Ive always felt this way. As a parent, i remember recording a few episodes of "sesame street unpaved" & "electric company" for my kids on vhs. They were 4 and 3 but took to it like fish. Reciting every letter, sounding words, more than the recent shows they watched.

While I don't personally think Elmo was the primary culprit behind "Sesame Street's" downfall, the real downfall to me was the show gearing more towards a strictly preschool sudience shortly after Jim Henson's passing in 1990. Around the same time, Elmo started getting more prominance, so its easy to say Elmo more or less became a scapegoat. Like Elmo at least never outright stopped others from getting episodes to themselves after he became the new mascot. That being said, his movie "The Adventures of Elmo In Grouchland" brings out the worst aspects of his influence on "Sesame Street".

So Elmo didn't ruin Sesame Street. The writer's immaturity in helping to curtail a 3yo's attitudes was the issue.

The original Sesame Street had bright, flashy segments to draw attention away from the other frenetic shows, but was wise enough to have longer, less chaotic moments on the street to balance it. I feel the new Sesame Street has lost that balance. It's over-stimulating all the time, with no opportunity to take a break from the noise.

As an amputee child, it really was special seeing kids like me. My parents did a fantastic job raising my sister and me, but one mistake my parents made was I had no amputee or even other disabled kids my age. As far as I know, I was the only amputee kid in my entire school, all through school from K to 11'th grade. There was an 9th grade girl missing an arm, but I never met her, and by the following year she was gone. I heard she was attending a school for kids who got into trouble.

Yeah Frank Oz has a point. It’s no longer a kid’s show based about education. And now it’s a kid’s show based about entertainment that has education. I mean, it’s still way better than anything else on TV.

What a phenomenal video. And that big bird clip where he says goodbye to Jim broke me down to tears. What a powerful and poignant moment that was.

Remember when the "Tickle-Me-Elmo" doll, was the "must-have of the year in 1996?"

The original Sesame Street wanted to prepare young children for growing up, current Sesame Street encourages young children to remain what they are.

It felt strange that I - a grown man without children of my own would watch a video about Sesame Street, but I found myself deepening my appreciation for everything Sesame Street achieved and everything children’s entertainment can be.

Along with Elmo taking most of the spotlight, one of my greatest disappointments with modern day Sesame Street, is the almost complete removal of Herry monster. I loved how as a child, he demonstrated the importance of gentleness. I appreciate him even more today, now that I have matured into a rather large hairy fellow myself, who appreciates not only gentleness, but kindness overall.

I remember some of those early clips. And the one where Big Bird learns about Mr. Hooper ‘s death still gets me in the heart, even after all these years. Sesame Street was a major part of my childhood, and it saddens me to see and hear what has become of it. May the Sovereign Lord have mercy on and bless all of the original cast members for their contributions to improving the lives of children everywhere. Great video and analysis. Thanks.

I loved all the adults on the show, especially "Luis." He was so cute with the dimples. I used to watch when I was sick and home from school. It was calming and amusing at the same time. Love the Muppet band called "The Beetles," which were beetles. I forget what they were singing about.

I miss the old Sesame Street. I was a kid in the 80s and the show was a hit with my entire family, especially my parents. I remember that saxophone bit with great love! I watched it all through the 90s and into the 2000s until the series started changing and I couldn't bear to watch everything I'd grown up with being slowly torn away.

Wow, I am glad they changed Snufffy's eyes. Holy crap those first eyes were terrifying.

my biggest gripe with standing desks is THEY HAVE NO DRAWERS!

I was a sickly little kid with undiagnosed autism/ADHD until adulthood. My parents used "Big Bird goes to the hospital" to prepare me for a short stint in there because I had a terrible flu/ear infection and was screaming my head off that I didn't want to go. Watching exactly what would take place helped me in a way that just telling me wouldn't have. I'm a very visual person by nature and still absorb more info by seeing and hearing it done than just being told. To this day, I'm grateful they knew how my strange mind worked even if they didn't have a name for it. Not only did the hospital trip go well, I wanted to be a doctor for many years after that. I've had tons of different jobs but my ultimate goal now is to be a professional artist.

This sure took me back. I'm old enough to remember Sesame Street pre-Elmo, and the ongoing "There's no such thing as a Snufflupagus" storyline; I can also vaguely remember Mr. Hooper. The older episodes are much more interesting on multiple levels.

The sad part is... I love Elmo and don't blame him. It's the fault of the execs for milking him for all he was worth.

I have many fond memories of watching Sesame Street as a kid. I still, at nearly 40, sing many of the songs I learned from Sesame Street. I haven't watched it in years. It's so sad that it's become so...fine when it used to be great. My favorite character has always been Grover. I love him so much. Count, Oscar, Snuffy, and the Aliens (not sure what they're called officially) also have a place in my heart.

I was born in 1972, so I basically grew up watching Sesame Street. That is where I first learned the alphabet, numbers, and even a little Spanish. As a boy from a small Nebraskan town, I almost never saw anyone who wasn't white. This show helped me see blacks and Latinos as just normal people. I also liked the adults. They were friendly, caring, and trustworthy. One of my favorite characters was Ernie. Ernie was nothing without Bert, though. They played the wacky/straight comedy duo very well. I love how the Muppets each had their own voices and personalities. That made them seem less like puppets and more like characters in their own right.

Big Bird is one of the primary reasons I became a puppeteer. The idea that puppets could really be there with you and live alongside us in our world. It’s kept me loving the art form ever since.

But seriously... When I was a kid, Sesame Street and The Electric Company ("HEY YOU GUYS!") were staples of my childhood. I don't remember much at all from those early years, but I know I watched them.

I'm an 80s kid from the Middle East. Growing up I used to watch Sesame Street religiously. The show used to be aired on Channel 2. I don't think they started with the very early seasons as I've never seen that first iteration of Big Bird, but it was definitely before Elmo. Barkley the dog was featured in the theme song of the show. I grew up with the old cast like Bob, Gordon, Susan, Olivia, Maria, Louis, David and Linda. I remember the first time I saw Rose (Alaina Reed Hall) in the 1985 sitcom "227", I recognized her immediately as Olivia from Sesame Street. It was such a pleasant surprise, like seeing someone you know. I still watch clips of my favorite segments from the show every now and then.

I was stationed at Davisville, RI, in the Sea Bees when the very first Sesame Street came on and EVERY TV in that barracks was tuned to it! It was amazing! It was much appreciated. We were getting ready to go off to Vietnam and this little bit of craziness seemed to fit in perfectly.

Elmo started the downward trajectory, sure, but his early appearances weren't all bad. There are plenty of times there characters interact with him as a 3yo, teaching him some skills like the song One Fine Face. What really did it for me was Abby. Once they decided to create a literal fairy to appeal specifically to the girls and solves all of her problems with magic, they showed they cared more about marketing to children than teaching them

I will never forget the Elmo toy craze of the 90’s. I remember my sister desperately trying to find one for my nephew when they were sold out everywhere.

Born in 69! Grew up with it. Loved it! Looking back seeing those Characters- Susan, Bob , Mr Hooper , Maria - thanks for the memories! Never watched after Elmo arrived , I grew up and never had kids. Really a special part of my childhood hood.

Born 1980 and grew up watching Sesame Street. I loved it! Even today at 43, if I happen to catch an old episode it stops me in my track and I am locked in.

I’ve got a three year old now myself, and like you, that’s brought me back to Sesame Street. And it’s a shame that what made the show great is all but gone. Too many animated segments, too many Muppets that could have been human performers, and too much focus on Elmo and Abby (sometimes Cookie Monster), leaving the rest of the characters no guarantee that they’ll even be in an episode at all. And no, I don’t count the filler songs that are in every episode as appearances. It’s sad to see a new episode of Sesame Street, make it to the credits, and find that Bert and Ernie weren’t there. That Big Bird made a token appearance to say “hey, is that Cookie Monster’s food truck?” to Elmo. It’s too focused on marketability, on selling Sesame Street as a product rather than an edutainment program. The goal now seems to be to sell toys and apparel, to keep a brand alive and profitable.

God damn i'm old. Elmo wasnt even there when I left Sesame Street.

Lol Just gonna skip right past the Elmo puppeteers arrest? When you said "all was safe on set..." Yeah.. no it wasn't. Lol.

I grew up on the old episodes of Sesame Street (I'm 36, but my mom liked the older episodes). By the time my sister came around 10 years later and programming was more accessible, I barely recognized the show. There has never been a Tickle Me Elmo in my parents' home. 😅

So basically sesame Street went through gentrification and the government uses Elmo as a figure head.

Cookie Monster was the one I gravitated to early on. The voice, the fixation, the subtle marketing of a healthy diet through a convincing Trojan horse, he had it all. Count von Count is also a personal fave, and I'm glad to see he's still pushing early numeracy to this day. I didn't think Elmo was a bad character (and really, reaching three year olds as well as sixes helped the show serve a much bigger audience), but I do remember being a bit miffed when "Elmo's World" took over the last half-hour in '98, then caused the rest of the show to be divided into short character-specific chunks a few years later, which the HBO shortening greatly exacerbated. The show really lost its original voice once every segment started sounding like badly written "Blue's Clues." Also, as a viewer woth autism, it's been nice to see Julia be such a prominent character, but she has a whole host of problems related to how she was introduced and marketed that are a fascinating rabbit hole of wrongness.

Elder millennial here. The other day I watched video after video of old Sesame Street animations... The creativity and nostalgia had me in awe.

I had a big smile on my face throughout this video. I am from the UK and grew up watching Sesame Street and this video has made me appreciate it even more. I always showed my children Sesame Street and you hit the nail on the head when you spoke of the balance. The balance and creativity of Sesame Street is unmatched ❤

Don't forget just how integral Joe Raposo's music was to the early years of Sesame Street!

You're seriously making me well up with nostalgia. I watched nearly every day in the late 70s. I learned basic reading from Sesame Street and the Electric Company. The adults were just showing healthy, decent, ethical people who were trying to do the right thing for each other.

8:42 is the NYC I still feel homesick for. Been an exile for a long time, and that NYC was gone a long, long time before i even left, but THAT is the NYC of my childhood in the 70's and i miss it, Red Light Times Square and all. I miss NYC before air conditioning, and we'll never have that community again.

It would make a really cool video if you took a critical look at the version we had in the Netherlands: Sesamstraat (1976-2019). It was about 50% clips from the original show (with Dutch voice actors though) and the other 50% was made as their own material. And the differences are pretty amazing. The stage design of the street has massive broccoli trees, a beach, and houses built out of huge toy blocks. Big Bird is called Pino, is now blue, and is the only muppet character that is similar to the US version. The other muppet characters are animal based (not monsters) such as a mouse, a dog and a piglet, and mostly represent children of different ages. The Dutch production team often had disagreements with the US producers, since they felt that the Dutch dark humor would not be understood by young children. It's incredibly sad that their funding got cut by the broadcaster, but the show was award winning and a huge success for over 40 years.

I couldn't agree more, with Frank Oz. I was born in 1983 and I still remember so much greatness that I used to enjoy on the show - Kermit the frog on Sesame Street News, Guy Smiley's game shows, Robin Williams just... being there, Cookie Monster just... being there, it was great. Even my oldest brother, who was in his late 20s at the time, loved the hell out of the Big Bird's Birthday special too. How it is that nobody can even try to make such great quality entertainment anymore, I'll never know.

I still sing "Oh, everyone makes mistakes. Oh, yes they do." in Big Bird's voice everytime I make one. Old Sesame Street was simply fantastic. When I was a baby, my parents moved from Argentina to the US for a few years. My mother didn't know a word of English, but she learned with us, watching Sesame Street. Old Sesame Street was creative, original and so fun to watch. And they didn't baby you. I appreciated that even back then.

I grew up watching PBS. Sesame Street really resonated with me and I LOVED Big Bird. I looked forward to watching Sesame Street with my kids while pregnant. When I returned to watch with them it wasn’t what I remembered. I thought maybe the nostalgia made me think it was better than it was. But you nailed it, the differences highlighted by Elmo. It really was a great show. Jim Henson’s vision was great and sadly forgotten by Sesame Street.

I’m pretty sure the death of Jim Henson was what affected Sesame Street the most. Not the arrival of Elmo. Jim passed in 1990…

Sesame Street in the 70s and 80s was fantastic and unforgettable. The same certainly cannot be said of today’s version.

As a 2000's kid, I remember when Sesame Street was an hour long and full of content. Seeing it chopped down to twenty minutes, majority of it taken by Elmo, no classic segments recycled, full of stock pop culture parodies, and not even on PBS anymore, is really disheartening. And it's a cold feeling to think I was the last generation to have entertainment that was more than all stimulation, no substance.

"Everyone loves Elmo " I never did