Children's Shows You Should Pray You Never See

With political correctness the number one rule, cartoons in today's world feel like fast food;  homogeneous, devoid of any actual conflict and lacking in any intellectual value other than what could be discerned in five minutes or less of talking with a two year old. 

There's one main character with two side kicks. One of the trio either has the ability to create anything or acquire anything.  They must all get from point a to point b.  The other sidekick is more of a writer's crutch, giving necessary background information that the creators want delivered to the kids and move the plot (such as it is) along.  The journey goes through three terrains or conflicts of some sort.  There will be a nemesis who must be stopped.  They will arrive at the end spot.  Everyone will cheer and there will be a party but no cake.   Bleah.  We need a broader array of ideas for entertaining the future of our country than a watered down version of Dungeons and Dragons where there is one main player with two Dungeon Master controlled non player characters, one sporting a bag of holding.

Literature to the rescue!

The following are solely my ideas. If you pitch this to a person in Hollywood and they make a show staring Miley Cyrus and Justin Beiber because it would be cool, you owe me money.  I'll collect when we both meet in the nether regions of the underworld --you for making it a reality, me for thinking of it in the first place. 

10) The Prince:  Narrated by the one who used to be and is again so named, this afternoon educational program would show kids how to use the techniques outlined by Machiavelli to navigate the rough jungle world of playground friendships and the politics of classroom etiquette.

9) They're All Greek to Me:  Classic Greek Myths told from the monsters' point of view.  Of course the society of hydras, gorgons, medusas and sirens would lament the evil persecution of their people by those annoying demigods who were always going around chopping off heads and stealing our treasure.  Each show would end with the monsters eating at least a few "heroes" as part of getting back at the 1%. 

8) Jane Austen Survivor Style:  Post MTV generation teens put in the countryside estate setting of 19th Century England.  Each week, contestants would be voted off the island for non Austenian type mannerisms and behavior, with the winner becoming the owner of said estate. 

7) Upton Sinclair Street:  The Values of Socialism and Vegetarianism all in one place as narrated by a muppet who lives with a family that suffers exploitation.  No word on whether McDonald's would be willing to run commercials during the breaks.  Hey Kids...Happy Meals.

6) Shakespeare in Ponyville:  My Little Ponies...doing Shakespeare. What????  They'd watch it.

5) Canterberry Tales: Because all cartoons are promos for toys, the surplus Strawberry Shortcake dolls et all would be used to enact the pilgrimage to the see the Holy Blissful Martyr's shrine.  The main character would occasionally break the 4th wall to teach the young viewers Olde English.  "Can you say, "WHAN that Aprille with his shoures soote, The droghte of Marche hath perced to the roote..."

4) Hemming's Way:  A Geography show.  The main character Earnest is a boy who travels the world.  He explores the snows of Kilimanjaro, runs with the Bulls in Spain, drinks Maraschino Cherry juice in Venice and visits Great Britain to make friends with the nurses at the local hospital.  The narrator is the same character but as an old man, retired and living in Key West, Florida.  He spends his time fishing for prize marlins.

3) Sun Tzu's Ancient Art:  Five kids come together to learn military strategy and various marital arts. They are called upon in each episode to apply the tenet put forth by the master as they battle the forces of evil.  Agents are currently investigating if this could be color coded, red, blue, gold, green and black and each of the five have special ships that they alone control, one a plane, one a motor bike, one a boat, one a car and one a rocket. They would also be mutated to be half human half insect and each would be named after a famous composer of classical music. Bach, Brahms, Beethoven, Mozart and the rebel, Rachmaninoff.   They'd para sail in their spare time, eat pizzas sprinkled with tofu and have wacky not discernible from anywhere accents. 

2)  For the Bible Belt/those who are sad that Veggie tales was taken over by ABC:The Adventures of Noah, Pokemon Master: He caught them all.....twice. Except for those pesky Unicorns.

1) Young Twilight: The stories of Young Edward and Jacob and Bella. 

I'll be waiting for the call from my agent.

p.s. Sorry for the earlier copy with misspellings. I did a spell check but it saved the prior version.

Should I Be Concerned?

My four year old daughter is precocious and smart and often elects to be silent.

So yesterday when she produced a menagerie of animals and dolls at the table and began imaginary play by herself, I eavesdropped.

There's a reason that one should not poke one's nose into the musings of another's thoughts unwelcomed. 

It can unnerve. 

She began singing.  I tried to catch the lyrics but the meaning caught me up.  She was play acting all of the villains from the Little Mermaid, Pokemon, My Little Pony, Phineas and Ferb, Dora and Thundercats merged into one.  I waited for the hero to save the day, the barbie to be rescued, the pony Rainbow Dash to fly in at the nick of time, even a Thundercats HO! call to arms.

Nothing.

Not a peep.

Ursula won. Team Rocket Won.  Nightmare Moon and Doofensmurtz, Swiper and Mum-rah won!
She let out a triumphant cackle, the kind that usually ends the first half of a two parter episode where the bad guy seems to have the upper hand.  I made her lunch and mine.   I didn't want to interrupt.  I was waiting for the second act.

"You think you will win but you will not!" She was gloating. "For I am the greatest in the WORLD...." She let her voice float along dramatically holding that last word.

I waited, "Lunch?" 
"Yes! That would ...please me." she said in deep tones. We were now channeling Darth Vader I think, from the old version that is on VCR tapes.

A butter sandwich, yogurt, goldfish crackers and a banana later, she was back in her world. 

The heroes never showed up or they were beaten but she seemed to be having a splendid time.  Now I don't ever recall having the self possession to roll play outside of the parameters of the good guy as a kid; shoot I wouldn't even allow myself to be a villain in Dungeons and Dragons when I was a teen, much less find myself sorted in Slytherin as an adult so I wondered that a little girl barely old enough for pre-school would find the forces of chaos so compelling as versus those of sweetness and light. 

Part of it was the rump roast effect of getting the assigned roll by older sisters in games, she'd come to know these second tier characters first because she had to wait her turn for the prime spots that others who were older had jump claimed in any play that took place.   Part of it was personality; the villains were much less transparent in their actions and motivations and my daughter liked keeping her cards close to the vest.   I decided that rather than fret, I'd be direct.

"Why do you like the villains?" I asked, trying to seem very casual.
"Mom..." she gave me a look of amusement, one that made her seem at least eight years older than she is, "It's only pretend."

Perhaps I need to get out a bit more.