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+--- Thread: Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon (/showthread.php?tid=7049)
Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon - A Black Falcon - 16th May 2017
Now, I have always said that Mr. Rogers Neighborhood is the best childrens' television show ever. The best thing about the show has to be his message that everyone is best just the way they are, and he is famous for that message. Almost as important, however, is the shows' focus, or rather, the absence of the constant barrage of thirty second long scenes; instead, each episode has only two major parts, in his house and in the land of make-believe. As a kid I liked the longer-form nature of Mr. Rogers over Sesame Street's short, constantly changing scenes. The calmer tone of Mr. Rogers is great too, I really like it; not being another one of those kids shows that is a 'barrage on the senses' was one of Fred Rogers' major aims with the show, and I at least always liked it more for that. Of course Mr. Rogers' way of speaking straight to the audience is the most important part of what makes it so great, but the tone and longer story arcs, often even with stories that continue through multiple episodes, is fantastic as well.
So, you may have heard of this, but previously Twitch streamed all of Bob Ross (painting) and Julia Child (cooking) shows, those classic PBS hits. I didn't watch much of either, but it was an interesting thing to do. They are following those with this, a run through the entire well over 800 episode run of Mr. Rogers episodes. It started on the 15th at noon (PST), so now it is in the middle of the very long first season -- looking it up, the first season, which is from 1968, is a whole 130 episodes, and is in black and white. Most of these first-season episodes have never been reran since they aired once in 1968, so only people watching then saw them. So yeah, I've been watching a bunch of this, and it's great stuff, different because it's in B&W and is older than the episodes I remember as a kid, but it's also so familiar because the show is what it is, it didn't change much. It's awesome. The songs are even charming, and I am not exactly a fan of music.
(The first season, from 1968, is 130 episodes, all black and white and not rerun. Then season 2 through 9, from '69 to '75, are about 65 episodes per season, and are all in color. Then there were no new episodes, only reruns, for over three years. When it returned in 1979, for the second series that ran 22 seasons until ending in 2001, the number of episodes dropped to only 10-20 per season most of the time, so that shorter first series ended up producing far more episodes than the longer second one. Huh.)
... Now, on the one hand, you've got this incredible childrens' show, with lots of not-seen-in-49-years episodes on right now (and for the next day or two as well)... and on the other hand
you've got it on Twitch, representing the internet, with its often-toxic comments bar scrolling by on the right. It's a pretty weird mix. The internet is both one of the best things ever and one of the worst things ever, depending on when and where you look... but it's very much worth watching anyway, just ignore a lot of that chat stuff.
https://www.twitch.tv/misterrogers
Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon - Dark Jaguar - 17th May 2017
Mr. Rogers was a nice person on TV, and exactly as nice in real life.
The message "just the way you are" though has rubbed me the wrong way for years. I get the sentiment, but well, was Hitler fine "just the way he was"? Was Ted Bundy? Some people are absolutely awful just as they are. Also, there's got to be some way to add in a message about self improvement. Ignorance is just the way most of us are, but should be something people actively try to correct.
I still agree that Mr. Rogers was an amazing show, and his ability to get kids to tell their own stories and just listen to them was good stuff. I also loved that he refused to lie to kids, and so even his puppets were all clearly called the "Neighborhood of Make-Believe", saying "it's fun to pretend, but also important to know the difference between fact and fiction". I also love Sesame Street, but in recent years that one has kinda lost the way. Original Sesame Street stories would be about one of the muppets trying to help fix a window they broke, but lately we're getting completely nonsensical stories like "how to make sure you recite the spell's incantation correctly lest the magicks fail in unpredictable ways". I mean, that's important too I guess, but only for magical fairy muppets, not for us really real people watching the show.
Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon - A Black Falcon - 17th May 2017
"Sometimes people are good, and they do just what they should, but the very same people who are good sometimes are the very same people who are bad sometimes" is how his song (in the '68 episodes they're still playing) begins, on a subject relating to what you said. It then continues to Maybe he could make the "and you should try to be good" part of the message stronger, but it is there -- 'everyone does bad things sometimes, but generally try to be good' is the subtext I think. Remember, the target audience is, like, 3-8 year olds or such. I'm sure his message would be quite different for adults, but for little kids it works fine as it is. There was an arc earlier (like, about episode 40 or 50?) where the factory in the land of make-believe caught fire and burned down. The story continues through the whole week of episodes, as the guy who owned the factory was very sad, King Friday uselessly commanded the fire to stop since he was afraid, Mr. Rogers tells children not to play with fire, and such, initially... but then there is a happy ending, as it gets rebuilt nicer looking than before. So the series does occasionally cover issues more serious than the usual stuff like what that song I reference at the start of this paragraph does -- the next line after that one is like 'sometimes you get wet, and your parents get upset', and such; not exactly the worst kind of behavior, but just the right kind of thing for the target audience.
On another note... Yes I'm watching the stream now, and I love the time stuff. Like, 'I will see you again in 187 1/4 seconds"... heh. :) Or when Handyman Negri asked for "9" as a payment for some work, so he was given... a round piece of paper or wood or something with a 9 written on it, which he accepted. It's good stuff.
The kinds of subjects in the episodes from '68 are sometimes weird as well. Sometimes it's Mister Rogers playing with finger paints or toy trucks, or helping teach the alphabet or basic addition... but other times there are guests doing things such as interpretive dance segments (and there are more than a few of these), gymnastics, tap dancing, glass blowing... it's weird stuff, but what should you expect from the '60s? The series' very first story, from the first five or so episodes, is interesting stuff as well. Presumably inspired by fear about the Vietnam War, it is an arc in the land of make-believe about how the king is scared and trying to wall off the kingdom and has put barbed wire on the castle battlements. To try to fix the situation Lady Aberlin comes up with a plan for a peace party (like a party party, not a political party), and to float balloons with peace messages over the castle. After initial fear --King Friday sees them and says 'paratroopers! man the cannons!' -- once he is shown what they are, King Friday likes it and gives up on the whole barbed-wire thing. It is quite a fantasy in that real wars don't end so easily, but it's a nice aspirational message at least!
Another thing... while right from the beginning he sings the same song at the beginning of each episode, mid-series the ending song changed. In much of the first series it's a song called "Tomorrow", which is catchy stuff. Also it's only midway through the first season when he starts changing his shoes at the beginning and end of each episode -- at first he only changes from coat to cardigan, that's it. I noticed very quickly when starting watching this stream that the shoe-changing bit wasn't in the early episodes, going from outdoor shoes to house shoes, but he added it fairly early.
Quote: I also love Sesame Street, but in recent years that one has kinda lost the way. Original Sesame Street stories would be about one of the muppets trying to help fix a window they broke, but lately we're getting completely nonsensical stories like "how to make sure you recite the spell's incantation correctly lest the magicks fail in unpredictable ways". I mean, that's important too I guess, but only for magical fairy muppets, not for us really real people watching the show.I haven't watched Sesame Street in a very long time, but sure, while Mister Rogers was a lot better, I thought it was good. That does sound like they've upped the weird, but hasn't Sesame Street always had weird stuff in it?
(Remember though, I didn't watch these shows nearly as often as many kids -- I mean, when I was little we didn't have a TV at home so I could only watch any of this stuff occasionally, and once we did get a TV and were in the US I was 9 and probably did watch them sometimes, but not as much as you would when you are younger.)
Regardless, I definitely can enjoy this Mister Rogers stream as an adult, but I don't know if I would feel similarly about a Sesame Street one. I'd probably watch a lot less of it.
Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon - Dark Jaguar - 17th May 2017
I'm not opposed to weird at all. It's great that he shows glass blowers and so on. I have fond memories of that. I'm more specifically talking about stuff that can't happen, like the fairy muppet casting magic spells in modern Sesame Street. There's nothing a kid can relate to there, it's just in there because kids like magic. Better would be a muppet master of illusion, since stage magician is something a kid could actually one day do.
The thing about the lesson to not be bad and be good or a lesson to improve yourself is it works at every age level. Thing is, there's lots of kids out there in bad situations, and Mr. Rogers did speak to them. Rogers did seem to try to be teaching kids not to pick on their peers just because they were different. That's good, and I like that. It's just that, well, you know, inconsistent rules can come back to bite you. We've got a LOT of adults today who don't care who they hurt because that's just who they are and we should just totally accept that. I'm not really "blaming" Rogers here, but frankly that lesson really is flawed, and it really should be refined.
Edit: Do you think they'll put Twitch on the Switch?
Twitch Mr. Rogers Marathon - A Black Falcon - 17th May 2017
Oh yeah, they stick to those silly times quite closely -- when King Friday says 'I will be back in 59 seconds', he is back in, well, about that amount of time. It's a realistic show after all, stick to your schedule!
Quote:I'm not opposed to weird at all. It's great that he shows glass blowers and so on. I have fond memories of that. I'm more specifically talking about stuff that can't happen, like the fairy muppet casting magic spells in modern Sesame Street. There's nothing a kid can relate to there, it's just in there because kids like magic. Better would be a muppet master of illusion, since stage magician is something a kid could actually one day do.... Those first two sentences don't really connect, the first is Mr. Rogers and the second Sesame Street. But as for why that character's there, I haven't watched any of it, but I assume it's because of the whole 'girls like faries' thing that does seem to be popular these days. Sesame Street's just following along with it.
Quote:The thing about the lesson to not be bad and be good or a lesson to improve yourself is it works at every age level. Thing is, there's lots of kids out there in bad situations, and Mr. Rogers did speak to them. Rogers did seem to try to be teaching kids not to pick on their peers just because they were different. That's good, and I like that. It's just that, well, you know, inconsistent rules can come back to bite you. We've got a LOT of adults today who don't care who they hurt because that's just who they are and we should just totally accept that. I'm not really "blaming" Rogers here, but frankly that lesson really is flawed, and it really should be refined.I agree with the former part, 'don't pick on others because they are different, everyone is' is definitely an important part of his message and it's a great one.
But as for that latter part, that modern right-wing line of 'everyone is special so I have a right to say anything I want no matter how obnoxious' twists his message beyond its meaning. That may be the superficial reading of his words, but even if he didn't make the "and try to be a better you" message as strongly as you might like pieces of that definitely are in the show, maybe most importantly by example -- he may say 'even I am bad sometimes in that song I referenced', but you never see it on screen, you only see the good. And there are also the episodes where he says 'don't set fire to things', 'don't play with delicate glass objects since they are not toys', and such. Or in the episode just airing, Daniel Tiger broke a glass ornament he was going to give Mr. McFeely as a gift. He is very sad about it, but the lesson is a variation on the series' common theme of getting up, admitting your mistakes, (not doing the really bad things like setting fire to buildings), and doing better next time. There is an assumption of basic decent behavior in that core message of his, "I like you just the way you are". Just by being who he is, even if he isn't saying "and you should be good", don't you want to be to be more like he is? Not that many people actually can live up to that standard of course, but it's a good ideal.
Quote: Edit: Do you think they'll put Twitch on the Switch?You may just be making a pun, but the Switch needs video apps, yeah -- Amazon Video, Youtube, Twitch, Netflix, Crunchyroll, etc. The Wii U has that stuff, and a browser too, and its tablet is barely "portable"! I know they rushed the Switch out as soon as they could in order to have it ready, but since the Switch is an actual portable it really should have that stuff, yeah. From what I hear the store is incredibly basic too, they need to work on that.