Like most parents of my generation, I watched plenty of television as a child, although my choices were comparatively narrow: there were just three networks, plus PBS.
This was children’s TV? Why was it so beautiful? Yet, meditative as the show was, Miffy was a jolt to my expectations. The mood was so lulling that when, in one sequence, Miffy gave her broken toy a small, frustrated kick, my husband was startled. It was like a shelter magazine for toddlers. The colors-red, blue, and yellow-were brilliant. It was drawn in the minimalist, mouthless style of “Hello Kitty.” (The brand sued the owner of the popular Japanese character for ripping off Bruna’s style the two sides recently settled in court.) Its heroine lived with her animal friends in an idyllic Dutch town, but none of them spoke their small dramas were narrated in voice-over. The show presented a world so stunningly peaceful that I dreamed of entering it myself.
#SPONGEBOB LOCK SCREEN SERIES#
“Miffy and Friends” is a Claymation series based on the children’s books by the Dutch artist Dick Bruna, who created the character in 1955. And it was then, rattled by sleep deprivation, that I discovered Miffy.
#SPONGEBOB LOCK SCREEN TV#
By 2007, when I was juggling a two-year-old and a newborn, a little TV watching in the pre-early morning seemed pretty appealing. I did so in the manner of other parents I knew, which is to say with my first child. Then, as a new parent, I dutifully followed the American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines-no TV until two. Until 2005, I had no idea that such shows existed: if you don’t have young children, it’s easy to condescend to the form. And, like the top dramas for adults, they harness to bold new ends the genre most deeply associated with episodic television’s strengths-the formulaic procedural, familiar to viewers from series like “Law & Order.” The best of these shows are as visually thrilling as they are well constructed. I’m not a saint.) But, as a critic, I’d argue that it’s time to recognize what this exhausting, rancorous debate has obscured: a quiet renaissance among children’s shows, many of them innovative in ways that parallel the simultaneous rise of great scripted television for adults. I’m hardly immune to such concerns like many parents, I limit my children’s Tivo time. Not to mention radio: in 1936, the educator Azriel Eisenberg warned that parents “cannot lock out this intruder because it has gained an invincible hold of their children.” Over the years, such rhetoric has shifted from the moral to the neural, with spiritual anxieties now expressed in the fear that young kids will grow addicted to dopamine squirts, their brains ruined rather than their souls. Decry the trend of marketing to newborns, the co-branded toys, the childhood obesity, the dwindling attention spans, the fate of the picture book, the wasted hours the American child spends in front of the tube (three a day, on average!), and all those selfish, shower-taking parents who use TV as a babysitter.įor six decades, people have been wringing their hands with worry, echoing panics about the corrupting influence of comic books and rock music. (I suggest Beaker or the Swedish chef.) Then begin the lament, and lay it on thick, with comparisons to candy and drugs. Begin with the sinister idiom “screen time.” To show you’re no prig, make a warm remark about “Sesame Street.” Name your favorite Muppet. When children’s television comes up in conversation, everyone knows the drill. Some of the best shows for children follow the procedural format.
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