Heyyyy Yooouuuuu Guuuuuuyyyyyssss! The Electric Company Is Back!
This morning - MONDAY. DECEMBER. BLAH. - wasn't nearly so horrible as I expected, because? I got to relive, for a moment, being eight years old:
The Electric Company was six trillion kinds of awesome, not least because it made literacy cool in a way that could only be finessed by a young Morgan Freeman in polyester bell-bottoms. And now it's back.
The clip below is a promo for the new version, which doesn't attempt to replicate the manic seventies flare of the original (which, as Jezebel points out, is better captured by Yo Gabba Gabba) (DJ Lance is no Morgan Freeman, but he does rock a trippy unitard, which, you know, counts for a lot when you're considering the legacy of shows like The Electric Company and The Banana Splits and Captain Kangaroo and 3-2-1 Contact) but instead updates its high-energy sensibility and attempts to translate it into new millennium cool.
Cool, schmool. It seems to me that the original was so awesome because it didn't try so hard to connect with 'the kids' - it was just grown-ups doing stupid shit that somehow managed to have something to do with words. So I had more fun trawling YouTube for clips from the original than I did watching the clip below, but then again, I'm a nostalgia-whore and an old fogey and I was maybe - MAYBE - jacked up on Froot Loops at the time, so what do I know? Check it out for yourself:
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Ok, you just made my morning. We own the 70s version on DVD and my 3 year old already quotes "Sorry, I can't hear you, I have a banana in my ear" when she doesn't want to answer me. Awesome!
Posted by: bd | December 01, 2008 at 10:44 AM
Very exciting. We bought some Old School Sesame Street DVDs and there was an add for the Electric Company DVDs and I got excited, now I'm more excited! My 18-month old is a Yo Gabba Gabba head (mostly by MY doing, I can't STAND Barney, Dora, Diego, Calliou, Thomas... basically most shows). Now we've got something else to add to the rotation!
Posted by: Allison | December 01, 2008 at 12:54 PM
Can I take this moment to say Yo Gabba Gabba saved me from a life of Barney, and I ADORE IT. Elijah Wood Doing a Dancey Dance??? The Ting Tings singing on the Super Music Friend Show???? Jack McBrayer doing knock knock jokes, Amy Sedaris as the tooth fairy, and Biz's Beats of the Day?????
ADORE IT.
Posted by: rebecca | December 01, 2008 at 02:45 PM
The best was my 3 year old singing Happy Birthday to me but the version from Sixteen Candles by Altered Images. All thanks to Yo Gabba Gabba!
Posted by: bd | December 01, 2008 at 02:58 PM
I think Yo Gabba Gabba is the best thing on television that doesn't have curse words.
That said, this new Electric Company has me a little worried. It just doesn't look like anything my kid would want to watch. I hope they prove me wrong.
Posted by: Renee | December 01, 2008 at 03:24 PM
BD - How did I overlook this post, or you forgot to mention it? This is the 2nd best news of the day!
Pinch me!
Posted by: FM | December 02, 2008 at 04:41 PM
Every time I see cabbage, I STILL think of the song about how "the cabbage and the lettuce look the same"!
Posted by: BaltimoreGal | December 03, 2008 at 02:42 PM