Now that school’s over and I’m all refreshed and relaxed and able to type long texts without feeling anxious, depressed and tired, I figured it was about time I wrote a second part to my wanderings on Nostalgia Crescent. Besides, I’m sure that it’ll help recover some of our souls from the institution known as the University of Toronto. In my last post, many of you mentioned a lot of old TV shows we used to enjoy as children. Now, again, this will not apply to you if you did not grow up in Canada in the 90s, so I welcome you to write your own post. In any case, I’ll try and think up as many shows as I can. I’ve already mentioned a few anime titles, such as Pokemon, Digimon, Dragonball Z and Sailor Moon in my last trip down memory lane, so I’ll refrain from mentioning them again. Anyways, let’s start the second part of our journey down Nostalgia Crescent with…

Mr. Dressup

You don’t know how much I despair when I hear that people my age who grew up in Canada don’t know about Ernie Coombes, much better known as Mr. Dressup. This show was absolutely magical: it engaged children through music, drama (as in acting), storytelling and visual arts. To this day, I still remember Mr. Dressup going to the Tickle Trunk to get his costume so that he could act out a story with his puppet sidekicks. Or all the cool arts and crafts that he did. All I can say is that Mr. Dressup is love. Pure love. There’s a bit of a war going on in facebook groups that pits Mr. Dressup against Mr. Rogers, which is sort of fair game because I think they had the same timeslot on different channels. As a result, I grew up a Mr. Dressup girl and never knew the world of Mr. Rogers… even though I do know the “It’s a beautiful day in the neighbourhood…” song somehow.

Arthur

Everyday when you’re walking down the street… Remember this song? Arthur was awesome. Even though people got confused as to how they had a dog character and then Pal, who’s Arthur’s pet dog. Then there was the issue of them being in either 4th or 6th grade and being allowed to go around town by themselves like teenagers. Nonetheless, Arthur is just so awesome that it still runs on TV today.

Magic School Bus

A month or two ago, I was supposed to be writing my essay but what was I doing instead? I fell into a fit of nostalgia and ended up watching the Magic School Bus, a show that taught you all the science that an arts student would know. I used to have this Magic School Bus ruler/protractor that had a mini bus in the centre that you can slide to each of the nine planets of the solar system… those were the days when Pluto was still a planet.

Bill Nye the Science Guy

If the Magic School Bus wasn’t enough, Bill Nye was there to give you more science -related facts! Humour, cool experiments and an awkward music video at the end of each episode – Bill Nye knew how to make science fun! Now, excuse me while I try to find some liquid nitrogen to dip roses in…

Sesame Street

Sesame Street celebrated its 40th birthday last year, as displayed by the long string of google doodles. Admittedly, I ended up watching clips of Sesame Street as a university student when I discovered that people like Norah Jones, Ben Stiller and Michelle Obama were guests on the show. That is just pure cool. (Ben Stiller’s appearance and song about people in the neighbourhood is hysterical. I recommend that you watch it.)

Barney

Ok, we all make fun of it, but let’s face it: chances are, you’ve watched Barney as a kid. I don’t really remember anything beyond the purple dinosaur and some song that went something like, “I love you, you love me, we’re a happy family…”

Shining Time Station

I don’t think “Thomas the Tank Engine” was broadcast in Canada back the those days but I know about Thomas because the people at Shining Time Station would tell stories about Thomas and his friends. There was a little conductor man in the show and according to wikipedia, it was at one point played by Ringo Starr. Cool! Also, let’s not forget that cool jukebox with all the puppets who would sing and play songs for you.

When I was either 5 or 6, I had to go to the washroom this one day but ended up missing the ending to one of the shows and started crying. I stopped when I heard the first strains of the theme song to…

Power Rangers

I don’t particularly remember why I liked watching this show. In fact, my mother abhorred it because it was so violent. The Red Ranger (sans costume) did this really cool trick with a stick in the ending credits. I’ve watched bits of the Japanese version of Power Rangers either last year or a few years ago while in Asia, and I must say, the Japanese have wayyy better special effects and costumes. It was pretty trippy.

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

I don’t think I was old enough to really understand the purpose of this show when it was on TV but I watched it anyways. For now, all I remember is flashing lights on top of these posts. Reading its wiki entry, apparently there was a plot to the game show. Cool.

Kratt’s Creatures

This was the precursor to Zabomafoo. It had no puppet, no stories set in “Zabooland” (I was leaping along… leap, leap, leap…) and no songs, but the Kratt brothers, Chris and Martin, did track down some pretty amazing animals. One time, I had to do a report on camels and couldn’t find books on them at the school library because everyone else was using them but lo and behold, guess which animal the brothers were talking about on the show that night? Woot for coincidences because if it weren’t for them, I would’ve failed that assignment. Oh yes, and a question: who had a crush on one (or both) of the brothers when you were little? *raises hand*

Art Attack

This is such an awesome show hosted by a guy with an awesome accent. Who could forget the huge pictures of sand/salt/fabric and the crafts. The crafts were never as pretty as the ones in the show when you made them yourself, but it was always tons of fun anyways. Funnily enough, it took me forever to figure out what PVA glue was. Oh those Brits…

Bananas in Pajamas

This show might seem a bit moronic now – I mean, it’s about talking bananas which were actually guys in giant banana suits – but it was actually really charming. I still remember a bit of an episode when the Bananas had to organize something or other but ended up making a box for a “flower” rather than “flour”. A cute fact: the bananas rode a car.

Country Mouse and City Mouse

Another show on TVO that was rather charming about two talking mice who solve mysteries. It was always pretty obvious who the culprit is and they also usually owned a cat. Although I loved the show, I was rather miffed at the  feline antagonism. I think there was another show called Book Mice with a bad cat (who incidentally couldn’t read) called Exit. Why was there so much feline hate back then?

Flipper

Oh Flipper. What a helpful dolphin friend, just like Lassie, but a mammalian sea creature. According to wikipedia, a young Jessica Alba was part of its cast.

Reboot

For some reason, it took me a while to figure out that the people in Reboot were actually in your computer. Nevertheless when I figured it out, I never understood how winning games destroyed your computer or how Hexadecimal was a “good” virus… or at least she turned good at some point in the series. Still, it was a fun show.

Breaker High

I’m not sure how many of you remember this show as it was shown later in the evening (past my bedtime when I was in elementary school at least) and it was about kids who went to high school on a cruise ship and went around the world. Now that I think of it, other than all the drama, those kids were lucky little ducks, weren’t they?

Goosebumps

Yes, we’ve read the books but the show was just as engaging as the books. Thanks to the show, ventriloquist dummies are rather creepy to me. (I’m going to have nightmares if I look at the above image too much…) Other than that, the show wasn’t scary at all. Was anyone else freaked out by anything from the series?

Are You Afraid of the Dark?

There’s nothing more fun than telling ghost stories in the dark… around a campfire. That should be an activity to do in the summer. Just like Goosebumps, I never thought any of these stories to be scary.

Lamb Chop’s Play-Along

If you know “The Song that Never Ends,” it’s very likely that this show is the cause since it was the show’s ending song. Lamb Chops was a pretty adorable puppet… though with a rather unfortunate name.

Animaniacs

I’ve had so many reactions when I talk about this show with friends or acquaintances. Some people loved it, and love quoting Pinky and the Brain (“The same thing we do every night, Pinky, try and take over the world!) while others found this show rather annoying. I can see where they’re coming from, but it was a cartoon you came home to after school.

The Elephant Show

I don’t really remember all that much from the elephant show other than the fact that Sharon, Lois and Bram sang. I do sort of remember this guy called Eric who played the Banjo and had his own show, “Eric’s World”, which was filled with drama and laughs. I also liked the, song that went, “Don’t say goodbye, just say hello…”

Some other things on TV you might remember from your childhood:

• Sugar, a previous host of YTV who sounded as if she was on helium all the time. She hosted the Zone with a guy named Carlos and a creepy machine thing with weird voice.
• Speaking of Sugar and Carlos, do you remember that stupid song they sang that went, “Today is Friday, I hope you have your sneakers on!”
• Patty, who was a host on TVO and is now on CBC.
• Some of the “high school” or “college” shows that were on TV during your adolescence, like Big Wolf on Campus, Radio Active (my personal favourite) Student Body and System Crash

Anyone care to add anything else?

Pictures from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

Sailor Moon

I have yet to meet another girl (or boy) around my age who was not a fan of Sailor Moon during their childhood years. This was probably the first show I have ever followed religiously. I even remember that the boys in my class enjoyed the show as well; so much that they collected Sailor Moon cards. (I was so envious since they had more than I did.) My favourite sailor scout was Sailor Mercury. What was yours?

Dragonball Z

Although I never really watched the show (yes, boo me), the Dragonball series were always pretty popular back in elementary school, mostly for the boys. I still remember amusing myself as I watched the boys play their pretend games where one was Goku and the other, Vegeta. I had no clue what was going on; all I knew was that they were acting funny. Oh boys…

Polly Pocket

I apologize if some of these toys/shows/fads tend to be directed at girls; however, if it’s any comfort, I was a bit of a tomboy during my childhood so I was interested in a lot of things the boys were and I hope that this will be reflected in the rest of the article. For now, let’s just take a minute to remember that Polly Pocket used to be these tiny little box-things with tiny little dolls with round bases at the bottom so you could fit Polly and her friends in tiny little round slots around the little doll house. I find it a bit sad that I had to search “Original Polly Pocket” in order to find a picture of what I played with in my childhood. Nowadays, it seems that Polly dolls and sets have grown and can now no longer fit in your pocket.

Pogs

I’m still puzzled as to how you played with pogs despite the fact that I owned quite a few back in my childhood. There were the paper discs and then that big metallic one… I think it involved throwing the big one… Thinking back, how on earth did I get my pogs in the first place?

Furby

Gosh, I had forgotten how hideous these things were, hence why I never owned one. Nonetheless, who could ever forget those funny tales and urban legends of people teaching furbies how to swear (with disastrous consequences as swearing was so bad back when we were kids). Even to this day, I still wonder at the truth of these stories.

Tamagochi and other virtual pets

Tamagochi, the little virtual pet that was supposed to teach you to be responsible… that is, until school started, which by then if your pet was still alive, you’d become an irresponsible student since you were too busy taking care of your virtual pet to pay attention to your teacher as they explained the basics of long division. There are also those who managed to keep their pets alive for 100+ days, which in that case meant that you had no life. I had another one of these virtual pets, a Dinky Dino, which died after 12 days no matter what. I was very sad the first time it happened, but I got over it.

Pokemon

Gotta catch’em all! (Or go catch little animals, trap them in little balls, make them fight their fellow animals so that their owners can also put them in little balls!) Ok people, let’s get this straight, 150 Pokemon are more than enough to satisfy children seeing that an entire generation has grown up with the Poke-rap that only had 150 Pokemon to name. Even then, as long as you know Pikachu, we know that you haven’t been living under a rock during your childhood. Now that I think of it, I wouldn’t mind a gameboy and Pokemon red or blue for Christmas, those games were kind of fun. (The boys in my class used to let me play with theirs. I also still have my old tiny stack of Pokemon cards somewhere…) Anyways, Pokemon are still popular, just don’t ask me to name them all because there’s about a gazillion of them by now.

Digimon

When we think of Pokemon, let’s not forget the other show with monsters that actually had a plot. In other news, T.K. and Kari got together after season 2, no matter what the epilogue says.

Butterfly Clips

When I mentioned that I was a bit of a tomboy, this is my reason: I owned Pokemon and Digimon cards, but never, ever, ever did I own these hair clips. All the other girls in the class but I preferred my anime. No wonder I was never part of the “popular” girls group. Oh well, being a nerd is so much cooler.

String Chokers

Unfortunately, the internets have failed me. I cannot find a picture of those tiny string chokers that were another sign of being in the popular girls group. Needless to say, I never owned one of these either.

Crazy Bones

I loved the glow in the dark Crazy Bones, probably because my first pack of Crazy Bones consisted solely of glow in the dark bones. Taking a look at pictures on google, it seems that the bones are now multicoloured with faces painted in and everything. I disapprove. I mean, none of these new ones could ever compare to the adorable little “Eggy” Crazy Bone, which I wanted and have never owned. *Tear*

Super Long Series of Books

Of course, they weren’t great literature, but still fun to read, but it was hard not to enjoy series like, “The Babysitters Club” or “Goosebumps”. (I was an equal fan of both.) Who’s still a bit scared of ventriloquist dummies thanks to Slappy?

The list can go on and on, but I will stop here. Tell me if I forgot anything! It’s always nice to remember all the lovely things in childhood.

Pictures from here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

After seeing ads all around the subway, I discovered that the CBC would be doing a new show about skating. I had no clue what it would be all about but I knew that figure skating somehow fit into the equation. Since seeing Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, my love for the sport had rekindled and I hoped that my schedule would allow for me to watch the program, which I did.

If you were wondering what the show is all about, it’s actually rather simple. Eight pairs, composed of a famous male hockey player and a female figure skater would skate in a figure skating competition. Each pair will do one routine per week and viewers will have to call to vote for their favourite couple; a format similar to So You Think You Can Dance. To help viewers with the technical aspect of the sport, a panel of judges (Sandra Bezic, Dick Button and a guest judge) will give their comments along with a score in the archaic 6.0 format where skaters are given points out of 6. The winning couple will win $100,000 for a charity of their choice (very Canadian, eh?) and the title of… Canada’s favourite skaters? (I just made that up.)

Although the competition sounds rather interesting, what really got my attention were the competitors. They are listed in their pairings as follows:

• Claude Lemieux and Shae Lynn Bourne
• Glenn Anderson and Isabelle Brasseur
• Stéphane Richer and Marie-France Dubreuil
• Ken Daneyko and Jodeyne Higgins
• Tie Domi and Christine Hough-Sweeney
• Bob Probert and Kristina Lenko
• Craig Simpson and Jamie Salé
• Ron Duguay and Barbara Underhill

Since I haven’t watched hockey in ages, the show has kindly given biographies of the hockey players and they all seem to be competent and pretty decent at their sport. As for the figure skaters, many of them are World or Olympic medalists. As well, the show features many interesting and famous choreographers such as David Wilson who choreographed World Champion, Yuna Kim’s winning 2009 programs.

With all this going for the show, I was actually slightly disappointed. The routines were sort of fun to watch but by the end of the show, you started getting really sick of the very similar lifts in every routine, which were the only highlight of the program since the routines were more theatrical than technical. There was no footwork, only one throw jump in the entire episode and no spins, spirals or twizzles, which are my favourite elements in figure skating. Since the beginning of the show, the figure skating snob in me kicked in and started picking at the sloppy entrances and exits into the lifts – a crime that was not limited to the hockey players.

You could say that it is unfair to judge the skaters this way, but you really have to wonder at who the target audience for this show is. Would fans of a rough and tumble sport like hockey be inclined to watch their favourite retired players figure skate week after week? If you’re a figure skating aficionado like I am, how much sloppy skating can you take before you can’t take it anymore? And if you’re a person who has no interest whatsoever in skating, why would you even watch this show? To me, it just seems as if this competition is very apt at estranging its potential viewers. I would hope that all the pairs would get better each week, but if the same kind of sloppy skating goes on, I’ll be less inclined to tune in, especially with the fact that I have to organize my time carefully if I ever want to watch TV. Perhaps in the end, the only people who will be left watch will be the ones who gush over every Canadian figure skater, good or bad, who and agree with P.J. Kwong’s belief that Canada is the world’s #1 figure skating nation. As a Canadian, even I disagree with that and would concede that the title should belong to Russia, who has produced excellent skaters in every discipline.

In any case, I might stay tuned if I have the time to watch the show. Hopefully there will be more highlights in the future other than watching hockey players trip over the ice picks on their figure skates.

Which begs the question: why is there even a demand for these sensationalistic magazines full of stories that are partly or completely untrue? Honestly, why should I care about who Brad Pitt sleeps with? Why should anyone care? Oddly enough, the case of Jon and Kate that I mention above is an interesting one, considering that their decision on their marriage will definitely affect the television show they are on. However, curiosity on whether or not the show will continue does not excuse the blatant and extremely creepy stalking that is going on. The season premiere of the hit series also featured for the first time, the Gosselin family being followed by the paparazzi as they’re getting decorations for a birthday party for their newly turned five year-old sextuplets. (They were also during the party, which made it even creepier and frankly, disgusting.) Even though the Gosselins do have a good part of their everyday life on display, I fail to comprehend the need to know all the other details that they don’t want people to know.

To theorize, perhaps to those who do read tabloids, the act of reading them becomes a legal and non-committal way of satisfying their stalkerish tendencies. Or has it become another way to live vicariously through celebrities? In any case, if anyone does understand why people read this complete and utter nonsense (when there are obviously more interesting and productive things to do), please tell me. I’d really like to know. What compels you to read tabloids? Do you really think that anything written in them is true? Why and why not? What’s the benefit from say… knowing that Lindsay Lohan or whoever went partying last night?

To conclude, although the public gaze does in a way de-humanize (and perhaps deify) celebrities or television/film/musical personalities, a fundamental thing that everyone has to remember is that they are all simply human beings just like us. There are definitely things that you don’t want people to find out about and therefore it is none of their business; not to mention that spreading rumours/”decorated” or false stories can be extremely hurtful and destructive. Even if celebrities are constantly in the public eye, they do have the right to have their own secrets as well as the right to deal with their troubles and hardships without anyone scrutinizing them or their decisions unless they choose to divulge these secrets.

A couple of weeks ago, I had the privilege of attending my first Second City performance. Boy was I impressed, especially considering my growing disappoint of Saturday Night Live. Albeit, I must say it has gotten slightly better since the Sarah Palin sketches. Nevertheless, Second City is way better. Not having seen the original Chicago show, I have no real other comparison to draw from other than SNL.

So what makes Second City better than SNL? First, I have to of course include the fact that the sketches are indeed longer and therefore, I guess, easier, to pack in more funny than it would be for shorter SNL sketches. Secondly, I would like to point out that the actors in the sketches were oftentimes the ones who wrote the sketches, and can therefore present the sketches they way they intended to. Unlike SNL (where big corporate owners control everything since it’s broadcast on live television), Second City (I am assuming of course), has more liberty as to what they want done. Lastly, Second City is pretty much a different show altogether, but for the purposes of this article I equate the two simply because they’re both sketch comedy shows.

Now with that being said, let’s move on and not make further excuses as to why SNL can’t help but suck. The Second City show I saw was packed full of surprises and randomness. Topics included the recession (but with a tastefully comedic spin), racism, sex, break-ups, random people standing around and looking at you, politics (with a spot-on impersonation of President Barack Obama), etc. The show was brilliant, not only in its versatility of topics and ability to bring up controversial and recent subject matter, but because of its delivery. The dialogue was tasteful and considerate, flawlessly presented with quick wit and charm.

The only thing I wasn’t so keen on was the improv which comes after the 2-hour scripted part. The improv lacked any real substance and just seemed to drag on hopelessly. The actors tried, as they may, to be shocking and funny. That just fell flat and left the audience, well at least me, feeling weirded out and uncomfortable. There were of course some funny moments but nothing really worth staying the extra hour for.

To learn more about Second City Toronto and other shows playing, visit their website.

Wild Roses, which airs on CBC TV Tuesdays at 9pm, is definitely more mild than wild.  I’d call it a classic soap opera with love triangles and forbidden love, back-stabbing, filthy rich white people and the working class, and shamelessly tacky dialogue. The twist however is that it’s set in Calgary, a renowned Cowboy oil-rich city, which I guess sets it somewhat apart from other soap operas in the US.  The tragedy however, is exactly that: it is just another soap opera. It’s not really different from any other show in terms of predictable story plots and outcomes, corny lines and very good looking people.

Is it just me or do Canadians want Canadian shows to do well and therefore are willing to sit through lame Canadian dramas and sitcoms over and over gain? After watching  an episode of MVP: The Secret Lives of Hockey Wives long ago and Being Erica just recently, I was so disappointed in our home bred talent, or lack thereof, in our Canadian TV industry.  One good thing about Wild Roses is that it is somewhat relatable in terms of the struggles a working class family goes through. It also gives an interesting insight into the Alberta Oil Industry, which, of course, is over-sensationalized for TV. Another is that there is some solid acting from characters like Kate and Maggie Henry.

It feels to me that Canadian television shows just try too hard, or rather try too hard to be American.  I’m all for creativity and something uniquely Canadian, but Wild Roses is really neither. To me it’s like Dallas, but with a few Canadian references here and there.  It’s as if just plopping a bunch of actors onto Canadian soil will make the show Canadian. Where’s our unique sense of humour? Where’s the creative dialogue? Where do we find better actors that we haven’t already seen in the all of the other countlessly recycled Canadian TV shows? Better yet, who can stop CBC from funding such bad shows?

It’s shows like Wild Roses that anger me as a tax-paying Canadian. My money is being used to fund shows like this when money can be better used elsewhere. How many shows has CBC flushed through in the last year? The sad part is, there were probably some good ones like Jpod, which was the best written Canadian show on CBC that I’ve ever seen, though that got canceled. I’m willing to give shows a chance, but it seems like CBC just makes bad decision after bad decision.  Honestly, whoever green lights these shows needs a better understanding of what the Canadian public wants or, at least, make a more conservative effort to spend our money wisely.

Wild Roses again airs on CBC TV 9pm Tuesdays. For more info, visit their website.