R.I.P. READING RAINBOW
08.28.09
More like RACIAL Rainbow!
After a run of 26 years on PBS, the final episode of “Reading Rainbow” aired today. The only children’s television shows with longer runs are “Mister Rogers” and “Sesame Street.” **plays “Taps” on the kazoo**
Each episode of Reading Rainbow had the same basic elements: There was a featured children’s book that inspired an adventure with Burton. Then, at the end of every show, kids gave their own book reviews, always prefaced by Burton’s trademark line: “But you don’t have to take my word for it …”
The show’s run is ending… because no one — not the station, not PBS, not the Corporation for Public Broadcasting — will put up the several hundred thousand dollars needed to renew the show’s broadcast rights. [NPR]
I don’t know if “Reading Rainbow” had any lasting effect on people who grew up in the ’90s, but if you were a nerdy little bookworm in the ’80s (guilty), this show OWNED YOUR SH*T. Check out video of the original credits after the jump. The catchy hook and the reverb on the synthesizer makes me want to go read the f*ck outta some Very Hungry Caterpillar.
[via Popwatch]
SEE ALSO: 11 best “Reading Rainbow” theme song covers at Buzzfeed.
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*SOB!* NOOOOOO! I freaking LOVE that show… At first because I was a nerdy little bookworm (and still love reading), and then because it was a great way to get the little kids I babysat to read books with me and sit still for more than two seconds a day. With shows like this, 3-2-1 Contact, Square One, and the original Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego meeting their doom… well, quite frankly I’m not surprised that at least 5 out of 10 teens I meet are poorly educated, and at least 1 out of every 25 can’t read at more than a 6th-grade level. It’s a damnable course of events, and I wish more parents would get involved in putting a stop to it.
Reading? Our kids don’t need no reading. Reading makes you get all upitty, sassin’ your parents and preachers. Nope, don’t want none o’ that.
I may have missed the attention span, but go here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=144192794133&ref=ts and help us brainstorm ideas to keep Reading Rainbow on the air! Any and all ideas are welcome!
Well at least The Electric Company still comes on for my kids to watch. I wont let them watch this new stuff
Bring back ZOOM!
*tears up* its ok even though pbs doesnt love you anymore patrick stuart still does. “status report mr. laforge”
Disney and Nicklelodeon produce retarded crap with insipid laugh tracks and politically correct propaganda cartoons, designed to make a max profit and dumb down American youth. Mothers plunk their kids in from of this electronic babysitter, and they graduate to the garbage on MTV, ruining their morals. Damn, we had to pull this crap off the satellite, and I see my nieces and nephews becoming brain-dead. Anything promoting critical learning is eliminated, and PBS is nothing but a propaganda arm for Barak and ACORN. I am not surprised, write your congressman if you feel the same outrage about the dumbing down of America!
Damn, I didn’t even known this show still aired. Makes me wonder if there are any shows left airing that actually try to influence children to read more.
Wow. I didn’t even think the show was still on air. I definitely would have watched that during sick days instead of the rest of the crap that’s on during the day.
Damn it! This show was the fucking bomb, and now fucking gone.
Say what you want about the 80s but kids knew how to fucking read thanks to Levar Burton. The world is going to shit because there’s no fucking Reading Rainbow anymore. Fuck you world.
Hadn’t heard that theme song in years, that was weird. A little depressed the show’s toast, but honestly I had no idea it was still filming.
I was told there would be no math.
reading is FUNdamental
I think we all owe it to ourselves to punch every Harvard alum we meet, just on the off chance it’s HarvardAlum.
longer runs are “Mister Rogers”
Thanks for the image of that chode’s diarrhea. HarvardAlum is a total faggot.
I was going to make an amusing and pithy point, but HarvardAlum has pretty much hate-fucked this thread to death.
Too bad about the show…
Racial Rainbow?? RR was filmed in Brooklyn,New York.. Do the Math people! You want to talk about race, lets talk about the lack of color in the citcom “Friends”. A show filmed in NEW YORK, but with no black people! Give me a break. This must be the utopia that the East Village has been praying for, but then again where will all of the New York Knicks,Yankees,Mets live? Racial Rainbow right there!
I didn’t even know it was still on.
This show made me half the man I am today.
Because I am illiterate on my left side.
Damn! First Square One and now this!
Best episode ever was when they visited the set of Star Trek and talked about the “special effects”. Like a model of the Enterprise in front of a picture of stars.
@Danger
Ch-Ch-Ch-Chip and Dale! Rescue Rangers!
@Danger Guerrero
When you’re in trouble you call DW … Darkwing Duck!
I loved the show as a kid, and have a feeling the synth intro made a lasting impact on my musical tastes.
That video almost brought a tear to my eye and I have no idea why. I think it had to do with the Benjamin Franklin looking guy that used to scare the hell out me for some reason as a kid.
*pokes at my new vagina
@ Vodka
Agreed. I’ve won multiple drinks at bars from friends by being able to sing theme songs of kids’ shows from the 80-90s purely from memory.
/Ducktales, woo-oo
Affirmative Action Rainbow
This is sad news. That show was great. The more stuff like this happens, the more I realize I think I watched everything on TV growing up.
Holy crap, I felt like I was having an acid flashback watching that (less dragons than usual, though). That show kicked ass.
if they want the show renewed they should re-format into some sort of reality show. “America’s most illiterate children” or “Read your ass off” are two possible angles…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1K8hYiJIHo
Pours a forty for levar.
Damn! First 3-2-1 Contact and now this!
I was too busy watching He-Man, Transformers and GI Joe to even know this show existed.
Also, I would have gone with “reading rainbow coalition” for the picture’s title.