PBS Kids (2023-present)

PBS Kids
The old saying is true: you either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become another trashy children's block.
Genre: Edutainment Country: United States Release Date: July 11, 1994 (as PTV) September 6, 1999 (as PBS Kids)

PBS Kids is the brand for most of the children's programming aired by the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) in the United States. The target audience is children between the ages of 2 and 8. PBS Kids brand programming is aired daily on most local PBS stations during a daytime block, typically scheduled in the morning hours, in addition to a separate 24/7 channel (sometimes called PBS Kids Channel or PBS Kids 24/7). Both the block and 24/7 service are broadcast over the air, via cable and satellite providers and on streaming platforms. Select programming is also available internationally. It was great until 2018 and was decent until early 2023.

Doinked Qualities

1. One of the main bad qualities is the logo change and rebrand, which received backlash from many fans of PBS Kids.
   • On top of that, while it's not all that bad, it looks sorta bland and average at best, despite being made by Lippincott of all companies. It's still a circle with the words "PBS KIDS" on it, but they removed Dash and the thinking bubbles in the logo, and the circle's now blue. But hey, at least they used the font of the original logo from 1999.
   • Compared to the previous brandings, the 2022 rebrand feels very lazy, uninteresting, and just plain simple at best.
2. Another reason is that a lot of their best shows like Thomas & Friends, Bob the Builder, Between the Lions, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, WordGirl, Martha Speaks, Fetch! with Ruff Ruffman, Ready Jet Go!, Maya & Miguel, Dragon Tales, The Electric Company (the 2009 reboot), Clifford the Big Red Dog (the original one from 2000), Clifford's Puppy Days, WordWorld and many others have been either screwed over or unnecessarily cancelled and replaced with these boring, cringeworthy, and lifeless (despite some being good) cartoons that feel absolutely nothing like actual PBS Kids shows. Most of their new shows nowadays focus only on protecting the environment, learning about cultures, or learning to be a good person, which while not bad necessarily, can get bland, repetitive and tedious.
   • Even shows that originally focused on one topic, like Cyberchase with math, are focused now on protecting the environment, and on Season 10, eating healthy.
3. They've started to milk some of their shows, such as Arthur, Sesame Street, and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, and the 24/7 deadline clearly shows.
   • Arthur, despite being cancelled in 2022, is still currently rerunning on the channel, which is basically proof that PBS will stop at nothing to milk the Arthur franchise.
4. With the instant lack of variety, logo oversimplification, downgrade of quality, and removal of some classic shows after 2022, it caused many older viewers to feel that PBS had lost its touch.
5. Shows like Let's Go Luna!, Splash and Bubbles and Ready Jet Go! have either gotten bad finales or have ended on cliffhangers, which are not very good ways to end a show. Even Nature Cat, which ended its run on a high note, didn't really have a good finale.
6. They don't bother to promote new content (new episodes and movies/specials, etc.) of their less well known shows often resulting in their unfair cancelations and/or removals.
7. The "Family Night" block (introduced in April 2017) isn't really as memorable as it was.
   • Last year for Father's Day, the block did a marathon of Father's Day episodes of four shows: Alma's Way, Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, Dinosaur Train and WordGirl. This year they're doing just a boring four-episode marathon of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. Which is not only ACTUAL PROOF that PBS Kids Family Night has fell off, but proof that PBS still milks their golden child, also known as Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood.
8. Just like modern Nickelodeon, the channel nowadays tries so hard to be hip, modern, cool and relevant with the kids and mostly comes off as cringe-worthy, especially during 2023, which is very odd. For example, some bumpers and videos would involve the characters rapping and using teen slang.
9. Many of their shows tend to be underrated, which isn't bad at first, execpt that it ends up making the channel more closer to oblivion.
10. In addition, they also aired a lot of bad/mediocre (or at least annoying) shows, such as the HiT era of Barney & Friends, Caillou, season 9 onwards of Cyberchase, Sid the Science Kid, Pinkalicious & Peterrific, Clifford the Big Red Dog (2019), Splash and Bubbles, Super Why's Comic Book Adventures, Donkey Hodie, Lyla in the Loop, and the third and (currently) final season of Odd Squad (although the show's returning for a fourth season set in the UK), etc.
11. The PBS Kids block feeds got cut short as they are no longer available on the afternoons and after school hours all because of their focus to streaming and the 24-hour network, marking an end of an era. The change might’ve also been made to compete with the Nick Jr. and Disney Junior (now Disney Jr.) blocks.
12. For some reason, they love decreasing the episode count for every passing season. This also happened before 2023.
13. PBS Kids used AI-assisted conversations in both Elinor Wonders Why and Lyla in the Loop which should NOT be a topic for preschoolers!

Good Qualities

1. PBS Kids is still more committed to making new original cartoons than most major for-profit American entertainment companies these days.
2. There still air a handful of good/decent shows such as Sesame Street, Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum, Molly of Denali, Elinor Wonders Why, Rosie's Rules, Peg + Cat, Hero Elementary, Curious George, Wild Kratts, Let's Go Luna!, the first two seasons of Odd Squad, Nature Cat, Arthur and the first eight seasons of Cyberchase.
3. Sure, they may be picky when it comes to shows they own, but at least the PBS corporation doesn't purge their shows, or unfairly remove shows from streaming services, after cancelation and removal from networks, unlike what the infamous Paramount Global did back in early 2024 with some Nickelodeon programming, such as Big Nate and Blue's Clues & You.
4. They have some good short-form programming such as You, Me & Community, Plum Landing, The Ruff Ruffman Show, City Island and Jelly, Ben & Pogo.
5. The channel was way better before 2018 and decent until early 2023.
6. The new logo, while very mediocre, isn't really that bad compared to other oversimplified logos at the time.
7. While the bumpers and the idents aren't as good either, they're at least adorable and appealing.
8. They aired some great movies like the four Nature Cat specials (Ocean Commotion, The Return of Bad Dog Bart, A Nature Carol, Nature Cat's Nature Movie Special Extraordinaire), Dinosaur Train: Adventure Island, Ready Jet Go!: Space Camp, Rocket Saves the Day and Brambletown.
9. Thankfully, they've permanently removed Caillou in early 2021 and is currently no longer airing any reruns, mostly due to the rights expiring and heavy controversy.
   • However, it's still available on Prime Video with a PBS Kids subscription for some weird reason...
10. A few ended shows such as Super Why!, SciGirls, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, The Berenstain Bears, The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That!, Dinosaur Train, WordGirl, Let's Go Luna! and Peg + Cat are still airing locally on several stations such as WXEL, WFYI, WEIU, KLCS (and the kids subchannel), or on weekends or occasionally on the PBS Kids Channel. They can also be viewed on Prime Video anytime with a PBS Kids subscription, which is obvious proof that PBS still owns the rights to these shows, both on TV and digitally.

Reception

TBA

Videos

TBA

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