LTPHarry

The whole premise of this 1993 New Year's Eve special, which was funded by six broadcasters who created their own Sesame Street co-productions or aired the original show, is to give an overview of how different countries in the world ring in the New Year. However, the main focus is in the United States within Sesame Street itself.

The synopsis is that while most of the adult residents are at their own parties, Gina and Savion stay behind to help the kids celebrate, with help from Big Bird and the other muppets. All in the meanwhile, worrywart Telly Monster, who doesn't understand the concept of the New Year, is paranoid about the year ending, and Oscar doesn't help matters. This leads to fun antics, like where he disguises himself as a human and fools the kids and muppets, and "hides away from the New Year", but Gina shows him that there's nothing to worry about. Good stuff indeed.

All in the meanwhile, Elmo hosts the "Monster News Network", where he showcases how the New Year is celebrated in Israel, Portugal, Germany, Norway, Mexico, and Japan. The first four represented by the respective co-productions, the last two represented by Rosita and two original characters named Cousin Pepe (Mexico) and Elmo-noske (Japan).

This is one of my favourite New Year specials. It perfectly represents what the holiday is meant to be, and it just makes you feel good. To hardcore Sesame Street and Muppet fans, it's also neat seeing the characters from a small selection of co-productions as well.

"Kids' Guide to Life - Learning to Share" was the first in an installment of Sesame Street direct-to-video releases by Sony Wonder that were aimed at teaching children important life lessons through the appearance of a special celebrity guest star. This installment focuses on cooperation, for instance.

We start with Elmo playing his all-time favourite toy, his train. He sings a song about it, and afterward, Zoe, his best friend, comes up and asks if she should play with it. Elmo, being the furry-red three-year-old that he is, doesn't want her (or anybody) to touch it. Meanwhile, Maria and Tarah take note of Elmo and Zoe while the former is fixing a television set, and take note of them, not realizing the two muppets are arguing.

Afterward, Maria turns on the television, and it heads into a program called "Cooperation Today", a parody of NBC's Today. The celebrity guest star and then co-host of the actual show, Katie Couric, tries to interview Jack and Jill, but the two of them won't cooperate, and it heads into chaos.

We head back into Elmo and Zoe's argument, and to represent how much he won't share the train, he enters into an epic song explaining such! Zoe is upset, and as such, Elmo decides to let Zoe take part in his train game. When they take notice of two Banana peels, they decide to take them to Oscar... through the train!

After a segment with Cookie Monster and his friend (What is Friend?), Katie Couric is now interviewing the Three Little Pigs, who are having trouble cooperating and allowing the Big Bad Wolf to destroy their houses. Eventually, the Wolf leaves to annoy Red Riding Hood instead.

After another segment involving Herry and the Two-Headed Monster (Two Heads Are Better Than One), we head back to Elmo and Zoe. She now says it's her turn to push the train, but Elmo is hesitant and suggests they both operate the train; however, this ends up leading to disastrous consequences after the next segment featuring Grover and Prairie Dawn (Sharing).

We see Big Bird, who has just finished constructing a tall block tower and is proud of it, but when he hears Elmo and Zoe playing with the train, and the ramp facing right in front of the tower. Big Bird tries to stop them, but as Elmo and Zoe were not listening, it was too late. Big Bird gets upset with the two, and Elmo and Zoe realize the trouble they caused and how hurt their fine yellow friend was.

This leads to Big Bird taking note of the train, and suggests that he could make some tracks with his blocks to allow Elmo and Zoe to deliver the banana skins to Oscar. They then sing a song about sharing.

We go back to Katie Couric, and this time, she's in the studio and gets a report about what Elmo, Zoe, and Big Bird are doing. She heads into a taxi cab ("Sesame Street, please, and STEP ON IT!") in a flash. Meanwhile, the three muppets have finally reached Oscar's trash can, and there goes Katie interviewing the three of them! Oscar pops up with Grundgetta, and the three of them give the Banana peels to Oscar. Even he gets to know how to share as well, when he gives the other peel to Grundgetta! When Oscar takes note of being on camera, he is embarrassed by doing a nice thing.

After he and Grundgetta leave, Jack, Jill, and the Pigs return and find out how much that cooperation worked. Everyone then sings the final song, "So Much Better When We Work Together" i.e., "Cooperation Song".

The last scene has an interview with Katie Couric, where she discusses in detail the life lesson that the feature has to offer about how to share and cooperate, with a "little help" from Elmo and Zoe.

Learning to Share is a lot of fun and gives good development to Elmo and Zoe's friendship, which can be rocky at best on the show (no pun intended). I honestly would say that their portrayals in the life moral are done in a realistic way that toddlers their age would act, or even people on the autism spectrum or other disorders. This shows because, being autistic myself, I can be a bit protective of my belongings and find it hard to share or cooperate with other people.

Elmo, Zoe, and Big Bird provided good roles, and Katie Couric worked out as a good foil for the muppets. Even Oscar had some funny moments.

This is a good special and a definite recommendation to those who have children or are just wanting a throwback of older Sesame Street material.

So, as you'd expect, the media sometimes adapts material from social media and websites. This show is based on a popular Subreddit of the same name, where users discuss conflicts they've had and declare if they're the ___hole in this situation. And somehow Comedy Central decided to commission this Jimmy Carr-fronted comedy game show (I know there's a co-host as well, but I've forgotten her name) and call it a day.

This show completely misses the mark on why the Subreddit is so popular. The whole concept is similar, where members of the public discuss something very embarrassing or awful (normally, really average, normal things like riding e-scooters to work, etc.) and win money if they do. Except, why turn a subreddit into a game show? The whole point of the subreddit is that you are (mainly) not telling this to the public. This is just a bad idea right from the start.

The whole show screams "Gen-Z", and it's obvious. Almost all the contestants featured are young social media influencers, and there are references to things like Nando's to fill in the boot. As for the humour, it's the same forced shock value that plagues other modern comedy shows, including Jimmy making his standard fare jokes he's well known for. Edgy jokes used to be fun. The subreddit isn't entirely about shock tactics, and yet the British comedy scene thinks that's the best way to make a viewer sit down and watch this.

As for Jimmy's role, he doesn't do a great job. He's one of the most popular British comedians, and when he's directed right, he can be the talk of the town on most shows. On this show, he doesn't. It feels like the only reason he decided to even host from the start was that he needed the money and ran for it. I don't even remember if he had any chemistry with his co-host.

My final verdict: Jimmy Carr's Am I the ___hole? Completely misses the point of why the Subreddit is so popular, and shows that the media is running out of ideas (by going to the internet to grab a shameless concept). I don't expect this series to last another season, and maybe that could be for the best! This show is just awful, and it is easily the lowest of the low for comedy shows, even more so than when I reviewed Silence is Golden a few months ago!