The 90s saw a cornucopia of some of the most twisted, deranged, and innovative television to ever grace the screen; none more potent or vital to my existence than the shows on Nickelodeon and MTV. As it is, both of these stations lost the will to entertain after 1999 and gave in to pregnant teenagers, whining pre-teens, and cartoons that would cause the braindead to become... er, braindead.
But let’s not dwell on the things that we can’t change. No matter how many petitions are signed, Facebook groups are started, or how many times we swear off television we’re never gonna be able to bring back that glorious orange couch on Friday nights; the wit and disdain dripping monotone of an unpopular high schooler; or the sexual and thematic undertones of the cartoons that we absolutely adored. So, we need to just suck it up find home grown comfort from blogs such as Strange Kids Club.
The fun part for me came when I went back to these shows and rediscovered what I fell in love with in the first place. So, with this turn of the screw, I’m going to take you hand-puppet in hand-puppet down the hypnotic grooves of one Mr. Sifl and his confidante Señor Olly. ¡Olé!
. It was a series that aired on PBS in the early to mid 90's that presented mysteries in the form of story arcs. It was about a ghost who first makes contact with two Brooklyn kids by the name of Jamal and Lenni in order to protect them from danger. These kids will become known as the Ghostwriter Team and began as a group of four but later added three more members. The ghost can only communicate to the children through manipulating text and shaping his own sentences out of them. Members of the Ghostwriter team wore pens around their necks that they could use to write to Ghostwriter whenever they wanted. They would even use Ghostwriter to send out a message to the entire group at one time.
