I was interested to discover Sesame Street updated this classic with a shot-for-shot re-make, using claymation and a new version of the song.
Unsurprisingly, I found the newer version a terrible disappointment. Perhaps I'm blinded by nostalgia, but as shot-for-shot remakes go, this is a bigger mess than Gus Van Sant's Psycho.
For starters, the new cover of the song is too aggressive! I hate how the singer roars random words, breaking the infectious rhythm that made the original so memorable. Why a new version? Is this the result of a royalty squabble?
The new version of the ladybugs look weird. The original aren't overtly feminine, they're just wearing bonnets. The newer ones look like Mad Men era housewives; fresh from the hair parlour, always preening themselves, obsessively consulting mirrors and reapplying lipstick. They're at a picnic for Christ's sake!
Another change I can't wrap my head around is switching the firefighter from a mouse to a dog. Did they think a dog with his tongue hanging out was cuter than a hard working, blue collar field mouse? Scale-wise, the mouse makes more sense as a mouse is closer in size to ladybugs than a big dog would be.
I dread to think of what horrors they're planning to turn the 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10-11-12 Pinball cartoon into.
