Teletubbies

The Teletubbies is a UK show about four stubby aliens who live on a giant miniature golf course. They walk around the course doing simpletonic tasks and eating alien toast. Their only means of communication is nonsensical jabbering and slight English-sounding words. Every once in a while a talking shower head rises out of the turf and gives them instructions to please the sun which is really a giant baby's head inside of a sun. Then a giant pinwheel beams messages directly into their cerebral cortexes and their abdominal area becomes a projector. Their stomachs usually show small films about children going on adventures, or less exciting things. One time it showed five kids jumping. Just jumping, for five minutes.

If none of this makes sense, watch the show, it probably won't make any more sense, but it might.

The Teletubbies live in a Nazi-style bunker where everything is "lovely". Genetically modified rabbits are their only living companions. A voice from nowhere tells them what to do, or tells them what is about to happen to them. They show a small film from one of their bellies and then repeat the film - this was another Nazi trick - repetition being used to brain-wash.

All of this weird nonsense is watched over by a baby in the sun. All the Teletubbies are named after slang for genitalia:- Tinky Winky (obviously the male organ), La La (female), Po (bottom in German) and Dipsy (Russian slang for the male organ.

It's quite amazing - you should watch it.

I must first state that I agree that this show is a bit over hated. There are some redeeming qualities, such as the landscape, which I think is very pretty and charming. Those surroundings look a bit like a golf course but with the addition of cute fluffy bunnies. I also don't have any problem with their speech pattern, they're meant to resemble toddlers after all. The segments shown on the Teletubbies' stomachs are also very interesting. With that said, I myself don't particularly care for it although I do think that it gets a little too much hate. My main problem is that it is extremely repetitive. For example, after you see the videos on the Teletubbies's belly screens they play the same video again. In fact, pretty much everything is repeated ad nauseum. My other problem with Teletubbies is that in their grassy mound of a house (apparently called the "tubbytronic superdome" or something) they have a pet: a very creepy vacuum-type thing called Nunu. This thing communicates solely with uncanny sucking sounds, has bloodshot eyes, and appears out of nowhere. I found it very creepy when I first saw this as a kid and still find that thing creepy as an adult. To compare, Maleficiant scared me when I was little but I outgrew that, while Nunu gives me the creeps to this day. In conclusion, not as bad as they say but I would have preferred if everything wasn't replayed "again" and if it were just the Teletubbies without their scary pet.

This show, if anything, will slow down the development of a child. When the Teletubbies watch a little film clip in their stomach, thats fine... but then they do it "again!" Ask just about any child psychologist... repetition does nothing for a child except bore it. Children learn many times faster than adults, and they take in all that they are going to on one viewing, during the second one, they are just waiting for the show to get on with it. Maybe if you show it to them another day it might do some good, but not 5 seconds later. Also, this show is aimed at children that are still learning to talk, and the Teletubbies speak in a gibberish. Children are listening for words, trying to figure out what they mean and sound like so they can talk as well. Teletubbies will simply confuse them and slow down that learning process. The scenes are all dragged out too long and make the same point too many times. If you want your child to actually learn from what he sees, show him Sesame Street or something. Even letting the child sit in a room while you watch a soap opera is going to give them a better idea of the English language than this show.

Some of the reviewers here seem to expect something like Game of Thrones in a children's show, ie something that entertains adults. You have to realise that the audience of this show is infants and toddlers from 6 months to about 4 years. So even five year olds are going to prefer shows more targeted at them.

I feel sympathy for children whose parents expect everything to be educational. Teletubbies is not really supposed to be educational. It is entertainment for littlies, and in that regard it serves its purpose well. The British seem to be very good at shows for young children that are for entertainment purposes only, Americans don't seem to get it.