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Okay, so since it is still Blue’s Clues 25th Anniversary, I figured it’s still a good time to finally give my actual thoughts on it’s new revival series, Blue’s Clues & You! Now Blue’s Clues is one of the big dogs in terms of favorite TV shows of mine, alongside Thomas, Sesame and VeggieTales, so when this series was announced, I was interested to see where it was going to go. It looked like it was gonna be better than VeggieTales in the House was. So after watching a few episodes, I’m gonna fully elaborate on the grades I gave in the picture and explain what I think is good and what I think needs improvement. So let’s get into it.

Animation: The animation is the show's biggest strong point, aside from the characters. It’s the same concept from the original, but this time combining live action (the humans), 3D animation (the dogs), and regular 2D animation (the backgrounds and everyone else), and they all mesh surprisingly well. The animation also succeeds in recreating the original sets, keeping the original designs the same, but also adding in new details to give a newer look to them. Though, I do rather prefer the nostalgic, simple, Terry Gilliam cut-out style much more. As it stands, the animation is definitely great, and this is coming from someone who doesn’t pay that much attention to animation.

Writing: Now we come to the writing, and it’s here where my issues with BC&Y start to show. Part of what made the original Blue’s Clues so great was that it’s format and structure were like Phineas and Ferb, where you knew what was gonna happen in every episode, but it’s how it happens where things get shaken up and keep you invested. The possibilities are practically endless, and there are definitely way more plots that could’ve been created than the ones we got in all six original seasons. But it seems that this show REALLY leaned on its predecessor here, because no joke, the entirety of season 1 is just remakes of old episodes from the original series. They’re nice remakes, but they’re still remakes with little to no changes to the actual story. If just one or two episodes were remakes, I'd probably just turn a blind eye, but no, every season 1 episode of BC&Y is a remake. If people really wanted to see these plots, they could just easily watch the original Blue’s Clues. It would be so much better to see this show tackle things they’ve never done before, like planning to go see a movie in a movie theater, or spending the day learning about trains, or going camping, etc. instead of just rehashing the same plots about snack times, pajama parties and Blue’s birthdays.

Thankfully, this issue does fix itself for the most part, starting with season 2, where there are original plots, as well as more different takes on original episodes. One of which was even a special birthday party for the viewer. While the writing did suffer from a lack of originality in the beginning, things do get better as the series goes on.

Characters: You’ll be happy to know that most of the characters haven’t changed that much in the revival. Traci Johnson reprised her role as Blue, which she still nails, and the rest of the house crew are present also, with their own voices, as well. The great thing about these characters is that their voices aren’t too recognizable, so if they have to change voice actors, the voice change won’t be too noticeable. As for Josh, the new host, he’s actually pretty good. He’s got the necessary energy, he’s great at singing and he does a good job at making the viewer feel welcome. Like with Joe, it’s not that Josh is bad, it’s that Steve set the bar so high that no one else will ever reach it.

Speaking of Steve and Joe, they actually do appear in this series as recurring characters. I love how they remember to tie Josh to them by saying that he’s their cousin. I also like that the two of them now have jobs in their community. Joe works at the present store, and Steve runs his own detective agency. It seems that they’ve grown up a little, but they're not the only ones. Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper’s first two children, Paprika and Cinnamon have grown as well. With Paprika being a teenager, and Cinnamon being a full grown kid. Adding to that is the birth of two new additions to the spice family, Ginger and Sage, twins that were born in episode 3.

But this is kind of a double-edged sword, cause while this series builds upon things in the original, it retcons certain things as well, like Magenta getting her glasses, and Periwinkle moving into the neighborhood. And I know kids aren’t really gonna care about continuity issues, it still kinda bugs me that they’ll have stuff like certain characters getting older, but still acting like certain things never happened before. They’re having their cake and eating it too, essentially, and these types of situations always seem to rub me the wrong way, but I digress.

For the most part, the characters are just like we remember them, which will definitely entice older fans to check this series out.

Music/Intro: The music is another pretty good aspect of the show. Though, I still prefer the original for the amount of variety it had. Even though most of it was set to the same beat, every piece made for the original Blue’s Clues, specifically in the first 5 seasons, managed to stand out from each other in some way. Especially during the credits. They could range from silly and quirky, to synthy and techno, from country to Italian, to grandiose and loud, from scat to blues, to even no music at all, just sound.

In BC&Y, the new theme song is actually pretty catchy. Helps that Josh is a Broadway singer and has the necessary experience. But it also seems to be the basis for many of the other ditty remakes in this show, including the credits, and that can be a bit of a drag to listen to. But on the plus side, the original songs are pretty nice, too.

Enjoyment: While the original Blue’s Clues will always be the best in my eyes, Blue’s Clues and You is a pretty faithful recreation of it. While it does recycle lots of old plots, it doesn’t change the formula, and instead gives a new fresh twist on it, which is what all re-imaginings of shows should strive to do. The characters haven’t changed too drastically, even with the retcons, and it still feels like there’s effort being put into making this a fun, educational show for kids to watch and enjoy, while also being something for old-school fans to feel nostalgic over. I’d definitely recommend you check an episode or two out. Mainly one from the second or third season.

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Description
Okay, so since it is still Blue’s Clues 25th Anniversary, I figured it’s still a good time to finally give my actual thoughts on it’s new revival series, Blue’s Clues & You! Now Blue’s Clues is one of the big dogs in terms of favorite TV shows of mine, alongside Thomas, Sesame and VeggieTales, so when this series was announced, I was interested to see where it was going to go. It looked like it was gonna be better than VeggieTales in the House was. So after watching a few episodes, I’m gonna fully elaborate on the grades I gave in the picture and explain what I think is good and what I think needs improvement. So let’s get into it.

Animation: The animation is the show's biggest strong point, aside from the characters. It’s the same concept from the original, but this time combining live action (the humans), 3D animation (the dogs), and regular 2D animation (the backgrounds and everyone else), and they all mesh surprisingly well. The animation also succeeds in recreating the original sets, keeping the original designs the same, but also adding in new details to give a newer look to them. Though, I do rather prefer the nostalgic, simple, Terry Gilliam cut-out style much more. As it stands, the animation is definitely great, and this is coming from someone who doesn’t pay that much attention to animation.

Writing: Now we come to the writing, and it’s here where my issues with BC&Y start to show. Part of what made the original Blue’s Clues so great was that it’s format and structure were like Phineas and Ferb, where you knew what was gonna happen in every episode, but it’s how it happens where things get shaken up and keep you invested. The possibilities are practically endless, and there are definitely way more plots that could’ve been created than the ones we got in all six original seasons. But it seems that this show REALLY leaned on its predecessor here, because no joke, the entirety of season 1 is just remakes of old episodes from the original series. They’re nice remakes, but they’re still remakes with little to no changes to the actual story. If just one or two episodes were remakes, I'd probably just turn a blind eye, but no, every season 1 episode of BC&Y is a remake. If people really wanted to see these plots, they could just easily watch the original Blue’s Clues. It would be so much better to see this show tackle things they’ve never done before, like planning to go see a movie in a movie theater, or spending the day learning about trains, or going camping, etc. instead of just rehashing the same plots about snack times, pajama parties and Blue’s birthdays.

Thankfully, this issue does fix itself for the most part, starting with season 2, where there are original plots, as well as more different takes on original episodes. One of which was even a special birthday party for the viewer. While the writing did suffer from a lack of originality in the beginning, things do get better as the series goes on.

Characters: You’ll be happy to know that most of the characters haven’t changed that much in the revival. Traci Johnson reprised her role as Blue, which she still nails, and the rest of the house crew are present also, with their own voices, as well. The great thing about these characters is that their voices aren’t too recognizable, so if they have to change voice actors, the voice change won’t be too noticeable. As for Josh, the new host, he’s actually pretty good. He’s got the necessary energy, he’s great at singing and he does a good job at making the viewer feel welcome. Like with Joe, it’s not that Josh is bad, it’s that Steve set the bar so high that no one else will ever reach it.

Speaking of Steve and Joe, they actually do appear in this series as recurring characters. I love how they remember to tie Josh to them by saying that he’s their cousin. I also like that the two of them now have jobs in their community. Joe works at the present store, and Steve runs his own detective agency. It seems that they’ve grown up a little, but they're not the only ones. Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper’s first two children, Paprika and Cinnamon have grown as well. With Paprika being a teenager, and Cinnamon being a full grown kid. Adding to that is the birth of two new additions to the spice family, Ginger and Sage, twins that were born in episode 3.

But this is kind of a double-edged sword, cause while this series builds upon things in the original, it retcons certain things as well, like Magenta getting her glasses, and Periwinkle moving into the neighborhood. And I know kids aren’t really gonna care about continuity issues, it still kinda bugs me that they’ll have stuff like certain characters getting older, but still acting like certain things never happened before. They’re having their cake and eating it too, essentially, and these types of situations always seem to rub me the wrong way, but I digress.

For the most part, the characters are just like we remember them, which will definitely entice older fans to check this series out.

Music/Intro: The music is another pretty good aspect of the show. Though, I still prefer the original for the amount of variety it had. Even though most of it was set to the same beat, every piece made for the original Blue’s Clues, specifically in the first 5 seasons, managed to stand out from each other in some way. Especially during the credits. They could range from silly and quirky, to synthy and techno, from country to Italian, to grandiose and loud, from scat to blues, to even no music at all, just sound.

In BC&Y, the new theme song is actually pretty catchy. Helps that Josh is a Broadway singer and has the necessary experience. But it also seems to be the basis for many of the other ditty remakes in this show, including the credits, and that can be a bit of a drag to listen to. But on the plus side, the original songs are pretty nice, too.

Enjoyment: While the original Blue’s Clues will always be the best in my eyes, Blue’s Clues and You is a pretty faithful recreation of it. While it does recycle lots of old plots, it doesn’t change the formula, and instead gives a new fresh twist on it, which is what all re-imaginings of shows should strive to do. The characters haven’t changed too drastically, even with the retcons, and it still feels like there’s effort being put into making this a fun, educational show for kids to watch and enjoy, while also being something for old-school fans to feel nostalgic over. I’d definitely recommend you check an episode or two out. Mainly one from the second or third season.

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