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by Lore Sjöberg
Conjunction Junction
Sure it's got the most down-home funk of any children's television tune
since "The Easy Reader Theme Song." But "Conjunction Junction" goes deeper
than that. Haven't we all asked ourselves "What's my function?" Haven't
we all come to the conclusion that "and," "but," and "or" can get us
pretty far? Haven't we all cut loose the sandbags of our dreary, workaday
existence, only to find that the balloon of our spirit won't go any
higher? This song speaks to the humanity within us all, especially that
portion of our humanity which wears a little train conductor's outfit. A+
The Body Machine
This short seems to be an exercise in mixing metaphors with hedonistic
abandon. The body/machine conceit is abandoned almost immediately in
favor of a series of inexplicable similes involving an unrelated series of
professions. Your saliva acts as a bus driver? A tiny skin diver is
responsible for extracting nutrients? Cellulose is the digestive equivalent
of a traffic cop? We can only be grateful they declined to venture
below the small intestine. C+
No More Kings
Aside from the ocarinas in the backing track, the main appeal of
"No More Kings" is in the parade of impressionistically animated
characters: the identical Puritans, who seem to function as a sort
of hive-mind; the grotesque parody of a King -- who, by the way, must
be over 150 years old by the time he gets a bucket of tea-stained
seawater dumped over his noggin; the "Redcoats" who would be more
accurately called "Puce-bodies; and the oddly smug President Washington.
Speaking of whom, can anyone explain why he's getting his shoe adjusted
by a colonist in the third shot of him? B
Elementary, My Dear
One of the difficulties with Schoolhouse Rock overall is that at the
same time that they're educating about one thing, they're introducing
misinformation about another. For instance, in "Elementary, My Dear,"
at the same time that you're learning that 2 times 16 is 32, you're
also learning that lions drove little bumper cars in Genesis. Two
steps forward, one step back. B-
7.50 Once a Week
This space does not acknowledge the existence of so-called "Money Rock."
The Schoolhouse Canon is not to be trifled with. Not Applicable
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