While parents have always said TV is only good for rotting your brains, they never said how much it impacts us. When I was younger, I was (and still am) obsessed with TV shows. I would channel surf if nothing interesting was on. I remember all the times I laughed my *ss off or cried my eyes out just because of a TV show. It is no surprise that I want to work on TV shows for production studios in the future. I am thankful for all the nights I had to watch TV alone because my parents were working. My love for TV is what got me into drawing. I tried to draw and plan out my own TV shows when I was younger. The plots and drawings weren’t the best, but hey I tried.
While I did watch a lot of TV shows, I am going to reminisce about the ones with the biggest impact.
When The Backyardagains came on, you couldn’t tear me away from the TV. I loved the singing and dancing in each episode. This show taught me how to always make an adventure in any situation and use my imagination. I didn’t have a big backyard, but that didn’t stop me. I would go outside and come up with these crazy adventures. A box on the ground outside was my boat and I would pretend to be a pirate exploring the seven seas.
Another important and iconic show was That’s So Raven. We all know this iconic Disney show about a girl who could see into the future. This show was important to me because I rarely saw shows with black female leads and it also had an amazing theme song that got stuck in my head. It was nice to finally see someone who looked like me and wasn’t a side character on Disney. I loved Raven’s crazy schemes to prevent bad things from happening and her funny facial expressions. It was refreshing to see a non-stereotyped black character who had great friends and amazing morals. I wished every day that I would wake up with psychic powers, but sadly it didn’t happen. She taught me to stand up for what you believe in and that it’s ok when life doesn’t go the way you want it to.
Lastly, I have to talk about my favorite show as a kid, The Powerpuff Girls.
Who says that girls can’t be tough? Powerpuff Girls showed that girls can be cute and fight crime at the same time. Seeing female superheroes made me feel like girls were amazing and just as good as the male superheroes. Buttercup was my favorite because she was so strong and cool. I was a huge tomboy when I was little, but my mom wanted me to be more girly. I thought there was something wrong with me because I prefer sports over jump rope or overalls instead of dresses. Seeing a character have the same interests as I was reassuring. I guess you could say I have more spice than everything nice.
Even though I couldn’t touch on every show that influenced me growing up, I am still grateful. If I talked about every single show, this list would be longer than a CVS receipt. Thanks to the amazing creators of these shows because you made my childhood enjoyable. Even in college, I reminisce about how good kids’ TV shows were back then compared to now. When I watch TV shows now I get excited thinking about how I will be working on one someday. People will be watching and talking about a show I worked on. I feel like that is a huge honor and I can’t wait to see my name appear in the credits one day.
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