Why I will mourn the erasure of The Not-Too-Late Show With Elmo: A Fone Bone Essay

Crazy couple of days, right?

I managed to purchase the first season of The Not-Too-Late Show With Elmo off Amazon Prime (before it's, well, too late) but the second season is not available. And the first season is the talk show and the second season is the game show. The talk show is better but I am really upset to lose the Game Show version.

Because of the kids.

There was one disabled kid on one of those game episodes. The games are all staged and rigged in favor of the kids but it gave me great joy to see a boy with no hands on his arm stumps being allowed to play on a game show and being made to feel like he is playing a videogame. This was probably the highlight of his young life, and possibly the highlight of his entire future life too. He was made to feel joyous and normal instead of people staring at him and feeling sorry for him.

And because of David Zaslov, the best moment of his life is not something he will ever be able to share with his children legally when he has then. One of the best and most rewarding experiences of his young life is something no future generations will be allowed to share with him. For a brief shining moment for around six months before the show was written off, this kid showed the world his lack of arms won't stop him from having fun and playing with Elmo.

Now? Nobody will ever know.

I weep for this kid at much as I weep for every single person whose hard work has been destroyed by David Zaslov's greed and maliciousness. I was never that crazy about The Game Edition because the games were clearly fixed, but having it disappeared down the memory hole stings for this reason.