Dead Bird Episode YKTTW Discussion

An episode of a kid's show that teaches about Death

Description Needs Help

(permanent link) added: 2012-06-29 23:22:19 sponsor: HugoLuman edited by: CalamityJane (last reply: 2012-07-24 13:29:39)

A kind of Very Special Episode. When an educational/young kids' show has an episode about dealing with Death. Seems to commonly feature the child protagonist finding a dead bird and then asking his/her parents about it, but that is not necessary to qualify as an example. Dead birds are just often used because they are fairly common in real life and thus easily found by children.

Live Action TV

One of the most famous examples of an episode like this would be on Sesame Street when Mr Hooper died, and Big Bird has some trouble understanding why he can't come back after he's dead.
The Dick Van Dyke Show: Rob takes home two ducklings which were used as props in a sketch and gives them to Richie. They grow to adulthood but are sickly because they aren't built for living in suburbia. One dies, and Rob convinces Richie to let the other go into the wild. Nothing is mentioned of the fact that the duck is untrained in wild life and will soon be dead.
The Andy Griffith Show: Opie shoots a bird with a slingshot. Andy is upset with him, and he has to raise the nestlings the bird was caring for. Opie learns An Aesop.

Newspaper Comics

Calvin And Hobbes had two of these. One of them, and the one that went fully into sad mode, involved a dying raccoon that Calvin tries (and fails) to save; and the other was a Sunday strip that literally involved a dead bird.
For Better Or For Worse dealt with the death of the family dog.

Western Animation

In Caillou, an episode is dedicated to dealing with the death of a bird.
The Simpsons: Bart shoots a bird with a BB gun. Marge is upset with him, and he has to raise the eggs the bird had in her nest. Bart learns An Aesop. Except it turns out the bird's eggs were replaced by a parisitic Bolivian Tree Lizard's, which overrun the town and kills many birds. Except the BTLs kill the town's pigeons, which everybody is happy about.
The Arthur episode "Good-Bye, Spanky" involved D.W. coping with the death of her pet parakeet Spanky. Fortunately, she gets a replacement pet in the form of a toad named Toadie.

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