The Snoopy Show

If you’re looking for something calm for what ails you, this is great. What the creators evince is a remarkable sweet element of innocence, fun, and whimsy, that’s so worth watching. “The Snoopy Show” is pure joy distilled into 22 minutes.

It’s something parents will enjoy sharing with their kids while also being reminded of their own more innocent times, spent in front of living-room televisions staring at animated Snoopys from their past. It’s a new Peanuts security blanket, wrapped in a comforting and familiar Peanuts security blanket. It’s a reminder that happiness was, and still is, a warm puppy.

It’s a pleasant, funny, weightless affair that manages to evoke the feeling of Charles Schulz’ seminal comic strip, but not its meaning. But hey, Snoopy is fun.

While The Snoopy Show isn’t the Peanuts comeback some diehard fans might want, it’s still fun to watch Snoopy, Woodstock and the gang hang out together, even if the episodes are more kid oriented than usual.

The Snoopy Show is well-paced and nicely designed to appeal to five-year-olds, teaching them about friendship and yada yada. For me, though, watching it is bittersweet in the way that watching Sesame Street, as I wrote on that show’s 50th anniversary, is bittersweet. Much as I never got the appeal of Elmo, I never saw “Peanuts” as primarily about the big-snouted dog but rather, the big-headed little boy of my youth.