Jambi the Genie is one of those things that we forget about nowadays. But Jambi, as well as Globey, Conky, Pterri, Mr. Window, Floory, Countess, as well as Pee-wee Herman himself are a part of many of our childhoods, especially if you watched Saturday morning cartoons in the 1980s. Although this gang of crazy characters left the air rather abruptly in 1991 due to certain actions made by the leading character unrelated to the show that we won’t discuss here, we’ve seen them since then in repeats, most notably on Fox Family. Still, it goes to show that television is not the same anymore. You don’t have shows like this where the show was originally intended for adults as a stage act, but made up for children on the television screen. It was such a shock to see Miss Yvonne, Mrs. Steve (still an incredibly funny name for a woman, if you ask me), Cowboy Curtis, and Captain Carl (as well as Pee-wee, of course) on stage and doing such things as wearing shoe mirrors to look up Miss Yvonne’s dress. It was something else, needless to say. Still, this was a unique bit of television genius all lumped together into one show. Still, you have to wonder a few things… where was Pee-wee going on his scooter at the end of every show? Where was he coming from at the beginning of the show? Whatever happened to Dixie and Mrs. Steve? What exactly was Puppetland? Was it just the area inhabited by Dirty Dog, Cool Cat, and Chickie Baby, or was it the entire general area that the playhouse was in? Questions, questions, questions… and ones that will never have an answer since the show is no longer in production. Digging up a tape of old episodes of Pee-wee’s Playhouse makes you think of these things.
