This is a list of every wrong or absurd detail in the final Late Show with Stephen Colbert Christmas cartoon.
The cartoon featured a host of family-oriented characters and was intended as a satire of Trump and the defunding of PBS. It included a variety of technically inaccurate details.
1. PBS lost the rights to Caillou, which was acquired Canadian programming. They didn’t cancel it or make fewer episode orders. They let themselves lose the American rights because of themselves being less interested in the program, and the reality that literally no one liked Caillou after a certain age (he had quite the reputation as a bald little brat), but there were people of all ages watching and enjoying Arthur (who was not written as a brat). In addition, parents wrote strongly worded letters to PBS because of Caillou.
Finally, Cartoonito is the U.S. distributor of Caillou now. There is also a Caillou reboot by WildBrain (formerly DHX Media) that you can easily find on YouTube.
2. PBS was defunded, but not hidden like a legally forbidden sort of media. You can watch almost any PBS show on YouTube or the local PBS affiliate. As NewsBusters reports, PBS wasn't banned altogether, and defunding media is not hiding it.
PBS deserved to be defunded because taxpayers were stuck paying for it but not using it, due to purposeful historical anachronisms in Victoria (Masterpiece Theater), teaching evolution as fact, and the Ratburn episode from 2019. In Victoria, for instance, they included a same-sex relationship, even though the show took place in the wrong historical period for that.
3. Sesame Street is with Netflix now. They have moved beyond being a PBS-exclusive show. You can watch it on PBS, but some episodes are Netflix-exclusive. Additionally, there is a Cartoonito spin-off called Sesame Street: Mecha Builders.
4. Mr. Ratburn isn't in this episode. Tinky Winky is, though.
Around 1999 to the early 2000s, because of Jerry Falwell, some people thought Tinky Winky (the purple Teletubby) was a precursor to Ratburn since he was on PBS and carried a "magic bag" that was mistaken for a woman's handbag.
However, a public relations agent for Itsy Bitsy Entertainment, the company that made Teletubbies, did confirm that Tinky Winky was not actually gay and was simply a child-like character who brought a bag of fun toys with him.
Incidentally, PBS also lost the U.S. distribution rights to Teletubbies in 2008. The show, an imported British program, saw its contract expire.
Also, when PBS was defunded, more parents and congressmen were responding to notorious Sesame Street and Arthur episodes than to Teletubbies. Teletubbies was not being discussed and largely disappeared from the news media’s attention around 2008.
The stated technicalities suggest that the Tinky Winky incident likely had very little to do with PBS being defunded.
5. Arthur is a ripped bodybuilder and Caillou's tattoo artist. Ironically, Arthur is eight years old, while Caillou is four.
6. It’s rude to shout, "Loo, loo, loo, loser!" during The First Noel, especially at a sitting president. As they refuse to acknowledge, Donald Trump is getting a LOT done.
7. Conservative icon Franklin the Turtle is in it. They meant to reclaim Franklin as a liberal symbol.
8. Bumble the Abominable Snowman is probably not "nice" for switching sides against ICE. He also seems dumb for joining ICE simply because he saw a commercial for them while watching football.
