Considering how long Sesame Street has been on the air, you’d think the show would have long ago made more of a point to capitalize on spinoffs and specials. But we’re now in the midst of the first season for the offshoot The Furchester Hotel, which features Cookie Monster and Elmo, and Cookie Monster is now getting his very first one-hour special next month, titled The Cookie Thief.
Boasting a guest-starring role for Saturday Night Live vet Rachel Dratch, The Cookie Thief will take place not long after the Sesame Street population experiences the opening of its first cookie art museum. (Note to self: email city council about getting one of these.) When exquisite paintings like Muncha Lisa and Girl with the Cookie Earring go missing, it doesn’t take much for Cookie Monster targeted as the prime suspect. So it’s up to him to prove his innocence, lest he be forbidden to ever enter the museum again! Take a look at the first image released by PBS.
Because this is Sesame Street, there will also be a Cookie Thief-themed game that will debut on PBS’ website in February. As well, The Cookie Thief will be available to stream on the website, along with all of the PBS Kids apps, the same day it airs live. The Cookie Monster’s Challenge app also plays into the 45th anniversary’s focus on self-regulation and executive function skills. If I was that museum owner (or whatever), I’d just pack up and self-regulate my hindquarters elsewhere if I experienced robberies that quickly. There are better places to show off art, even cookie art, than Sesame Street.
Just so it’s out there, I apologize to everyone who thought, as I did, that this would be a fuller-length adaptation of The Great Cookie Thief. Woe are we.
Sesame Street has remained as relevant in pop culture as ever in recent years, with its educational parodies and uneducational late night talk show appearances. Here’s hoping the success of this special will lead to more down the road, and basically I’m trying to get Benedict Cumberbatch and Sherlock Hemlock for True Detective Season 3.
The Cookie Thief will premiere on PBS on Monday, February 16.
