• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, October 10, 2024

What’s missing from the new “Barney” series coming to Max next week? The answer: Actual children.

The show, titled “Barney’s World,” is directly descended from the original “Barney” show -- “Barney & Friends” -- which stuck around in one way or another on public TV from 1992 to 2010.

Who can forget Barney? He was the bouncy, always smiling, purple dinosaur star of “Barney and Friends” whose antics and repetitive songs charmed children and drove their parents crazy.

The original show was decidedly analog. Barney was cosplay all the way. He was a costumed character akin to team mascots such as the Phillie Phanatic and the San Diego Chicken who was “played” by two people -- one who wore the costume and another who supplied the voice.

But in the digital TV age, costumed characters such as Barney are apparently passé, except for those unlicensed costumed characters dressed as Elmo and Mickey Mouse pestering tourists in Times Square.

As a result, the new “Barney’s World” is an entirely digital creation, right down to the digital kid characters who receive life lessons from a bouncing, flouncing digital Barney.

Thus, one of the most conspicuous features of kids’ TV from decades past is now a thing of the past -- namely, the wrangling of real kids as studio audience members or program participants.

I suppose it was inevitable, just like so many other things. Time marcheth on, right?

With digital animation capabilities, the producers of “Barney’s World” are no doubt saving money. Heaven knows how much it used to cost to dry clean the old Barney costumes.

Today’s tiny tots are growing up in the digital age, so the joys of live-action kids’ shows are not something they will miss.

The new “Barney’s World” starts streaming Monday on Max, and will also be seen on Cartoon Network sometime after that.

Season One of the series consists of 52, 11-minute episodes. Warner Bros. Discovery provided a few of them for preview, so the TV Blog chose the one that was titled “I Lovey You” (Episode 2).

The title was puzzling. Unless I missed something, Barney never said “I lovey you” in the entire episode, which was about one little boy’s fear of darkness.

The boy had other fears too, but Barney allayed all of them. The lesson? Don’t be afraid! 

Other episodes provided for preview included “The Brave Truth” (Episode 6), in which one of the girls breaks another girl’s favorite toy but is afraid to tell her the truth. 

In Episode 17 -- “The Big Spill” -- one of the girls, Vivie, “is overcome with feelings of anger after a pigeon messes up her painting.” As a New York City resident, I can definitely relate to that.

In both shows, Barney comes to the rescue. In the broken-toy episode, Barney helps Vivie find the courage to tell the truth.

In the pigeon-mess episode, he helps her to learn “healthy ways to manage big feelings,” says WBD. 

Don’t be afraid, tell the truth, and adopt healthy ways to manage big feelings. 

Thank you, Barney. Those are valuable lessons for grown-ups as well as children.