'This is the second coming we all deserve': Sesame Street goes global at long last

An entire generation of British adults was raised by Sesame Street. They're easy enough to spot; they're kind, they still have that Pointer Sisters pinball counting song in their heads, and they pronounce the final letter of the alphabet "zee".

- Stuart Heritage

But this generation is getting older. The last time Sesame Street was regularly broadcast in the UK was 2001 - but now it's back. Sesame Street rolls out on Netflix for the first time today.

This is undoubtedly a good thing. More than almost any other children's show, Sesame Street seemed to crack the code on how to simultaneously educate and entertain children. Lessons about early phonics and mathematics have always been folded into madcap, brightly coloured sketches, such as the warring two-headed monster that teaches you to share, or the monomaniacal numerical egotism of the Count (official name: Count von Count).

This was always shot through with a sunny humanist outlook on life that delivered messages on everything from patience and cooperation to how to cope with death. If you watched Sesame Street as a child, it was a fundamental building block of who you'd grow up to become.