The Best of Sesame Street Spoofs Volume 1 & Volume 2 is a collection of the spoofs that appear on Sesame Street from time to time. Sesame Street has always made an effort to encourage parents to get involved with their children, and the pop-culture references do just this. Looking back at the long list of parodies included in this DVD set, you can see that some do a better job than others in engaging an adult viewer. Most of the skits involve simply taking the name of the show they're referencing, and turning it into a "What starts with this letter?" game. But some really make some clever references, and I can see how these could start a conversation with a child.

Honestly, many of these spoofs are even a little before my time. Or to put it another way, I was the clueless kid watching these when I grew up, not knowing why Cookie Monster was singing about "Hey Food" with a band called "The Beetles." Perhaps the funniest part of all this is when I realized I was more familiar with "Monsterpiece Theater" than its inspiration, "Masterpiece Theater." I still crack up when the theme song plays, and the camera pans over old pictures (of muppets), and the sound of Cookie Monster scarfing down cookies occasionally comes in and crashes the whole snooty atmosphere.

Here's a bit of a feel for the range of the spoofs in this set. Star Trek: The Next Generation becomes "Starship Surprise." It's not one of the best: there's really only a (purple) Captain Picard muppet, a Doctor Crusher, and a Worf. They find a planet where everything starts with the letter H. This is one of the more disappointing spoofs that seems to borrow only the likeness of the characters and nothing else. Then there's "Law and Order: Special Letters Unit." They search for a letter "M" at large. At least it makes humorous use of that "DUN DUN" sound that nearly everyone knows from the real show. One of the best might be the "True Mud" spoof. Something like True Blood seems untouchable, but the clever Sesame Street folks turn it into a rhyming game about mud. This is also one of the best parodies, which actually imitates the opening song and credits style, and includes a parody of Sookie and Bill's characters (the muppet Sookie shows a bit of sympathy for the stranger with a taste for mud).

Some entertaining bits for adults are the ones where real actors interact with the Sesame Street cast. Anderson Cooper makes an appearance on GNN (Grouch News Network) to discuss the letter "G." Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs visits the Grouch to see if he can do Grouch's dirty job of sorting trash. Speaking of something for adults, "The O Show" has the strongest parody feel. The show is hosted by the letter "O" and cleverly parodies the infamous Tom Cruise couch-jumping episode as well as the easily parodied Oprah enthusiasm and giveaways ("You get an Oboe! You get an Oboe!")

Overall, there's so much content here, you're bound to find that one spoof you love. Of course, if you're looking for real entertainment for an older crowd, you have to remember that this is still a kid's show. Everything is very PG, and designed to teach a lesson about counting, the alphabet, and word concepts. Still, if you're looking for something to bridge the gap with a child, this collection isn't a bad start.