Here's a must read for fans of the hilariously surreal Nickelodeon TV series from the mid-90s, The Adventures of Pete & Pete. Author Mathew Klickstein offers an incredibly thorough history of the show, how it was made, the people and underground stars involved, and why shows like this may probably never be made again. Here's a snippet in which creator Will McRobb describes how his NYC bohemian background and love of post-punk was a direct influence on the show, and what he and his co-creators were trying to accomplish.

“We really believed in Nickelodeon, and at the time it was designed to be the ‘anti-Disney,’” McRobb said. “Disney was about a certain way of looking at childhood and Nickelodeon was about trying to capture what was a little more real about being a kid. And so we felt fiercely proud of that identity, especially in the promo department. That analogy of a ‘collective,’ of independently-minded creative people banding together to do something that was subversive — that’s where, for me, it was the most powerful."

Read the rest here (because it's great), and refresh your memory with the Pete & Pete theme performed by Polaris.