It can be hard to think of things to be grateful for when you are lost in the guts of parenting. For example, I am not especially grateful that my younger child refused to eat a single bite of the dinner it took me an hour to cook last night. Nor do I feel particularly blessed about the manner in which my elder woke me up at 5am this morning to sing the Lion King soundtrack, in full, at top volume, directly into my face.

But Netflix has thrown up a new series of Ask the StoryBots and I could weep with gratitude.

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So much kids’ TV is abjectly terrible. Take Ryan ToysReview on YouTube. It may be the worst thing I have ever seen. It has long since broken free of whatever its original premise was and now exists as a sprawling paean to overwhelming capitalism. There was a video last month in which the titular eight-year-old millionaire slept in bedding adorned with his own face, in a T-shirt adorned with his own face, clutching a plush toy version of himself. He woke up and brushed his teeth with a Ryan-branded toothbrush and Ryan-branded toothpaste, before changing into a different Ryan-branded T-shirt while his father poured cereal into a Ryan-branded bowl so that Ryan could eat it with a Ryan-branded spoon. Then Ryan packed his Ryan-branded lunchbox and his Ryan-branded exercise book into his Ryan-branded backpack and went to school. All these products are for sale. In the year to June 2018, the channel made £17.3m. Ryan ToyReview is what the end of the world looks like.

So, when you come across something that has been made with care – something that has a higher purpose than dumbly shifting products – it deserves to be met with enormous praise. Ask the StoryBots is exactly that show. It is nothing less than Sesame Street reincarnated. I couldn’t love it more if I tried.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest ‘It’s nothing less than Sesame Street reincarnated’ ... Ask the StoryBots. Photograph: NETFLIX

Ostensibly, as the theme tune explains at length, the StoryBots are little robots that live inside your computer and seek out information. They are led by a screaming, perpetually stressed figure akin toJ Jonah Jameson, the pompous publisher of the Daily Bugle in the Spider-Man comics. He sends teams of StoryBots into the outside world to answer questions posed by vaguely hipster children. We follow Answer Team 341B – comprising Beep, Boop, Bing, Bang and Bo – on various fact-finding missions. Questions in the newest series, which landed on Netflix on Friday, include “Why do people look different?” and “What happens when you flush the toilet?” Previous episodes have included “Why is the sky blue?” and “Why can’t I eat dessert all the time?”

The StoryBots slowly piece together their answers with the help of animated characters and celebrities (including Jay Leno, Reggie Watts and Edward Norton, in what genuinely may be the best performance of his career), before reporting back. It isn’t an original premise, but the level of effort that goes into the execution is staggering.

The Sesame Street comparison comes because Ask the StoryBots has a restless underlying creativity. The animation styles change constantly. Inside the computer, the StoryBots are flat and two-dimensional. Out in the world, they take on a faux-claymation air, complete with visible fingerprints from their apparent animators. Then there are the songs, each offering a new look. There are raps about colours with stop-motion StoryBots. There are quieter ukulele songs about emotions with watercolour StoryBots. There are velociraptor Beastie Boys. There are dancing elephants. There is a song about lorries so catchy that it will destroy your entire life.

It is a dizzying collage of a show, swapping tactics often enough to demand your child’s full attention. It isn’t quite as toothless as Sesame Street and can drift into scary territory – I think the episode with the giant talking eardrum caused a couple of sleepless night in our house – but the quality control can’t be faulted. In terms of animation, humour and songwriting, Ask the StoryBots operates on a much higher level than it needs to. But in a world where competition comes in the form of endless dismal YouTube advertorials, my God I am grateful for it.