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'Reading Rainbow' has finally found its new host—beloved librarian Mychal Threets

For those who haven't heard of this Internet-famous champion for "library joy," get excited.

Gstatic, Wikipedia

Now this is some positive news.

Undoubtedly, a major part of what made Reading Rainbow so special, what kept people coming back year after year for nearly two decades, was the show’s charismatic, inspiring host—LeVar Burton. Even after the series ended, Burton remains an advocate for literacy and libraries through his podcast LeVar Burton Reads, as well as hosting the 70th National Book Awards Ceremony & Benefit Dinner, and serving as the 2023 Honorary Chair of Banned Books Week in 2023 to highlight the importance of fighting censorship. The man is even an award-winning author himself.

All that to say, these would be some pretty big shoes to fill, should the show ever come back. Lo and behold, the series is returning, and the new host couldn’t be any more perfect.

Mychal Threets, a California-based librarian with an amazing afro, quirky threads, and a contagious smile, first began sharing TikTok stories about the everyday folks he met at the library where he worked during the pandemic. It was either that or dance videos, and “I’m no dancer,” Threets warned in a recent interview with TIME.

Below is a small sampling of Threets lovely personality:

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Threets went viral in 2023 after sharing his experience of talking to a child whose grandparent was worried about library fines. Since then, Threets has used his Internet fame to spread “library joy” throughout the land, ensuring that it’s a “place for everybody to exist,” not just a book warehouse. And, boy, is it a message that’s been resonating with people.

So when it was announced that a Reading Rainbow reboot would be happening on Kidzuko, a popular kids-focused YouTube channel hosted by none other than Threets himself, people were moved to say the least.

Pretty soon, across various social media platforms, heartfelt praise for Threets began rolling in.

“I laid in bed last evening and cried when I saw the news.”

“You are a testimony to living your most authentic life and how that pays off and finding your passion.”

“What a time to be alive! I can’t think of ANYONE better. “

“Genuinely cried seeing the announcement, I'm so incredibly excited and I hope that this can catch my daughter's interest and help her grow her love for books.”

“Can’t think of a better way to move the legacy forward."

“My eyes are tearing up. Mychal you’ve come so far and are doing incredible things! You are gonna be remembered alongside the likes of LeVar Burton, Mr. Rodgers, Steve Irwin, and Bob Ross. Once in a lifetime gem.”

Threets also went onto Facebook to share gratitude for his predecessor.

“I was raised on Reading Rainbow; LeVar Burton is my hero. I am a reader, I am a librarian because LeVar Burton and Reading Rainbow so powerfully made us believe we belong in books, we belong everywhere.”

As we all wait on baited breath to see what Burton has to say, let’s take this time to congratulate Threets on this amazing milestone. It’s sure to inspire not only a love of reading for a whole new generation, but also lift a lot of spirits, too.

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LeVar Burton gives cheeky 'Reading Rainbow' segment for banned books

The segment, shown on "Jimmy Kimmel Live," featured banned titles like "Charlottes Web" and "Harriet the Spy."

Super Festivals/Wikipedia, Wikipedia

You've never seen a "Reading Rainbow" episode quite like this

“Reading Rainbow” might have had its last episode in 2006, but LeVar Burton hasn’t stopped being a book advocate.

The actor and beloved host has spoken out against the unprecedented levels of books banned in schools throughout the country—acting as executive producer do the 2023 documentary “The Right to Read,” and has partnered with the nonprofit MoveOn.org to create a limited-edition T-shirt that reads “LeVar Burton Says Read Banned Books.”

And recently on “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” Burton brought attention to the subject by resurrecting the popular kids show. Only this is unlike any “Reading Rainbow” segment you’ve seen before.

In the clip (which features the well known “Reading Rainbow” song with a few tongue-in-cheek lyric tweaks) Barton shows a group of kids a selection of banned children’s books, and shares the questionable reasons why they’re banned, including:

“Harriet The Spy,” because it “encourages spying.”

“Charlotte's Web,” because “talking pigs is disrespectful to God”

“Stella Read Me A Story,” because the author’s last name is Gay.

According to AL.com, this last title removal was done in error, since the last name showed up in a keyword search, but only further shows how flawed the system is if this is the basis for which books are being tossed out of the children’s section.

Burton also asks the kids why they think adults might be banning these types of books.

“Because they don't want their kids to learn and be successful when they’re older,” one kids says.

Another adds, “They don't want their kids to be smarter than them.”

If they had it their way, these kids would rather ban “racism, anti-diversity,” and “Barbies, because when you cut their hair you get their DNA and it’s weird.”

Watch the full clip below, which also shows the group take a little field trip down to a school board meeting so they can see exactly how a book gets banned:

What makes this skit so impactful (other than hitting peak nostalgia) is that Burton is actual involving kids in the discussion, and allowing them to express their own ideas and opinions on the topic. Empowering younger generations to make their own informed decisions does far more for their future that strict censorship.

This is clearly something Burton believes, and the reason why so many of us love him.

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LeVar Burton shares thoughtful reaction to finding out he has a Confederate ancestor

“There’s some conflict roiling inside of me right now, but also oddly enough I feel a pathway opening up…"

LeVar Burton/X (via Finding Your Roots/PBS)

James Henry Dixon was a North Carolina farmer with a wife and children when he fathered Burton's great-grandmother.

The United States has long been seen as a "melting pot," a "nation of immigrants," and a country where people of diverse backgrounds mix and mingle together under the common banner of freedom and liberty.

It's a bit more complicated than that, though, especially for Black Americans whose ancestors came to the U.S. by force as part of the "peculiar institution" of human chattel slavery. Through the cruel system of buying, selling and breeding human beings for generations, many people's ancestral knowledge was stolen from them, a historical reality that prompted "Black" with a capital "B" as an ethnic and cultural identifier for people of the African diaspora.

Curiosity about the varied backgrounds of Americans is the basis of "Finding Your Roots," a PBS series hosted by Harvard professor Henry Gates, Jr. The show has revealed some surprises in some famous people's DNA, including the beloved "Reading Rainbow" host, LeVar Burton.

Burton sat down with Gates to go over what researchers had found out about his lineage, and what they discovered floored him. Burton said that his mom, who had raised him and his siblings as a single mother from the time he was 11, had never wanted to share anything about her own personal history, so he didn't know much about his ancestry.

As it turns out, the man who was on record as being Burton's great-great-grandfather, Louis Sills, was not actually his blood ancestor at all. The man who fathered Mary Sills, Burton's great-grandmother, was actually a white man named James Henry Dixon.

Burton knew Sills when he was a child and referred to her as "Granny." He had always been told that Granny had some Native American ancestry, but she was actually half white, her father being a North Carolina farmer who had a wife and children at the time Sills was born.

Not only that, but Dixon had served in the junior reserves for the Confederacy as a teenager, too young to be in active combat when the war broke out in 1861. So not only did Burton have a white direct ancestor but that ancestor was on the side of defending the enslavement of Black people.

"Are you kidding me?" was Burton's initial response to this news. "Oh my god. I did not see this coming."

Once the news sunk in, Burton thoughtfully reflected on what it might have meant.

“I often wonder about white men of the period and how they justify to themselves their relations with Black women, especially those in an unbalanced power dynamic," Burton said. "There has to be a powerful disconnect created emotionally and mentally. So it’s possible in my mind that he could’ve contemplated it and was conflicted at worst, maybe repentant at best. And then there’s the possibility that he didn’t think about it at all."

Through we don't know the nature of the sexual relationship between Sills and Dixon, sexual violence was a ubiquitous feature of enslavement in the U.S. and the power dynamic between white and Black people at that raises questions about whether any relations could be viewed as truly consensual. Previous episodes of "Finding Your Roots" has unveiled relationships that defy assumptions one way or the other, so that element of Burton's family history remains a mystery. However, Dixon fathered at least nine children and had at least 40 grandchildren, meaning Burton likely has white relatives scattered throughout the country.

When Gates asked Burton how this revelation of having a white Confederate great-great-grandfather made him feel, he said, "There's some conflict roiling inside of me right now, but it, it, it also, oddly enough, I feel, I, I feel a pathway opening up…I believe that as Americans, we need to have this conversation about who we are and how we got here. But yet I see that we're so polarized politically and racially. We're not talking to each other. And so I've been looking for an entry point to talk to white America."

"Well, that door just opened," said Gates.

"Here it is," responded Burton. "Here it is."

Some people didn't understand Burton's reaction, highlighting the complexity of racial identity and the history of race relations in the U.S. in particular due to the reality of race-based slavery. One of the things people love about "Finding Your Roots" is how it opens up entirely new perspectives in people's own life stories, which is a very personal thing.

As Burton wrote in response to a commenter on X, "It is one thing to know something on an intellectual level, another matter entirely to be introduced to an emotional truth that is both surprising and wholly unexpected."

Burton found out a lot more about his ancestry on both sides, including the fact that education and literacy—which Burton has dedicated much of his career to—can be traced back several generations through his father's side. His father left when he was 11 and he didn't know anything about his background, but he actually had educators in his family going back to at least 1880.

Though Burton said it was "overwhelming" to find all of this out about his lineage, he also said he was "ecstatic" to learn it.

"Never in a million years would I ever have imagined that you would find information like this for my family," Burton told Gates.

Watch Burton's entire ancestry being revealed on "Finding Your Roots," starting at the 12:00 mark and continuing again at 32:50:

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Man’s cheery ‘Hey good morning’ videos have given TikTok a breath of fresh air

People are calling him the next Levar Burton and insisting PBS give him his own full show.

PBS|TikTok and Levert The Bassman|TikTok

Man's TikTok videos creates calls for him to host 'Reading Rainbow'

Sometimes you see someone and know they've got a gift. It's not always something you can put your finger on, but you know there's something special about them and you want them to succeed. That's basically what happened to Levert The Bassman thousands, if not millions, of times on TikTok.

Levert, who starts every video with his signature cheery, "Hey good morning!" has been spending his time making education videos on the social media platform. Without fail, on nearly every single video, multiple commenters tag PBS and ask them to give him his own show. Something about his voice is calm and soothing, yet possesses an authority that makes people want to stop and listen.

He's made videos on a plethora of historical topics, and after multiple requests, he's even read children's books. People have been virtually pitching Levert to PBS to become the next "Reading Rainbow" host.

All you have to do is take a cruise through his comment section and you'll see people saying he's the next LeVar Burton. The internet has declared Levert a star even if PBS hasn't made him the host of "Reading Rainbow" or created an entirely new show just for him. But if you think his fans' pleas were for naught, you'd be wrong.

Social media is a powerful tool, and PBS reacted like any curious person or brand who got tagged a million times. They went to check him out. It didn't take long for the Public Broadcasting Station to see that the fans of Levert just might be on to something. PBS decided to partner with Levert and it all started with a box that contained a blanket and a postcard that read, "you, me & a documentary," back in February 2023.

@pbs

#stitch with @levertthebassman #greenscreen run to his page. We dare you to watch his videos and not smile, it’s impossible. #package #unboxing #pbs #blanket

The package seemed innocent enough, like a small token of acknowledgment, but PBS had something a little bigger in store. Nothing had really changed on Levert's page until months later when one of his videos popped up on the PBS TikTok page in a playlist they have labeled, "Learn with Levert."

Talk about people freaking out! So many commenters were so excited for Levert and the potential opportunities that could come for him. He's made multiple videos in his partnership with PBS, but that doesn't stop people from encouraging the station to give him his own show on television. Everyone still seems to be holding out for a "Reading Rainbow" reboot and who better to give it to them than Levert.

That catchy theme song could become future generations' childhood earworm and I, for one, don't think that would be a bad thing. Since the time frame between Levert getting the package and his audience finding out about his partnership with PBS was nearly six months long, it's highly unlikely a show announcement would happen so soon. All anyone can do is wait. Shows take time to come together, but there's no doubt that anything PBS might make with Levert as their host would be worth the wait.

@pbs

Lets take a little dive into the history of pregnancy, women, and prisons. Like for part two. @LevertTheBassman #PBSFilmFest #history #levertthebassman #prison #womeninprison

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