diff --git a/src/core/Iterator.pm b/src/core/Iterator.pm
index b4c4d7797ef..6545dd61dca 100644
--- a/src/core/Iterator.pm
+++ b/src/core/Iterator.pm
@@ -1,6 +1,15 @@
 augment class Iterator {
-    multi method perl() {
-        $.eager.perl;
+    multi method perl(:$limit = 40) {
+        # Doing this right is probably beyond mortal dwimmery,
+        # and even in simple cases it needs the ability to
+        # serialize code to have any hope of producing
+        # output like (1, 1, * + * ... *)
+        # rather than (1, 1, 2, 3, 5, {???} ... ???).
+        # Try to do something useful for debugging, for now.
+        my @a = self.batch($limit);
+        my $and_more = '';
+        $and_more = ', {???} ... ???' if @a == $limit;
+        '(' ~ @a.map({ $^a.perl }).join(', ') ~ $and_more ~ ')';
     }
 
     multi method elems() {
diff --git a/src/core/Seq.pm b/src/core/Seq.pm
index a7b95c2a456..b3459ffa0be 100644
--- a/src/core/Seq.pm
+++ b/src/core/Seq.pm
@@ -88,6 +88,10 @@ augment class Seq {
     multi method fmt($format = '%s', $seperator = ' ') {
         self.map({ .fmt($format)}).join($seperator);
     }
+
+    method perl() {
+        '(' ~ self.map({ $^a.perl }).join(', ') ~ ')';
+    }
 }
 
 multi sub sort (@x, :&by = &infix:<cmp>) { @x.sort(&by) }