Your Thoughts: Lady Gaga and The Muppets Holiday Spectacular on ABC

[Quazimoto]

My thoughts: It was okay. I genuinely liked most of the Muppet portions. Genuinely loathed most of the Lady Gaga portions. And was mostly indifferent to the shared bits.

Highlights for me were...

- The ending sequence with the "outtakes". Classic Muppet outtake humor there and I loved it. Heck, I could watch a 90 minute special of just Muppet outtakes.

- "Baby It's Cold Outside". I actually really liked that song and thought Lady Gaga was at her best there. For the life of me, I will never understand why she chooses to disguise genuine talent for signing and songwriting behind awful, overproduced, pop-music trash and ridiculous outfits that scream "I didn't get enough attention when I was a child". Strip that crap away and you have a beautiful woman with honest to goodness talent for writing songs and a truly classic voice yanked right out of the jazz era. Kinda sad that she hides it so often.

- I may be in the minority, but I really dug the Electric Mayhem parts. Of course, I love running gags like that and thought the aloof cluelessness fit the group well. They don't think about holidays... they just wanna rock.

- Kristen Bell. Okay, maybe it's because I have a little crush on her, but I thought her "Muppet Groupie" shtick was great. Just hanging around backstage like a little girl lost in Disneyland.

- Bobo!!!

Overall, the show was just alright. Nothing that will last the test of time as a Muppet holiday or a Lady Gaga television special. I don't feel like I wasted an hour of my life (watched it online because I totally forgot to DVR it), but it's probably not something I'd ever watch again (okay - I'll watch the Muppet parts one more time, but fast forward through the rest).

 

[jvcarroll]

The more I think about this, the more I think this was a Lady Gaga special that they just incorporated the Muppets in last minute. For one thing, a 90 minute TV slot is pretty awkward and unusual... especially for a network time slot. That's probably why nothing meshed. It probably wasn't supposed to.

I don't buy the "The Muppets were off" crap. They have had much worse performances, and at least they managed to get some fan favorites in there. And the Leprechaun Brothers bits were good, if underused. I'd say something was slightly off with Gonzo, but he's been going down the Steve Martin route of becoming less and less wacky for years. But seriously? We're ragging on the Electric Mayhem's appearance? Yeah... remember when we got all excited that Dr. Teeth said "Shalom" even though band disappeared for the rest of MFS? We have the band back, they're talking, Lips is there... that's huge.

I prefer these shaded Gonzo performances to the usual schtick we get from Piggy. Her character has become flat. I think the Mayhem was wonderful and I loved that Scooter was included in this special. He was gone for so long that I cherish every new moment when he's on screen.

They really missed some opportunities here. Just a few:

• Rowlf playing the piano with Gaga.
• Gaga chatting with the Mayhem.
• A call-back to a classic Muppet holiday number.
• Dancing monsters and creatures in Gaga numbers. Where was Sweetums?
• More Muppet madcap behind the scenes moments.
• Holiday spirit. Only the Muppets seemed to bring that.

 

[D'Snowth]

I still don't understand what purpose Kristen Bell was supposed to serve for special, other than to just stand around a look pretty (which she did quite well I'll admit, but that's besides the point).

pantomime

That reminds me too... I don't even remember what the song was, but Gaga's second number was clearly lip-synced, where lyrics were still being sung, yet her mouth was either just hanging open, or completely shut.

But seriously? We're ragging on the Electric Mayhem's appearance? Yeah... remember when we got all excited that Dr. Teeth said "Shalom" even though band disappeared for the rest of MFS?

That was different: Dr. Teeth had kind of been somewhat retired (like Rowlf) because of Jim's death (likewise, Janice as well because of Richard's death). Forget it, EM was still around, they made speaking appearances in both MCC and MTI, just Dr. Teeth and Janice were silent. Yeah, we got excited about Dr. Teeth saying, "Shalom!", because that was the first time he ever uttered a word since Jim's death. Last night, on the other hand, aside from their first number with Gaga, EM basically did nothing in the special but just stand around and go, "Uhhh.... uh..... uhhhhh...". But I agree with you, and like I say, the bits with The Leprechaun Brothers were some of the only good parts of the special.

 

[jonnytbird]

Here's what I thought about the special:

This was a quote from my recent Fb account: "Who Does Lady Gaga think she is, John Denver?"

Now I'm not saying that this was the worst of the worst for the muppets, but less Gaga more holidays. I did enjoy seeing the forgotten muppets like Lips, Rizzo and Carl again. I also enjoyed Swedish Chef, Animal, and Beakers musical moments and the bloopers at the very end. But I knew his would be somewhat of a trainwreck when I first found out about Lady Gaga teaming up with the muppets. I didn't think it was right to have RuPaul on there and I'm not a fan of Lady Gaga whatsoever. However, I did enjoy her and Elton's duet of Bennie and the Jets or Gaga and the Jets.

In conclusion, I though it was mostly CRAP other than the positives that I've mentioned. And before I forget, I was surprised to see Swedish Chef's wedding ring.

 

[D'Snowth]

Off topic, but hey, Jonny, you stole my t-shirt, man!

J/k

 

[jonnytbird]

Off topic, but hey, Jonny, you stole my t-shirt, man!

J/k

Good catch, D'Snowth. I'm actually wearing that shirt right now cuz my family is meeting some friends who has some young children to see a Sesame Street live show.

 

[scooterfan360]

im so disapointed that i had to miss out on this because my news addicted grandfather had to do his nightly watching of the local news which starts at 11pm but get this it was only 10.44 pm and he threw one of his fits over the tv so i turn the channel to that the local news aired on and had to sit through lame detective shows but before that my lame sisters wanted to see vh1 and watch the movie about the group tlc which i know that vh1 is going to freaking play the heck out of it so no tv special for me tears

 

[jvcarroll]

Here's what I thought about the special:

This was a quote from my recent Fb account: "Who Does Lady Gaga think she is, John Denver?"

Now I'm not saying that this was the worst of the worst for the muppets, but less Gaga more holidays. I did enjoy seeing the forgotten muppets like Lips, Rizzo and Carl again. I also enjoyed Swedish Chef, Animal, and Beakers musical moments and the bloopers at the very end. But I knew his would be somewhat of a trainwreck when I first found out about Lady Gaga teaming up with the muppets. I didn't think it was right to have RuPaul on there and I'm not a fan of Lady Gaga whatsoever. However, I did enjoy her and Elton's duet of Bennie and the Jets or Gaga and the Jets.

In conclusion, I though it was mostly CRAP other than the positives that I've mentioned. And before I forget, I was surprised to see Swedish Chef's wedding ring.

Auds expect more from both Gaga and the Muppets, but it's quite the exaggeration to call this a tranwreck. It just wasn't very spectacular. It seemed like extended performance segments from talkshow appearances rather than a higher-tier special.

Also, why is it "not right" to have RuPaul on a Muppets special? She's a star who has been around for years and earned a place in entertainment. There are celebrities we'd all have rather seen in this special instead of others, but every artist had a right to be there. I thought her performance was fine. I only wish she'd interacted with the Muppets. That's one of the many lost opportunities of the show.

Could it be that certain segments of this special were pre-taped before Gaga decided to call the Muppets?

 

[FrackleFan2012]

That was a great special. I was glad by the surprise appearance of Big Mean Carl. They should've had the monsters from the final number in some earlier scenes.

 

[MuppetsRule]

Auds expect more from both Gaga and the Muppets, but it's quite the exaggeration to call this a tranwreck. It just wasn't very spectacular. It seemed like extended performance segments from talkshow appearances rather than a higher-tier special.

Also, why is it "not right" to have RuPaul on a Muppets special? She's a star who has been around for years and earned a place in entertainment. There are celebrities we'd all have rather seen in this special instead of others, but every artist had a right to be there. I thought her performance was fine. I only wish she'd interacted with the Muppets. That's one of the many lost opportunities of the show.

Could it be that certain segments of this special were pre-taped before Gaga decided to call the Muppets?

I think you're right on here. The whole show just seemed too disjointed and cobbled together. Nothing seemed to flow real smoothly or connected. And it also seemed very rushed, like they were trying to fit too much stuff in. The Stadler and Waldorf bits seemed off and very rushed without any sense of comic timing it seemed.