Whimzie's House? A Closely Muppet related show?

[dinoboy]

In the late 1990's, there was a puppet based show called Whimzie's house. Although it was targeted for pre-schoolers, I got a kick out of watching it anyway. I thought that this show was created by Jim Henson, since the characters(dragon-like with fins on the side of their heads that wiggled)looked liked the Muppets, from the material that was used to make them. It used to air on Ch13 or Ch21 for a few years, the series was produced by Cinar. One year, the show was suddenly taken off the air and I didn't know why. I then read in an article somewhere that the people at Henson studios claimed that the puppet characaters from the show closely resembled the works of Henson's muppets.
Cinar was told to remove the show from the air, however they were given permission to place some of the episodes on DVD and I did manage to get one. Amazing how I got mixed and confused thinking that the show was produced by Henson.

 

[D'Snowth]

Aw man, I LOVED Wimzie's House! I used to watch it everyday! I really miss it, it was a nice, charming little pre-schooler show... I actually have a really big binder full of press releases, and things like that for the show from the PBS station I used to intern at.

I agree, I kind of thought that it was a Henson show as well, but that was before I learned that those kind of puppets are pretty much how puppets made for television look.

 

[Drtooth]

Hate it. hate it so much. I will say the puppets looked good, but the puppetry, voice acting (you can tell it was a prerecorded track throughout), and rotten song writing would have been suited for 1990's The Learning Channel or even local programming. Public access even.

I know that at one point Henson had an unsuccessful law suit against the show. And I wouldn't blame them. You two clearly thought it was a Henson program, and we wouldn't want anyone to think that horrible quality is lumped into Henson's much better catellogue. Not everything they did was gold, but this was just a terrible, routine, junky little show. Still, I like it better than Barney and Teletubbies.

Now Puzzle Place... THAT was a quality production.

 

[D'Snowth]

Hate it. hate it so much. I will say the puppets looked good, but the puppetry, voice acting (you can tell it was a prerecorded track throughout), and rotten song writing would have been suited for 1990's The Learning Channel or even local programming. Public access even.

I know that at one point Henson had an unsuccessful law suit against the show. And I wouldn't blame them. You two clearly thought it was a Henson program, and we wouldn't want anyone to think that horrible quality is lumped into Henson's much better catellogue. Not everything they did was gold, but this was just a terrible, routine, junky little show. Still, I like it better than Barney and Teletubbies.

Now Puzzle Place... THAT was a quality production.

What, and they didn't file a lawsuit against Between the Lions? Now THAT right there looks like a Henson rip-off!

 

[frogboy4]

Jim Henson Productions apparently sued and won over the resemblence of the Whimsy's House character design to that of the Muppets. Michael K. Frith designed many of the Muppet characters and did (and was allowed to do) so for Between the Lions since part of this Muppety style is also his. Hope that clears things up.

There's some great information and sketches by Frith on the Muppet Wiki.

 

[tutter_fan]

Man, I loved that one muppet who liked dirt! He was funny!

 

[D'Snowth]

Man, I loved that one muppet who liked dirt! He was funny!

That would be Jonas.

Man, I sure do miss that show... could thing I taped a lot of episodes... I'm tempted to upload some episodes on YouTube, but then my account would be deleted due to "copyright" infringement.

 

[Drtooth]

Jim Henson Productions apparently sued and won over the resemblence of the Whimsy's House character design to that of the Muppets. Michael K. Frith designed many of the Muppet characters and did (and was allowed to do) so for Between the Lions since part of this Muppety style is also his. Hope that clears things up.

Indeed, with Between the Lions, there were many people that worked with Jim involved in the production. Some of the Puppeteers work or have wotrked on Sesame Street, and Chris Cerf was in charge of Music. The tag line at the end for Serious Productions says "For Jim, Joe, and John"- Jim Henson, Joe Raposo, and John Stone. There's one more but I can't remember. I'm gussing Norm for Norman Styles.

Whimsy is a cheap little production. poor puppetry, cheap voice acting (that didn't do the puppetry), lazy song writing. I will say this, the same guy that did the voice of the Blue puppet was the same voice actor as Binky Barnes as Arthur. in fact a lot of the voice actors for the puppets would later work on Arthur (and with much better acting, anyway). The puppets look good, but they definately were trying to cash in off of Henson in some shape or form.

 

[D'Snowth]

Indeed, with Between the Lions, there were many people that worked with Jim involved in the production. Some of the Puppeteers work or have wotrked on Sesame Street, and Chris Cerf was in charge of Music. The tag line at the end for Serious Productions says "For Jim, Joe, and John"- Jim Henson, Joe Raposo, and John Stone. There's one more but I can't remember. I'm gussing Norm for Norman Styles.

Whimsy is a cheap little production. poor puppetry, cheap voice acting (that didn't do the puppetry), lazy song writing. I will say this, the same guy that did the voice of the Blue puppet was the same voice actor as Binky Barnes as Arthur. in fact a lot of the voice actors for the puppets would later work on Arthur (and with much better acting, anyway). The puppets look good, but they definately were trying to cash in off of Henson in some shape or form.

But didn't Jim Henson create that kind of working puppet specifically for medium of television? So nobody else can work with puppets that work like a muppet puppet would because it would be infringing the muppets?

 

[Drtooth]

But didn't Jim Henson create that kind of working puppet specifically for medium of television? So nobody else can work with puppets that work like a muppet puppet would because it would be infringing the muppets?

Makes sense. But then again, someone would clearly associate an inferior show to them, and that's why a law suit only makes sense. But then again, I never seen Disney sue over the various knockoff Enchanted Tales videos that popped up suspiciously whenever they released a similar movie. I think Pixar should sue for Ratatoing. But that's just me.

I will say the puppets looked good. And maybe if they had better writers, better puppeteers, and just plain higher quality everywhere throughout, it would have been a better show, instead of something so generic.