Disney-Muppets...Versus Sesame Street Muppets

[CaseytheMuppet]

Well, the characters from SST ARE still Muppets after all, so really, there is not misidentification when it comes to "confusing" them with the Muppets.

Yeah, I know. Both are great, but sometimes it bugs me when people confuse them.

 

[Drtooth]

But anyway, to clarify what Drtooth has said, when Jim was originally dealing with Michael Eisner over the deal of the Muppets, Eisner did want the SST Muppets included in the deal, but Jim said no, that the deal was to including only what we now refer to as the "Classic Muppets" (Kermit, Fozzie, Piggy, Gonzo, etc)... then no sooner did Jim die, then Eisner basically tried to steal the SST Muppets away from CTW and JHC, thoug luckily, they fought back over that.

Personally, I don't want Disney to own the SST Muppets, frankly, I don't want any more of Jim's empire sold off... my respect for Brian and Cheryl and the rest of the JHC is already at an all-time low, what with them selling out the Classic Muppets to EM.TV then back to Disney, then just giving away the rights to Fraggle Rock, etc.

Exactly. The Muppets have had a huge upswing with Disney once the idea of a theatrical movie came about. But Sesame Street doesn't need that bump. The Muppets haven't had a steady show since The Muppet Show (JHH and MT were canned all too quickly)... and they only really popped up as TV specials every so often after 1999's last theatrical movie. Sesame Street is self sustaining. It's too popular to ever need a boost. It's too much of a staple. Other than problems that could arise at PBS that could hinder Sesame Street, that is, but I don't want to go there. As much as everyone hates Elmo, you have to admit, the show's never been more popular since he gained popularity. And I swear, I see more people of a certain age wearing Sesame T-Shirts than Muppet ones.

I can see why Eisner wanted them the most... they make the most money. Unfortunately, that money BELONGS to Sesame Workshop. Not just to make a show here, but to start up other shows all over the world, some in very dangerous places where they're the only spot of peace the children will ever get to penetrate a mind being bombarded by hate. I'd hate Disney screwing that up.

 

[a_Mickey_Muppet]

my respect for Brian and Cheryl and the rest of the JHC is already at an all-time low

I can agree 110% on that too! I have NO respect for the screw up, i mean...Henson kids at all what so ever!

 

[Drtooth]

I really can't blame them all that much. They really haven't been in charge recently... the problem with Henson will always be budget. They will always need a secondary partner to release movies and TV shows. No one wants to be that partner, and the ones we had that were turned out to be terrible for them (Hit/ Weinstine... Lionsgate seems to have given up). There was some bad blood between them and Sony (going back to the 1980's Columbia deal) after Buddy, Elmo in Grouchland, and Muppets From Space. Though not bad enough to not continue releasing DVD's up until the Disney buyout.

The reason we didn't get a Fraggle Rock movie was simple. The partnership they had was terrible, with a dysfunctional company that once paid off hush money to a film maker they screwed so they wouldn't get bad press when The King's Speach was nominated for an Oscar. Heck... Henson should have threatened to sue them when whatever Oscar bait Weinstine was getting good press. They'd probably get enough hush money to make the film themselves!

As much as we hate EMTV, if they didn't sell the characters, we wouldn't even have had VMX. The Disney sale at least gave us one more theatrical movie (no doubt a second one is in consideration). Under Henson's ownership, I'm sure they'd wind up wading through good scripts that go unproduced, like they did since the 90's.