Febuary Fools Day News

[minor muppetz]

Happy Febuary Fools Day! Okay, so it's not an official holiday, but it is the first of the month, so I'm treating Febuary the first like I would April the first. And now here are some febuary foolish news reports:

Vintage Sesame Collection Comming Soon

Genius Products and Sesame Workshop are planning a collection of single-disc DVDs called the "Vintage Sesame Collection". These will be single-disc collections featuring only segments with certain characters. The first sets will be as follows:

• Vintage Big Bird
• Vintage Oscar
• Vintage Ernie
• Vintage Bert
• Vintage Cookie
• Vintage Grover
• Vintage Count

Each will feature segments from 1969-1977 (except for Vintage Count, which will contain segments from 1972-1980). Each will be approximately 90 minutes in lenght, and each will feature six bonus segmnets on different topics. For example, Vintage Count will include bonus number segments, Vintage Ernie will include bonus animation and film segments by Jim Henson, Vintage Grover wil include six versions of The People in Your Neighborhood, and so on. Also comming from Genius Products is it's Mini-Old School collections, single-disc collections featuring two episodes from the first ten seasons, and ten or more bonus segments, usually focusing on certain characters or subjects. The first four volumes are comming out in june, and epsiodes included on these sets wil include Linda's debut, Big Bird hosting a number four show, and a rarely-seen appearance by the Wicked Witch of the West. Retail for these will be $19.99, and the third Old School set will be released in october.

The Muppet Podcast Show Commign Soon

This march, Disney will be producing a Muppet video podcast series, tentatively titled The Muppet Podcast Show. Each show will be around ten minutes long, and follow the format of The Muppet Show, though it'll be shorter, and not every show will include a guest star (and some will include two or three guests). Guests scheduled for this podcast include Weird Al Yankovic, Jim Carrey, Jessica Simpson, Molly Shannon, Kelly Clarkson, James Taylor, and Paul McCartney. Each show will include at least two musical numbers (in addition to a theme song), and everybody from The Muppet Show, The Jim Henson Hour, and Muppets Tonight will be included.

New King of 8 Series Comming Soon
Sesame Workshop and The Jim Henson Company have teamed up to produce a new computer animation series caled The Adventures of the King of 8. Based on a segment from the second season of Sesame Street, this series wil follow The King of 8s adventures where he tries to keep his best to make the number 8 the most important number. Returning from the original segment is the jester, who will be named Jesse the Jester, and the kings original 8 daughters, who will be named Jessica, Brittany, Norah, Kelly, Fergie, Ashlee, Beyonce, and Mariah. New characters will include the Queen of 8, their newborn ninth daughter, Carrie (who the king dislikes because now he has more than 8 daughters), Tom the 8 Hater, an evil wizard who hates the number 8 and will stop at nothing to make the king miserable (and was the one responsible for the sudden birth of the ninth daughter), and Tom's evil pet ostrich, Oogie, who thinks he is a dragon. Each show will include special introductiosn by The Count, who watches the show on his television set. John Henson will provide the voices of the King of 8 and Oogie, Joey Mazzarino will provide the voice of Jesse the Jester, Allison Bartlett O'Reilly will be the voice of the queen, and Jim Cummings will provide the voice of Tom the 8 Hater.

McFarlane Toys to produce Muppet, Fraggle, and Sesame action figures

McFarlane Toys has just announced that it has purchased the rights from Disney, Sesame Workshop, and The Jim Henson Company to produce seperate action figure lines with the casts of the Muppets, Sesame Street, and Fraggle Rock. McFarlane has signed four-year contracts with Henson and Sesame Workshop, and a two-year contract with Henson. The figures will be "like the Palisades figures, only better", says an anonymous bias spokesman.

Series 1 and 2 of all three lines have been announced, and here are the line-ups:

Muppets Series 1

• Kermit the Frog with Robin, tea cup, banjo, and banjo strap
• Miss Piggy with Foo-Foo, dressing room table, and mirror
• Seymour and Pepe with elevador stick and elevador blueprints
• Sal Manilla with bananas

Muppets Series 2

• The Great Gonzo (in Muppets Tonight attire) with Rizzo the Rat
• Dr. Teeth with keyboard, hat, "The Mupet Movie" script, and album
• Johnny Fiama with microphone and rats
• Mildred with Green Frackle

Sesame Street Series 1[

• Big Bird with radar and Little Bird
• Bert with bowl of oatmeal, chair, paper clips, bottle caps, and pigeon
• Don Music with piano and record album
• Herry Monster with scale and x-ray machine

Sesame Street Series 2

• Ernie with Rubber Duckie, chair, and banana
• Abby Cadabby with magic wand and martians
• Telly Monster with triangles, pogo stick, and tuba
• Little Chrissy with piano, alphabeats, and record album

Fraggle Rock Series 1

• Gobo Fraggle with radishes, post card, and doozers
• Mokey Fraggle with Lanford, rocks, radish, and journal
• Junior Gorg with radishes
• Cantus with flute, doozers, and doozer construction

Fraggle Rock Series 2

• Red Fraggle with Cotterpin Doozer, radish, and doozer sticks
• Boober Fraggle with hat, Flange Doozer, radishes, and wash tub
• Pa Gorg with cage
• Murray the Minstrel with guitar and Wignut Doozer

Have a happy febuary fools day. And now, I don't plan on doing anything like this for march fools day. By the way, none of these reprots are real. That's why I put it in fan fiction.

 

[minor muppetz]

There were a few joke articles that I'd considered putting here, but forgot. One was a report that the Mupets would host this sunday's Super Bowl halftime show. The other was a "press release" announcing the proposed "Jim Henson's Early Works" DVD.

 

[minor muppetz]

Oh, crud! I'd thought of another "prank", weeks ago, and forgot to include it in my post yesterday. I was going to write that Sesame Workshop was going to allow fans to vote for their favorite video clips that are available on the Sesame Street online video player, and that the top 22 most voted on segments would be released on a special one-disc DVD, with bonus features including the top 5 most-requested clips for the web video player, and ten unaired segments.

I wonder how people would feel if Sesame Workshop actualy did it. The clips are obviously there, so the people voting for their favorites wouldn't really need to buy a DVD release of what they can watch online for free (though I wouldn't mind buying a DVD release of just segments that can be watched online). Some segments on the player are edited (the sketch where Lefty attempts to sell Ernie a scale has a rather odd beginning on the player), so if the edited segments were included on such a DVD, would the segment still be edited? Also, some of the clips are from specials (such as Christmas Eve on Sesame Street), and a few are from parts of street stories (such as Abby Cadabby meeting Big Bird and Mr. Snuffleupagus). Would people actually vote to have these clips on a DVD release (especially since both of what I mentioned are commercialy available, though casual fans might not know it)?

Then again, it would be interesting to try to figure out who the majority of people voting are: people with video copies of many Sesame Street segments or people with very few copies? People with every/ most commercial video and DVD release or people with zero/ very few commercial releases? Old-time fans or newer fans? Fans of main characters like Ernie, Grover, and Elmo, or fans of older characters like Guy Smiley, Sherlock Hemlock, and Forgetful Jones? It would also be interesting if fans could vote for segments for a DVD, and there weren't any Muppet segments included (which would be odd).