"The Muppets" isn't the Muppets

[Pinkflower7783]

Umm....I just basically said that. I KNOW you can't keep the Muppets frozen in time. I believe I said most of that in my post. But okay whatever!!!

 

[Drtooth]

Frozen in time, like frozen as a franchise exactly after the last Jim Henson made movie, correct?

I'd HATE to see Muppets frozen in season 1 time. Undefined Piggy bouncing from Richard Hunt to Frank Oz and back... no Beaker. Worst of all... NO Pigs in Space.

 

[Oscarfan]

We'd still have good ol' Mildred!

 

[Pinkflower7783]

I mean frozen in time in general. Show, movies, whatever you wanna call it. And I personally would never want The Muppets to stay in a dormant state anyways. Jim Henson never did so why just because he past away shouldn't it be okay for other people to do? Jim always made sure The Muppets were up and current during his time he didn't let them stay on a 1970s show. As Steve Whitmire said in an interview "you want Kermit to alwys be Kermit but you can't let him get stale you have to keep developing his personality into the current times."

 

[MWoO]

I think if you jump from 1990 to 2011 you would t recognize the muppets at all. Almost the entire cast of characters has been recast. Certain characters haven't interacted in years. Certain characters have changed since the recasts, and even before. So yes, when you compare TMS and the original movies to The Muppets things are off. It's very different. But I would say the same when comparing TMS to JHH or MT.

If you have followed most muppet projects from 1990 on then you will most likely love the movie. If the last you saw of the muppets was TMS and the first 3 movies the you need to get use to the new way of things. Heck, compare Sam and fried s to TMS. That's a heck of a change too.

 

[DannyRWW]

first of all the Muppets was the Muppets..if for no other reason it is after all the title of the movie all kiddig aside (if we can in fact ever actually put Kidding aside...my wife argues that that is something i am incapable of doing).... my friends and various people I have had to convince to see the movie have in fact loved it...in fact I have metno one who has not likd the movie on some leel...you see while I think they have changed I think the movie created a false sense of nostalgia where even if this wqas not the muppets we remember from our youth to the casual fan it made them feel like it was (thus why i think they went with 8s references rather than 70s because many people became fans of the muppets in the 80s after the showwas rerunning). that being said I felt it was the Muppets in spirit even if it was not exactly the way we remember things...but aren't all our really truly happy memories more pleasant than they actually were at the time

 

[mupcollector1]

Well as a continuing fan in my early mid-20s, I've always admired the classic stuff the best. Yes, I do agree that there seems to be a lack of things a little bit in the more recent newer stuff. Part of me thinks we they are all really trying their best because it's not the same without Jim Henson, Frank Oz and even Jerry Juhl as their writer. Which maybe true in certain cases, then there's part of me that's like, NO, it can be done better. Muppets Tonight and Muppet Treasure Island (of course Carol 3 years before) were great, and hilarious, and these were made 6 years after Jim's passing. It can be done.

But I think in my own opinion it comes down to one thing. The Irreverent humor / Muppet style humor isn't there much anymore. Manly due to this PC world and certain things people consider offensive more and more but you got to admit in the new movie, they did bring back explosions and let Crazy Harry light up a few. lol But yeah stuff like bad puns, energetic craziness, zanniness and silliness, weirdness for the sake of creative weirdness, random moments with monsters eating other Muppets and unexpected explosions, the old school of cartoon violence (simular to classic Looney Tunes but what was uniqe with The Muppets, you never expected it. Even refrigerator throwing or a bowling ball being through out of a plane) and finally a certain risky edge to it if you know what I mean.

To me, the humor is what made The Muppets who they were. But there was a soft side that showed the character's truely cared about each other. The movie does show that. To tell you the truth, there was several moments where happy tears almost went down my face. Especially pictures in my head. "Would anyone ever watch or even care, Should we do it all again, and make them laugh like we did back then" it kind of touches me even as an artis myself.

But anyway, back to the humor. According to history, Jim fought hard to get The Muppet Show on the air. Sam & Friends were aimed strictly towards adults and Jim sort of wanted to do that with The Muppet Show. And of course there was Land of Gorch on SNL (which I personally love lol) and all that stuff.
And there was a lot of adult situations with the characters on The Muppet Show and even Muppets Tonight. From if a character had a crush on a guest star in which they knew they would only be there for this one show and leave to even arguments and everyday life situations but with a twist of course.

But yeah even The Jim Henson Hour with MuppetTelevision it had it's share of Muppet style humor like Karate Squid, Peare Roach vs. The Swedish Chef, etc.

But yeah, I sort of blame the whole PC rules of things now. Just because the littlest person on the planet will be disturbed by a comedic explosion or a character getting hit with a heavy object. Trust me, I can ramble on and on about it in the general discussion forum. lol
Even Sesame Street changed it's format because I've heard that they can't really do that Muppet style humor anymore because classic episodes were shown by the modern test audiences and got negative reactions. It sounds strange I know but let's just say that I heard this from the grape vines.

 

[CensoredAlso]

I don't know if any one else has experienced this, and I personally find it rather baffling, but I really haven't met anyone else who enjoyed "The Muppets" outside of fellow fans. Now normally I'd write this off as "well they just don't like the Muppets" but that would actually be wrong. A number of these people, whilst not being "fanatics", are very fond of the Muppets.

I think you've observed very well. Sometimes, not always, but sometimes the more casual fan can be a bit more discerning because they don't obsession over every project the way we do, hehe.

Regarding the poll, I put down Not Sure. I think this is the best post-Jim Muppet film I've seen, but is it the Muppets from Muppet Show? Well occasionally I did see glimpses and I appreciated that, but overall it still felt a little off, like a very good fanfiction. Though I got the impression the scenes that were cut might have fixed that.

All I'm gonna say is is time doesn't stand still...things change. You can't keep The Muppets frozen in the 1970's. You have to develop their personalities even into the modern era.

The past is not nearly as different and otherworldly as we tend to think it was. Things don't change that much to the point where something that was quality must change what it was. The Muppets don't need to try so hard to be modern. They changed clothes from the '70s to the '80s. They did not change personalities. That's what happened in the '90s and early 2000's and that's why they weren't successful.

 

[Drtooth]

We'd still have good ol' Mildred!

Mildred was fun, I guess. They really should have used her as a censor lady like Lydia Karaoke in Histeria. That's the only role I could see her in.

Regarding the poll, I put down Not Sure. I think this is the best post-Jim Muppet film I've seen, but is it the Muppets from Muppet Show? Well occasionally I did see glimpses and I appreciated that, but overall it still felt a little off, like a very good fanfiction. Though I got the impression the scenes that were cut might have fixed that.

The thing about The Muppets was that it was the only Muppet Movie (other than VMX, if you count it as a movie) that attempted to be The Muppet Show... and it also attempted to be the first 3 Muppet movies all together.

When it comes to Muppet Show vs Muppet movie there's humor that's similar and humor that doesn't work in the same scale. There's a different kind of humor in the First Muppet Movie than there is on the show, though they did try to incorporate a couple little things, like Muppet Labs and the insta-grow pills. But even then, it has a different punchline, one that incorporates into the plot. GMC, that's a movie in which The Muppet Show doesn't exist, and it does its own thing. That's why that film worked. MTM was the furthest from the show completely of the first three, though it's the only one that referenced Gonzo's stunts.

What I'm saying is that the movies NEVER had the same feel of the show, and went for something stronger that can sustain itself in a 90 minute continuous plot. There were episodes of TMS that had plot, sure, but those are plots that could be solved in 2 minutes. Not going to work for 90 minutes. Plus, while there were episodes that featured a LOT of character development, you can just get so much more mileage from a consistent, uninterrupted stream of plot.

Now if this movie should get any credit, it's that it tried very hard to mash the show Muppets into the Movie Muppets, and I think it managed to do it a lot better than VMX did. The sketches on the telethon show are supposed to mirror ones from the actual Muppet Show program... just they went for the musical ones over the one that actually WAS a Muppet Show skit, The Swedish Chef. I think they had the right amount of those in the movie... one more could have stopped the plot (such as it was) cold. Though I agree, a couple more scenes added into the film could have shaped it to have been even stronger.

 

[bandit]

This is an interesting thread. I think I can see this from both sides.

Over all, I thought that the way the reintroduction of the Muppets into the mainstream was handled very cleverly. It's one of those meta instances. Their circumstances in the movie somewhat mirror their circumstances in real life. They had been somewhat forgotten.
Well, given some of those last movies, maybe that's what you call a 'mercy forgetting.'

Anyway, my point is that while it didn't exactly have the feel of some of the older films for various reasons, it was a very good step in the right direction. For once, the movie seemed like a solid effort--fart shoes and Gonzo shortcomings aside.
So you kind of have to look at it as a warm up. Hopefully, whatever follows will ride the momentum of this wave of popularity and hit its own stride.

And yes, they have to evolve somewhat. Audiences aren't what they used to be and neither are performers. If you want to use characters that deal in pop culture, you have to figure out how to do that while preserving the thing that makes them who they are.
Bottom line....Things may change but if the Muppets themselves and the movies have the heart of Henson's concept at their core, they can't go wrong.