The "Muppets on Robot Chicken" Thread

[Flaky Pudding]

The Adult Swim sketch comedy, Robot Chicken has parodied the Muppets several times. Some examples I can think of include:

-Behind the Music:Electric Mayhem. It was pretty much a VH1 behind the music spoof. Rowlf, Fozzie, and Kermit appeared in it. But no Lips, .
-Big Bird gets the Bird Flu.
-Cookie Monster eats a man's computer.
-The Fraggles leave their home in a parody of Watership Down.
-A Gelfling raps about the Dark Crystal.
-Scooter goes around killing Muppets.
-A man reveals he was Toby from Labyrinth
-A parody of Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas.
-Oscar meets another Grouch named Ricky Recycle Bin

If you can think of more sketches or if you just wanted to talk about Robot Chicken spoofing Muppets, this is the thread!

 

[FunnyBear]

The Adult Swim sketch comedy, Robot Chicken has parodied the Muppets several times. Some examples I can think of include:
-Big Bird gets the Bird Flu.

I saw this one as a kid I had had nightmares for awhile after seeing it. D:

 

[Mo Frackle]

A complete list of Muppet references on RC:

http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Robot_Chicken

 

[Drtooth]

The Biggest loser parody was lame. The jokes were obvious and it ends on the lame "cartoon character is an animal that gets eaten, so let's have them get eaten" bit. I was very disappointed they did with with Darkwing Duck instead of something clever. Like an addiction to painkillers. Seems apt, they went for a "he's a duck so lets eat him" instead.

 

[mr3urious]

I loved the Dark Crystal rap "The Dark Cristal". It condenses the plot of the movie in the form of a stereotypical gangsta rap. Plus, you gotta love those singing Mystics.

 

[Gonzo14]

I remember the EM skit, that was funny.

The thing about Robot Chicken is that you can't get too offended by them making fun of your favorite franchises, like the Muppets. They're equally irreverent to everyone, like South Park

 

[Drtooth]

I don't mind the offensiveness. It's the lazy standbys that bug me. Like they add extra "adult" jokes into scenes that don't need them. That's not so much offensive as gratuitous. Thankfully most Muppet segments are more clever with that usage. While "killing classic kid's characters" is overused as heck on that show, I did like how it was used in the Emmet Otter parody.

 

[JJandJanice]

Robot Chicken can be very "hit or miss" not just for the Muppets for for all their skits. For example, I LOVED their "Behind the Music:the Electric Mayhem" and "Who's Killing the Muppets" skits. But I thought their "Fraggleship Down" skit was pretty awful. Reason being was that it felt like it was written by someone who saw maybe one or two episodes of Fraggle Rock as a kid and really doesn't remember the show too well and I'm sorry but in order to a GOOD parody you should know what it is you're parodying. In that case, it DOES HELP to be a general fan. If you don't agree with me on that, look at "spoof movies" and see what separates good ones like Spaceballs from god awful ones like "Meet the Spartans" or "Epic Movie."

And the "Big Bird gets sick" sketch, I don't know, that just felt totally unoriginal. Like we've seen that joke already quite a few times since the bird flu epidemic was big at the time. Didn't even Madtv beat them to that one? Heck despite what I just said on the Fraggle Rock skit, I can even give them a pass for not knowing that Snuffy IS real (well "real" in that he is not Big Bird's imagery friend, but he's actual friend).

 

[DramaQueenMokey]

I like the sketch where Cookie Monster goes and attacks the Keebler elves and they feed him cookies until he explodes; I mean, that might be one of the more 'stretched out' sketches for when they move to the second half but, I still like it. I mean, I have a very cynical sense of humor and, I'll usually give things a chance when they're mixed with my favorite shows.

But, outside of Robot Chicken, I'm very picky over my Muppet and Sesame Street parodies and things.

 

[Drtooth]

Robot Chicken can be very "hit or miss" not just for the Muppets for for all their skits. For example, I LOVED their "Behind the Music:the Electric Mayhem" and "Who's Killing the Muppets" skits. But I thought their "Fraggleship Down" skit was pretty awful. Reason being was that it felt like it was written by someone who saw maybe one or two episodes of Fraggle Rock as a kid and really doesn't remember the show too well and I'm sorry but in order to a GOOD parody you should know what it is you're parodying. In that case, it DOES HELP to be a general fan. If you don't agree with me on that, look at "spoof movies" and see what separates good ones like Spaceballs from god awful ones like "Meet the Spartans" or "Epic Movie."

The only thing good about the Fraggle Rock skit was the Uncle Matt post card. They did their research on that but not on any basic character personalities outside of that. I'll give the Big Bird Flu one the benefit of the doubt due to animation lead time. It's not their fault that quicker media beat it to the punch and overused the joke before the thing actually aired. Happens to the Simpsons all the time. Even the CN MAD series referenced it on their last episode, doing a parody of Ender's Game based on the trailer just to get it relevant. Cracked did worse when it was a Mad knockoff magazine (they got NOTHING right in their redundant Spy Hard parody), and it was a magazine!

Though it seems that the skits are inconsistently written by those who actually know the source material and those who don't. Seth Green's supposedly this huge Muppet fan, and they have several Henson people working on the show. You'd think one of them would give some input to get the skits up to believable parody.

Though I can't stress enough the show is capable of doing good parodies here and there. It's just a shame that some fall on the same children's character dies horribly/has sex/gets high or drunk type stuff. There has been improvement in recent years, and I like how they're going after more obscure references. I actually quite liked the short about Barnyard about how Otis has udders and he's a male, even though unless you have ready access to Nicktoons (and it's one of the months they decide to show it), you probably forgot it.

(BTW, Barnyard is a fine show. Movie was so so, but the writing is far superior in the series).