What went wrong with Muppets from Space?

[Daffney]

As Muppet fans are nervously awaiting promotion for the upcoming Muppet film, it's time to see why it's taken a decade for the Muppets to return to the silver screen. And what better way to do so is by looking back at the cinematic mess of 1999's Muppets from Space.

When the short lived Jim Henson Pictures division was formed in 1995 with the help of Sony, one of the many movie ideas they had was a Muppet film... IN SPACE!

Jerry Juhl and Kirk Thatcher wrote separate scripts for a Muppet space adventure. Juhl's one was on UFOs, while Thatcher's one was a wacky space adventure that would've been great.

Kirk sent his screenplay to Henson (entitled Muppets in Space) and they were about to get the film on the go. When Jerry sent his script (Star Gonzo) however, Henson changed their minds and used his screenplay instead.

Okay, good and all, but after some script rewrites and a hurried shooting schedule, the end results were a Muppet film lacking the musical feel and cram packed with pop songs and the easy pop-culture references. It didn't feel like a Muppet film. As the matter of fact it didn't feel like a space film either.

I needed to know who was responsible for these shortcomings. The only good way was to look at the little guide for the DVD of Muppets from Space. It contained some insights of the making of the film, but no answer. So I haft to assume the entire fault was on the director, Tim Hill. Apparently, Hill didn't know how to properly direct a Muppet film and he had no idea what he was doing.

Another culprit could be the distributor, Columbia. Brian Henson said the the film was to be released off-season (i.e. the spring or fall months), but Columbia insisted that Muppets from Space would be a summer blockbuster. Production was hastily rushed because of that. It could be one reason why Frank Oz couldn't perform his characters during filming and had to dub their lines latter.

When Muppets from Space hit theaters in the summer of 1999, it was crushed at the box office by the other shinning hits of the time. All in all, the film failed to earn its $26 million budget back and the Muppets never returned to the big screen... until this Thanksgiving.

That's my two cents, what do you think happened?

 

[frogboy4]

Story, story, story: They could have used either of those original scripts and been successful, but they decided to second-guess everything and created a film with a good premise that didn't yet have an engaging story. I personally like Juhl's original pitch.

Muppet Music: Where the frog was it? How can anyone make a movie without Muppets singing music. I don't mean the lip-synced opening number. That was nice enough and the movie kind of fell apart from there. Where were the grand production numbers, or even the small simple songs? I don't care if the late 90's weren't considered musical friendly - this is a Muppet movie and without songs it just isn't very Muppety!

Muppet Magic: The characters appear to be either bored or listless the entire picture. Except for Pepe, it's almost like they're phoning it in for the paycheck. I admit that it's fun to see Muppets do everyday chores, but Kermit painting the house is only funny juxtaposed to something else that's happening. The Muppets would have been more lively giving a financial report on C-Span!

They Knew It: Sony and Henson knew this was a turkey. They kept it from critics and yanked it from theaters very quickly in order to fast-track it to video three months later. That used to be considered fast back in 1999. VHS tapes took a little more time to burn and distribute than DVDs.

The director of Grease was to helm "Muppets From Space" but for some reason his take on making a musical and incorporating classic parody didn't sit well with someone at Henson or Sony. Basically they tried *not* to make their Muppet movie very Muppety. What the frog?

They're obviously not making that mistake this time. They're blending all the classic Muppet magic for Thanksgiving's picture and so far the buzz seems good.

 

[dwmckim]

Quality wise, it was the classic case of too many cooks spoiling the broth.

Box office wise, it was lost in a sea of huge summer blockbusters without the promotional blitz needed to stay afloat with the sharks.

 

[Drtooth]

Story, story, story: They could have used either of those original scripts and been successful, but they decided to second-guess everything and created a film with a good premise that didn't yet have an engaging story. I personally like Juhl's original pitch.

Muppet Music: Where the frog was it? How can anyone make a movie without Muppets singing music. I don't mean the lip-synced opening number. That was nice enough and the movie kind of fell apart from there. Where were the grand production numbers, or even the small simple songs? I don't care if the late 90's weren't considered musical friendly - this is a Muppet movie and without songs it just isn't very Muppety!

Muppet Magic: The characters appear to be either bored or listless the entire picture. Except for Pepe, it's almost like they're phoning it in for the paycheck. I admit that it's fun to see Muppets do everyday chores, but Kermit painting the house is only funny juxtaposed to something else that's happening. The Muppets would have been more lively giving a financial report on C-Span!

They Knew It: Sony and Henson knew this was a turkey. They kept it from critics and yanked it from theaters very quickly in order to fast-track it to video three months later. That used to be considered fast back in 1999. VHS tapes took a little more time to burn and distribute than DVDs.

The director of Grease was to helm "Muppets From Space" but for some reason his take on making a musical and incorporating classic parody didn't sit well with someone at Henson or Sony. Basically they tried *not* to make their Muppet movie very Muppety. What the frog?

They're obviously not making that mistake this time. They're blending all the classic Muppet magic for Thanksgiving's picture and so far the buzz seems good.

You forgot
Director, Director, Director Let's not ignore that fact, as it's screaming in red colored bold face type

Fro Toughpigs:

It was a miserable experience. We were working with a director, Randal Kleiser, who had directed Grease, one of my favorite movies. We got the green light, it was Jerry Juhl’s script, and they asked me to do a pass, and I wrote a very parody-heavy script. We parodied Men in Black, Contact, Alien, and we were very close to shooting. Then I got a panicked call from Henson saying that they were firing Randal. They said, “We don’t feel like he’s bringing enough vision.” I said, “But we got the green light! We’re going!” So they flew me out to LA to pick a new director, and we picked a director who was a very nice guy, and he did a decent job, but he wanted to get rid of all the parody stuff. He wanted it to be more real, and the ending, I hate the ending. In my draft, the aliens were getting the signal of old Muppet Shows, and they made themselves look like Gonzo because he was the ultimate being to him. And then they peel back to reveal themselves to be these hideous creatures. And it’s not about family being those guys, his family is the Muppets. So he’s still a whatever, he’s not an alien in the end. So the fact that they made him an alien bugs the crap out of me. Anyway, they hired him, he wanted to make all these changes, and I just left.

Now, I have to admit, MFS would have had some great potential had they shot the script Joey wanted. The key is that Tim Hill replaced the ending himself with something banal, he took out the parody references, he may have been the one to take out Traveling Matt from the movie, and I'm sure he had a say in killing any original music.

Above all, he wanted it to be "real" where all the house painting, lawn mowing, and mail checking came from. Suffice to say, this is the same cinematic genius that gave us the Garfield movies and the First Chipmunks (I can't believe the second one proved there was someone worse than him). Now, I've heard of director's ruining scripts, but this guy slaughtered it. How bad was the Grease guy? At least he would have left things well enough alone. There is a little Muppet magic in the film, but Tim represses the HECK out of it. At the very least, at least the Muppets didn't play third or fourth string characters, and you got to give them credit for at least playing themselves in this film. MFS is clearly not perfect, but it's much more entertaining than MCC was for me.

Besides Uwe Boll...err... Tim Hill's misdirection (really, hearing his involvement in Hop just... I want to stay as far away from that as possible) aside... well, what genius thought it was a good idea to have ALL of Frank's characters in one scene? There's something off about that part of the movie, and the lack of Frank's presence kind of throws that bit off... similar to Miss Piggy's role in MTI.

 

[minor muppetz]

well, what genius thought it was a good idea to have ALL of Frank's characters in one scene? There's something off about that part of the movie, and the lack of Frank's presence kind of throws that bit off... similar to Miss Piggy's role in MTI.

I thought that was due to Frank just dubbing voices most of the time. Since he was dubbing the voices anyway, why not? Though it seems like a missed opportunity... Oz was only doing the voices, and yet the movie still hardly had any direct interraction between his characters.

 

[Drtooth]

That's just it... the dubbed voices of Piggy, Animal and Fozzie... all played by different people, all characters one person does the voice of... and had the movie more time for them to split up and get lost in the lab looking for Gonzo, there could have been potential for some funny stuff there. Instead, none of the characters really do anything interesting. It seems that Kermit and Pepe were the only characters that actually DID anything in that scene. Animal, well... there's no point for him to even be there, he disappears, and all he does is hit on Kathy Griffin. Either more of the Muppets should have gone with them, or Animal should have stayed home or... I dunno...

I have a similar problem with LTS, where Rizzo goes with Kermit and the gang... had it been Scooter or anyone else, there would have at least been more interaction... but Kermit didn't talk to Rizzo, Rizzo didn't talk to Kermit... Rizzo seemed just there.

 

[BobThePizzaBoy]

I honestly think the entire blame goes on Tim Hill and the fact that this film went through way too many writers.

I'll come clean and honest: I like the fact that this movie has no songs. There's no need for them. In the Rhino compilation CD years ago, they actually said in the booklet they had a strong debate about whether the Muppets should sing or not in the movie. I think they made the right choice, I personally don't think the narrative calls for songs, at least the way they were in the previous Muppet movies.

Tim Hill was all in all a bad, last-minute choice for this movie. He had no expertise in directing a feature and the whole thing comes off as lazily done. I think a more experienced name director would have been a step in the right direction. I'll be the first to say that I find Grease very overrated (I don't hate it! But it is very overrated. That's another rant for another time.) but really Randal Kleiser could have directed this film well. Had he dropped out again, Joe Dante might have been a nice fit.

Finally, the release date was terrible. It had to face off against The Phantom Menance, The Sixth Sense, Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me and more importantly, Tarzan. Really hectic summer if you ask me. Sony really should have given the film a February 2000-ish release.

 

[D'Snowth]

I still cannot comprehend why everybody dislikes MFS so much, I thought it was a really fun and great Muppet movie... ten times, even a hundred times better than that mess IAVMMCM turned out being.

No Muppet Musical moments? What do you call "She's a Brick House' at the beginning? Or "Celebration" towards the end? It wasn't in the actual movie, but the soundtrack had an updated version of Gonzo singing his classic "I'm Going to Go Back There Someday", just like Kermit's done different versions of "Bein' Green", for both SST and TMS.

Not to mention, the Muppets fall victim to a lot of franchises of having to keep up with the times (in the wrong ways) to appeal today's audiences... now KSY, another one that was pretty good but everyone hates, took that to a bit of an extreme: the writing has always been geared towards BOTH kids and adults, it's the antics that the characters get into the kids like, while the subtle wordplay is what adults like, but the Muppets really seldom use "grownup" words and dialogue, which they did quite often in KSY, which makes it just a LITTLE shocking, because kids don't usually use those kinds of words, but it's nothing bad or anything. But then IAVMMCM... good Lord... Scooter cage dancing at a rave party? I think not only were they trying to hard to keep up with the times, but they didn't really have to go all emo on Scooter did they? But then again, a lot of "kid-friendly" franchises attract unlikely fanbases... it still surprises me to this day that The Chipmunks have such a large emo following.

All-in-all, out of the three post-Henson theatrical releases, was MFS the best? Not exactly, BUT, it's still a really good Muppet movie nonetheless, and it really doesn't deserve the beating it always receives.

 

[MelissaY1]

I think it just lacked a huge part of what makes the Muppets the Muppets. The jokes felt forced, I think they tried to be too "hip" (which is my fear with the new upcoming film), I don't think it had really any tender moments that the Muppets greatly mix in with the wackiness.

I think one of their biggest mistakes was to try make it definitive that Gonzo was an alien. Some of the funniest gags over the years was the names Miss Piggy would bark at him "Bazooka beak", "Turkey", etc. and his not knowing what he was even had a great run of gags and a great episode around that idea on Muppet Babies!

Also I think the title was misleading. Muppets From Space, they could've focused on some new characters coming to meet the main ones, or they could've made it Muppets IN Space and had the gang traveling on a rocketship which could've been fun. There was just a lot of things that were just a dead end for them in terms of story, etc. with this one. And I think like other people here have already said, big part of that is due to the various writers, there's something to be said of the old "too many cooks can spoil the broth".

 

[MelissaY1]

I still cannot comprehend why everybody dislikes MFS so much, I thought it was a really fun and great Muppet movie... ten times, even a hundred times better than that mess IAVMMCM turned out being.

No Muppet Musical moments? What do you call "She's a Brick House' at the beginning? Or "Celebration" towards the end? It wasn't in the actual movie, but the soundtrack had an updated version of Gonzo singing his classic "I'm Going to Go Back There Someday", just like Kermit's done different versions of "Bein' Green", for both SST and TMS.

Not to mention, the Muppets fall victim to a lot of franchises of having to keep up with the times (in the wrong ways) to appeal today's audiences... now KSY, another one that was pretty good but everyone hates, took that to a bit of an extreme: the writing has always been geared towards BOTH kids and adults, it's the antics that the characters get into the kids like, while the subtle wordplay is what adults like, but the Muppets really seldom use "grownup" words and dialogue, which they did quite often in KSY, which makes it just a LITTLE shocking, because kids don't usually use those kinds of words, but it's nothing bad or anything. But then IAVMMCM... good Lord... Scooter cage dancing at a rave party? I think not only were they trying to hard to keep up with the times, but they didn't really have to go all emo on Scooter did they? But then again, a lot of "kid-friendly" franchises attract unlikely fanbases... it still surprises me to this day that The Chipmunks have such a large emo following.

All-in-all, out of the three post-Henson theatrical releases, was MFS the best? Not exactly, BUT, it's still a really good Muppet movie nonetheless, and it really doesn't deserve the beating it always receives.

It was definitely better than the TV Christmas movies, and some of the other projects they came out with after that, but after seeing Christmas Carol and Treasure Island it just seemed they hit rock bottom with Muppets From Space. It seemed to be more on the cheap, lacked a lot of other stuff the other films didn't have, I just didn't think it was "fun". But that's my opinion.