Your Thoughts: Muppet Central's 24th Birthday

[Phillip]

Happy birthday! Muppet Central is now 24 years old. The site and our original forum debuted 24 years ago on January 28, 1998. Muppet Central Radio began two years later on January 28, 2000.

Back when the site first started the Jim Henson Company still owned all of their original properties including the Muppets and Sesame Street. Two new feature films were in development simultaneously, "Muppets from Space" and "Elmo in Grouchland". The Children's Television Workshop was gearing up for their upcoming 30th anniversary and the Jim Henson Company was developing an ambitious sci-fi series that would eventually become Farscape. Even though many changes have occurred throughout the EM.TV and Disney years, we’ve been honored to be a small part of it and to provide a place for fan discussion and interaction.

We want to thank all of the staff, past and present who have given so much of their time and giftings to make Muppet Central a great place. Every member here is a vital part of what makes Muppet Central special. Thanks for doing your part in keeping Jim Henson’s vision of the Muppets alive. We believe great days are ahead.

While we’re celebrating 24 years, we are also looking towards the future. Read the below questions and let us know your predictions for 2022.

(1) What do you think the future holds for the Muppets especially with the successful premiere of "Muppets Haunted Mansion", the five-season debut of "The Muppet Show" on Dinsey+, and the continued success of "Disney Muppet Babies" Season 3? On February 17, it will have been 18 years since Disney bought the Muppet characters and Bear in the Big Blue House. They aren't the new property anymore, especially with money makers like Fox, Star Wars and Marvel now in the family. We'll see if "Muppets Haunted Mansion" leads to more Disney+ specials or a new theatrical film. Hopefully "Muppets Tonight" and "Bear in the Big Blue House" will finally make their debuts on Disney+ in 2022.

(2) What would you like to see Sesame Workshop produce or release in 2022? Also, what new classic episodes would you like to realistically see on HBO Max? Sesame Workshop will continue to produce new episodes exclusively for HBO Max through Season 55 with debuts on PBS approximately nine months later. We'll see if the new Sesame Street movie in development since 2012 finally enters production this year. The film was originally planned for a theatrical release before the pandemic, and may now be produced exclusively for HBO Max.

(3) What are your hopes for new productions from the Jim Henson Company in 2022? With the new Fraggle Rock series "Back to the Rock" and the Dark Crystal prequel series "Age of Resistance", the company has truly returned to its roots. We're hopeful that "Back to the Rock" will remain in production for years and will lead to more classic projects like the upcoming Emmet Otter film and the new Storyteller series.

(4) What are some of your favorite Muppet Central memories or traditions from the past 24 years?

Happy birthday everyone!

 

[D'Snowth]

There pretty much isn't anybody left here to celebrate; so many people have essentially abandoned ship, we're almost a ghost town now.

 

[CoolGuy1013]

Yeah, I’m basically the most recent active member to join (as well as the youngest active member). Having visited this site growing up and longing to be a part of it, it’s a bit of a letdown to see it lose so much of its former glory once I got here.

It’s the same way I feel about living in the Midwestern US (especially since I live in the state with perhaps the most “Rust Belt” cities). It’s kinda sad at this point.

I really hope that things improve by the 25th anniversary next year.

 

[LittleJerry92]

Still on a social media break atm but I lurked the forums today and saw this thread. I’m going to give my honest thoughts.

Truth be told? I really don’t like this website anymore, and it really isn’t as fun as when I first came on this website in February 2007 as a very shy 14 year old pretending to be a person named “Jeffy” (based off Big Jeffie of the Monotones which was my first username before I changed it to my current one based off my YouTube channel name) before abandoning in 2008 due to not liking how I started off. When I came back in the summer of 2017 as the real me having grown A LOT more since, it really felt like I reunited with an old home I missed a lot, and I reconnected with old friends I knew on YouTube and made new friends here (many whom unfortunately abandoned ship later on the road). While I enjoyed my time (for the most part) on here in 2017/2018, by 2019, it feels like this website was slowly starting to rot, and I blame it on a lot of problems with the fact that ever since the Charlie Benson incident in the summer of 2019, it feels like the website has gone from taking forever to approve members to never approving members ever again since. I mean, let’s be honest. How many new faces have we honestly seen since 2019? Name one. Just one.

……

Yeah, that’s what I thought. It really feels like the main admin here has slowly lost interest in actually bringing in new people or giving out new admin roles or banning trolls (and it certainly took a long while to finally ban an ongoing one back in October) long as it has nothing to do with his radio that barely anyone listens to anymore. So many staff have left so now we only have one admin and one moderator, the latter who even does any actual work to begin with but can only do so much.

Honestly, I don’t see this website making it into the 2030s. I know I’m coming off very cold saying this, but this is a thread giving “our thoughts,” so I’m telling it like is.

 

[CoolGuy1013]

Honestly, I wish someone else would take over the website and help it thrive again. I was considering myself, but I doubt that’ll ever happen.

 

[Muppets02]

Still on a social media break atm but I lurked the forums today and saw this thread. I’m going to give my honest thoughts.

Truth be told? I really don’t like this website anymore, and it really isn’t as fun as when I first came on this website in February 2007 as a very shy 14 year old pretending to be a person named “Jeffy” (based off Big Jeffie of the Monotones which was my first username before I changed it to my current one based off my YouTube channel name) before abandoning in 2008 due to not liking how I started off. When I came back in the summer of 2017 as the real me having grown A LOT more since, it really felt like I reunited with an old home I missed a lot, and I reconnected with old friends I knew on YouTube and made new friends here (many whom unfortunately abandoned ship later on the road). While I enjoyed my time (for the most part) on here in 2017/2018, by 2019, it feels like this website was slowly starting to rot, and I blame it on a lot of problems with the fact that ever since the Charlie Benson incident in the summer of 2019, it feels like the website has gone from taking forever to approve members to never approving members ever again since. I mean, let’s be honest. How many new faces have we honestly seen since 2019? Name one. Just one.

……

Yeah, that’s what I thought. It really feels like the main admin here has slowly lost interest in actually bringing in new people or giving out new admin roles or banning trolls (and it certainly took a long while to finally ban an ongoing one back in October) long as it has nothing to do with his radio that barely anyone listens to anymore. So many staff have left so now we only have one admin and one moderator, the latter who even does any actual work to begin with but can only do so much.

Honestly, I don’t see this website making it into the 2030s. I know I’m coming off very cold saying this, but this is a thread giving “our thoughts,” so I’m telling it like is.

I know I am responding late to this post, but I agree with what you are saying here. While you are definitely blunt in pointing out the flaws of the website, you are really just stating the reality of how the situation is around here. It was certainly not a coincidence, given how things are around here, that several more members would end up leaving not long after these remarks were made. And nearly every member who was here during my original years on this forum has also have left at this point. And during this year, there were a few huge thread deletions that ended happening here.
I honestly do not know how much longer this website can last, with the way things are around here. These past few weeks have also been very slow definitely for this forum, with there being a few days where nobody posted anything at all. While it would be good to have better moderation and management for this website, it is far too late for that to happen at this point.