Your Thoughts: Muppets Letters to Santa

[uppitymuppity]

I love it! What did the New York Times want... Citizen Kane?

It's perfecto!

The music is beautiful! Scr*w the Times!

and I mean that... Seriously!

 

[Baby Gonzo]

I understand, I mean I don't think it will ever be as good as it once was. If something's classic, by its nature it can't be easily repeated. If it could, it wouldn't be as special.

Yeah. But even if they aren't as great as they once were, I think I would be crushed if the Muppets stopped doing new things. At the same time though, I think we, as fans, are lucky that they have done so much and that Jim was indeed able to do so much with them.

 

[JJandJanice]

I love it! What did the New York Times want... Citizen Kane?

It's perfecto!

The music is beautiful! Scr*w the Times!

and I mean that... Seriously!

I didn't hear the Times review on it, but I would agree with you. It's just an hour long special so no one should really think it's going to be something for the ages kind of thing.

Plus I think when it comes to something like the Muppets (this is just my opinion by the way), if you don't have that certain connection with the characters than you're probably not going to enjoy it as much.

 

[theprawncracker]

I love it! What did the New York Times want... Citizen Kane?

It's perfecto!

The music is beautiful! Scr*w the Times!

and I mean that... Seriously!

Sir... you have no idea how happy I am to read that post from you. I have a very high opinion of your... opinion and I'm really, really glad that you loved it just as much as I did.

I'll hold off on my full review until later... but... just know I loved it. I LOVED it. I honestly can't think of anything that it needed--except more. I loved it. They are on top of their game and everything is falling into place.

Now they just need to keep the ball rolling.

 

[MWoO]

I liked almost everything in this movie up until they reach Santa's house. Up to that point it had good pacing for a special. Flying on the wing was great, being thrown out of the mail truck, going through security. It was all great, except one thing. Santa.

The one thing that ruined the movie was what the movie was about. Having Santa as a real character is what makes this special too kiddie. The mobsters saying they don't want to be on the naughty list? Officer Meany letting the muppets go just because he wants back on the nice list? And then that very odd Santa interaction was just NOT right. You take out the parts where Santa is treated like a real person by the adults and you take out the part where the muppets interact with him and you got am uch better special.

I'd much rather have seen Fozzie, Kermit, and Gonzo get to the north pole only to find nothing there. Gonzo leaves the letters and they head back home (how I'm not sure, haven't thought it through just yet. maybe Joy pops up on a snow mobile and takes them back to the air port) then we pan back to the letters and we see a black boot crunch the snow and a gloved hand pick up the letters. Everyone gets back to the house and Gonzo apologies to Claire about not getting the letters to Santa, and then we find out that all Claire wanted was for her friends to be with her on Christmas and that her Christmas wish came true. No need for Santa to be in it at all. The letters were such a let down anyway, the time could have been better spent. And if you really need Santa, have him seen at the end talking to Joy. Far better use of Santa I think.

 

[dwayne1115]

I cant wait to see the numbers on this. I would not be to suprised that it did better then both OZ and AVMMX combined!

 

[Miss Froggy]

They definitely were targeting this special to children, but I enjoyed it regardless. It had it's funny and cute moments. I wish I had an opinion on the songs, but I was watching it with my friends' boyfriends they left in our dorm suite to annoy me, apparently, and they talked over them. I should have gone all Miss Piggy on them.

I enjoyed the cameos a lot, they worked well. Nathan Lane was hilarious!

 

[MuppetCrazy]

Am I the only one that was surprised not to hear Kermit's song from the Macy's parade? I really expected that to close out the show......

Overall, I liked it a lot. The only thing I had a hard time with was Scooter's voice. I imagine that eventually it'll grow on me just like the rest of them did. I mean after all, most of the characters have changed over the years (except ) and most of them have turned out just fine! Growing up with the Muppets, Jim was Kermit to me. No one could ever replace Jim, but Steve had done a magnificent job of "becoming" Kermit.

Many thanks to Disney for putting out a fun, enjoyable show for all of us Muppet lovers. Even if it wasn't necessarily a 5-Star show, it was still a lot of fun. Here's looking forward to the next project!

 

[dwayne1115]

Fozzie was really prefromed well!

 

[frogboy4]

Initial Reactions:

First - I am a happy Muppet fan tonight.

The music and numbers were great. Production values were good. It's great to have that back!

There wasn't much to the story. That's where it's in need of some help. There isn't much that can be done in 45 minutes, but the characters weren't given much more to do except read their lines. I am reminded by arthouse films containing scenes with characters chatting in a coffee shop followed by characters sitting and chatting in a bar followed by characters sitting and chatting at home. They really didn't give the Muppets much to do but chat and deliver letters to Santa. The main thing missing was action.

The puppets weren't all top-notch as I've come to expect with Muppet productions. Miss Piggy should really get rid of that flat-ironed wig and go back to her GMC face. Fozzie needs consistency in his ear placement as well. Gonzo, Kermit and many others looked great throughout. I loved having all of these inclusions.

I felt Robin sounded okay. Let's face it, most of us want him back but no one contains that specific quality or sharp rasp in Jerry Nelson's voice. Scooter was particularly disappointing, but it seemed to improve a bit throughout the special. I still approve of Rudman taking over the role. He has the right spirit of the character and I think he will grow into the roll over time like Steve has done with Kermit - different, but a quality performance of an established character.

This is the first real outing since the Disney push so I think we should let the writers hit a stride. The special did have that Muppet spark for the most part. It did have heart and a lot of Christmas joy that was missing in VMX. Here's my initial breakdown:


Music: A-
Script: C
Humor: B-
Regular Performances: A
Recast Performances: C
Puppet Design: B-
Holiday Joy: A
Muppety Quotient: B

Overall: B-