On Feb. 4, “The Muppet Show,” a 50th anniversary special television event commemorating the release of the original Muppets series, aired on Disney+ and ABC. The 32-minute special guest-starred singer Sabrina Carpenter, and reintroduced many beloved and familiar Muppets faces. Reception for the new special was overwhelmingly positive, with many praising its nostalgic feel and cheerful, kitschy humor. However, for a die-hard Muppets purist like myself, who has loved the original series and films since childhood, I was less than impressed.
I will openly admit that I approached the special in bad faith, already frustrated by previous Disney-produced Muppets content like the 2010s Muppets film duology, and Disney+’s 2023 limited series “Muppets Mayhem.” These installations are part of Disney’s “franchise-ification” of the Muppets, which has turned beloved characters into nothing more than recognizable IPs. While Disney Muppets content has been sparse, with some sort of film or special tossed out every few years to maintain the company’s trademark rights, most of the projects have relied heavily on “nostalgia-baiting,” using familiar and beloved Muppets characters, settings, and tropes to target audience sentimentality, ensuring views and high ratings.
“The Muppet Show” anniversary special was no exception to this rule. The special, which followed the formula of an original “Muppet Show” episode, checked all of the boxes. As all “Muppet Show” episodes do, it opened with Scooter giving the 15-second curtain call to the guest of the week. It had musical numbers that inevitably went wrong, a disastrous daredevil performance by Gonzo, wisecracks made by Statler and Waldorf from their regular box, and Fozzie Bear telling terrible jokes. Miss Piggy vied for the spotlight, and Kermit the Frog saved the show at the last minute with the power of friendship.
However, despite carrying all the earmarks of a “Muppets” episode, the special felt hollow, corporate and formulaic, lacking any of the heart or genuine creativity that made the original series so great. The over-produced music performances, stilted humor, and overall painful unremarkableness were another typical Disney production. Contrary to the sometimes unbelievably lifelike performances from the original “Muppet Show,” the characters in the 50th anniversary special were spiritless and dull. It contained just enough character favorites, callbacks and references to keep viewers distracted from its emptiness. An emptiness, created in part by the absence of original Muppet creatives who first conceived and created The Muppets that we know and love.
The first original Muppets team, led by Muppets founder Jim Henson, created the beloved characters in the early 1960s. Puppet artists and performers alike were not only co-workers but close friends. Most notably, performers like Frank Oz maintained close friendships with Henson. Oz and Henson, who met at a puppetry convention when Oz was only 17, famously played many characters opposite each other like Miss Piggy and Kermit, Fozzie and Kermit and Bert and Ernie from “Sesame Street,” lending their friendship and love for each other to the characters that they played. The relationships and dynamics between Muppets often mirrored the real-life relationships of the puppeteers. The team not only shared a creative vision but also developed the “heart” of The Muppets through the relationships that they forged.
However, after Disney purchased The Muppets in 2004, years after Jim Henson’s untimely death from pneumonia in 1990, Disney has been criticized for not properly honoring The Muppets or Henson’s legacy, most notably by Oz himself, who no longer works with The Muppets. In an interview with The Guardian in 2021, Oz shared that although he would love to continue working with The Muppets that he has not been asked back by Disney since 2007. Oz said of Disney that, “They don’t want me because I won’t follow orders and I won’t do the kind of Muppets they believe in...The soul’s not there. The soul is what makes things grow and be funny.”
In addition to Oz, Steve Whitmire, a close friend and mentee of Henson’s who was asked by the Henson family to take over as Kermit after Henson’s death, was abruptly fired from The Muppets in 2017, with Disney citing “unacceptable business conduct” as their reasoning. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Whitmire shared that he was told his firing was because of “unwanted notes during the short-lived Muppets reboot on ABC and a union disagreement.” Whitmire stated that he had disagreed with a plotline in the reboot where Kermit lied to his nephew Robin about a breakup with Miss Piggy.
Whitmire felt that lying to his nephew was out of character for Kermit and suggested a different approach that he felt was more in line with Henson’s original characterization. He stated, “We have been doing these characters for a long, long time, and we know them better than anybody. I thought I was aiding to keep it on track, and I think a big reason why the show was canceled (after one season last fall) was because that didn’t happen.” However, Whitmire, despite his efforts to stay true to the heart of The Muppets, was replaced by Matt Vogel, a former Sesame Street cast member, who never met or worked with Henson.
It seems that Disney is determined to ignore the suggestions of founding members of The Muppets, creatives who understand the heart and purpose of The Muppets. Instead, they seem content to continue dragging out lifeless IPs every couple of years to keep the nostalgia alive and get views from fans. But since the close relationships between the puppeteers are what created the “soul of the Muppets,” with many of the original creators, including Henson, no longer with us, and surviving members like Oz and Whitmire abandoned or fired by Disney, is “saving” The Muppets even possible? Or, without the original creatives present and involved, is Disney’s new, unimaginative and formulaic approach inevitable?
Oz also stated of Disney, “There’s an inability for corporate America to understand the value of something they bought. They never understood, with us, it’s not just about the puppets, it’s about the performers who love each other and have worked together for many years.” If the 50th anniversary special taught me anything, it’s that Frank Oz is right. Disney doesn’t understand The Muppets. But maybe, nobody else does either, and no matter who you put in the driver’s seat, the “original Muppets soul” can never be recaptured. Over the years, The Muppets have gone from a passion project among friends to a corporately owned franchise that is more concerned with revenue and viewership than staying true to the heart of the project. Without Henson and the other creatives, the idea of what The Muppets were is gone and has been replaced by something else. And maybe, despite all of the nostalgia-baiting, it’s not coming back. Disney can make as many reboots and spin-offs as they would like, but whatever they do and whoever they hire, they may never be able to possess what really made The Muppets unique.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.