Madea Simmons, No. 5 - I Can Do Bad All By Myself (2009)

I’m pleased to say when I am wrong, especially when it means enjoying a movie, and I Can Do Bad All By Myself is far and away the best Tyler Perry movie I have seen!

Going back to Madea Goes to Jail… It’s by no means the worst Perry movie – though I’m not sure which one exactly is – but it sort of represents Perry bottoming out. This is odd, because the individual ingredients of Goes to Jail are themselves decent, but it’s the most artless merging of comedy and drama imaginable. It highlights the fundamental tonal problem with Perry’s work, and it fails more by being an attempt to over-utilize Madea Simmons, Perry’s irascible comic grandmother. It’s against Perry’s personal instincts to do pure comedy, when he mostly loves marrying it with sincere melodrama, and divorcing those distinct personalities so wholly was clearly uncomfortable for him.

Now, about I Can Do Bad All By Myself (or ICDBABM, which sounds like a ballistic missile)… On paper, it seems just as stagnated as Perry’s lesser efforts: Yes another adaptation of one of his plays, following the same formula as always – see Madea’s Family Reunion for perhaps the strongest manifestation of that formula. But apart from a shared name, ICDBABM is actually an original work, made specifically for the cinema – so Perry’s direction is more immediate, more honest, as he finds a way to remain in his formulaic comfort zone, yet still evolve as an artist.


Of greatest interest from my perspective, Perry has learned how to use Madea (and his comedy as a whole) far more elegantly. Madea remains the comic relief, same as always, except now she’s truly a relief. She’s our direct access into today’s isolated dramatics – needed, since audiences come primarily for Madea’s antics, and stay for the heart-warming drama. So jumping right in, one night Madea finds three children downstairs trying to steal her VCR and other Georgia valuables. When asked, these urchins (Kwesi Boakye, Freddy Siglar, Hope Olaidè Wilson) cannot account for their mother – who’s long dead (of a crack addiction, the standard Tragic Past™ of all Perry’s personas) – nor their current grandmother guardian. And it’s nicely efficient, how this gets Madea tied up with needy people who aren’t a part of her ridiculously extended family – Any chance to escape Madea’s relatives, especially the Browns (whom we met in Meet the Browns, then grew sick of in Goes to Jail), is most welcome. (The like-titled play revels in the Browns, so were really dodged a bullet with this one – unfunnier versions of the intermittently funny Madea that they are.)

Once Madea has deposited the three little beasts off at their nearest kin, April (Taraji P. Henson, a singer and Academy Award nominee – for Benjamin Button), she goes on her separate way. This isn’t the end of Madea’s presence, but she’s inadvertently served as master of ceremonies into our main plot.

Saying my peace on Madea, she remains a minor presence, a surrogate mother figure for the children. They briefly work for her, paying off the damages from their botched robbery. And most importantly (as Madea is relief), whenever dramatics in the to-be-discussed main plot become too much, the kids seek Madea’s solace. Thus she gets to run through her regular routine – dispensing foolishly knowing wisdom, arguing with pothead brother Joe (who is played, like Madea, by Perry in full “SNL” mode), otherwise running through low but effective comedy (be it ethnic, fart or stoner). Perry’s comedic instincts have improved dramatically, best exemplified by an extended misrepresentation of the Life of Christ, which anachronizes up all biblical figures, and also somehow Sigfried & Roy and something called “Cedric the Billy Goat” (presumably one of the “Twelve Disciplines”).

Like I said, this is relief, for the home situation Madea has foisted these three random children on is pretty trying. And most amazingly, it’s a genuine drama…not melodrama, drama! Perry has grown beyond his farcically plotted pseudo-realistic grotesqueries, and so April (the kids’ aunt, it must be said) emerges as the most fascinating Perry character I’ve come across.


Structurally, April is the usual Perry heroine, in a go-nowhere relationship with an unmistakable villain, soon romanced by an alarmingly decent man, seeking to fix her life. But it’s all presented with more finesse than usual. April is not a symbolic cipher, awaiting plot convolutions to rescue her from fate; she is a deeply flawed person, whose problems are entirely of her own doing. (It all falls back to that title, I Can Do Bad All By Myself, which – when translated into “white” – can be rendered as I Suck Without Your Help.)

April’s circumstance is presented with respectable efficiency. She sings at the Club Indigo (an easy way for Perry to justify the jazz clubs he’d give us anyway). She is in an affair with married man Randy (Brian White, also of Perry’s Daddy’s Little Girls). She’s regularly drunk. Otherwise, literally all of April’s time is spent asleep in bed, all day long. It’s kind of an over-literal representation of her inner turmoil, but it’s far more elegant than the external struggles we normally get. And with all this, she’s barely prepared to care for her sister’s children – and as circumstances develop, it’s clear April is the only person these kids have, lest they get split up into foster homes.


Against all of April’s woozy protestations, her young charges shall be the catalyst for her turnaround. For now, though, let’s look at Randy – the designated obvious villain paramour. The type is a character-as-plot-device, and Perry has become self-aware enough to whittle away those characteristics which no longer work now the “melo” has been dropped. So Randy isn’t wealthy, isn’t a long-term prospect for April…he’s just an asshole. Minus that soap opera baggage, Randy’s villainy resembles a real world version of domestic terrorism…Perry does well to serve his audience with dramatized familial issues like this.

And while with time we get April’s vengeance, her turnaround abuse and even bathtub torture (incredibly similar to Diary of a Mad Black Woman), it seems Perry’s grown aware of his double-standard regarding inter-gender violence…When April threatens to murder a bathing Randy with her radio, we’re not meant to cheer her liberation, but fear she’s hit rock bottom. It’s a nicely self-critical move on Perry’s part, and he emerges a stronger artist for correcting some of his former problems.


Randy’s counterpart is good man Sandino (Adam Rodriguez). Perry corrects his former faults with this type as well, losing all of the fantasy world perfections he’d formerly wallowed in. Sandino is a refreshingly believable guy, who just happens to be decent. Hell, he doesn’t even conform to Perry’s standard of male beauty…at least, not until he shaves. Then Sandino retains Perry’s beloved perma-stubble, though he still differs from his formers by being unmistakably Hispanic (Columbian, to be specific, but don’t tell Randy) rather than just a light-skinned black guy. Perhaps it’s penance for all the evil Latinas we’ve gotten before – except for the always-vivacious Sofia Vergara (not seen today), who’s never come off poorly.

Knowing Perry’s formula, it’s evident Sandino is destined to fall in love with April, and vice versa…oh, and they’ll get married at the end, because Perry remains resolute in his condemnation of extramarital affairs. For the time being, there’s no evidence of this inevitability, without reference to the greater Perry meta narrative. Rather, Sandino is just a recently-immigrated handyman put up by the church in April’s basement, who takes a liking to her three itinerant minors even when she won’t and –

The church! That deserves some focus. It’s been no secret ever since Perry’s first play (let alone movie) that he’s a devout Christian, and unafraid to depict the faith in his films. I approve of this impulse, even when Perry’s artistry isn’t grand enough to really do it justice. It’s a moral stance which is refreshingly bold, and a major reason for Perry’s guaranteed niche audience. Having said all that, I’ve been surprised at how little faith has played into his films in the interim between Diary and Myself. Oh, there’s still been some chuchiness on hand, but just habitual references, not a dedicated place in the narrative.


…Well, ICDBABM restores the balance, making the church at least as powerful a presence as Madea herself…actually, a far huger entity than she, fat suit and all. As represented by Pastor Brian (Marvin Winans, actual gospel singer), the church is a major part in April’s slow reconstruction. This is a simpler message than the occasional “faith in sassy black women of a specific generation” platitude Perry sometimes delivers, and not as reductive. You might agree with Perry’s basic religiousness, you may not, but this angle certainly serves him well.

There’s not a lot more to say specifically about April’s restoration, for a simple character drama like this one oughtn’t to be heavy on the plot. Rather, I’ll ask you this: Seems like there’s been a decent smattering of singers in the cast, right? And that’s without me even pointing out that Gladys Knight is loitering around! Oh, and Mary J. Blige too – who’s apparently more successful than Whitney Houston, Janet Jackson and Mariah Carey, if Wikipedia is to be believed. Why’s my white ass never heard of her?!


Oh, there’s a reason for all these singers! It’s a part of the patented, FDA-approved Tyler Perry Formula. Only we’ve never seen it before, if we’re only limiting ourselves to the movies, but his plays also double as musicals. Each features a strong eight or so recycled R&B/gospel standards, and ICDBABM follows suit…In fact, to my utmost surprise, this movie is a musical, rare in our days, with every song totally justified within the film (a club performance, a church worship, etc.).

I say, Perry has discovered the way to most efficiently communicate his emotions directly to us. Many of his former works boast that beginning playwright’s best friend, the overlong monologue (which ICDBABM doesn’t boast, but for Madea’s aforementioned Bible tirade, which is acceptable for its jokiness). Perry the movie director now learns this medium’s ropes, and presents emotional change through song instead – it’s a non-verbal technique, and ICDBABM is a fine repository for soulful musical performances even if you’re uninterested in the underlying dramatic/comic framework.


A great deal of the movie’s running time is taken up with songs, which do a good job of eating up minutes that might otherwise be inhabited by inappropriate non sequitur Madea routines. It’s an easy-going approach, and Perry does a good job of letting the performers do their thing. He is not particularly equipped with a visual acumen – between that and a recurring comic side character, Perry really is like the Kevin Smith for middle-aged black women – so Perry is wise to utilize his stage-honed skills with actors instead. Of course, what I’m enjoying most about these latter Perry movies might be just what others dislike about his ouvre – it helps to watch these on a Sunday (as I just did, regardless of whatever day this ends up getting posted on…Saturday), and to be unironically receptive to Perry’s general decency. With prolonged exposure, I’ve learned to accept some of his idiosyncratic deficiencies, for the result is forever interesting.

Then again, even with some renewed vigor, it’s hard to find new things to say about these movies. Either they work for ya, or they don’t; if they do, you’re likely already a fan, and that’s all there is to it.


What’s interesting to me now, on the eve of Madea’s Big Happy Family (can you feel it in the air?) is how this series can be thought of specifically as the Madea Simmons franchise. Even though I’ve spent the majority of my energies examining Madealess dramatics, I’m starting to feel that she defines these movies nonetheless. For Tyler Perry’s filmography is defined by hope, even when 95% of the running time is mired in seemingly insurmountable personal ordeals and other such nonsense. Having Madea as a dichotomous lens through which to view those hardships promises a turnaround. She may seem completely out of place with the dramatic tone – a fat-suited cross-dressing outdated Mammy stereotype trafficking in archaic buffoonery and honking perpetually like a goose doesn’t quite fit in with gritty ghetto dramas – but with greater control over his films, that’s entirely Perry’s point.

With today’s sermon (er, the movie’s message) concerning Job and the nature of suffering under a loving God (love too is featured strongly, in a nicely parallel manner), let’s talk about Good and Evil. It is often said one extreme is best highlighted in contrast to the other. With storytelling in general usually so unable to dramatize goodness, having Madea as the “good” is useful. She’s not simply a drama-free variation on the “evil” dramatics our heroines must overcome; she inhabits a wholly different genre! Her comedy becomes funnier when artfully contrasted with temporary suffering (a hard balance to pull off). Madea, for all her contradictory sins and ignorance and ridiculousness, represents a constant ideal for our transitory protagonists to aspire towards. And now I’m officially reading too much into Tyler Perry movies.


RELATED POSTS:
• No. 1 Diary of a Mad Black Woman (2005)
• No. 2 Madea's Family Reunion (2006)
• No. 3 Meet the Browns (2008)
• No. 4 Madea Goes to Jail (2009)
• No. 6 Madea's Big Happy Family (2011)

Pippi Longstocking, No. 3 - Pippi in the South Seas (1970)

Steeling myself and preparing for the worst, I pop another Pippi Longstocking DVD into the player…

But saints be praised, this one isn’t merely bearable, it’s good, and it has a plot! With conflict! The first Pippi Longstocking film in the series, Pippi Longstocking, could get along without a plot, since it was an introduction (and a slice-of-life). The second, Pippi Goes on Board (or maybe this is the second – it’s confused) had no excuse, though. It was more random than an episode of “Family Guy.” It’s basically the worst thing you’d picture when told of a Swedish public television kid’s show reedited and dubbed for U.S. theatrical distribution. But Pippi in the South Seas, it takes the promise in Astrid Lindgrin’s original Pippi Longstocking and does something with it. This entry is so much more disciplined, narratively, I’m shocked it’s by the same people.

Also, it has pirates.

On top of having a plot (and villains), Pippi in the South Seas is notable for one other thing – emotional resonance. It wholly focuses on the relationship between Pippi Longstocking (Inger Nilsson) and her Papa, Captain Efraim Longstocking (Beppe Wolgers, noted Swedish translator) – a relationship which was entirely missing from Pippi Goes on Board, yet another of its detriments. And in this endlessly feather-light children’s franchise, Pippi and Papa ground things more thoroughly than any halfhearted realism or the “audience surrogate” Settergren siblings.

Things seem at first to be following the standard Pippi rule of randomness, with Pippi floating around in a bed hoisted by her hot air balloon, as Tommy and Annika (Pär Sundberg and Maria Persson) come over to visit, their parents on vacation. But let us not fret, for Pippi is already well underway detailing her family’s piratical pastimes, with talk of a treasure she herself helped bury, once belonging to her grandfather, the dread Pirate Unspellable. Then her bed falls apart.


Pippi promptly finds a message in a bottle, and our story is off! Papa Efraim, as flashbacks reveal, has been kidnapped by evil pirates (unlike his fun-loving self), and is being held in a tall tower until they can extricate info on his buried treasure. Well, no hour and a half of disconnected scenes for this flick, for it’s off to the rescue!

Yup, this is an adventure story, told from a child’s point of view. That means many good things: It takes place in whole new settings, suggesting a rather substantial budget for this government-funded work of Swedish TV. The budget’s clearly not too huge, as evidenced by the cheap and makeshift special effects on display, but that’s part of the charm. It evinces the sort of consistent (yet clearly artificial) fantasy universe I’d hazard inspired the Gene Wilder Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (that is, if that 1971 film had access to the original Swedish TV show, since the actual film wasn’t put out until 1974, apparently). This is another one of South Seas’ triumphs: its magical realism. This was already present in previous Pippis, but removed from Pippi’s tiresome hometown, it seems more apropos, more imaginative, and far, far less crammed full of stifling whimsy. And being away from that hometown is doubly good, since it means most of the series’ regular adults are not to be seen.

There’s something else marvelous about the adventure story framework: Tommy and Annika have no choice now but to cease being ciphers. No longer are they simply anthropomorphized reaction shots; now they have individual personalities. Like in any good three man band, we have Pippi the leader, Tommy the stupid but gung-ho lackey, and Annika the realist who is always getting shot down. That makes her far more interesting than Annika the depressive and angst-ridden Swede.


So off these three children sail, on their balloon-hoisted bed, ready to make the 2,000 mile trek to the South Seas. Logic is not an issue here, in that perfect way of childhood, ‘cause we cannot let it taint the fantasy. Of course, that a bottled message would unerringly reach Pippi in the first place…

(There’s a possibility this whole story is merely make believe, but raising such questions is to disbelieve and misinterpret the childlike intent of the tale.)

Soon enough Pippi’s balloon has run out of air and deposited them on some mountaintop. This is but a minor setback for three imaginative and enterprising youths, for while an adult may see the nearby junkyard wasteland as an isolated hell, Pippi sees it as an opportunity. An opportunity to fashion a rickety steampunk airplane out of boxes, driven by a bicycle pedal. Soon they’re back on their way, flying through the air!


And flying through a volcano!


Meanwhile, Papa is pondering his imprisonment and pirate parrot persecution. We’ll be joining him whenever the movie needs a narrative cutaway. The two villainous pirate captains, Jocke med Kniven (Martin Ljung) and Blod-Svente (Jarl Borssén), continuously trouble Papa about the treasure, to little effect. As villains in a Pippi Longstocking movie, they are none too effective, but unlike the crooks we’ve seen before, they’re at least somewhat of a threat. Considering the past narratives, it’s amazing these filmmakers were comfortable with clear cut bad guys.

But to undercut their threat somewhat, we instantly see the Pirate Captains (What, you think I’m bothering to write out their insane Swedish names each time?) training for defense, all in preparation for than inevitable scourge, Pippi Longstocking (shudder!).

That scourge, meanwhile, has drifted her less-than-sound aircraft onto an isolated island paradise – with lions. Such wildlife shall offer little threat to our prepubescent heroes, as the cats are represented primarily in the form of culled nature doc footage. And while we get several minutes of Pippi’s gang existing in pure “Gilligan” mode, it never feels like an intrusive non sequitur, as in the past films – because the narrative structure of such an adventure tale allows for picaresque episodes. As long as the characters persist, the plot needn’t be airtight.


And just when we’re pondering how they’re gonna get off that island (Pippi has a raft-building book, and is openly considering the Jack Sparrow method), a pirate ship appears in the cove – ah, The Curse of the Black Pearl, I see where you’ve been stealing from! This crazy new set of pirate-neutrals, led by the fearless One-Eyed Oscar (Alfred Schieske), makes berth just as – Pippi et al steal away in their ship. Pippi’s spurious logic, moral relativist that she is, justifies that these random pirates as least have their rowboats. Just as in the equally plagiaristic Muppet Treasure Island, expect this one-off gag to become an extended callback.

The children sail into the sunset, as the movie wholly embraces the childhood fantasy of pirates divorced from their historical realities – not a complaint. It turns out, against all reason, that this film is something of a musical. Okay, sure, we’ve had that “Pippi Longstocking Theme” bellowed at us incessantly for all three pictures so far, usually sung by Pippi herself in full self-narrator mode. Oh, and she (or her redubbed voice) even sings it LOUD, in a way that neither my television’s speaker system nor my ears are happy with.

(“I am Pippi Longstocking. / When you say it fast, it’s funny. / Pippi Pippi Longstocking. / Don’t you love to hear my name?”).

Still, this movie feels the need to add in occasional new songs. What is with this compulsion for children’s films to make pirate movies into musicals?! Hilariously, the dub’s translators don’t seem equipped to respond to this problem; they do rephrase the first few new songs, but after about halfway, we start hearing everything in Swedish. Ah, laziness. I can relate.

Halfway through, and Pippi has reached the port town where her Papa is kept (by unerring inner compass, combined with childlike fantasta-logic). Considering how terrified the Pirate Captains are of Pippi Longstocking (a name which sends a chill up the heartiest spine), I expect the rescue section shan’t take too long. Then it’ll be a Third Act to recover the buried treasure, right?...Right?

In what I’d call South Seas’ greatest misjudgment, the remaining majority of the film shall concern Papa’s rescue, leaving a mere 10 minutes at the end for treasure hunting. It’s the same plot I’d expect, really, but it seems somewhat disproportioned. This means the latter half drags, but then again, I’ve been spoiled with my 62 minute Charlie Chan movies, which would just be ending around now.


Of course, it’s always possible to fill up a nearly interminable amount of minutes with time-honored pirate clichés. One of those clichés, available on a budget, is the pirate tavern. This is where Pippi goes next, seeking info on Papa’s whereabouts. The many, many grown men skip about unerringly, singing a chantey full of the vague “Yo hos” the translators replaced Swedish lyrics with. Then, in regular dialogue, one pirate says something so incomprehensible, it too is left in the original Swedish. And you know, the original movie’s good enough, I could care less how awful the translation is – it’s like Drunken Master!

The Pirate Captains arrive, they of the greatest Pippi-terror known to mankind. Still, somehow they do not recognize this freckled redhead girl with the sideways ponytails – Who else could it be?! And just like when you act scared in front of a pit-bull, their sudden horror when Pippi reveals herself (through song) prompts her to torment all the adult men with a deadly long-sword. Non-graphically, of course, and non-fatally.


Despite her clear mastery over the baddie brigade en masse, Pippi is soon on the run, as it were, in a foot chase filled with wonderful cartoon logic. And still, in all the danger, the three children skip! It’s their main mode of locomotion, an odd and distancing form of glee that’s best left behind in the other Pippi pics.

In all this chaos, Pippi has learned where Papa is – the prison cells (NO! – sarcasm). Thus they break into the central fort, accomplished all Trojan-like within three separate cannons. Then the Pirate Captains consider testing said cannons in anticipation for the final deadly standoff. Thus Pippi & Co. sneak out and hide in a nearby well, taking a hint from the Disneyland ride.

Night falls, and scores of lazy, terrified Scandinavian South Seas pirates sing a song as they fall into sleep. I cannot decipher the lyrics, as it’s in Swedish, but given my familiarity with this nation’s cinema, it most reminds me of the flagellants in Seventh Seal. That’s happy Swedish kid’s entertainment for ya! And as they sleep, the children creep over their prone, grog-deadened Swedish husks, like Woody and the Cheetos in Toy Story 2.

Ultimately Pippi is able to sneak her way into Papa’s tall tower, for the heartfelt reunion. You’d think, considering the story’s internal logic, that she could easily best the Pirate Captains when they then arrive to check in on Papa, and the escape will be affected! You don’t think like Pippi, then. She hides, which is as nonsensical as if Superman did it (she even has Superman’s icy breath, as of this entry, to compliment her superstrength). That rescue shall have to wait for a while, since Papa has an even more important task for Pippi to fulfill first. He’s hungry, and he wants Pippi to sneak him food in his cell. (Papa’s fat, you see.)


When the Pirate Captains discover Papa’s secret food, and learn of their Pippi infestation, they proceed to move him from the tallest tower to the deepest dungeon. Oh, my dear pirate friends, you’ve played right into Pippi’s devious trap!

Or so I think. Here are Pippi, Tommy and Annika loitering funkily upon the beach, tossing rocks. Careful, guys, you’re edging into directionless Pippi Goes on Board territory here! But the gods of plot momentum respond, in the form of another bottled Papa message – Man, those things are more efficient than texting! So now that Pippi knows Papa’s in the dungeon, she shall finally go and freaking rescue him the only way you can in movie climaxes – with explosives!


Making a long and ridiculous story short, now that Pippi’s set her mind to it, Papa’s rescue is as easy as Swedish meatballs. Pausing briefly so that Pippi can go all Donkey Kong and hurl barrels at pirates, she, Papa, and those two somewhat useless other children can all sail off in One-Eyed Oscar’s pilfered pirate vessel.

Now they’re off to retrieve the buried treasure, but so are the Pirate Captains. See, in their final moments of pre-Pippi peace, those masterminds were at long last able to torture the info out of Papa’s corpulent gourd – he’s ticklish, it turns out. So now it’s a race to buried treasure, with…nothing in particular hanging in the balance. Except the good guys deserve the treasure more, apparently, by dint of their being the good guys.

The treasure, by the way, is on another desert island, inside this really interesting multi-colored drug cave which we really should’ve spent more time in.


As Pippi and her two loyal droogs divvy up the loot on the beach, the notorious Pirate Captains near in their ship, actually equating themselves with chickenhawks…Oh – oh my dear. That’s…something the translators ought to have altered (I’d bet it means different things in Sweden).

There is a final conflict concerning possession of the treasure, involving a few more parties than I have the energy to explain right now. Suffice it to say, this is the moment where One-Eye Oscar makes his grand reentry, and a bunch of maroons are there too. It all pans out, of course, with Pippi in possession of the gold, and the baddies now marooned on the island with its unspellable Scandinavian name. Pippi’s left them with her raft-building book, though, and here the translators do manage to work in a good gag of their own: the book’s title is in Swedish, and our English-speaking villains cannot speak Swedish. That’s comeuppance for ya, combined with a funky interpretation of the translation convention!

As the film ends, Pippi and Papa resolve to go their separate ways (again), Pippi to return to her home at Villa Villekulla, everything back to normal. It’s originally a TV show, remember, so there’s decent justification for the snapback.

So, what are my main complaints? It drags a little, and the sound mix on the DVD is overwhelming. That’s not much of a problem, considering Pippi in the South Seas does everything I thought this series should do. A child of a sufficiently low-tech mindset (that is, one who doesn’t need farting CGI Chihuahuas to be happy) could appreciate this, though I’d say it’s a bit outside of my target demographic. Still, on an intellectual level I can see the film’s value – sadly, I lack true nostalgia for this series. And with Astrid Lindgren writing, I’d wager most of the success here not having to do with the production design or Inger Nilsson has to do with her original novel. And that’s a classic of children’s literature – so I’m told.


Related posts:
• No. 1 Pippi Longstocking (1969)
• No. 2 Pippi Goes on Board (1969)
• No. 4 Pippi on the Run (1970)

The Muppets, No. 5 - Muppet Treasure Island (1996)

1996’s Muppet Treasure Island is surely a part of the second movement of Muppet pictures, which started four years before with The Muppet Christmas Carol. The first trio of Muppet movies, heralded under Jim Henson’s tutelage, was expansive, placing a massive cast of Muppet characters in the real world as if they were not puppets. This next set of theatrical releases, guided by Henson’s son Brian, is inward-looking, with a smaller cast of A-list Muppets on obvious sets, utilizing literary properties for their inspiration. So obviously, Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic “Treasure Island” forms the basis for Muppet Treasure Island, just as Charles Dickens was the springboard for…the other one.

The Muppet Christmas Carol showed the potential drawbacks to this new Muppet approach – fewer Muppets in limited roles, the need to marry the anarchic Muppet tone with the often at-odds tone of another artist’s work. This was perhaps the best example of what the Muppets could do as Raiders of the Public Domain. The lone highlighted human, Michael Caine, gives perhaps the best ever non-Mark Hamill performance entirely alongside hand puppets, so good that I never even realized then how odd it must’ve been for that seasoned thespian. Despite largely the same crew behind the scenes – director Brian Henson, writer Jerry Juhl, the usual assortment of unnamed Muppeteers – Muppet Treasure Island is a fairly sorry variation on the same idea. It goes to show how the little changes can make a big difference.

Once again, this film was produced by the Jim Henson Company and distributed by Disney. However, the Disney hand is far more obviously felt at this point – the Muppet movies were always musical comedies with essentially “animated” characters, but they were always more Looney Tune in style and humor. By 1996, Disney was riding high on an unprecedented series of traditionally animated hits (Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King…eh, Pocahontas not so much…), all built around a dependable but increasingly-boring musical theater formula. And Muppet Treasure Island does its damnedest to match that formula as best as the Muppets can – Hell, it even has a Yearning Song!

Considering the psychotic megalomania of Disney around the mid-90s, the Muppets were only one of their attempts to branch out into other realms of children’s entertainment. Consider it: They had cell animation under their belts. There were efforts to corner the stop motion field (The Nightmare Before Christmas), and the upcoming CGI market (Toy Story). The Muppets were their inroad into puppetry. The best of these Disney-distributed projects (anything by Pixar) successfully broke free of the immovable Disney formula; the Muppets here did not. For once, their output wasn’t a rich brew of kid-friendly adult humor; it was just kid-friendly.

Considering the stupid new unwritten rules the Muppets were operating under (zero deaths, lessened anachronistic anarchy, music numbers modeled after Ashman and Menken), we have a strange amalgam of Muppet and Disney, a neither-nor proposition. It feels like the sort of thing that, budget aside, would nowadays find its way to TV or DTV (actually, recent Muppet history bears this out). Anyway, considering these new rules, it’s even a strange idea to use “Treasure Island” as your base, since you kinda have to ignore a lot of the no-longer kid-friendly piratical elements to squeeze it into this lame 90s concept of family entertainment. Why’d they (and Disney in 2002 with Treasure Planet) think this was the book for them?

Don’t get me wrong, “Treasure Island” is a great book, something all non-illiterate boys (that is, not most of the youngest generation I now know) should read at some point growing up. It’s the perfect adventure story, and single-handedly turned pirates into a subgenre. And the plot is eminently recognizable (map to buried treasure – that’s mostly it), so there’s room for Muppets to play. But, come on, hand puppets can do “heartwarming” well enough (see The Muppet Christmas Carol), but swashbuckling action sequences are somewhat less in their comfort zone. And the thing just doesn’t have the sort of melodramatic emotions that benefit a musical.

The opening sequence shows what perhaps could be done by hybridizing Muppets and pirates – Muppirates! A I mass of evil, evil pirates trounces about the titular Treasure Island (not yet so named), burying their ill-got treasure and singing “Shiver My Timbers,” which has just about the most piratical lyrics I’ve ever heard: “Shiver my timbers, shiver my soul/Yo ho ho!” Considering all of the seven or so songs in the film are derived from sea chantey tunage, there’s only so much you can do with this angle, and this one does it best. There are, of course, metric felt-tons of Muppets on hand to sing as well, crabs, gators, monkeys, fleas, totems, skulls, whatever, none of them familiar. There are hardly any A-list Muppets here, odd since they’re not real actors with contracts, and thus just as easy to throw in as the anonymous goat monsters we get. So anyway, this scene boils down to a fun sea chantey, and singing Muppet skulls. Good times.


Here we are at that inn like in Stevenson’s novel, not clearly named here (and I forget what they called it in the book – oh whatever). Drunken pirate scalawag Billy Bones (Billy Connolly, a comedian here not trying to be funny) regales us all with his exposition about the buried treasure at Treasure Island – you know, that’s not so complicated a concept to need so much exposition. Also, Jennifer Saunders is there, as per this film’s scant, scant cameos. Young Jim Hawkins (Kevin Bishop, in his first role, now star of “The Kevin Bishop Show”) is rightly thrilled by this tale of pirates and gold and corpses. Where’s the Muppets?! Ah, here’s some now – Gonzo the Great and Rizzo the Rat (as “themselves”), now officially a comic duo after their unexpected success together in The Muppet Christmas Carol. And here’s the problem with such an adaptation of “Treasure Island”: They have no literary equivalent; they’re just extra characters with no plot function.

They also do not serve the same function as last time, to act as the meta-framing device – a means to up a Muppet movie’s IQ by many dozen points. Sure, the fourth wall gets broken occasionally, but only in the ornamental sense of The Great Muppet Caper and not in the intricate, essential way of The Muppet Movie. ‘Cause, you know, they could be formally inventive, but that’d confuse the kiddies, and Disney don’t want that!

A little wilting comic business later, emphasis on the lame slapstick over the usual sophisticated bad punning, and it’s time for Jim’s Disneyfied Yearning Song™, “Something Better.” This so precisely follows the Disney standard that – Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…

Whoa, pirates!...Well, Muppet pirates, hideous “frog” creatures (I guess, since they’re French) that look like so much disgusting felt under the couches at a kindergarten. The new character designs here look diseased. This is the inciting incident, sending Jim (and Gonzo [and Rizzo]) off on a whirlwind adventure of musical numbers and stilted action. Jim gets the map to Treasure Island from Billy (Connolly), who promptly – dies. Rizzo thinks this shouldn’t be here, though it’s clearly in the book, because, you know, people can’t die in kid’s films. I disagree. I think kids are less innocent than the moral guardians would prefer, and if you don’t give ‘em some death in the right way, they’re just gonna go ahead and watch some Eli Roth movies, and that’s much worse. But I digress.

Uh…Jim seeks a ship, so to go get that there treasure what for himself. The next ten minutes sees the introduction of most A-list Muppets to appear, so let’s go over them. There’s Fozzie Bear as Squire Trelawney, Dr. Bunsen Honeydew as Dr. Livesey, Beaker as whomever, Sam the Eagle as Mr. Samuel Arrow, and Kermit the Frog as Captain Abraham Smollett. Also, Sweetums appears for the first time in about 15 years, which probably meant very little at the time. Also also, Statler and Waldorf are the Hispaniola ship’s bow sprites, just because – look, we gotta squeesze certain Muppets in someplace, setting be damned! And not only are these some random and arbitrary character designations (except for Sam the Eagle, which is why this is the only time he’s had a major role), but it begs further questions. Like this: With the Muppets averaging a movie every four years, and with no regularized TV show since the early 80s, just who would appreciate or even recognize the Statler and Waldorf jokes? It’s like putting Disco Stu in Ancient Greece and calling him Discus Stu, only without the regular series context to make that joke “work.” With this continued Treehouse of Horror approach, I can see why the Muppets are not the most tenacious of film franchises.

More specifically, Kermit’s usage in these films grows increasingly gutless in each entry. He is slowly getting Mickeyfied, becoming a noble and personality-free company mascot who is no longer allowed to have conflict. To only see this movie, you’d never understand how Kermit could reach the cultural plateau he now enjoys; it took my rediscovering the old Muppet movies to realize this myself.


Now, isn’t there a certain character from “Treasure Island,” a certain greatest fictional pirate of all time, without which Muppet Treasure Island could barely call itself a shallow pastiche of a century-old book? Yeah, we’re gonna need a Long John Silver, that rapscallion who did the one leg and parrot thing before it was cool. As per the new Muppet rules, this’ll be the big guest star of the entry, like Michael Caine last time. It’ll be Tim Curry – you know, Dr. Frank N. Furter, the Lord of Darkness, Pennywise the Dancing Clown. That’s one bizarre-ass resume! And compared to Caine’s soulful and film-carrying performance from last time, Curry just hams things up worse than the yet-to-appear Miss Piggy. It’s one thing to deliver an unfiltered mass of “Arr!”-ing pirate clichés, and it’s another thing to do it well (like those other Disney pirate movies from the ‘00s – you know the ones).

Speaking of those unnamed movies, guess who did the soundtrack for this thing? Hans Zimmer. Wow, it’s almost like a real pirate movie!

The Hispaniola is off on an interminable sea voyage. There’s the usual conflict concerning Silver’s character, who might be a good guy (a father figure to Jim), or a bad guy (scheming potential mutiny). You ought to know this, though, since this story ought to be amongst our culture’s best known – it might even be through pure pop cultural osmosis. The Jim and Silver stuff, the real meat of Stevenson’s tale, plays totally independently of the Muppet-based nuttiness. It’s pure melodrama, and played totally straight even though it’s aimed for the rafters. It’s pretty bad.

The Muppet stuff, which is totally independent of Stevenson, largely concerns Rizzo having organized an anachronistic cruise for his drunken rat buddies, a “Caribbean Pi‘rat’e Tour.” If that pun made you cringe, well, it’s about the best joke in this thing. Oh Jerry Juhl, you were once so good at telling bad jokes! And there are songs, naturally, the best way to fill out the streamlined narrative and sketchy humor to feature length. “Sailing for Adventure” is, well, it’s exactly what you’d expect from that title. At some point in here, Dr. Teeth’s Increasingly Anachronistic Mayhem makes a token appearance, to little or no effect. Animal, the greatest and most glorious of all Muppets, gets only one line: “POLITICS!” Actually, that’s the funniest joke in the movie!

The movie drags along, and it seems we’re rather in the doldrums. This is appropriate, since the characters themselves are too, just lying around uselessly on the deck awaiting incident. And where do you turn as a filmmaker when put up against such a stultified wall? Why, straight to Crazy Town, that’s where! All the Muppets go mop mad as a vague Raimi cam settles on them, bursting into the “Cabin Fever” dance number, ship somehow transformed into a Copacabana discotheque. This is the sort of imagination-deprived, desperate non sequitur plea for attention one sees in DTV kid vid flicks, and “VeggieTales.” (They’re vegetables!...That’s the joke!) Now, name a musical genre. Go ahead, name any. It appears in this sequence. Statler and Waldorf make occasional appearances to badmouth the movie they’re in, as is their wont. Sadly, in this particular case, they’re right on the ball (for once).

Back on the actual plot front with Silver: His central trio of hench-Muppets is brigged, then de-brigged, then whatever. Now, there’s a central incident in the book, where Silver straight up murders Mr. Arrow, which is rather essential to the story. But, Billy Connolly aside, we cannot have deaths in this exceptionally infantile version of a young adult story, so…Silver rids the ship of Arrow (Sam the Eagle, remember) by tricking him to row out in a lifeboat. Actually, I can’t wholly badmouth something Bruce Lee did in Enter the Dragon. Still, this is a pretty awkward way to avoid a death that would otherwise surely be in here. Why’d they adapt this novel?! Couldn’t we have had the thirty-thousandth unnecessary adaptation of “Alice in Wonderland” instead?

Doop-de-doo! We finally make it to Treasure Island. This movie is wildly over-plotted (for a Muppet movie), but it all boils down to this: The entire crew turns out to be pirates, intent upon enacting mutiny in order to get their hands on the same treasure they were going to get their hands on anyway. Half of these (Muppet) pirates go with Silver and a captive Jim to the island, while the other stay on the ship to tie up the various A-list Muppets the movie no longer has any use for (Fozzie, Bunsen, Beaker). Kermit, Gonzo and Rizzo, meanwhile, have independently headed inland to rescue Jim from Silver.

The ship goings on barely matter now, but we still have two central plot threads here. The thread that actually conforms to the novel, Silver’s quest for the treasure, follows fairly true to Stevenson’s outline. Only Stevenson never wrote a song titled “Professional Pirate,” which is the sort of thing like “The Pirates That Don’t Do Anything” that struggles to make pirates kid-friendly. ‘Cause, of course, kids love pirates, but adults don’t want ‘em to like pirates qua pirates. Oh, life’s silly little paradoxes.

Meanwhile, Kermit’s trio has quite a non sequitur experience (another one) that has absolutely nothing to do with the novel that is ostensibly being adapted here. It has more to do with an unseemly desire to readapt King Kong with pigs in place of more overtly racist stereotypes. So, in this version, Treasure Island is inhabited by a tribe of cannibalistic pigs, who have frog-, rat- and whatever-napped Kermit, Rizzo and Gonzo in order to eat their delicious felt bodies. That crazy ceremonial dance from King Kong, the one where they were about to sacrifice Fay Wray, is recreated as “Boom Shakalaka,” which is pretty much just the same thing – with Muppets. And along comes a massive cage containing whatever the pig cannibals’ holy beastie is. With great, dramatic emphasis, the cage is opened to reveal:


Miss Piggy! Aaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!

Piggy here plays Benjamina Gunn. Er…okay then. There’s a character in “Treasure Island” named Benjamin Gunn, marooned from the original treasure-burying trek. That’s all well and good, but in a film full of arbitrary Muppet casting, this is easily the most arbitrary. You wanna make a movie where you can (eventually) include the beloved Miss Piggy, you adapt a story with a female character. Still, Treasure Planet making Benjamin a robot called B.E.N. is maybe an even stupider indignity visited upon this poor, unsuspecting fictional character.

As in the original story, Silver is unable to find the treasure as per the treasure map, since Benjamin (er, Benjamina) has snatched it away – that is, if I remember correctly a book I last read in the late 80s. To hell with you, Wikipedia! Whatever the case, this leads Silver to a faceoff against Piggy, one where he ultimately learns of the treasure’s true location. The cannibal pigs have to get involved here, because they’re in this movie, but they can’t have any impact, because they’re awkward additions. I’ll bet someone who hadn’t read Stevenson could ID the bizarre mutant limbs on this thing.

But meanwhile, Jim has escaped Silver’s clutches (and crutches), and freed Gonzo and Rizzo (new characters) from the pigs’ clutches (new characters). They aim to get back to the ship out in the cove, which is made over-simple for them since Sam the Eagle suddenly appears in his lifeboat (original character, but long deceased originally). It ought to be that Jim alone swims out to the ship, and has a harrowing encounter against the nastiest of Silver’s underlings aboard the mast. This is perhaps the highpoint of the novel, and I haven’t seen a single film adaptation that matches it. They don’t even try here, since the Muppets are rather allergic to adventuring, so all those pirates on board are simply scared off – they think Sam is a ghost of himself.

Silver, ever the more obvious villain here than usual, ties up Kermit and Piggy by ropes over a seaside cliff. There’s little room in “Treasure Island” for the usual faux-insipid lovey-dovey lampoonery we’re used to getting when the pig and frog are on screen together, but they try their best anyway. See, apropos of nothing in any other adaptation, Kermit has a romantic past with “Benjamina” (that’s a fan-fickish notion that would be truly wrong in a normal version). Thus they dangle helplessly together, singing the bland romantic duet “Love Led Us Here” while Silver’s pirates go for a treasure hunt in a treasure hut. They’re going for “ironic juxtaposition,” only…ah hell, these things hardly ever work! It’s probably just done here because it’d be too boring to watch a pig and frog sing and dangle motionlessly for three whole minutes otherwise.

Commanding the Hispaniola, “Captain” Jim Hawkins steers directly under pig and frog just in time for them to plummet and be caught by the anthropomorphized bow sprites (which surely wouldn’t be as fatal as hitting the ocean about 10 feet further down). Then the ship runs aground on the beach, just as Silver and his comically inept pirate crew emerge with their treasure. Cue a big swashbuckling sword fight climax – with Muppets! Which makes it kind of awkward and not at all swashbuckling. And somehow, despite the setting and the mass of pointy, pointy swords, the potential for death is avoided at all turns, just like how all the gunplay in the old “G.I. Joe” was similarly nonfatal. Amidst all this insane inanity, Kermit engages Silver to a duel. It’s a really awkward physical matchup, like Stallone versus Lithgow in Cliffhanger, meaning the screen cap below is the only moment where Kermit and Tim Curry convincingly appear on screen together. And then Silver loses, because Kermit is no longer allowed to look bad.


The treasure is now in the hands of the rightful robbers, non-pirates, as the Hispaniola sails off for the sunset. In the original novel, Silver escapes from the brigs to flee with part of the treasure, and is sent on his way by Jim, realizing there is some goodness in this man. Ah hah!, but painting Silver as a morally grey character would be too much for a kiddie flick to do, so we can’t give him an open-ended exit like that! Sure, Jim still lets Silver go, as he always does, only in this one Silver’s lifeboat instantly sinks – he’s the bad guy here.

Now it’s off into the sunset. “Here we go again,” Gonzo says for absolutely no reason. Just as randomly, we plummet into the ocean for the first time in this ocean-themed movie, to see a few aquatic Muppets just as the credits play.

Despite my relative issues with it, Muppet Treasure Island is the second highest-grossing Muppet movie, after the unassailable Muppet Movie. That it could only make $30 million in 1996 dollars indicates just how minor these Muppet movies have always been. That they retain any sort of pop cultural cachet has less to do specifically with their films, and more to do with the overall Muppet impact, through television, theme parks, et cetera. They’re just recognizable (like Mickey, Donald and Goofy), even if most people have never seen them in any real narratives (like Mickey, Donald and Goofy). Their inexplicable continued cinematic presence is evidence of a deeply stagnant production company more than anything innately interesting about them as a narrative property.

The Jim Henson Company could try self-contained puppet-based films, such as Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, but they don’t. Perhaps there’s little call for puppet movies in this day and age; Star Wars suggests it was once a valid movie practice, but the dreaded Prequel Trilogy suggests no longer. Danged audiences today are, sadly, not sophisticated enough to accept the reality of something as blatantly unrealistic as the Muppets. They want themselves some photographically realistic thinguses like those hideous robots from Transformers, even if their animation is the furthest it could be from nuanced. Consider the relative critical love for Fantastic Mr. Fox, versus its box office take.

I surely don’t know what kind of movie could be told entirely with puppets. Maybe it’s not a valid question. But there’s gotta be more to the medium than just Muppets…Of course there’s always Team America – there you go!


Related posts:
• No. 1 The Muppet Movie (1979)
• No. 2 The Great Muppet Caper (1981)
• No. 3 The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)
• No. 4 The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
• No. 6 Muppets From Space (1999)

The Muppets, No. 4 - The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)

It is remarkably sad, even twenty years after the fact, to begin this entry with a consideration of Jim Henson’s death. Henson’s brilliant career and puppet-based company were at their peak when he passed away at the young age of 53 in 1990.

The memorials held for Henson were joyous affairs meant to honor rather than mourn him. At Henson’s own insistence, no black was worn, and all those in attendance animated butterflies overhead. Dixieland music was played, and Big Bird performed a solo. At the finale, the six central Muppet performers appeared onstage, seen for the first time alongside their signature Muppet roles, for a swelling, growing performance of “Just One Person.” LIFE Magazine described the memorial as “an epic and almost unbearably moving event.” Henson’s ashes were scattered in Santa Fe.


I made myself sad.

In light of this, isn’t it appropriate that the inevitable next Muppet movie would be something of a joyous memorial itself? For The Muppet Christmas Carol is the umpteen-hundredth adaptation of Charles Dickens’ seminal “A Christmas Carol,” and so it brings in all of that novel’s debate with mortality, followed by its heartwarming and celebratory finale. There is no obvious moment of Jim Henson navel gazing in the film, which is just as it should be. Rather, simply be contented with an opening title dedicating the film to Jim’s memory, then enjoying the movie on its own merits.

The choice to adapt a beloved and well-known literary classic solves a certain problem that has always dogged the Muppets – What sort of plot could they inhabit? Witness The Great Muppet Caper to see a story that doesn’t quite know how to develop due to Muppet-based diversions. Of course there are new issues to be had with this approach. For the first time ever, the Muppets are not appearing as “themselves,” but as designated roles from the book. The opening credits corroborate this, with the fictional Kermit the Frog “playing” the equally fictional Bob Cratchit, for example. This isn’t necessarily unusual – Mickey’s Christmas Carol found the same role for its titular mouse. Still, for those of you used to Kermit’s cinematic omnipresence, it’s odd to witness a Muppet movie where he has only three or so big scenes.

The central figure of “A Christmas Carol” is and has always been Ebenezer Scrooge, that miserly skinflint bah-humbuggist long overdue for the most exciting Christmas Eve ever outside of Die Hard. In The Muppet Christmas Carol, this all-important role is not covered by some Muppet or another, but by our human guest star – Michael Caine. This is the only name that will get bolded this time, as they’ve now clearly dropped the celebrity cameo thing entirely. Considering how hard it can become to squeeze in uncooperative celebrities time and again, this is probably a wise move – and it now somehow makes the fleeting Muppet sightings cameos in themselves. There are still a few other humans in the cast (though none are famous). Almost all of them are Scrooge’s relatives, and the one that isn’t is Scrooge’s love interest. See, they’ve also avoided that ever-icky human/Muppet pairing issue that plagued poor Charles Grodin. So humans only appear in this movie when their relationship to Scrooge necessitates it; otherwise, this thing is as Muppet-infested as we would wish.

So far, I’ve recounted the ways in which The Muppet Christmas Carol separates itself from its predecessors – recognizable literary plot, major switch up of the human element. Now let’s see how it honors past Muppet tradition. First, and most obviously, it is a musical – they’ve never really dropped this element, though the setting here demands music a little more classical and/or Christmassy in its nature. Of far greater interest, though, it that the fourth wall takes another serious beating for the team, after sitting off on the sidelines for the entirety of The Muppets Take Manhattan. The specific nature of this film’s fourth wall breaking will be seen later, but suffice it to say this is a return to Muppet form, without ever being nearly as head-exploding as the masterful Muppet Movie.

One reason for this glorious resurgence of meta-narrative nuttiness is the return as screenwriter of the Muppets’ greatest unsung asset – Jerry Juhl, humorist and “Muppet Show” writer extraordinaire, last seen lending The Muppet Movie a similar touch. Considering the dropping quality of Muppet writers over the last three entries, it seems a conscious return-to-form to bring Juhl back now, a move on the part of the Jim Henson Company to do their departed founder proud in their first post-death production.

Another sign of this devotion is evident in the picture’s director: Brian Henson. That’s right, Jim’s son, in his directorial debut. If anyone would approach a Muppet project with the proper respect, knowledge and passion, this would be the guy. And say what you will of Brian’s skills (he proves adequate for the role, and may actually be more cinematically gifted than Jim Henson or Frank Oz), I’d far rather have an untested Henson on board than some anonymous studio journeyman. That he seems up to the job is just the icing on the cake.


We descend on an obviously stage-bound, production-designed Olde London of the 19th century, covered in snow and soot – and Muppets. The Great Gonzo (that nebulous blue “whatever” of the Muppet lineup) turns and greets us directly, so – take that, fourth wall, a mere minute or so in! It turns out Gonzo “is” Charles Dickens, here to narrate his own story whilst interacting with it (somewhat). Rizzo the Rat is besides Gonzo, playing “himself” (no other Muppet here does this), immediately bringing into question the fourth wall-breaking Gonzo has employed. Yup, this is a Juhl screenplay! They debate the many layers this movie shall employ – classic literary story, told by felt monsters, narrated to us by the original “author,” himself played by another felt monster, while Rizzo is aware of all these layers. It’s not as vortex-inducing as The Muppet Movie, because it never questions the movieness of it all (merely the bookishness of it), but it certainly presents a nice precedent.

At the behest of Gonzo’s narration, here comes Ebenezer Scrooge himself. A song is sung (“Scrooge”) by various anonymous Muppets I’ve never seen before, outlining Scrooge’s frugal, miserly scroogishess. And here’s the thing about adapting a known work – For as familiar as this story is, there’s still plenty of plot exposition to get across, far more than the Muppets have ever had to deal with before. Much of this is done in song, because a) it’s fun, and b) it satisfies the higher generic needs of a movie musical. Whatever isn’t done in song is done, naturally enough, by the Great Gonzo himself, who really is the premiere Muppet of this entry (it helps that Dave Goelz was always Gonzo’s main man, while the Henson hoard like Kermit are somewhat shunted in the absence of their creator). Now, a lot of Gonzo’s dialogue is directly from the Dickens novel – I cannot say this in certainty, having not bothered to read that book (too busy reading the entire Internet), but this is dialogue no one would have originally written in 1992. And much of it is familiar from so many other “Christmas Carol” adaptations – but with the usual Muppetty jocularity to throw in a new spin. So it goes.

Humbug!

Scrooge oversees his dreary office environment, modern drab fluorescent exchanged for Victorian drab oil lamps. He barks harsh orders at top clerk Bob Cratchit (Kermit the Frog) and his assortment of rat Muppet henchmen. And as far as Scrooges go, Michael Caine’s interpretation is far from the nastiest – the Muppets will not allow true vileness, nor is Caine able to totally hide the good man we all know him to be. This is one Scrooge who convinces far more when he reaches the “good” side of his arc later on. And here is Scrooge’s nephew Fred (Steven Mackintosh, a human actor), present to offer the pro-Christmas sentiments to Scrooge’s negative bah-humbuggery. And in come, as per the novel, two charity collectors. Let’s see, which Muppets shall they be? Oh…let’s make them…Bunsen and Beaker! Sure, why not? “Meep!”

Ultimately, Scrooge quits the dusty confines of his office for the dusty confines of his home. Scrooge gone, Kermit and the assortment of clerical rats perform a rather disposable little tune, “One More Sleep ‘Til Christmas,” hurling themselves about to provide the requisite visual interest. Ah, Christmas movies. Here’s a sort of subgenre I have little real understanding of. Seen during the right season (around Christmastime), they can have a nice, heartwarming glow. Seen at any other time of year (such as now, inexplicably in July), it all just seems arbitrary. Of course Christmas as we know it is arbitrary, a strange evolution of long-forgotten cultural movements – The Dickster’s own “Christmas Carol” is probably largely responsible to the holiday’s current form, really. So…it makes sense to do this sort of stuff in a Dickens adaptation, but it does sort of make this Muppet movie seem conceptually more marginalized than the others. (I could watch The Muppet Movie any day of the year to the same effect.)

Humbug!

Gonzo (with Rizzo) trails Scrooge to his lair, regaling us with tale of Scrooge’s deceased business partners, Jacob and Robert Marley. Heh heh, oblique Rastafarian references! (Indeed, Robert is an invention of the movie – a chance to justify the perpetual Muppet duo of Statler and Waldorf appearance as the Marleys’ ghosts.) And indeed, here are Statler and Waldorf, those perpetually unimpressable movie critics, haunting Scrooge with a singing of “Marley and Marley.” This is one of those expositional songs, telling Scrooge of their current purgatorial enshacklement as a result of their Madoffian misdeeds in life. (You don’t drown orphans without some sort of kick in the ass from karma.) Scrooge himself is to be shown the error of his ways tonight, in the form of three spirits who – Okay, we all ought to know this tale, right? The unique focus here should be on Muppets, so here are some:


(Pardon the poorness of these screen caps – I took ‘em from YouTube.)

“A Christmas Carol” is, lest we forget, full of ghostly goodness. Indeed, parts of it would make for a danged good Halloween movie too. Rizzo, aware of this, questions whether this is too scary for kids. Gonzo assure him (and us) that it builds character, just like other kids’ films such as Pan’s Labyrinth or…Labyrinth.

The clock strikes one, and the first spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Past, descends upon poor Scrooge. Originally, they’d plotted to use three famous Muppets for the three spirits, until they realized a spectral Miss Piggy would somewhat derail the tone of the film – dramatically, Scrooge’s story is totally separate from the joyous Muppet nuttiness at the sidelines. Hence, meet the first of three new Muppets, rather visually distinct from the familiar floor mops we all know and love. This Ghost takes Scrooge up and, in the best special effects a moderately budgeted film from 1992 can muster, takes him (and Gonzo [and Rizzo]) on a wild flight over the forests into Scrooge’s past. Cue much slapstick for the rat – Oh, by the way, Gonzo and Rizzo themselves remains perpetually invisible throughout the entire movie, just as Scrooge himself is in his three ghostly journeys. Not only does this make meta sense, but it actually informs a theme from the original book. Well done, Brian or Juhl or whomever was responsible.

Scrooge bears witness to his childhood, the younger Scrooge himself pooh-poohing Christmas with the best of ‘em (is Scrooge a Jew?). Let us not dwell on this, nor Sam the Eagle’s cameo as Scrooge’s headmaster. Let us move on through the years to Scrooge’s old employer – Fozzie Bear as Foziwig (Feziwig in the original book, a joke so obvious, I suspect it’s where the idea for this movie came from). This is a party at Foziwig’s Rubber Chicken Factory (ha!), headlined by a 19th century version of Dr. Teeth and co. (and ANIMAL!). This party’s the chance to squeeze in all those other Muppets they couldn’t fit in elsewhere, such as Rowlf, and the Swedish Chef, and, like, some anthropomorphized vegetables. This is perhaps the sacrifice you make when squeezing your cast into unrelated roles, like a proto, feature-length “Simpsons” Treehouse of Horror.

Humbug!

Ah, but this is Scrooge’s story! This is when younger Scrooge nearly found love, with a belle named Belle (Meredith Braun, human). They head out together into the snow, in an entirely Muppet free scene, where Belle sings a song lamenting Scrooge’s inability to love – “When Love is Gone.” The current Scrooge, Caine variety, sings unseen behind her – this is a nice sort of musical movie touch, having all to do with transforming Dickens’ story into a musical (Muppets notwithstanding). And the movie’s serious dramatic heart, be it Brian Henson’s or Charles Dickens’, becomes obvious in these moments, with Michael Caine believably expressing woe at what he sees.

A nice, cut-free transition sees Scrooge back in his darkened bedchamber. Shortly after a little more Gonzo narration, the Ghost of Christmas Present Muppet makes his presence known – his massive, ebullient, genial presence. They cannot let this moment pass without a song (this movie is song happy, even for a Muppet production), so the new Ghost warbles “It Feels Like Christmas.” Again, July ain’t the time to be watching this stuff.


The tour of Christmas Present is done rather more economically than the Past – they got a running time to squeeze in under, remember. First is a quick visit to Fred’s Christmas party, which is largely Muppetless, save for a few literally monstrous Muppets collecting dust bunnies on the furniture. More, more importantly, we must go to Bob Cratchit’s house. Here we meet Emily Cratchit (Miss Piggy – about time she shows up!), along with the story’s central heart, Tiny Tim (Robin the Frog, that miniature, cloying Kermit). There are also two lesser Piggys, Betina and Belinda, because I suspect they were characters in the book. With Scrooge peering in through the window like a common Gonzo, Robin expands upon an overplayed sentiment from Dickens’ novel and sings “Bless Us All.” This is the sort of warm, gauze-filtered family moment I’d expect to see on the Hallmark Channel, and – weren’t the Muppets about anarchy at some point? It’d be like stopping a Marx Brothers movie for insipid love songs – wait.

Anyway, you know the gist of this scene. Scrooge feels the warmth of family for the first time ever, saccharine little Tiny Tim (or Robin, as I’m playing fairly loose with my designations here) coughs and wheezes over his crutch, and the Ghost of Christmas Present predicts a short, painful, Victorian-era life for the lad. Scrooge pleas for no more.

Humbug!

Before a church, Scrooge meets the Grim Reaper’s lazy brother-in-law, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Gonzo and Rizzo are too terrified for this, so they bail on us until the finale. Uttering not a word, the Ghost leads Scrooge through a particularly deadly Christmas day: Robin (er, Tiny Tim) has died, naturally, his passing commemorated by an unused crutch by the fireplace (something almost exactly like Dickens’ words). A certain unidentified miser has also perished, to absolutely no concern of anyone else. The Ghost shows Scrooge to the cemetery, to learn the name of this unloved old man. We know this one – it’s Scrooge himself. (And you know, there’s entirely zero humor in this final act.)


In the movie’s climax, Scrooge turns to the Ghost to plead his case, himself nearly broken. It is a major point in this movie’s favor that it foregoes the special effects extravaganza that could be undertaken here; instead, it peaks with Scrooge’s laments of existentialism. In even a lesser performance from Michael Caine, I am rather wholly sold by this.

It feels somewhat fruitless to over-elaborate upon the plot developments of something like “A Christmas Carol.” We know how this ends. Scrooge awakes, finds it is Christmas day (the standard exchange takes place with Bean Bunny, with no variation on the classic dialogue), and goes about town in his pajamas spreading goodwill and cheer and turkey to all. By the particular stylistic quirks of Muppet movies, this is a musical number, “Thankful Heart,” a cast-wide show-stopper utilizing the largest sets and the most Muppets. How many ways are there to say the final 10 minutes simply aim for “heartwarming?” Well, it does. Gonzo is back, as he promised, narrating Dickens’ final verbiage word-for-word. (“And Scrooge was better than his word…”) The movie actually ends in Kermit’s (er, Cratchit’s) home, with a second song sending us off: “The Love We’ve Found.” Here’s the final image:


Humbug!

The Muppet Christmas Carol was distributed by the Walt Disney Studio (or whatever exactly they’re called), naturally enough right around Christmastime. It was not hugely successful, as somehow no Muppet movie ever has been, but it did…well enough. Of course, Disney intentionally undersold this movie so as to not take business away from their own Aladdin – God forbid studios ever tire of their petty schvanshtucker-measuring contests. At least the movie was still entirely produced by the Jim Henson Company – Disney wouldn’t go and buy them out until 2004, long after the artistic vitality had been sapped from the studio (eh, either one).

Despite its merely moderate triumphs, The Muppet Christmas Carol has aged into…eh, a sort of moderate modern Christmas classic…I think. The world surely doesn’t need another “Christmas Carol” adaptation, nor less another released by Disney (eh, Zemeckis?), so The Muppet Christmas Carol only satisfies a new need if you really need your “Christmas Carol” goodness spiced up with Muppets. It’s one of those remarkably niche options, like a tangerine pizza or something, which might take “ok” to those who really want it (I’ve never eaten a tangerine pizza), but’s just sorta “weird” otherwise. It ain’t bad (the Muppets, anyway, as again I cannot comment on the stupid pizza metaphor), but it’s not really called for. But still, if the Muppets are going to somehow continue sputtering on as a halfhearted franchise of sorts, at least the literary pedigree suggests new routes they could go in.


Related posts:
• No. 1 The Muppet Movie (1979)
• No. 2 The Great Muppet Caper (1981)
• No. 4 The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
• No. 5 Muppet Treasure Island (1996)
• No. 6 Muppets From Space (1999)

The Muppets, No. 3 - The Muppets Take Manhattan (1984)

The Muppets Take Manhattan? What a misleading title! The Muppets don’t even get to Manhattan until two thirds of the way through the movie, and once there, they hardly kill anyone!

Hold up. I’m being informed I watched the wrong movie. That actually makes a lot of sense. I mean, that one guy sorta looked like a Muppet once he removed his hockey mask, but otherwise – bupkis!

Okay, let’s get the right poster up there…


Ah, there we are!

Anyway, The Muppets Take Manhattan, it turns out, is an appropriate title. More appropriately, it should be The Muppets Take Broadway, for that is the primary dramatic focus of the film (quite, quite unlike Charlie Chan on Broadway, curse that movie to hell). Considering the Muppet movies so far have held an extreme fondness for old ‘30s musicals, and thus a nostalgic view of Broadway itself, it makes sense for them to directly embrace the Broadway musical genre, rather than to apply it to nonsensical subject matter like heist movie pastiches. And considering the Muppets are best known as self-conscious, fourth wall-breaking celebrities, it makes further sense to place them back into a show business storyline, even if the series by now has completely abandoned the meta narratives that I think are the best thing about the Muppets.

By 1984, Jim Henson himself, mastermind and founder of the massive Muppet menagerie, was feeling his oats, as it were. He was experiencing unprecedented Hollywood success, both with his theatrical Muppet motion pictures, and with a greater expanse into television – further to culminate in “Fraggle Rock,” “The Storyteller,” “The Jim Henson Hour,” and, er, eventually, and somewhat lamentably (post death) “Dinosaurs.”

With this newfound freedom, Jim Henson the artist wished to expand his creative realm, exploring more mature venues. Following his moderately successful directorial premiere, The Great Muppet Caper, Henson went on to create the puppet-based fantasy film The Dark Crystal, itself a precursor to the Bowie-based bildungsroman Labyrinth. As such, the Muppets were somewhat behind him, even if they remained his company’s spokes-things and brightest stars.

Thus, the Muppets would continue, but with Henson in a reduced creative role. Sure, he would continue to voice roughly 40% of the beasts, and executive produce (I cannot say if he was any longer the literal puppet master, though). But a direct creative role, like director, was out of the question. That role would go to Henson’s bestest buddy ever, Frank Oz, himself at a career peak following his triumphant performance as Master Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back. So The Muppets Take Manhattan is Oz’s first directorial effort, the first in a line of silly and disposable comedies (the Little Shop of Horrors remake, the Dirty Rotten Scoundrels remake, the Stepford Wives remake, Bowfinger).

They don’t waste any time getting us to Manhattan – Oh look, there it is! (Use your imagination; I ain’t uploading a picture of it.) Having now effectively teased us, the helicopter shot now travels out into the countryside, all the way to Danhurst College – some East coast campus or other. Onstage performing a song and dance number are all the Muppets we recognize from the earlier films, together already and ready to entertain. There is Kermit, Fozzie, the Great Gonzo (and his distasteful chicken significant other, Camilla), Rowlf, Scooter, Dr. Teeth and his increasingly anachronistic acid rock band (and Animal!), and…whomever else I’m forgetting. And also Miss Piggy, lest I incur her terrible wrath through omission, now sporting a frizzy '80s haircut that rather reminds me of Kate Capshaw. Considering the degree of in-jokery amongst the Muppets, I wouldn’t be surprised if this were intentional.


Holy schnikeys! I just realized there is a whole Muppet Wiki!

Anyway, the Muppets are performing in a musical play by one Kermit Frog, the generically-titled “Manhattan Melody” – I’d be surprised if this weren’t a real musical at some point, only…“The Broadway Melody” is a real thing – a freakish little detour in Singin’ in the Rain. Our hoofin’ Muppet mob warbles “Together Again,” the first of this film’s many songs. Oh yeah, you forgot?, these Muppet things are musicals. No exceptions! The college audience applauds, hugely receptive, prompting the Muppets as a whole to take their production to Broadway and Make It In the Big City. And then, because a Muppet movie isn’t complete without something questionable on display, Animal sexually harasses the female coeds in attendance. But it’s okay, because it’s Animal…and, you know, he’s the drummer.

The Muppets quickly make their way to New York’s greatest attraction – the train terminal. Here they set up residence, living inside those rental lockers terrorists like to put bombs in.

But we’re in New York, no time to dilly-dally! It’s off to see Broadway producer Martin Price – our first celebrity cameo (as the cinematic Muppets are founded upon celebrity cameos), Dabney Coleman!...Wait, who? According to Wikipedia, he’s an “American actor.” Investigating further…yeah, that’s pretty much it. They’re a long way from the astounding parade of fame in The Muppet Movie. Kermit pitches “The Manhattan Melody,” which appears to be a perfect parallel of the Muppets’ own developing story in Manhattan – out-of-towners come in, make it big on Broadway by producing a musical about making it big on Broadway. It’s like when you have two mirrors look at each other, only this is self-contained within the picture – In fact, quite unlike the astounding Muppet Movie, or even the not-so-great Great Muppet Caper, the fourth wall is never broken in this entry. I am very surprised by this. It sort of reduces a lot of what the Muppets are capable of – they’re now just lightly comic. It’s weird to get invested in this film as a drama when you’re already aware of all the framing devices and discontinuity that preceded it.

Oh well, Price turns out to be a con man, a flimflam artist, a grafter, a crook – as pointed out by a human female who is definitely not a guest cameo. Price, now revealed as Murray Plotski, takes Gonzo’s phallic nose hostage, prompting the Animal to viciously maul him (Plotski). Imagine all those “actor vs. rubber snake/octopus/giant leech” moments in awful old ‘50s B-movies (Bride of the Monster, etc.), only with Muppets. But it’s Animal, and therefore unassailable.

It’s back to square one for our massive Muppet mob. They attempt to sell their show throughout Broadway, told to us in the form of a song and montage: “You Can’t Take No For an Answer.” When this production is over, with all its ‘30s-style cinematic techniques (walking in front of signs), the Muppets are again back at square one. They’ve had to ignore their own advice, and take no for an answer at every turn.

Down to the last of their measly, minimal Muppet money, the monstrous menagerie attempts to dine at Pete’s Diner – assuredly the only “Pete’s Diner” in New York City. Here is Pete (Louis Zorich, who’s merely an actor in a major role, and by no means a celebrity). Here is also Pete’s daughter Jenny (Juliana Donald, again a mere actress, as her role here is her most famous role ever – though as an “almost cameo,” she does kinda look like Margot Kidder). While Kermit gets along famously with the non-famous Jenny, the rest of the Muppets contemplate deserting the frog to go out on their own. And Piggy becomes jealous that Kermit would develop a friendship with another female, because Piggy is an assembly of all the worst female traits possible.

At this stage the Muppets do indeed separate, which is something of a reversal of the other films’ structure. In them, The Muppet Movie specifically, the narrative concerns slowly amassing one Muppet after another. This one just gets rid of ‘em, then largely focuses almost solely on Kermit for the rest of the film (with a little bit of the pig). Bu there’s a few things going on here…and it’s been one whole paragraph since the last musical number, so – Musical number! “Saying Goodbye,” if you can believe that obvious title. (It’s really easy to determine the titles of all these forgettable Muppet songs, since it’s almost always the first lyric sung.) So anyway, now it’s only Kermit.

At a loss, the frog asks Pete for a job at the diner. I hadn’t mentioned it, but Rizzo the Rat (a Muppet) was already working here as a waiter. And since we gotta have some muppetry on display, Rizzo soon brings along his extended rat family to accompany Kermit – they will act as waiters, while Kermit mans (er, frogs) the kitchen. Thus human Jenny is on hand to advise Kermit on his continued pursuit of Broadway glory. And since she’s training to enter Fashion Design College, there are certain ways in which she can help…

Such as dressing Kermit in drag and sending him to the Winesop Theatrical Agency to act the tiresome show business self-promoter as he passes by Frances Bergen to drop his script off at Winesop himself, John Landis. Considering Frank Oz serves as a regular cameo in Landis’ films (such as The Blues Brothers), this is just returning the favor – hence it’s a rather underwhelming cameo by Muppet standards.

Kermit meets Jenny at the plaza to discuss his woes. Miss Piggy has decided to pass her time frog stalking, so she sees Kermit with Jenny and herself grows green – with envy. Also, several construction workers hoot offensively at Piggy, not so much because Piggy’s “hot” (they don’t insist upon that notion here), but because construction workers are sick, sick bastards.

Her stalking break over, Piggy returns to the department store where she works the makeup department with Joan Rivers. Now this is an actual celebrity cameo, with a known and humorous (psychotic) person, so the movie stops for a lengthy gag routine. This rather reminds me of the celebrity sketches from the variety “Muppet Show” more than anything specific from the films – even the similar celebrity sketches from The Muppet Movie.

It’s been quite a few paragraphs since a song, so here’s “Something’s Cooking.” It seems Pete’s customers have been complaining about filthy rats serving the food, so they are now at work in the kitchen, performing a percussive, lyric-free bit of bebop as they also somehow anticipate the entire plot of Ratatouille by some 22 years. And yeah, this gag-happy moment is what Ratatouille would have been like had it been non-Pixar – that is, adequate, but decidedly lesser.

Rat-a-tat rattiness over, Jenny arrives to deliver Kermit some distracting letters. What, you thought the plot was gonna progress? You don’t know these Muppet movies too well, do you? Nope. The first letter (of many) is from Scooter, who tells a tale of Cleveland. We flash (back?) for an extended scene of Scooter working in his new job at the movie theater – behold brief roles for the Swedish Chef and Lew Zealand. This moment is entirely independent from the rest of the movie, a true sketch routine writ large. Indeed, a massive amount of this movie is made up of the Muppets’ various letters (from a variety of great American cities and also Pittsburg) – a chance to just do like “The Muppet Show,” and avoid the plot-based purgatory of something like The Great Muppet Caper.

The next letter is from Dr. Teeth, from the aforementioned Pittsburg. He and his troupe are playing their latest musical gig – at an Oktoberfest. Cue Germanic oompa tunage. And Animal!

Fozzie’s letter comes from Maine, where he has taken up actual hibernation with real bears. Well, at first it looked to me like a cave full of real bears (which would be really funny), except it turns out Henson wanted to make a bunch of generic bear Muppets for the hell of it. That rather kills the joke, which has always been about how strangely out-of-place the Muppets are in the real world.

More letters shall come later. For now, it’s back to the “plot,” as it is, as Kermit enacts a “whisper campaign” to drum up enthusiasm for his play at all the hoi polloi restaurants. Wearing another of Jenny’s costumes, Kermit the pimp parades his frog self before the dinner patrons, as Rizzo’s rat retinue sing his frogly praise. And here, for no reason, is Liza Minnelli. And much like the John Landis-based cross-dressing bit earlier, nothing really comes of this attempt. It’s just another sketch, but following the film’s central Broadway theme.

Kermit and Jenny go for a walk in the park (you gotta squeeze Central Park into your New York movie somehow), as Missy Piggy continues her stalking from the bushes. That ain’t creepy. Then some punk (played by non-cameo) snatches Piggy’s purse, incurring her deadly pig rage. The midget inside the Piggy costume chases this punk down on foot, and just barely avoids going all Charles Bronson on the poor peon. This accomplishes pig’s reunion with frog, and a random cameo from Gregory Hines – you may not recognize the name, but you’d know him when you see him.

Pig and frog go for a romantic carriage ride together. As this movie really is rather founded on randomness, Miss Piggy randomly starts to hypothesize what life would have been like had she and Kermit been babies together…Uh oh, I don’t like the sound of that…It sounds like “Muppet Babies.”…It is! Nooooooo! And this is where that strangest of all media spinoffs got its start, as a random throwaway Piggy hallucination (fairly common for her, actually). And not only is this an excuse to showcase the new, real life Baby Muppets Henson decided his shop should make, but it’s also a musical number. Of course. Too bad that music, “I’m Always Gonna Be Loving You,” in no way compliments the baby-based antics on screen. It’s a weird piano and rumba tune, like something they wrote and had to squeeze in somewhere, with repeated references to neurosurgery. Strangeness. And when this mescaline-induced terror is over, we return to Miss Piggy in the park, where she has indeed reverted to infantile behavior.


Back at the diner, Rizzo hits on Brooke Shields. Good for him. Kermits gets his second batch of distracting letters, the first one from Gonzo. He is performing at some fifth-rate Sea World knockoff in Michigan, a stunt show that is a chance for violent slapstick and a poultry reference to Rossini (“William Tell”).

Rowlf’s letter finds him working a dog kennel – questioning just about every permutation of “animal” in the Muppet multiverse. He himself is a dog, but he’s an employee, boarding other dogs who are also Muppets, but also real dogs too. Someone drops off his shar pei, and if I could tell who he was (or find him on IMDb), I could say if this was a genuine cameo.

The next letter is from Bernard Crawford – wait, he ain’t no Muppet! Nope, he’s the plot! See, he’s a big Broadway producer eager to finance the frog’s musical. Kermit reports to Crawford’s office and – Oh wait, false alarm. It wasn’t Bernard who wanted Kermit, but his son Ronnie (Lonny Price, who is now a genuine Broadway-based cameo due to more recent Broadway success – good for him). But here is Bernard (Art Carney), willing to float the bill for Ronnie’s first production. The Muppets are gonna be on Broadway!

Kermit excitedly telephones Miss Piggy at Pete’s with the good news. Then he goes right ahead and gets his frog butt run over by a taxi! I’m serious.

A montage shows Piggy amassing all the other Muppets from their various out-of-state locations for the big, climactic production of “The Manhattan Melody.”

Meanwhile, Kermit’s doctor Linda Lavin checks him out at the hospital, diagnosing him with frog amnesia. It’s funny, to see a doc examine this Muppet’s flimsy felt form as though it were a real body – this is what the Muppets are all about. Kermit is sent out into the city on his unescorted, amnesiac way, under the exciting new name of “Phil.” He quickly has a run in with a trio of bluish frogs at Mad Ave Advertizing. Their names are Gil, Bill and Jill (the start of a very amusing series of awful puns), so “Phil” is a natural fit here. So yeah, with 20 minutes remaining, Kermit has suddenly lost his memory and taken up with a gang of amphibians to advertize soap. There is a reasonable amount of randomness in this movie.

The Muppets, sans Kermit, make preparations for their production anyway. Cue Statler and Waldorf criticizing the concept of Muppets on Broadway – Hmm, is this a travesty the Disney Company has actually thought of yet? To drum up excitement, Gonzo greets The Honorable Edward I. Koch – I thought someone looked like him in The Great Muppet Caper, and now I get the real thing! And of course the Mayor of New York City had nothing better to do than cameo in silly movies, just like our current Governor of California.

It’s opening night, and still no Kermit. The Muppets mope mournfully at Pete’s when, out of the convenient blue, “Phil” et al just up and decide to eat here. The Muppets recognize Kermit, but he cannot identify the Muppets (come on, man, they’re celebrities). Thus, to the astonishment of the ad frogs, they frognap Kermit anyway.

Well, that late Third Act complication is (mostly) resolved now, so it’s onwards to the theater! Backstage, Fozzie tells a bad koala joke (“Wakka wakka!”), while Miss Piggy expresses her undying pig love for Kermit. Kermit, sans memory, is for once astounded at the strangeness of a pig-frog pairing, and issues several puns to this point. It’s clear he truly doesn’t remember Piggy, for if he did, he’d know such statements are just an invitation for pig violence – Miss Piggy pummels Kermit viciously, which naturally restores his memory. Just remember that one, all you medical practitioners – a hard blow to the head resolves all psychological problems!

With Kermit back, the Muppets proceed to sing the musical’s grand opening number, “Right Where We Belong,” without even bothering to take to the stage first. But finally they make it on stage, doing a nice ‘30s tap number, in their canes and top hats and whatever else Fred Astaire would wear. And all throughout this movie, Kermit has been distressed by a certain glaring defect in his musical; now he knows the solution – it needs more bears and frogs and whatever! So all those random extra Muppet bears and frogs and whatever (and rats) they’ve thrown at us throughout the movie make their big appearance on stage, because when I’m in the audience for a stage production, I really want to be assaulted by a dozen bears. But of course this audience loves it.

The Muppets segue into their next big number, “Somebody’s Getting Married.” That “somebody” happens to be pig and frog. In a way, these Muppet movies have all been leading up to the climactic marriage of Kermit and Miss Piggy. Under the name of matrimony, the pig/frog couple will no longer be living in sin. The actual wedding ceremony is a Gene Kelly-esque tangent, something that could never possibly be performed on a real stage as we see it here. So instead just imagine a fantastical wedding chapel scene, filled with every Muppet I can think of other than Sweetums, along with some new Muppets I do not recognize (some truly hideous beady-eyed babies). And on the groom’s side, there is also the entire cast of “Sesame Street.” A human minister appears to perform the ceremony, a surprise to Kermit, since he thought that was Gonzo’s role. The suggestion here is that Kermit and Piggy (as characters in a film at least) are really getting married. (Who knows how this affects inter-entry continuity?) “I now pronounce you pig and frog.” All the Muppets (and, er, “Sesame Street” things) cheer.

Kermit and Miss Piggy appear in the moon over a star field. “The End” appears on screen, surprising the hell out of me, because I thought there were still a few plot threads to resolve – Was this show in fact successful? Did Jenny ever make it into Design College? Okay, I guess they’re not the most pressing questions ever, but still, in this post-Lord of the Rings era, I’m amazed at any movie that can just end.

This was the last Muppet movie for 8 years, and with good reason. Not because it was unsuccessful (it did as well as The Great Muppet Caper), nor because it was poorly made (it’s better than The Great Muppet Caper), but because things were naturally at an end. Whatever non-existent driving narrative focus there was in these basically unrelated Muppet stories, the pig’s marrying the frog resolved that. And of course Henson was busy with other things, having brought his beloved Muppets to a natural resting place. Their stories never quite suggested “franchise” anyway, for as popular as the Muppets are, there’s no particular story to them. I mean, none of their movies are sequels, except maybe technically. And these are family movies. A child audience outgrows material rapidly, making it sometimes a little more difficult to sustain the same audience.

As far as Jim Henson himself was concerned, this really was his grant finale, his ultimate Muppet gig. He’d seen them off in style, made his artistic statement with them (mostly in The Muppet Movie), and given them closure. But some pretty sad events would soon take place in Henson’s empire, most notably Henson’s own untimely death. The rest of the Muppet franchise (for it’s really only half over) would be entirely post-Henson.


Related posts:
• No. 1 The Muppet Movie (1979)
• No. 2 The Great Muppet Caper (1981)
• No. 4 The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
• No. 5 Muppet Treasure Island (1996)
• No. 6 Muppets From Space (1999)