How to SAVE The Muppets 

I recorded this whole video while wearing Muppet socks, without noticing or drawing attention to it. That's how committed you know I am to these guys.

I feel like Disney fundamentally doesn't "get" the Muppets and why they're so beloved, because most of their recent attempts at "using" them have either come across as too cutesy-cloying or too smugly self-aware and snarky. Disney fundamentally doesn't seem to understand how to be earnest without just being naive and how to be irreverent and goofy while still caring deeply, so they don't know how to strike that balance with the Muppets.

Ever since seeing someone pitch The Muppets Beauty and the Beast where they're all Muppets apart from the beast and at the end he transforms into a Muppet, i need it

i really genuinely can't understand why disney seem to refuse to go down the muppets christmas carol/treasure island route and just make a fucking movie about something else with the muppets as the characters. it's a foolproof idea that literally made the greatest Xmas film of all time

Obviously the correct answer is "Muppet Lord of the Rings"

One thing I’ve noticed is the slickness of the current puppet models. Part of the charm of the original Muppets, even up to Christmas Carol and Treasure Island, is that the puppets are all slightly scrappy. Disney has made them too clean and clinical in their designs, to the point where some of them don’t really look like themselves anymore. I want to see the bobbles on the felt

Simple, you just make a Muppets Star Wars trilogy of films

One solution might be returning them to the Jim Henson Company. After all, they’re doing a great job with Fraggle Rock. It only makes sense for them to be in charge of their signature brand again.

The Muppets have the best Christmas Carol, with Doctor Who being the second

We need more Muppet adaptations of classic stories.

I rewatched The Muppets (2011) just a couple days ago, as I watched, I thought the exact same thing you said in this video: they need to bring back the variety show. I think a modern version of The Muppet Show would have a chance at success.

The ABC Muppets with a full-stop was so joyless at first but it did improve a lot but Muppets Mayhem was wonderful.

As a fan of Jim Henson and puppetry as a whole I genuinely think we could get good muppets content again

What we need is a Muppet Doctor Who episode.

A weekly Muppet show on Disney Plus would be amazing! As well as celeb guests for each episode, I'd love to see sketches on all the random ip's they now own. It could even tie in and help promote new releases. A lion king spoof to promote Mufasa or Dwayne Johnson hosting when Moana 2 is released. A new series of Xmen 97? Kermit is cyclops, animal is wolverine and dr bunsen is prof x! It would surely be a corporate synergy dream!!

The question of “What do we do with the muppets” feels like a trick question from a teacher, the best answer is the most basic but everyone is too scared to say it for some reason…

I remember bailing on Muppets Now for two reasons. First, it got stale pretty quickly, doing the same thing week after week when The Muppets had always been about variety. But the there was a sketch where Dr. Bunsen Honeydew started trashing Beaker’s treasured possessions. My wife and I gave each other a look and we were both done. That one sketch showcased a critical misunderstanding about what The Muppets are. They can have problems. They can be mean sometimes. But they shouldn’t be cruel. And the production itself certainly shouldn’t be playing cruelty for laughs.

So many shows just aren't given the chance anymore. Loads of shows start kinda rocky and then grow to become amazing and in modern streaming if its not immediately trending its gone 😢

Frankly, i dont know why Dishey hasn't properly done Muppet Star Wars yet outside of merch. They have everything right there it practically wrotes itself.

Instead of making live-action remakes , Disney should do Muppets remakes.

They really had a good spark with the ABC Muppets comedy, I wish they had a 2nd season

Steve never should have been fired.

Well, Jason Segal figured it out in the 2010s and helped to produce two of the best comedies Disney has ever committed to. It's such a shame that after those two movies we didn't get anything else from that era. Those films were impeccably good.

Saw one comment suggesting the muppets playing a dnd campaign, with celebrities playing their ingame characters with the muppet voices playing over. It could definitely make a great hour long special.

I absolutely loved Muppet Mayhem, and am so sad that I didn't see anyone talking about it, it really felt like a return to form!

I've always wished they'd bring back 2015 The Muppets but I've accepted it'll never be the case

Great video. We need a “The Great Muppet Escape” movie where the gang try to escape out of Disneyland and the mascots of other absorbed franchises like Star Wars are the prison wardens trying to stop them

You probably gave this more thought than the current i.p. holders.

If Bob Iger doesn’t even care about the Muppets then he should just simply sell the brand to another company that does care about these characters and will know what to do with them. I think Universal and ClassicMedia might be a good fit

That “broken record” bit got a genuine belly laugh out of me both times. You’re very funny!

I agree, the fact that they are missing out on so much potential with a modern day Muppets Show is something I've thought about too. Especially when a lot of us arent very familiar with the celebrities in the original (outside of like Steve Martin and some others)... it would be so fun to see it brought back featuring peope we actually know.

Excellent points. Many of us fans have been asking Disney for a Muppet show revival for years. I hope they start listening as I think that would be a great way to bring back the characters like you said.

I also believe that The Muppets (ABC) was starting to gain traction and honestly I think that form factor works well for them. I felt like if they would have leaned into “The Muppet Show” we could have had something like a muppet version of 30 Rock. An on screen and off screen comedy that could have continued to highlight special guests, provide variety and explore the implied reality of Muppets as real world celebrities. But, as we all know, Disney has no idea how to handle the muppets and due to their own missteps they no longer have the stomach for giving them a real property.

I think The Muppets Mayhem really is the best Muppets project we had in years, and I agree that while the series was a big step in the right direction, it should have been a weekly series rather than all at once.

I watched that miss piggy as the host show and definitely agreed. It was a rough start. And then my partner and I totally forgot that the electric mayhem show was happening because it got announced and we never heard about it again. Would love to see the Muppets getting a lovingly crafted return.

I approach videos about the muppets with a lot of trepidation as many have a fundamental misunderstanding of them. However, this is such an excellent video, you have such great takes regarding the muppets. Really awesome job!!

You could even have the auld guys (can't remember their names) pointing out that they're just doing what they did before. Like they have a built in way to pre-address that criticism.

I’ve always desperately wanted a reboot of The Muppet Show, I giggle at the idea of having modern day celebrities clash with Kermit

If they're really so insistent about doing a new "Muppet Show", I think a show about the Muppets all living in a house together (a la "Muppets From Space") has potential. In addition to introducing some new characters, I think it's also a good idea to flesh out some of the "minor" characters. Also, I blame "Muppets Most Wanted" for the state that the franchise is in right now.

I’d love to see the Muppets come back.

The interview with Seth Rogan in muppets now was really funny. I also really liked Bunson and Beaker making a science RU-vid channel. Idea for a sequence of the new muppet show: tea with Kermit.

Wow. I had no idea Electric Mayhem was good and worth watching! Thank you for the recommendation!

i’m only half way through the video so i don’t know if you bring it up at all but i think one cool thing that happened with muppets fairly recently was them being at the kings coronation concert. back in may 2023 there was like a massive gig for king charles coronation and the kermit and miss piggy made a cameo there, similarly to paddington at the jubilee. i thought it was very cool and i can now say i’ve seen kermit and piggy !!

“IT’S MY IP TO SIT ON AND DO NOTHING WITH!!!”

Many of the more obscure Muppets projects or even panned ones I have just as much fondness and nostalgia for as the ones everyone gives attention to.

I think the muppets on ABC was a near perfect way to be new while being a show itself Electric mayhem is SO underrated. I ended up talking about them in a final project for a music class I was taking

And yes I LOVED the Muppets - yes like Discovery, too dark at the beginning, but it totally could have worked if again it had been given time.

I just want more Muppets Mayhem and another movie man

just got randomly recced this channel. joe you have a fantastic sense of humor & timing. i can see the muppet influence for sure. LOL

Yipeeee Joe AND muppets on the same day!! What an excellent Sunday

Bring them back.

It’s the Muppet Show, with our very special guest….JBOI!

excellent video and I wholeheartedly agree. also, your kermit is actually really good, easily one of the best i've heard.

Its honestly a good idea especially since they had that small youtube success era where they just had tiny sketches and music and they were very successful, that popcorn video and bihemian rhapsody did so well

The muppets deserve a great comeback, honestly. It feels like the Jim Henson company sold them to Disney for basically nothing. I think the biggest reason they don’t want to do another variety show format is because of the abundance of practical effects they may have to do, which would cost them more money than they think it’s going to be worth.

I love The Muppets, and I would absolutely love to see a true revival of The Muppet Show in some form or another. Seriously, these guys deserve to be utilized more in the modern era, given how much of a legacy they have under their belt and whatnot. Maybe someday...

I enjoyed the Muppets Haunted mansion, and LOVED the Muppets Mayham. I really hoping we get a season 2 and more "park ride parodies" like Muppets Jungle Cruise, never gonna happen... but I want more Muppets!

I always been thinking this and this is the only RU-vid video I’ve seen addressing the muppets today thank you

Great video! Some of my thoughts: I have watched the latest Muppet Babies series with my son and it is very high quality. Just worth pointing out that it is another corner of the muppets that has been handled well. I assume it was shown outside of Disney+ originally? Muppet Mayhem shows that Adam F Goldberg might be a good fit going forward. I wonder if they had just committed to a similar format (in terms of ratio of humans to muppets, comedy to character driven story, sitcom structure etc) but with the full Muppets cast it would have been more successful. The format is just such a good fit for TV rather than streaming though! The Muppet Show was very much in line with variety/entertainment popular back in the day. This has massively declined and a lot of the popular light night shows are mainly known for condensed clips that are popular on social media. So I do appreciate that RU-vid videos and muppets now have at least tried to translate the concept into a modern context. It would be great for a Mayhem esque show about the Muppets struggling to adapt the muppet show to this new context and make some comedy out of the problems they’ve had with the muppet ‘brand’.

Muppet Show is very close to something that in Poland is called "tv cabaret" - mixture of tv, literary cabaret and theatre with its own reality: zany, bit chaotic, sometime anarchic...often in tacky, retro decorations, mostly based on very thin plot but always with great performers, great dialogs, great songs. This is something you can't do with "content creators" in Excell. Jim Henson imagination is gone, original puppeteers are gon or retired... I was raised on Muppet Show - in early 80s in bleak times of disintegrating socialism in Poland it was one of the few really funny shows on tv. I can't see place for Muppets now. Disney don't understand them. Original Muppets were very very human. They were like bunch of outcasts trying to do a show. The were family. They were mean to each other and they were supportive, there was some kind of warm. You could feel Gonzo's weirdness and melancholy, bitternes of Floyd or Kermit's struggle to run the show without nerveous breakdown. Something has been lost.

These studio & network executives, tycoons & moguls in Hollywood had taunted, abused and neglected everything, you all loved and cared about and tainted all of them. They're the REAL TV and Movie villains.

I am to watch this while eating dinner (I’m not even joking)

I’m still patiently waiting for Muppet Great Gatsby with Leonardo DiCaprio reprising his role as Gatsby.

Yay! The Muppet Mayhem was such a solid show! Great video! I hope that for the Muppets that something better comes along, like the Daniel Craig Muppet Show special!

i honestly just think disney need to sell them back to the jim henson company, or at least a production company that knows how to market these iconic characters and make shows for them on a reasonable budget. the ip isn't making them the billions that they clearly expect to make back from every piece of media they release and...well, the ip being owned by disney is just so counterintuitive to the muppets essence as is. the muppets were made as a satirical and cynical commentary on 70s and 80s culture and capitalism; that will never come back for as long as they are owned by a media empire like disney.

A lot of The Muppet Show’s magic, imo, comes from it being set in a theatre and constantly referencing theatre culture. Recurring acts testing new material, audience interaction (you can’t heckle in a TV studio!), and the lived-in warmth of the backstage all contribute to its charm. The main cast are archetypal representations of performers and crew members. Their relationships are built on that dynamic, so when you take them out of the theatre, they feel a bit lost. If you want to make the Muppets work in a new setting, you have to figure out how their quirks, talents, and passions translate to that setting in particular.

Yes. Bring back the muppet show for the modern day! Awesome video!

I'm still holding out home for some version of the Great Muppet Movie Ride at WDW.

Something about the way you said " love you lots" just hit different. not in a weird way but in a wholesome way.

I don’t know why Disney don’t see what everyone else sees. The Muppets are wonderful and they shine brightest when they’re putting on a show. All they need to do is do another show like the original or Muppets Tonight. Not reboot either show but just make another one. I feel like that’s what Muppets Now was supposed to emulate but it was just too low effort. Didn’t bother doing anything but try to chase trends. The Muppets was on the right track but as you say it was too little to late after it’s miserable and awkward start. They need to do a proper variety show ran by Kermit I’d also like to see more films in the vein of Christmas Carol and Treasure Island adapting classic literature. Pride and Prejudice or something.

As much as I'd love to see another Muppet Adaptational Film, I think that script for Muppet Great Gatsby shows why it can't be the only thing that the Muppets are known for. (not that the script is bad, but because that's one of the key messages of it). I'm glad to see Muppets Tonight get some love. I remember watching it when it came out and loving it. I even don't have an issue with Clifford hosting (though he looks better with the sunglasses). I think that Muppets From Space is a good case study on what happened to the franchise, because it was pitched as one thing (Muppets In Space) but then they had a different more quirky idea that didn't quite work, and so people didn't love it as much. Or the two recent films really being half of an amazing Muppet film (The Muppets isn't zany enough and lacks ideas and Muppets Most Wanted isn't heartfelt enough)

20:30 brilliant

21:15 You've hit on something important there with "If he's written well enough." One of the essential conflicts between Steve Whitmire and the new management was that they saw the performers as nothing more than actors reading lines from a script, whereas the OG performers were used to much more of an improv style, and having more input into creating and developing the characters. Frank Oz has mentioned the same thing. Gonzo being attracted to chickens, for example, all stemmed from one throwaway line Dave Goelz ad libbed when a real chicken walked away from him in a Season 2 episode. I'm not 100% certain they can completely get the magic back if there's going to be a rigid division between writers and performers.

17:03 I feel sorry for this mysterious, hypothetical person

Ive said it before and ill say it again, id love to see a muppet show about the muppets running their own streaming service. You could get plenty of the back stage comedy with interstial bits from the "shows" theyre producing or shows being pitched

If I where to do anything corporate related I'd become the CEO of disney, re-open blu sky & put everyone from the actual disney animation studio there, make every company they've ever acquired independent (except marvel) & give them their IP back, give pixar planes, put all disney propeties in the public domain, & shut disney down taking marvel studios with it & giving the people that work there job opportunities in the studios made independent but all of that is if I get lucky enough to do that

Bet you if Muppet Mayhem was on ABC, we'd be getting a second season

Thank you for this video! I've been on a BIG Muppets binge lately. Always been a fan but have recently been going thru the old episodes of The Muppet Show and all the old movies - what a joy. The Muppets are iconic and I hope the Jim Henson docco coming out soon brings them back into the zeitgeist - it's time. A revival of The Muppets Show would go off 🙌 I honestly was not at all interested in the Electric Mayhem series solely on Lily Singh being in it 😂 But now based on your recommendation, I'll give it a watch!

Love your heart on this. A Muppet Show revival would be awesome. Here’s how to switch it up: Produce it almost like SNL style: Not live, but a one to two week production cycle. So if Taylor Swift is on the show, it’s what she did last week, not some vague time in the past. Current, but never topical. That would capitalize on the immediacy of puppet performance.

I think it’s about time for a new Muppets theatrical movie again. With Disney aiming to focus on quality theatrical releases again with sequels to Moana and Zootopia coming and the return of Tron and Star Wars on the big screen, a new Muppets movie would fit comfortably right in

I think the Muppets should do a real talk show in the way Johnny Carson did his back in the day. Have Kermit be the interviewer and he can interview regular people, and then have the wacky shenanigans run by somebody else, another crew, so you introduce new Muppets. You'll have the interviews you'll have a sketch with the star and you'll have sketches with the other Muppets very much the way the old Muppet show was but in a new light. In fact dropping the fake documentary style that they tried and doing it as a straightforward talk show brings it back to the Muppet show but you chose them in where their strength is.

The muppets mayhem getting canceled after winning an Emmy is still crazy to me

You do a great Kermit impression.

As a Star Wars fan, I'm so thankful for Disney. Disney and Kathleen Kennedy have made more good High Quality Star Wars than George Lucas ever did.

I'm glad to see this addressed in a heartfelt way rather than with the disdain that many other RU-vidrs have. I also feel like you've gone a little far with some conclusions. I grew up with Jim Henson's Muppets, The 1979 film being the first film that I remember seeing theatrically at the age of 5. I still carry some ill feelings about the Swedish Chef after he bungled his job as a projectionist. 😆 As I see it, the Muppets have 4 problems: 1. The performers and writers haven't always worked in tandem like they should. This has greatly improved with projects like Haunted Mansion and Mayhem being the best examples. There have been some quality creatives and sweet celebrities with good intentions who have had the opportunity to tinker with the Muppets while Bill Barretta, Matt Vogel, and Kirk Thatcher have been working hard in the trenches for decades. 2. Many fans won't let the Muppets grow and are too harsh when they make mistakes. Muppets now wasn't conceived as a show. It was Disney giving the veteran writers and performers the opportunity to play and improv and not worry too much about the financial cost or the franchise's reputation. These were going to be like the Forky shorts on Disney Plus. Those segments are hit-or-miss and so were these. Sewing them together as a show was an idea inspired by lockdown. Some fans only be satisfied having the characters simply retrace old steps. Jim didn't like repeating himself and that would have fallen flat. Few fans have perspective on the Muppets, and you touch on that, incorrectly believing that all of Jim Henson's (or the Henson Company’s) work with the Muppets was well received. They began floundering with Little Muppet Monsters and the Henson Hour. 3. Bob Iger expressed a quote in his autobiography that a colleague shared with him. - "Avoid getting into the business of manufacturing trombone oil. you may become the greatest trombone-oil manufacturer in the world, but in the end, the world only consumes a few quarts of trombone oil a year!” - This seems to reveal Iger's lack of consistency and care with relatively smaller brands under the Disney banner, like the Muppets. It's shortsighted because all Disney fans have their favorite niche and nostalgic properties and care for those brands as a whole should be a priority. En masse, they are as important as Pixar or Star Wars. Iger has a history of undercutting any momentum the Muppets have gained during his tenure. Canceling the critically acclaimed and Emmy winning Muppets Mayhem is a current example. 4. Like DC's Snyder fans, some of the Muppet fans still carrying ill will toward Disney, The Muppets, and Matt Vogel (that has been uniquely cruel) since Whitmire's contract wasn't renewed need to let it go and move forward. It's simply not going to change. It was a big adjustment to Whitmire in the 90's like it has been for Vogel the past few years. Whitmire never got Kermit completely right, but I looked to the things in his performance that were fun, heartfelt, and close enough. I honor his work and performances. I don't like how ugly this situation became in public, no matter what happened behind the scenes. Also, Whitmire's contracts with Fraggle Rock under Henson and Ernie under Sesame weren't renewed either. Jim Henson's family agreed with Disney's decision and helped choose Matt Vogel. That seems to either be unknown to many fans or has gotten lost under the bad feelings about the situation. Right now, as a fan, I believe that the right thing to do is show our enthusiasm for the things that went right with Haunted Mansion and Mayhem instead of the usual Disney disdain. They've struck a chord with audiences twice in a row. We should be encouraging the company to keep moving forward, grow what they're doing now, and see where it goes. Like you said here, that's how they did it all those years ago on the Muppet Show. Thanks for raising an interesting and reasoned discussion. 🌈 🐸 🪕

I had a lot of fun with Muppets Mayhem, but I actually thought it focused too much on the boring human POV characters

I completely agree!

As someone who never got the chance to grow up with the OG muppets, i think its tme to play the music, its time to light the lights, its time to #meetthe muppets!!

THIS VIDEO. I have had the EXACT same thoughts, but lacked the time, energy, platform, and audience to get this point across. The Muppets work best within the Muppet Show context (and subsequently building other projects off of that). I won’t rehash a lot of your points, but I’ve thought for YEARS that having stars interacting with the Muppets like Tom Holland (maybe as Spider-Man), Drake, or even athletes like Gabby Douglas (what a strange list) would make for GREAT episodes of the new show. I first discovered the Muppet Show after the 2011 movie (even though I knew of them before that) and it’s an indescribable feeling to know that what they were trying to revive in the movie was ACTUALLY something that happened irl (and not me watching the series before the movie). And on top of that, the Muppets have always been like kids SNL (similar to All That or the original Animaniacs), they should be out there making tasteful jabs and lighthearted fun of the world we’re in today and the people who are in it. I’d love for it to take on the model of playing on tv first and going on streaming the next day (much like a Rick and Morty Adult Swim style) and you could air it on Disney Channel or ABC or wherever BEFORE dropping it on Disney+. Also, having it be clip-able so that you can advertise funny clips or short sketches on TikTok and RU-vid Shorts would be a MUST! If they could include a SMALL bit of modern meme humor, fast-paced, random, a bit absurdist then I’m POSITIVE it would go viral (much like Back at the Barnyard, which was originally hated, but gained cultural following due to memes). Anyway, this is getting long (and I haven’t even mentioned the potential for Marvel, Star Wars again, Dune, Game of Thrones, etc. episodes) but thanks for finally making the video I’ve been looking for for years!

If you ever saw the short-lived TV show Reboot, (It's on Disney+.) they should do that but with The Muppets. And longer than a single award-nominated series that's only 8 episodes.

Golly I wish they kept going with muppets most wanted type stuff. It was so much closer to what these characters are than the schmaltzy Jason Segel mess.

The Muppets have been so hit & miss over the past decade and a half. I loved the 2011 movie, but I really didn’t like Muppets Most Wanted. I thought the 2015 sitcom was excellent and underrated. Muppets Now was “meh”. I’ve only seen part of the first episode of Muppets Mayhem and found it a bit boring. I’ll have to give it another chance. As for Muppets Haunted Mansion, I forgot I’d even watched it until I heard you mention it. I watched the Muppet Babies reboot with my toddler godson and thought it was good for a pre-school show, but I really loved the final episode where they put on a show and there are loads of references to the original Muppets Show. Even if you don’t have young kids or haven’t watched any of the show, if you’re a Muppets fan, the new Muppet Babies series finale is worth watching on its own.

With talk shows dying and puppeteers funnier then comedians now, just bring back the muppet show or have them interview celeb guests

I do hope Disney comes out with a new Muppets show bringing back Jim Hennsons legacy.

Some days, I feel like the hardest part of being a Star Wars fan is... other Star Wars fans.

To the final part where you mentioned modern celebs. The Jack black muppets scene was the best scene in the movie and he needs an actual full muppets host episode

good video! I definitely agree people just overthink "how to make X relevant" when you just need to make something good most the time. Do you think there's an elaborate story for Iger's muppet hatred?

The Muppets Haunted Mansion was so good and so well received that I think that's the way to go. Do more one shot specials for Disney + or feature films.

for me the appeal of the muppets was always the puppeteers having fun putting on a puppet show, making characters, making sketches, doing something silly, exactly like how a lot of uk sketch shows did well such a little britain or league of gentlemen. Both the muppets specifically and puppets in general I think need to just have outlets to let the people behind them have *fun* and its hard when there's pressure for things to be an overnight sensation and not have the time needed to build a real relatiobship to their audience. I'd love to see a new muppet show or a puppet sketch show or maybe a more fast paced version of the old jim henson's Storyteller series since while that was sensational visually and a wonderful idea they kind of treated it too much like a documentary and it made it literally sleep inducing. I would love to see maybe them partnering with people who have a background in these kinds of genres to put on some interesting shows

Could you imagine a new muppet show where the special guest is like Trixie Mattel or Ryan Gosling? Like hilarious!