Back in the early Seventies, fueled by their presence and popularity on
Sesame Street, Jim Henson was frantically trying to grow his Muppet Empire to
ever greater heights. This expressed itself in several specials (including The
Great Santa Claus Caper; see elsewhere in the blog), most of which were
‘hip’ adaptations of classic fairy tales. Then for the first season of Saturday
Night Live (1975) the Muppets appeared as a segment called ‘The Land of
Gorch,’ which had much more sex, violence, and drug references than any other
Muppet iteration. After really hitting the big time with The Muppet Show,
Henson went on to make Fraggle Rock, which I never saw on its first run
because we didn’t have HBO, but which I later developed a liking for,
especially some of their songs. I retain a sneaking (if not whole-hearted)
fondness for the Muppets, just nothing they’ve done post-Henson (1990). Whether
that’s because the company now lacks his executive vision and are just poorly
recycling his ideas and methods, or I’ve just become an old fuddy-duddy, is a debatable
point. Enjoy these while you can; Disney (who now owns the Muppets) took down
the complete “The Frog Prince,” and who knows what might follow?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvbcQJuR6Sw
Hey, Cinderella!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmRM20R_2rE
The Muppet Musicians of Bremen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YRImKNAlqA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dl4699DDkU0 The Frog Prince
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxnG5X4Geak
Dregs and Vestiges, The Land of Gorch
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6aIwLiiD3U
Fears of Zero, The Muppet Show
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0PtCdqFL7o The Minstrels, Fraggle Rock
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