Kermit the Frog is the problem

I love the Muppets, I absolutely do. They are almost always guaranteed to improve my mood with their wacky antics, but they don’t always work. Sure I’d take anything Muppet over anything Kardashian but a lot of the newer stuff has fallen flat. Some attribute this solely to them being acquired by Disney and “Disney not understanding the Muppets” which is partially true. The Muppets are meant for anyone to enjoy, while the Disney era has leaned them more to kids with the risqué and cynical being removed. If you don’t believe me about the cynicism listen to the Rainbow connection from the Muppet movie, on the surface it’s a nice song about rainbows but actually look at the words “Rainbows are only illusions”. The more interesting passage is “Who said that every wish, Would be heard and answered, When wished on the morning star, Somebody thought of that, And someone believed it, And look what it's done so far” because who thought of “when you wish upon a star” Disney. The Rainbow connection is the Muppets saying the Disney message is potentially harmful. The Muppets are wide-eyed dreamers but they’re mostly realists (some characters are unaware of their faults like Miss Piggy), the older audience are aware that Fozzie’s jokes are awful, and every time he makes an awful pun Kermit cringes or Waldorf and Statler yell at him from the balcony. The Muppets were not meant for kids, Jim Henson had 2 other shows with puppets meant for kids (Sesame Street and Fraggle Rock) The Muppets were for the whole family.

This lack of cynicism is part of the problem but the real problem is Kermit is not Kermit. Let me explain Kermit the frog is the centre of the Muppets, he was Jim Henson’s favourite puppet, his go-to if he ever needed to do an appearance. Kermit predates the Muppet show or their random appearances to do skits on late night talk shows. The plush amphibian started out on Jim’s early public access show Sam and Friends. Most episodes of Sam and Friends are now lost media, but Jim used Sam and Friends as a way to experiment with films and puppets. Jim Henson always thought of himself as an experimental film maker first and a puppeteer second. Puppets were his chosen medium because he thought they could do more than entertain toddlers, which is why he was so hesitant to make Sesame Street until he found out it was actually educational. Jim Henson with the Muppet Show and Sesame Street played many characters; Ernie, Rowlf the Dog, Dr Teeth, The Swedish chef, but Kermit was his go-to. Kermit being in both shows drew criticism at the time, but it makes perfect sense Jim and Kermit are the same. Kermit in the Muppets is a paternal figure who keeps the groups of misfits and oddballs together but with his role of leadership is stressed. Kermit is passive aggressive but also empathetic and caring like a real person. The best description of Jim Henson I’ve ever heard is “a Doozer pretending to be a Fraggle” and if you don’t know what that means I’ll explain. Fraggle Rock has an ecosystem with Doozers who are workaholics and are obsessed with building massive towers that the Fraggles eat, The Fraggles spend all day making up silly songs and playing games. Jim Henson was always working on the next project whilst trying to emit an air of whimsy.

Jim Henson died in 1990 shortly after selling The Muppets to Disney. Now Disney didn’t start off ruining his legacy, we got the classic Muppets’ Christmas Carol, and part of the reason this worked was it shifted away from Kermit. The centre of the film is Gonzo as Charles Dickens and Rizo as the rat who argues with Charles Dickens. Kermit plays the role of Bob Cratchett which keeps Kermit central to the story, but he doesn’t have that many scenes to hide the fact he isn’t Jim anymore. Replacing Kermit with Gonzo was a smart choice, Gonzo may not have been the most popular Muppet (despite objectively being the best he is called “Gonzo The Great” it’s in his name), but he had a similar relationship with his Muppeteer. Gonzo was created as a form of therapy for Dave Goelz who worked on the show making Muppets, Goelz was painfully shy and he was given any puppet he liked to be his and he picked Gonzo because he was kind of funny looking. Gonzo’s personality like Kermit’s is complicated, lots of the Muppets are simple Animal likes Drums, Piggy is conceited, the Swedish chef makes a mess but Gonzo has depth. Gonzo is a show-off but insecure, he acts out because he’s lonely, he doesn’t have a family he doesn’t even have a species he’s a “Whatever”. Gonzo was the focus of the next two muppet films, Treasure Island where he and Rizo tag along with Jim Hawkins for all the major scenes and Muppets from Space. Frank Oz once said “Muppets from Space wasn’t really a Muppet movie” and well he’s right but that’s not a bad thing (also Oz told George Lucas to have MORE Jar Jar in Star Wars so can we trust him). Muppets From Space is unique among the muppet movies, the meta-element of them is gone from it. All the other movies have a nod and a wink that this is a movie, either because the muppets are adapting a well known story or because of 4th wall breaks. The Muppet Movie is overtly about a fictional version of how the Muppet show started, The great Muppet caper has a recurring deliberately bad joke that nobody can tell Kermit and Fozzie apart despite them being a frog and a bear. Muppets take Manhattan is the only other one that doesn’t have this element to it, except at the end with the broadway wedding of Kermit and Miss Piggy. But Muppets takes Manhattan isn’t about the Muppets as characters, it’s still about them as performers. Muppets from Space is about Gonzo, it’s about how he’s the only one of his kind, how he doesn’t feel like he fits in and at the end him realising it’s ok to be different because all the Muppets are different and they all love him.

Unfortunately Muppets from space bombed and the next Muppets specials were terrible, Muppets Wizard of Oz which had one good joke in the whole thing and then it’s Wonderful Muppet life, which was about Kermit wanting to commit suicide.

After those 2 stinkers we got a yellow life preserver called Walter. Walter was a new character and the centre of the film Muppets. I can only assume Walter was another self-insert character as anyone who trains to be a Muppeteer is probably an even bigger fan of the Muppets than me and that was Walter’s defining trait. Despite Walter being the saving grace, Kermit had to be centre again for the painfully unfunny Muppets Most Wanted. Muppets least wanted (as I have officially dubbed it in my head) is a step backwards with Walter is a small role and then ABC’s The Muppets doesn’t even have Walter in it (his Muppeteer Peter Linz was still involved but without any leading roles). The ABC Sitcom got cancelled and Steven Witmore was fired from the Jim Henson company by both Lisa and Brian Henson citing radically different reasons as to why Witmore’s Kermit was wrong. Lisa believed his Kermit was an “Amoral drunken sociopath” and Brian thought he was a “complete pushover devoid of charm”. Witmore openly complained that the show made him “do things Kermit would never do like lie” but these fell on deaf ears and Kermit was forced to act out of character.

Kermit now isn’t fairing any better. Disney Junior have revived Muppet Babies (something they can only do because they own Marvel who did the animation for the original series) but Kermit is a wimp. Kermit isn’t even the one who comforts the others. That role belongs to Summer Penguin (a new character added for the reboot). And the adult Kermit who is now played by Matt Vogel: he’s so lifeless, everything coming from him seems like “Would Jim do this” or “will this test well”. 

Kermit doesn’t need retiring but he isn’t the leading frog he used to be, now he doesn’t seem like he could lead anything. The Muppets should’ve changed and evolved, Jim Henson never let a setback stop him. He had to make 3 different pilots for the Muppet show and move to another country to make it. But Disney keep going back to what they think worked but it wasn’t Kermit we liked it was Jim, I think what the Muppets need is to be more of an ensemble but Matt Vogel’s Kermit has to change; he shouldn’t be a lifeless parody of his former self.