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Arts & Life
The Clarion | Dec. 2, 2011
'The Muppets' movie review
By BJ Wanlund
Contributing Writer
It is an honor and a privilege for me to
review the new Muppet movie, simply titled
"The Muppets".
To give you guys a bit of background. I've
been a Muppets fan for about as long as I
can remember My mom used to plop me in
front of the television to watch Sesame Street
at first, then it was Muppet Babies, and then
it just went crazy from there. And then there
were Muppet movies out the wazoo, my
favourite of them being Muppets Christmas
Carol.
So, you can pretty much call me a Muppets
superfan. And yes, there were some turkeys
(the main one being Muppets Wizard of Oz),
but I was so thrilled that a new Muppets
movie was coming to the theaters.
I was incredibly skeptical that Jason Siegel
and Nicholas Stoller would pull off the
miracle to end all miracles, a Muppet movie
that didn't totally suck, but they somehow
managed to make a movie that is definitely
better than the last project the Muppets did.
The Muppets Wizard of Oz (a turkey in every
sense of the word).
In order not to bog this review down too
much. I'll just say what I thought were the
good, the bad, and the ugly.
The Good:
Almost all of the musical numbers worked
for me, including the numbers that were sung
by people not for the Muppet movie that
backed montages, etc.
The new Muppet, Walter, was really the
perfect character to not only allow Muppet
fans like myself to live vicariously through
him, but also allowed the new little kids that
were being introduced to these characters for
the first time to have a proxy as well.
One of the previews was for a movie that
Disney is distributing in the US called The
Secret World of Arrietty, based upon the book
The Borrowers. Hey, for me it's a chance to
get acquainted with the property before late
February, when the movie hits theaters.
The exit strategy Gonzo had for his business
was utterly ingenious and hilarious, and the
business he... erm... exited was totally in line
with his character
Geek Scooter (which was only in Muppet
Babies) is now canon! I admit I loved this
neat little 1 second of film in the montage
where the gang comes back together, but I
must give credit where it is due, and artist
Amy Mebberson, who has drawn a few of the
Muppet comic books that BOOM! Studios put
out whom I follow on Twitter and GetGlue,
gets that credit.
The Bad:
The villain is way obvious, with obvious
motives and a facade that, once you see it,
will be almost obscenely obvious. It doesn't
help that the villain song that Tex Richman
"sings" is so hilariously pointless that it could
have been excised from the movie altogether
and the plot would still have been advanced
properly without the need for such a song.
There wasn't nearly background on why
Animal was in the court-ordered anger
management session we find him in when the
Muppets came looking. I do not believe that
we Muppet fans should be left to fill in the
blanks, but I felt like several key moments
from this scene were left on the cutting room
floor to make room for the above mentioned
pointless villain song by Tex Richman.
Amy Adams's character, Mary, is shown
to be an elementary school shop teacher in
Smalltown, USA, but as I got to explore her
character throughout the course of the movie,
I found her character to be very bland, which
is unfortunate, because Amy Adams is a good
actress, but I felt that they didn't give her very
much to work with there.
Some of the Muppet characters seemed to
have some interesting new back stories that,
my guess is was cut to keep the movie from
being a three hour affair I hope that Disney
gets to explore these back stories later through
either short films or DVD/Blu-Ray bonus
features.
The Ugly:
The first version of The Rainbow
Connection, the song you hear in the Reno
casino when Kermit, Gary, Mary, Walter, and
Kermit go in search of Fozzie, is so sleazy
and sacrilegious that it makes several of the
awful songs in Muppets Wizard of Oz seem
way better in comparison.
There is a Toy Story short, called Small
Fry, that comes on after the previews but
before the main feature that is not my idea
of fun. I know, Disney doesn't have one lick
of confidence in The Muppets doing fine
WITHOUT Pixar intervention, but this short
film is not one of those which I wish to make
its acquaintance ever again, it's seriously
that bad. Of course, it's mainly because it
reminded me almost eerily of the first Toy
Story, which I did not enjoy nearly as much
as I did the second one.
4 out of 5 Kermits
Brevard College Debate Society hosts 10th annual debate tournament
Tuesday, Dec. 6 at 8 p.m. in the Reserve Dining Room. At 6:30 Dr. Sheffield's BCE 111 class will perform a Monty Python inspired skit.
The topic is “The United States should take significant steps in reforming
the American education system^^
Affirmative construct: Austin Flemming and Olivia Fawcett
Negative construct: Chantel Azevedo and Kyle Jackola
Debate Judges
Shelton Jones Joe McGuire Hon. Robert Cilley
Attorney at Law Attorney at Law Chief District Judge
Debate judge for 10 years Debate judge for 10 years Debate judge for 5 years