stumpcity t1_jdw2iw9 wrote on March 27, 2023 at 4:51 PM

This sounds like a really interesting way to try doing a Muppet Show without it being either in the shadow of, or scrambling to be absolutely the opposite of, The Muppet Show.

The problem with trying to actually just do The Muppet Show in modern times is that it's a variety show, and variety shows are dead, and have been dead for decades now. Trying to modulate the atmosphere of the Muppet Show to be about a late night talk show was an okay idea, but trying to make it The Office (or Larry Sanders, even) just didn't work.

Picking characters people like, but don't know a lot about, and making it about a side of the entertainment industry that isn't just "Let's put on a show, gang!" is a really smart way to sidestep a lot of what tripped up everything post "The Muppets" movie with Segel/Adams.

OneGoodRib t1_jdx25j2 wrote on March 27, 2023 at 8:37 PM

Except SNL is a variety show and isn't dead, and AGT is also a variety show and isn't dead.

The Muppet Show was a loving homage to Vaudeville which had died 40 years earlier. The issue isn't it being a variety show, the issue is it being a variety show that's harking back to a style of comedy that's 100 years old at this point.

stumpcity t1_jdx37xw wrote on March 27, 2023 at 8:44 PM

Saturday Night Live is a sketch comedy show. Yes, there are still music performances, this seems almost done not because people actually care about the music performances (people mostly hope the musician shows up in a sketch) but out of tradition.

America's Got Talent isn't a variety show it's a reality competition show.

The issue is that it's a variety show, and people don't like variety shows anymore, because media is so splintered and the means by which people consume media is so democratized that the very idea that made variety shows possible basically doesn't exist anymore.

The Muppets trying to put on a show is a fine framework for interpersonal dramas that lead to really funny situations. The show being a variety show is a terrible choice in the 21st century. This show seems to have figured out a way around that.