Benjamin Black
I remember watching some episodes of "Muppets Tonight" as a kid. I loved it; it's the Muppets, what's not to love? It had been years since I recently saw this show before I viewed some episodes on YouTube. Does it still hold up?...No. People seem to think the Muppets began putting out some pretty crappy productions, and I'd be lying it I said I didn't see that. If it be true, this was the start of the downward spiral for the Muppets for a while.It looks like the show is trying to be a re-creation of "The Muppet Show." They have a special guest in every episode who deals with the zaniness of the Muppets, the theme includes Kermit introducing the show and the guest star, and there are music selections. Now just by the first sentence (and my review for "The Muppet Show," you'd think that this would be awesome. Well...it's not. Let me tell you why.First of all, let's talk about the Muppets themselves. When you think of Muppets, you (or at least, I) think of the more popular characters like Kermit, Fozzie, Gonzo, Piggy, Scooter, the Electric Mayhem, Bunsen and Beaker, Statler and Waldorf, Rowlf, Swedish Chef, and a few others. Here, the screen is moved with a bunch of new characters that we (or, at least I) don't necessarily care about. I don't care about Andy and Randy, I don't care about Dr. Phil van Neuter, I don't care about Pepe or Seymour, I don't care about Bobo (not in this production anyway), I don't care about Pepe, I don't care about Nigel, and I don't care about Pepe! (Oh, trust, we'll get to Pepe later!) It's particularly Brian Henson's and Bill Barretta's characters that are extremely annoying and stupid to me. What about someone else's character, like Kevin Clash's? I love Clifford! Clifford is great! I was shocked when I heard in an interview with Kevin Clash that a lot of people don't like Clifford. As the interviewed continued, I heard Kevin Clash say that the reason was because the producers and writers took away a lot of Clifford's coolness. Go back and watch "The Jim Henson Hour" and "The Muppets at Walt Disney World." Watch Clifford with Jim Henson on "The Arsenio Hall Show" in 1990. There's a distinct difference between that Clifford and the Clifford here. Here, he's clumsy, we see his eyes, he's quirky, he's not as cool as he used to be. On top of that, despite the fact that I still love Clifford, why is he the host? He should never have been the host, and Kevin Clash himself agreed. When you think of a Muppet hosting a Muppet TV show, or a big Muppet star, is Clifford the first one you think of? Unfortunately, no. How about Rizzo? I guess he's OK here because we've gotten to know him from "The Muppets Take Manhattan" and "The Muppet Christmas Carol." But even with that, he's not one of the original Muppets. And why aren't we seeing the other, more beloved characters as much as, or more than, we see him?How about the entertainment? Is it still the Muppet's brand of entertainment we all know and love? Not at all! Harsh to say, it sucks! Remember how I said the Muppets in "The Muppet Show" and "The Muppet Movie" had their own form of entertainment? That goes out the window here! Here, you definitely get the sense that their just conforming to what was popular. There's no charm, there's no originality, there's no pushing the envelope with puppetry, there aren't any serious or mature moments. They're just trying to get us to laugh at things that aren't funny, just like a modern sitcom. There are a lot of sex jokes and fat jokes; and neither of those jokes - or the other jokes they make - are funny! They're distasteful!I don't know what else to say about the show; it's bad. It's the exact opposite of "The Muppet Show." The characters are annoying, the celebrity guests are annoying, none of the episodes or moments or songs are memorable; it's bad. You can see why this show lasted for only 2 years! If you really want to see another Muppet production or just to see if it's as bad as I say it is (which it is), I guess you can check it out. And maybe, who knows, you'll find something about the show that you can get hooked onto. But if you're like me, I can definitely say you can skip this one! BOOYIKA!
Robert Colt
The Muppets Tonight was 1st serious attempt to make a dedicated television show for the Muppets. It was different, and it had potential. The guest stars of amazing quality, and new spin on how original Muppet Show was done.However, it had to deal with changed world. After 2 brief seasons, Oklahoma City bombing accrued. Which rattled America, and it was key factors of the cancellation of the this young and potential show. The episode which was to be are, if memory services right few weeks after the bombing, introduced an old character. Crazy Harry, one of the Muppet show's original characters, a mad bomber. Television executives made the decision that this was too much and too soon after the Oklahoma bombing, so the squashed the episode. Later entire show was squashed. America changed, it became hyper sensitive about its viewing content on Television. Thus, Muppet Tonight one of its very first victims. Disney owned show transferred the show to its Disney Channel and it quietly shown in reruns for short while and died. Creative of the Muppets had been lost with the passing of Henson, thus no new motivations to push keep the new show going and being original as "Show" was. This is a private view, but I believe is the correct one. As of that date of this review. No new original Muppet oriented material has come out since Muppets Tonight. Only re-has, redo, television movies and Direct to video material.
