"The Happytime Murders" premieres August 24, 2018

KerMatttheFrog

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Hmmm... the whole puppets as second class citizens thing reminds me slightly of Greg the Bunny.

It's good to see that I am not the only one who apparently though this show was worth remembering. I thought it was hilarious and definitely edgy. With that said, I am also very much hoping that this new Henson project will come to fruition and be as entertaining as I think it has the potential.
 

dwmckim

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Just to state it for the record (since it actually hasn't been said yet on the thread), this would be under the banner of "Henson Alternative" - Henson's not-for-kids projects like Puppet Up! and Tinseltown.

I do like the idea. Who else could better send up Henson than...Henson...now that they are free (still have obvious ties with but still from an ownership angle are free) of The Muppets and Sesame Street, this could be a great nod to its past while establishing non-Muppet Henson as an entity...a high profile puppet-based project that's not a pre-existing property.

...and when i first saw the news, the first thing that crossed my mind was Roger Rabbit meets Greg the Bunny - actually what's cool about the premise is that it doesn't quite steal from GtB but rather takes the premise further! GtB dealt with the concept of puppets-as-second-class-citizens and kinda skimmed the surface of the bigotry they faced, but one of the worst forms of bigotry is violence/hate crimes. Henson really has the opportunity here to not only provide something edgy, fun, self-referential, but also still have that Henson touch of deeper meaning - using puppet as metaphor for the struggles of women, race (blacks in particular although many other races have felt the same sting), and gays. I don't see this as a hit-the-audience-over-the-head with the underlying message/metaphor in the way a Dinosaurs episode might - but still something people will "get" subconciously or perhaps after having exited the theater, that lightbulb pops up over the head.

I really quite like the idea, hope it does make it past development, and am excited to see how Henson takes the idea and runs with it.
 

dwmckim

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...oh btw, forgot to add... taking the GtB parallels a bit further, i imagine it would be highly likely that Drew Massey and Victor Yerrid would be involved which would be a nice kind of continuity since they were heavily involved with the network series adaptation of Greg the Bunny.
 

Erine81981

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...oh btw, forgot to add... taking the GtB parallels a bit further, i imagine it would be highly likely that Drew Massey and Victor Yerrid would be involved which would be a nice kind of continuity since they were heavily involved with the network series adaptation of Greg the Bunny.
I Loved that show. I record pretty much every episode but still haven't bought the DVD which i rented. But this is what i was thinking when i heard about this. If anyone hasn't see Greg the Bunny you should rent it or find it on youtube. You would love it.
 

DannyRWW

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I am excited about this. Greg the bunny was at its best when it parodied race issues. I thi nk one of its downfalls was playing the human stars too much rather than focusing on the race issues. I agree that a movie like this can take the concept much further and hopefully is not too dark (the Greg the bunny type satire would be perfect). I agree I hope it is not in the same spirit as meet the feebles. You can go to far with being adult.
 

lowercasegods

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I'd certainly watch it. I'm sure it could be cool. But I think that Who Framed Roger Rabbit kind of owns the formula (and I mean that figuratively, not literally) on this type of story. Fantasy character teams up with human is a not an original concept, and to lesser degrees it even predates Roger (though Roger certainly set the standard). And is hard to get around the Greg the Bunny issue, because they tackled the puppets as second class citizens issue very well. But all that aside, I'd like to see a full length film on this issue.
 

The Shoe Fairy

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I'd certainly watch it. I'm sure it could be cool. But I think that Who Framed Roger Rabbit kind of owns the formula (and I mean that figuratively, not literally) on this type of story. Fantasy character teams up with human is a not an original concept, and to lesser degrees it even predates Roger (though Roger certainly set the standard). And is hard to get around the Greg the Bunny issue, because they tackled the puppets as second class citizens issue very well. But all that aside, I'd like to see a full length film on this issue.
Agreed! And btw, I am eagerly awaiting your graphic novel, Good Stuff.:wink:
 

Beauregard

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I must say that I've always thought it would be great for the Muppets (Yes, I know these arn't the Muppets, I'm just saying what I thought) to deal with race issues/being different issues. In the Muppet world they are generally accepted as normal, but in fan-fictions they are often considered another species or subferior (hehe) to humans. I'd love to see something similar in this, kinda like X-men.
 

The Shoe Fairy

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The news of the film is starting to spread around, as some of my friends have got word of this production, without me telling them. And none of them like Muppets as much as I do.
 
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