The Muppets "Jump The Shark"

[Vic Romano]

For those of you who don't know what "Jump the Shark" means; A quick description: "Jumping the Shark" is when a television series begins to go bad and/or sells out and really just starts to no longer be the good show it started out to be. The term "Jump the Shark" hails from "Happy Days" when the Fonz gets on his motorcycle to actually "jump a shark". That episode seems to be agreed by many when the show started it's downhill spiral.

Now about this thread There's a website called "jumptheshark.com" that allows people to vote on when their favorite shows may have jumped. I'd post a URL link to it, but the site www.jumptheshark.com has it set-up that individual pages don't actually have web addresses, but they do have listings on "The Muppet Show", "Sesame Street", "Muppets Tonight", etc. so I thought I'd post 'em here and get your thoughts on if any of our favorite Muppet shows actually did or did not jump the shark! So:

The Muppet Show
Never Jumped - Got 66 votes
Guest Hosts - Got 3 votes
They tone down the violence - Got 2 votes
When Alice Cooper guest starred - Also got 2 votes
When Robin appeared, Fozzie got demoted, Beeker started showing up less frequently, and Statler & Waldorf 'got nicer' - Are all one votes a piece that made the list.
There are a ton of other thoughts (too numerous to list) that also made it on there.

Sesame Street This got LOTS of different votes, check this out:
Elmo 122 votes!
Never Jumped 49 votes
Everyone can see Snuffy 26 votes
They changed the opening theme 18 votes
Death of Jim Henson 16 votes
Death of Mr. Hooper 10 votes
Dumbing it down 9 votes
HIV positive Muppets 6 votes
David disappears 5 votes
Baby Bear 3 votes
Same character/different actor - Gordon 2 votes
Special Guest Star (Tim McGraw and Faith Hill) 2 votes
Journey to Ernie 2 votes
And the following all got one vote: Same Character/Different Actor (Susan), Singing (The Count), I grew up, Same Actor/Different Character (Olivia), Bert is Evil, The Seventh Seal, Birth (Miles), U.S. Cultural Imperialism, The color of Oscar's fur changes, Singing (Cookie raps), Not That There's Anything Wrong With It (Ernie and Bert), They got rid of the Children's Television Workshop at the end, The 90's, They started ignoring Canada, They sell out, It tried to be bilingual, They got rid of the vintage stuff, Special Guest Star (Robin Williams), Need more Ernie, Oscar goes soft, Special Guest Star (Goo Goo Dolls), The twiddlebugs disappear, Kermit hosts The Muppet Show, Rosita, It got too PC, Monster Clubhouse, The 2002 Season, No storms after the Count counts, The twiddlebugs disappear

Now obviously some of these are a little vague and bias, but what do you think? I'll post other shows later.

 

[King Jim]

Sweet!

 

[redBoobergurl]

Wow, this is really interesting! I can't believe Elmo got so many votes, but yet I also can believe it. I think it's interesting that the death of Jim Henson and the death of Mr. Hooper got votes when they were circumstances beyond the producers control. It's not like the producers said "hey let's kill off Mr. Hooper" so I'm not sure if that qualifys for truly jumping the shark, but oh well. It's still a really interesting list to say the least! Thanks for digging that up Vic Romano!

 

[DanDanStrawberry]

I love Jump The Shark, and Bored.com in general! I also like GuessTheName.com

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Oh! Bored.com Is Awesome!!!!!

 

[Vic Romano]

Muppets Tonight
Never Jumped 13 votes
Jumped from Day One 5 votes
Kermit Doesn't Host 3 votes
Ms. Piggy Takes Over 1 vote

The Jim Henson Hour
Never Jumped 5 votes
This is one of the very few shows on jumptheshark.com that recieved no votes for jumping of any kind. The following is a comment that pretty much sums up all the thoughts of those who voted:
This show was Jim's attempt to bring back the Muppets 8 years after the Muppet Show ended. Commercially it failed, but artistically it was one of his greatest achievements. The first half was a Muppet Show type thing, but the second half was a Labyrinth type thing. And they were both always brilliant. I can't believe this was cancelled for Baywatch.

Fraggle Rock
Never Jumped 46 votes
Jumped from Day One 3 votes
Naked Doozers 2 votes
The following all recieved one vote a piece: The opening theme ended, Everyone became friends, I got scared, The Weeba Beast chant, The Trash Heap goes PC and The séance

 

[DanDanStrawberry]

I've forgotten the name of the actual site, but a branch of Bored.com is where you type in a web address and it translates it into Swedish Chef language which I think is awesome!!

 

[Katzi428]

I've forgotten the name of the actual site, but a branch of Bored.com is where you type in a web address and it translates it into Swedish Chef language which I think is awesome!!

http://www.rinkwerks.com/
There you go Dan. Go to Dialectizer on that site & it has our ol' pal The Swedish Chef!

 

[Banjo Matt]

Even google has his own Chef-based site:

Bork!

See ya,
Matt.

 

[DanDanStrawberry]

http://www.rinkwerks.com/
There you go Dan. Go to Dialectizer on that site & it has our ol' pal The Swedish Chef!

Thanks babe!! That rules!!