Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
Here I am again with another review on a ‘Muppets’ movie, which I saw on Disney+ directly after seeing the fourth episode of ‘Muppets Now’. ‘The Muppets’ 2011 film was a movie I saw at the cinema in February 2012 in the UK. It is the first of what is considered as a ‘reboot’ of the Muppets.
At the time of seeing this movie, I didn’t think the Muppets had become unpopular by this point. Maybe it was due to me seeing ‘The Muppet Show’ in its first three seasons on DVD beforehand, but I didn’t think people had forgotten about them. Maybe they hadn’t made any movies for a long time.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed seeing Muppet films like ‘A Muppet Christmas Carol’, ‘Muppet Treasure Island’ and ‘Muppets From Space’, but maybe they weren’t so popular at the time they were released at cinemas. Hence, why they were given a reboot in order to inspire audiences again!
In this particular ‘Muppets’ movie, the film focuses on devoted Muppet fan Walter, who makes his debut in the Muppets universe, I believe. He has a human brother Jason Segel as Gary (who co-wrote the film, would you believe) going out with his girlfriend, Amy Adams as Mary. Gary and Mary!
Get it? Haha! 😀 By the way, it is surreal to see Amy Adams in a ‘Muppets’ movie before she played Lois Lane in the ‘DC Extended Universe’ movies. But honestly, I’ve seen Amy Adams in the Disney film called ‘Enchanted’ made before this ‘Muppets’ film. I knew I recognised her from somewhere. 🙂
Anyway, Walter, Gary and Mary help Kermit the Frog to reunited the disbanded Muppets in order to raise $10 million to save the Muppet Theater from being demolished by Chris Cooper as the evil businessman as Tex Richman. How do I know he’s evil? Because he says “Maniacal laugh” a lot here!
No, I don’t mean he does maniacal laughs in the film. He actually says ‘maniacal laugh’ in order to get Muppets like Uncle Deadly and Bobo the Bear who work for him to laugh maniacally. Maybe that’s why he didn’t become the Green Goblin in ‘The Amazing Spider-Man 2’. He couldn’t laugh. 😀
In many ways, there are plenty of emotional moments featured in the film as well as funny. The emotional and quite serious scenes between characters like Kermit and Miss Piggy are balanced by the comedy pretty well. I even had tears in my eyes by the time the movie finished, even on Disney+.
As well as Muppets like Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear and Gonzo the Great, there are plenty of guest celebrity appearances and cameos featured in the film. This includes Jack Black himself; Rashida Jones as network executive Veronica, Alan Arkin, Donald Glover, Emily Blunt, Whoopi Goldberg, Selena Gomez, Neil Patrick Harris (really he was in this?) and the late Mickey Rooney himself. WOW!
The songs featured in the film are very good too. As well as ‘The Muppet Show’ theme song, there are songs like ‘Life’s a Happy Song’, ‘Pictures in My Head’, ‘Me Party’, ‘Let’s Talk About Me’ sung by evil Tex Richman himself, ‘Man or Muppet’ (which won an Academy Award, I believe) and ‘Rainbow Connection’. ‘We Built This City’ by Starship was in this film and I’m playing it now as I write this review. 😀 And of course how could this movie not have ‘Mahna Mahna’?! Whatever that means! 😀
Overall, the 2011 ‘Muppets’ movie is an uplifting film to sit through. I enjoyed seeing it on the big screen back in 2012 and I’ve enjoyed seeing it on DVD, TV and recently on Disney+. This movie has a lot of emotional and funny moments featured throughout, fulfilling your inner Muppet happiness. 🙂
Now, what happened to that movie called ‘Green with Envy’? 😀
Thanks for reading!
Bye for now!
Tim. 🙂
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