It’s not easy being green

The Muppet Show was my favourite TV programme when I was growing up, but this film, the first in over a decade? Not so much, even though it is fun in parts. I liked it terrifically at the beginning, and loved seeing Kermit again, and Miss Piggy, with her ‘pork chop’ (‘Hi-yah!’) and Gonzo and Fozzie Bear and Animal, because they are all such distinct personalities, and have such presence, and when I heard the theme tune for the first time in years — ‘It’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights, it’s time to meet the Muppets on The Muppet Show tonight…’ — I felt I might actually burst with happiness, although luckily I didn’t. (Last time I burst with happiness, it was hell to get out of the carpets, and even splashed the curtains.)

But, in trying to appeal to my generation and today’s kiddywinks who are new to it all, it ultimately falls between the two stools before opting to veer towards the latter, after which it becomes the cloyingly predictable film it had set out to undercut.