The name of the game at the Walt Disney Company in the 21st century has been “acquisition.” The company has grown massively in size thanks largely to the era in which former CEO Bob Iger oversaw the purchases of Pixar, Marvel, and Lucasfilm. But in the years before Buzz Lightyear, Spider-Man, and Luke Skywalker became Disney property, an equally beloved if frustratingly underserved group of characters took up residence in the Magic Kingdom. That would be the Muppets, who joined the fold in February of 2004, ensuring that any future films, TV shows, and specials starring Kermit The Frog, Miss Piggy, and Fozzie Bear would have the Disney imprimatur.
This was one of the final big moves from Iger’s predecessor, Michael Eisner, the completion of a deal that had fallen through nearly 15 years prior—just before the death of Muppet creator Jim Henson. Compared to Iger’s active pursuit of Pixar once he was installed as CEO, the view from outside the company was that Eisner had handed his former underling a bag of unwanted felt on his way out the door. As the company poured more money into (and made more money from) sequels to Toy Story and Cars, the many phases of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and the start-and-stop expansion of the Star Wars galaxy, the Muppets managed to feel left out of the expansion party even though they were first to arrive.
The House Of Mouse’s shaky stewardship of Kermit and friends has become a flashpoint once more in light of the recent one-off revival of The Muppet Show and its impressive wins it racked up at this year’s Primetime Emmy Awards. Fans and industry watchers alike remain baffled that Disney hasn’t ordered any additional installments of Sabrina Carpenter’s critically acclaimed, much-watched visit to The Muppet Theater—all the more so after a recent Deadline report suggesting that the sticking point is “the premise” of such a show. Considering that the premise of The Muppet Show is built in (the premise is that it’s The Muppet Show), and considering the state of the Muppets overall, we should ask one simple question. What the hell is Disney doing with the Muppets?
On the surface, the answer would seem to be “quite a lot.” Theme-park fans were heartbroken to see Muppet*Vision 3D permanently retired at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Orlando last year, but that was somewhat offset by Dr. Teeth And The Electric Mayhem replacing Aerosmith as the musical headliners on the park’s Rock ’n’ Roller Coaster. Last decade, Disney released two separate feature films, The Muppets and Muppets Most Wanted, the former of which netted the Muppets’ first Oscar for Best Original Song. (Yes, inexplicably, “Rainbow Connection” lost to the largely forgotten theme from Norma Rae in 1980.) And in 2015, ABC aired a weekly TV series also titled The Muppets. Add in Disney+ projects like Muppets Haunted Mansion and The Muppets Mayhem and it doesn’t seem like the studio has ignored these characters at all.
But just because Disney has kept the Muppets on various screens hasn’t meant that it’s all been creatively successful, or effectively tapped into the blend of zany humor, boundless imagination, and sincere warmth that made people love the Muppets in the first place. The 2015-16 Muppets TV series was an attempt to modernize the characters and have them riff on a different style of TV: Just as the ’70s Muppet Show riffed on the primetime variety extravaganzas of the day, this one would riff on single-cam comedies like The Office and 30 Rock. The behind-the-scenes machinations of a late-night show hosted by Miss Piggy were shown in a mockumentary format, complete with talking-head confessionals and fourth-wall-breaking looks to the imaginary film crew. Perhaps that series could have worked on paper, but as soon as its writers talked about avoiding “talking vegetables and dancing chickens,” it was a sign that these Muppets couldn’t be your grandparents’ Muppets, with no good reason for why they had to be different. The midseason departure of co-creator Bob Kushell didn’t inspire much more confidence, nor did the retooling that followed (to fix it so, for example, Kermit and Piggy didn’t actively hate each other). The damage was already done, and the show was axed after 16 episodes.
Compare the desire to introduce relationship drama and showbiz toxicity into the Muppet mix to the reverence Jason Segel brought to the characters—along with the knowledge of what really makes them tick. Segel wasn’t the only creative driving force behind the 2011 film The Muppets, but his love of the characters was such a defining aspect that it underpins the arc in which his character has to come to terms with whether he’s a man or a Muppet. It’s a shame that appreciation wasn’t fully articulated in the script: The Muppets not only makes its title characters supporting players in a story centered on Segel, Amy Adams, and new Muppet Walter, but spends its entire running time trying to convince its audience that the Muppets are still worth paying attention to. (Anyone who bought a ticket probably agreed to begin with, so the movie was protesting a bit too much.) The 2014 sequel Muppets Most Wanted, meanwhile, actually, attempted to make the Muppets its leads. No mere Great Muppet Caper redux, its European-set adventure involving heists aplenty and a human villain infuses the film with much more of the joyfully anarchic humor of the Jim Henson/Frank Oz era. It should’ve been as big, if not bigger, a box-office hit as The Muppets.
While Segel’s take on the Muppets climaxed with a reenactment of The Muppet Show, the creative team for the 2026 special—the Forgetting Sarah Marshall star’s fellow Apatowverse alumni Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg among them—went the simple route. They just… y’know, made an episode of The Muppet Show. Where so many other iterations of the modern Muppets change things up, from placing them in different contexts or presenting them as drastically different from their established personas, this Muppet Show went right back to basics, and was a resounding success because of that choice.
It isn’t just that the episode aped the basic structure of the original Muppet Show. Gags like The Great Gonzo performing a ridiculous daredevil act while reciting the names of Best Supporting Actress Oscar winners or one in which celebrity guest Maya Rudolph shows up in a Muppet News Flash sketch only to seemingly die managed to thread a delicate needle. These bits allowed the Muppets to feel appropriately 21st-century without sacrificing the original series’ old-fashioned, “Let’s put on a show” spirit.
The Deadline article is, if nothing else, just echoing the frustrations that fans and critics have been voicing in the seven months since The Muppet Show aired on ABC. If the revival had been toothless or unfunny, or if it had been a ratings flop, a lack of a response from the executive team that has since replaced Iger at Disney would make sense. But the show received rave reviews, and its Emmy haul makes for a curious statistic: By winning the awards for Outstanding Variety Special (Pre-Recorded), Outstanding Writing For a Variety Special, Outstanding Picture Editing For A Variety Special, and Outstanding Production Design For A Variety Special, the special equaled the number of Emmys the original Muppet Show won across its five seasons. And while the two feature films and other specials may have had their bumps, the presence of celebrities like Jack Black, Zach Galifianakis, Lady Gaga, and Taraji P. Henson suggests that a new set of episodes would have their pick of A-List special guest stars, a notion seconded by Carpenter, Rudolph, and Rogen’s appearances in the 2026 Muppet Show. Surely the enthusiasm of so many big names holds some sway with the Disney brass.
While the Muppets have weathered their wilderness years, the more fussed over limbs that were grafted onto theDisney family tree have experienced their own struggles. Behind-the-scenes turmoil, flagging grosses, and the questionable results of turning the MCU and Star Wars into sagas that live-action film and television series have all led to the massive bets placed on Avengers: Doomsday and Star Wars: Starfighter—which feel, to paraphrase Jack Donaghy, like trying to make it the 2010s again through science or magic. But no matter how many unfruitful creative avenues they’re led down, audiences still love the characters at the center of this franchise—an affinity that’s particularly pronounced with the Muppets. Just look at the rapturous response to the news that Emma Stone, Jennifer Lawrence, and Cole Escola are trying to get a Miss Piggy movie off the ground, or the glowing New York magazine tribute in which Angelica Jade Bastién declared the porcine diva “the last woman movie star.”
There is, even if the Deadline article implies otherwise, no premise to crack with The Muppet Show. There is no roadmap to follow. Whether it’s Disney or another creative partner struggling to grasp this, the answer is simple: just make The Muppet Show. That alone would show that Disney was willing to do right by these worldwide stars once more. You don’t have to try any harder than that.
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