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‘Muppet Babies’ Are Back In 2017: New TV Series Announced

By Stacey Cole
Published on: 00:14 PST, Mar 23, 2017

The Walt Disney Company may have a (very) early Christmas present for Muppets fans. Though it’s only the third month of 2017, Disney has announced a reimagined version of Muppet Babies.

But here’s the disappointing part right off the bat: fans won’t see much of the new Muppet Babies in 2017 apart from some early teasers and previews, as it’s scheduled to be released in early 2018.

Last year’s failure of The Muppets on ABC may be hard to forget, but Disney is hoping for a clean start. Although the studio failed to win the hearts of grown-ups last year, it might still attract kids aged four to seven with its brand new, reimagined version of Muppet Babies.

Though Muppet Babies may want to get rid of the screenwriters of last year’s The Muppets to steer clear of yet another failure, the new kids series will feature young versions of some of the most favorite Muppets characters Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, Gonzo, Animal, and Miss Nanny.

Although fans won’t see much of the Muppet Babies in 2017, Disney has unveiled its plans to make each episode of the upcoming series 11-minutes long. The TV series will show Muppet Babies go on different adventures to help kids improve their creative and critical thinking skills. One of the stories will feature Muppet Babies building a time machine to go on a journey through outer space.

Muppet Babies, which will premiere on Disney Junior, is inspired by the original TV series of the same name that ran from 1984 through 1991. Interestingly, the new animated series announced in 2017 will allow the 1991 version’s fans, who may have kids of their own now, to treat their children to the show that promoted their own imaginative play.

In a statement announcing the new version of Muppet Babies, the vice president of The Muppets Studio, Debbie McClellan, said the upcoming TV series will engage both the nostalgic older fans and young kids, according to USA Today.

“We hope to engage and delight the nostalgic fans while also entertaining new kids, parents and diverse audiences through heart and humor as only the Muppets can deliver.”

The Muppets creators have had nearly a year since ABC’s show was canceled after just 16 episodes due to poor ratings, so hopefully for both Muppet Babies viewers and the studio itself, Disney will learn from its mistakes in 2017.

The Muppets viewers had several problems with last year’s ABC series, among them was shying away from its signature family friendly style. But original Muppeteer Frank Oz thinks he knows the reason why 2016’s Muppets was canceled, according to CBR. It was due to poor writing skills of the new team.

So the team behind Muppet Babies may want to fire the writers that worked on The Muppets last year to avoid a similar failure in 2017 and 2018. Oz, who was behind such iconic Muppets characters as Miss Piggy, Cookie Monster, and Yoda, didn’t like the 2016 Muppets show just like pretty much all of the show’s fans. And Oz thinks the main reason of The Muppets‘ failure was poor writing.

“My brothers, my sisters, were in there [as the puppeteers]. They did the very best they could. But essentially, they were working with scripts that other people wrote.”

In addition to that the single camera mockumentary style, which has been one of the biggest trends on TV since the success of Modern Family, is to blame for 2016’s Muppets cancellation.

A little less than a year is left until the new Muppet Babies is set to debut on Disney Junior, which is why it’d probably be a good idea for the studio to work on the show’s scripts and style for the rest of 2017.

[Featured Image by Cindy Ord/Getty Images]

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