The Muppets (2011)

When I heard a news about how Jason Segel approaching Amy Adams to star in his project, “The Muppets,” with unique approach (can’t find the link, sorry) to which Ms.Adams reportedly says that she couldn’t say “no” to, I was puzzled. I was scoffed when I heard about bringing “The Muppets” back to the big screen especially because I hadn’t seen them ever and I’m not really keen with the idea of pitting talking socks with human actors, and wondered why Ms.Adams, my number two favorite actress of all time had signed on it. Yeah, sue me, but I’m more of “Sesame Street” kid. And beyond Kermit and Miss Piggy, I have no clue on who else was in “The Muppets.”

But then the reviews started to trickling in, and they are at the very least, were positive even as far as attaining fresh rating from rottentomatoes. At this point, my wonderment turns into curiosity as I wondered if that perhaps there is some kind of a novelty that this movie has to offer to have such positive response. It turns out that, maybe I’m the wrong generation because there are so very few memorable moments from this movie that at first I struggled to see the fallacy of my early predicament. But in the end, no matter how I look at it, the truth remains. I can’t like “The Muppets” and I’m very disappointed with Ms.Adams for taking part in this movie. Hey, maybe I *am* the wrong generation.

The plot is very straightforward and it is my fault to expect otherwise and came out disappointed in the end. “The Muppets” are rightfully the thing of the past. They are fairly irrelevant and the world has moved on. But not for one loyal fan who wished to see them together again. Throw in some villain with an agenda to disband the Muppets once and for all, and you know exactly how the movie will end. Surprise! Well, no. Not even a surprise ending.

I read somewhere that they used to have the Muppets show loaded with celebrity cameos and who’s-who appeared regularly at the show. Tho movie lives to that tradition and it has a very generous amount of cameos, they have their own section at the end credit roll. It’s not much, but I have (well actually, more like trying to) more fun playing the game of spot-the-cameo than invested in the story development which I pretty much suspected, and probably true, is more to serve as a mere nostalgic device.

The movie occasionally breaks the fourth wall, a joke that I’m quite sure not that very effective against Indonesian audiences, some songs with a quite entertaining and some pinch of hilarity on its lyric, and for me personally, a new rendition to Nirvana’s classic, “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Dave Grohl also serve as one of the cameo, by the way. And for me, that is pretty much about it.