Wednesday, February 21, 2007

I have been a Muppets fan for as long as I can remember. One of my first television memories is the sketch about cooperation where the Geefle and the Gonk both want a nectarine, but each has a problem plucking the fruit off the tree, so they work together to get it, and once successful try to coin the term "cooperation" as "shirley" (man I wish YouTube hadn't removed every posting of that video). As a kid I'm sure I saw every episode of Fraggle Rock. I watched The Muppet Show (and The Muppet Movie) as a child, then again as an adult, and loved it both times, but for different reasons. I had a Snuffleupagus stuffed animal, which I treasured for years. Labyrinth is one of my most-watched movies of all time, and started my obsession with Jennifer Connolly (and David Bowie). I was upset for ages when I blew any chance of working at Sesame Street.* Even at 27, I got excited when I hear news about a sequel to The Dark Crystal.
Therefore, finding this list of 5 Freaky Muppet Videos gave me great joy, as did the fact that it actually contains much more than five videos. Hopefully you'll enjoy it as much as I do.

* This happened during one of my Communications classes in college. We had a guest speaker from Children's Television Workshop to help our discussion on how children understand television as they age. During the Q&A session, I asked her what she thought of critics who claimed that Sesame Street causes short attention spans in children, which was an honest, valid question based on our readings (MTV gets the same criticism). She stared at me for a moment, then curtly said "There's no evidence to support that theory" and quickly moved on to the next question. Afterwards, students had the opportunity to give her resumes to apply for internships. When I handed mine to her, she gave me a look that said "Wow, you've got some balls thinking I'll do anything except throw this in the trash as soon as you leave." I have since applied for another job there and never heard back. I blame this woman.

No comments: