We asked for your “Two Things” on The Muppets Mayhem, and boy, you delivered! A lot of people sent in their likes and dislikes about the new series, so without further ado, let’s jump in and see what everyone has to say!
Terry M
Likes: Meta jokes (especially the Feebles)
Dislikes: Too many human main characters
Christy
Likes: Everything
Dislikes: Nothing
Drappa
Likes: Lips + all the fanart inspiration on twitter
Dislikes: Meet the Feebles reference
Danny Beckwith
Likes: The feeling of pure joy watching The Muppets return to a true-to-form place where warmth, humor, and slightly risky choices were made (none of which were off-putting) with a sense of predictable unpredictability where anything could, and would, happen.
Dislikes: I didn’t like that the entire series was dropped all at once. The show was clearly designed to keep you wanting more after each episode. If it had been a progressive drop each week, I think there would have been more word of mouth and even more people tuning in to see what mayhem was going to happen next.
Mark Rowan
Likes: This has the heart and spirit of classic Muppets.
Dislikes: Janice and Floyd didn’t get to sing harmony together nearly enough.
Molly Clews
Likes: Learning more about the Band’s backstories and their connections to one another in particular Floyd and Animal. Brings so much more life and depth to these already amazing characters! Also just how obvious it was that this show was made with love and laughter.
Dislikes: Barely a dislike because I’m a sucker for this show and everything about it and I get why they made it about Nora of course and I love the character in general, she is brilliant, but I feel like she shouldn’t have been the reason they all came back together, rather Animal, who they literally state is their band’s heartbeat.
Caleb C
Likes: Honestly I was a huge fan of Peter’s version of lips, and i loved Dr. teeth’s backstory
Dislikes: Not too much but I hated the fact that the humans had most of the storylines about themselves.
Laura Shawver
Likes: A true Muppet production!
Dislikes: That there were only 10 episodes
Quackers J. Duck
Likes: I like that the creators gave Lips a new personality. I liked him before with Steve Whitmire (even if he had seldom been seen), but Peter linz really made me love him more than ever.
Dislikes: The whole “social media turning into lifestyles tearing the band apart” thing could’ve been something else. Maybe a more deep-rooted hatred/conflict could’ve been awakened that would’ve torn the band apart. Animal could’ve brought them back together via classic clips and good memories. But that’s just me.
Maria Nance
Likes: The love, care, and appreciation for the Electric Mayhem/Muppets was definitely seen and felt throughout from everyone in the cast and crew. The characters obviously had their roots, but were given room to grow.
Dislikes: Reliance on “social media bad” when that is a very nuanced discussion. It felt like the same old boomer logic of “all social media is bad and I hate change.” (And I’m cheating but also the minecraft plot, what the heck was that? Why was it needed? The backend of the series kinda fell on its face for me, especially since it focused so heavily on the humans and not the EM.)
David Boswell
Likes: Hard to pick one thing, I love a lot about this show, but the fact that it finally gave us a full Mayhem album (which rules!) is hard to top.
Dislikes: I think the overarching story lost a little bit of momentum toward the end, especially the tired “addicted to phones/technology” stuff.
Angelo
Likes: I like that the show allows the Mayhem to truly take the spotlight without more popular characters.
Dislikes: I didn’t like the look of the show. It looks too desaturated to me.
Matt Turner
Likes: The depth added to the Electric Mayhem
Dislikes: It needed more Muppets. Not necessarily the core characters but more muppets needed to inhabit the world.
Cgriff12
Likes: the music! it’s a given
Dislikes: Lips being characterized as a guy who just mumbles. We already have Animal for our nonsense speaker
Josh
Likes: Characters that aren’t normally front and center were given starring roles.
Dislikes: We haven’t gotten a definite season 2 announcement yet!
Kyle Frisch
Likes: The new Muppets characters introduced were all great!
Dislikes: The human character storylines were kind of bland.
Lucas Ross
Likes: That Bridge Over Troubled Water is what Floyd would sing to Animal when he was a baby.
Dislikes: A Kermit cameo would have been nice but I’m just being petty.
Nick Langford
Likes: Honestly? I keep coming back to the theme tune more than anything. It’s just such a fun song that will almost certainly be in my music rotation for years to come.
Dislikes: The look of the show was so drab! The mayhem are such beautifully colorful puppets and I really wish the look of the show had leaned into that brightness. I hate to be too negative though, I really think this is a step in the right direction overall for this era of muppets.
Tyler
Likes: I loved the show so much, but my favorite aspect would have to be the lore of Floyd, Animal, and Teeth. It felt so natural and well done.
Dislikes: Again, I loved the show, but I do wish there was a little bit more emphasis out on Floyd and Janice as a couple. I think aside from one off-handed mention, you wouldn’t even know that the two are romantically linked (an uninformed viewer might think that she has more chemistry with Ziggy Marley).
Jason Breslin
Likes: The new music
Dislikes: The lack of other Muppet characters
Zach Moore
Likes: I loved what they did with all the characters, and the songs were just incredible! #TeamZoot!
Dislikes: I can describe the ONLY thing I didn’t like about the show in one word: Minecraft.
Shane (a different one than me, I swear!)
Likes: How down to earth it was. It made me cry and laugh so much.
Dislikes: How disconnected it felt like the Muppets at times. Yeah it’s Electric Mayhem, but I was expecting a little more Muppets in there
Will
Likes: Dr Teeth’s characterization
Dislikes: Main hunan cast acting was rough, especially compared to cameos and the Muppets themselves
Chris Stulz
Likes: The music & the merch – especially getting The Electric Mayhem’s 1st album! Side Note: Episode 7 is BRILLIANT!
Dislikes: The repeated concept throughout the season of the band breaking up and getting back together.
Although I loved Floyd’s jingles “Soup De Doop” is a banger for sure, but it felt like something we’d see already – especially in the last two episodes of the season.
Andrew
Likes: The return to form for Muppet entertainment. The characters were true to themselves, the jokes were funny, the stories were character driven, the music was fantastic, and it was all made with the fans in mind.
Dislikes: I think the balance between grounded and silly for the human characters overall could have been tweaked slightly. Specifically, I feel they were holding back too much on Lilly Singh’s abilities as a performer and comedian. I think she’s at her best when she’s more chaotic and I would have loved to have seen that come out more with Nora’s character arc throughout the season.
Dustin Hauff
Likes: Watching a Muppet project minus the main characters (Kermit, Piggy, etc.) was refreshing. I love the main characters but it was nice to try something different for a change.
Dislikes: There could be, at times, too much focus on the human characters.
Lenny Penge
Likes: I loved the episode with Doctor Teeth’s parents, the backstory with Floyd was a lot of fun and some fun new info.
Dislikes: I don’t like it when writers try to modernize the muppets, they’re at their best when their being classic. Even the muppet show was based on 30s vaudeville. Giving them phones and tictok just makes me feel embarrassed on their behalf.
Jessie
Likes: The backstories!!! I somehow get the feeling that the whole band was pretty well established in one season so hopefully more screentime and exposition will be dedicated to them in a potential season 2.
Dislikes: not enough janpepper /j but seriously though it was so tiring to get through the human stuff. the love triangle is so corny. i love moog tho hes the best
The Bomp in the Bomp-a-Bomp-a-Bomp
Likes: I really love this show and its songs, but my favorite thing is the fact that expired marshmallows are a known Muppet hallucinogen.
Dislikes: Hopefully someone won’t try to replicate the hallucinogenic marshmallows, or things would go quite wrong.
Lucy
Likes: The classic-style muppet humor 🙂
Dislikes: The color grading i hate the color grading so much IT LOOKS SO BAD WHY DOES IT LOOK LIKE THAT
Sophie
Likes: My favorite parts of this amazing show were in episodes 3 and 6 when we flashbacked to the band’s origins. I want to hug every single member of the band now. They really are just this big family, and everything about how they met, from Animal the fortunately-rescued sad doorstep baby to Teeth running off with Floyd, feels perfect.
Dislikes: For the most part, this actually had humans that were likable, against all odds. But I HATE JJ. He’s this smug petty jerk who, every time he’s onscreen, turns the plot from fun band antics to an awful human love triangle no one asked for. I hated Nora forgiving and peacefully breaking up with him despite literally everything in the last episode so much that I immortalized it (and the way the Moog side of things just has… no ending) on TV Tropes Dethroning Moment of Suck.
Liz
Likes: The idea of a Muppet based project where most of the main cast don’t show up was a risky move, but it really paid off and I enjoyed how the tighter focus allowed each member, even Lips, to get plenty of spotlight.
Dislikes: The fact every episode had to end with an overly emotional tug on the heartstrings for a climax, usually accompanied by song. Most of the time I wasn’t invested enough in the episodes plots for it to mean anything so it just felt cloying and unearned, and as a result any time there was a legitimately emotional plot beat it didn’t hit as well because it was overdone.
Shan
Likes: the muppets
Dislikes: the focus on nora, her actress is not exactly super well liked and so such a huge part of the show being about her really dragged it down.
Rocko Rotten
Likes: Where do I begin with this amazing show? It’s so good that it has become my favorite Muppet project. One big thing is that we got to know more of the Electric Mayhem. It’s refreshing to see other Muppets get the spotlight, and I hope that this paves the way for a Muppetverse. With so many Muppet characters, there are endless ideas. Perhaps we may get a Tales from the Vet spin-off? Hopefully.
Dislikes: I have very little to complain, but there’s one bit in episode 8 that bothers me. The way they portrayed Minecraft in that episode was a bit unrealistic, and I don’t think it was the best choice to present. Roblox would’ve been a better choice. I won’t go on about what they got wrong there, but an average Minecraft player should notice what’s up.
Maria
Likes: All the new puppets
Dislikes: The pacing
Cole J. Dakers (Muppet Man)
Likes: All the references and new Muppet characters
Dislikes: None I can think of
GelflingJedi
Likes: The back story between Floyd and Animal
Dislikes: I seem to be alone on this but I found Penny to be obnoxious and gross. Someone had to say it.
Ilana Solomon
Likes: Dr. Teeth singing “Have a Little Faith In Me”
Dislikes: Dr. Teeth and Penny’s relationship
Tori Schmidt
Likes: It was really nice seeing zoot and lips both geting some real development
Dislikes: What was JJ’s deal? Was he a villain? A good person with bad intentions? He felt very under developed
Stella
Likes: I really like how the electric mayhem’s characters are more expanded.
Dislikes: I really didn’t like the love triangle that was going on between the human cast
Grant Harding
Likes: The show had a cartoon logic that had been missing for a while. Of course Dr. Teeth can pull mai tais from nowhere; he’s a Muppet!
Dislikes: They gave Dr. Teeth a first name and it wasn’t Leon.
Arturo J. Thong
Likes: Characters that we previously didn’t know a lot about were fleshed-out (felted-out?) and that really made the Mayhem fun to watch nearly every time they were on screen.
Dislikes: Some of the weaker episodes had tropes that were tired and unfunny. Hallucinating after ingesting “fill-in-the-blank”, Dr. Teeth creates a Youtube show like something out of ‘Ralph Breaks the Internet’, the band breaks up and has to get back together….this stuff was just not creative at all . One thing the Muppets were known for was a huge amount of creativity and turning conventions on their heads. There was some of that in the first season, but not enough. Hopefully we get more in a potential second season!
Brandon Stone
Likes: How they developed The Electric Mayhem more.
Dislikes: Most of the human characters except Moog.
Jack
Likes: The character backstories!!! Loved seeing Teeth and Floyd’s backstories and would hope to see more in the future! (And more of Tina and Gerald)
Dislikes: The only thing I didn’t like was the minecraft concert… It was probably just me but I cringed through the whole thing. I couldn’t stand to watch it.
Dre
Likes: I really enjoyed the overall vibe of the show. Really felt muppety for a TV series! Loved the shine on all 6 members of Electric Mayhem
Dislikes: I wasn’t a huge fan of the human scenes without a muppet. The writing was kind of meh for the humans.
Jake Friedman
Likes: It felt like it was directed by James Frawley (who Jim had hired to direct The Muppet Movie because of his work directing the Monkees TV show).
Dislikes: Dr. Teeth’s backstory as a serious thing. Seemed forced. Muppet backstories only work if they’re silly … like their frontstories.
Arthur Smith
Likes: Best Muppet outing in many years
Dislikes: That it currently has not been renewed
Syd
Likes: The mayhem felt like the mayhem and all the characters were dealt with perfectly
Dislikes: Sometimes the timing of the emotional moments or songs made me physically cringe like I couldn’t watch
Zac
Likes: Janice ???
Dislikes: Lack of colour
Ty Karac Sargent
Likes: The Muppets
Dislikes: The humans
Matthew Weikert
Likes: That the show is all about my favorite band of all time, the Electric Mayhem
Dislikes: That the band separated to accomplish their own goals thanks to technology
JD
Likes: Ben Schwartz playing off Animal
Dislikes: JJ was somehow both too evil and not evil enough
Grace
Likes: Literally everything about it. The characters and the music especially.
Dislikes: Nothing. Literally nothing
That’s a lot of things! But there’s more people than that on this planet with thoughts, so stay tuned later this week for Part 2! Wow, a cliffhanger! Disney+ is gonna love this!
Click here to have strong opinions about Lips on the Tough Pigs forum!
By Shane Keating
