The Middleman Blog & Origins

The ABC Family's new series The Middleman is much like Men In Black and the Ninja Turtles, that it is based on a comic book that is every little known. According to its Wikipedia article, the Middleman was first conceived to be a television pilot but was worked as a comic book, limited, and ended up as graphic novels.

If you love The Middleman and don't mind getting spoiled, check out the blog.

Little Known Muppet Projects #2: Inner Tube/Lead Free TV

Remember The Jim Henson Hour? It aired in 1989 on NBC on Sunday nights. I was excited to have the Muppets back on TV and religiously watched it. I was saddened to find out it was canceled, I always felt it needed more of a chance. But in truth, at the time, I was 7 and found it a bit alienating. As a kid, you are used to consistency and the show didn't offer that. I think it needed time for people to get used to it, then change it up. And according to Jim Henson's first idea, he wanted each week of the month to be different. Every first week would be The Storyteller, the second would be Inner Tube (which was renamed Lead Free TV in his pitch reel), the third would be a special and fourth anything goes. Back to the pitch later. Inner tube was a pilot he tired before the Hour.

InnerTube was a 10-minute 1987 pilot that was similar to MuppeTelevision of The Jim Henson Hour but had different characters, except for Digit. Also the puppet characters were made of foam latex, they were kinda creepy to me or still are. The cast includes the two harried mechanics Jake and Henry; a futuristic band (featuring Digit on keyboards, with a different, more robotic voice); Crasher, a wild loudmouthed punk character who mostly crashed into other TV shows or people's households; and Glitch, a computer animation that would mischievously interrupt transfer. Kermit and Miss Piggy would have made brief appearances in the show.

In 12 minute pitch for the Jim Henson Hour, Inner Tube was renamed Lead Free TV. The pitch was hosted by Jim Henson and accompanied for each week he explained with Kermit, Gonzo, Ms. Piggy, and Animal. It is available online and very delightful. The idea of these four types of episodes was dropped when The Jim Henson Hour was produced. The Storyteller did air as part of the show, but it was in half-hour episodes. Also, although the MuppeTelevision segments of the show as it was actually produced are similar in format to Lead Free TV, the Lead Free characters were replaced by the Muppets; some familiar faces, others new characters.

Oh Digit. I was both interested by him and scared by him. I liked the MuppeTelevision segments and welcomed him into the Muppet clan. Sadly the only 'new' Muppets to appear in other Muppet specials was Bean Bunny and Clifford, who no longer appears with them. Bean Bunny even cameoed in Muppet Babies. Digit however appeared on a video game. it always interests me how some Muppet characters bounce from one project to another and then never appear again. For example, Clifford joined the Electric Mayhem band as the sax player (In The Muppets at Walt Disney World) and then hosted Muppets Tonight with opened eyeballs. He still appears in specials, as he is puppetered by Kevin Clash, who is also responsible for Elmo.

Little Known Muppet Projects #1: Little Muppet Monsters

I didn't want to call this 'failed' projects because they were all amazing, but they were either changed or canceled. I used to watch Muppet Babies religiously through the 80's and 90's but I don't remember Muppets, Babies & Monsters. The first season of Muppet Babies did very well in the ratings, so CBS decided to expand the series from half an hour to a full hour in 1985, pairing Muppet Babies with Little Muppet Monsters. The umbrella title for the hour-long package was Muppets, Babies and Monsters. What I do remember is The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years, which the show Little Muppet Monsters was mentioned.

The show was anchored by three young Muppet monster siblings: Tug, Boo, and Molly. They lived in an apartment belonging to the adult Muppet Show characters and called them 'uncle.' Cameos would be supplied by Scooter, Kermit the Frog and various penguins and rats. Recurring animated segments included "Pigs in Space," "Kermit the Frog, Private Eye," and "Muppet Sports Shorts" (featuring Animal). Muppet segments included "Fozzie's Comedy Corner," with Fozzie discussing issues related to old jokes, illustrated through animation, and Gonzo presenting a cavalcade of weirdness, using silent film footage. Each episode also featured an original Muppet song. Only 2 of 18 episodes aired.

According to Muppet Wiki, Storyboard director Scott Shaw discussed the show in MuppetZine issue #3 (Winter 1993): "The concept of this second half-hour was neither simple nor particularly well-developed. A trio of new (live-action) Muppet Monster Kids, working from the basement of the adult Muppets' home, create their own television station which broadcasts only to the TV sets in the house upstairs. Although eighteen episodes were produced, only two of them ever aired; Henson Associates and CBS agreed that the concept had never been properly thought out and just wasn't up to Henson's high standards. To Jim's credit, it was his idea to pull the show from the Saturday morning lineup.

I've always felt that the juxtapositioning of live-action and animated Muppets invited an unfavorable comparison, to which the cartoon version inevitably suffered; the puppetry was just too good. The combination of Muppet babies, adults and kid monsters was very disorienting. Also, due to a lack of development time, the concept -- and therefore, the writing and designs -- never quite jelled. The now-vacant second half-hour was filled with repeats of the first season's Muppet Babies episodes, and the ratings stayed strong."

I admit it is indeed confusing. One episode is available on the internet now, and to see the Muppets we known from the muppet show to be in muppet form, adults and babies in cartoons is disorientating. Also, the adult muppets look creepy animated, I guess because we are used to see them without feet. The three monster kids were also seen briefly in the special The Muppets: A Celebration of 30 Years, which was broadcast in January, 1986. The special was shot before the decision was made to take Monsters off the air, so the show cheerfully plugged the Muppets' latest production -- even though that production had been canceled four months earlier. So I was confused to see it as I never seen or heard of them before.

George Carlin Day

I love George Carlin, he was a great man, actor, and comedian. I first discovered him when he had that FOX sitcom. Today, this Saturday, I tuned in on Bravo in the morning and they were showing the Actor's Studio with George Carlin. I never sat down and watched it before, he was a very smart and linguistic man. And of course, at night NBC showed the first ever Saturday Night Live, in which he hosted. And as you may or may not know, NBC and Bravo are both owned by GE.

Carlos Mencia admits to homophobia

At least he admitted to it. he has been pretty gay friendly on the show, but he got pretty homophobic last Wednesday when talking about gay marriage. Maybe he was making fun of homophobes. Almost every instance there was a near-naked man or two men kissing, he kept saying he was averting his eyes or looking at their boots. At one point he was screaming so much with angry that he burst in laughter and admitted that was filled with homophobia. It was great, I could breathe again. I was afraid he was perpetuating homophobia among the young Latino youth. The majority of his audience is frat boys, young Latinos and 'gangsta' boys, who all like him love Scarface. But thank god he had enough insight to point it out. He hilariously had Cheech Marin as the father of one half of a gay marriage.

Gay Parents adopting issue on 30 Days

This Tuesday there was an impactful and important "30 Days." If they repeat it or if you can get it online or ondemand, please see it. It was an awesome program. "30 Days" if you don't know is a FX program done by Morgan Spurlock who did Supersize Me and the premise is a person must spend 30 days with a family or person of opposing view of an issue. In this one, a mormon mother and wife lives with two gay men and their four adopted children. It was very well researched and showed many different views to the issue. Included many pro-gay groups and also anti-having gay couples adopting children lead by a woman that had a bad experience that damaged her sexually and psychologically by her father who suddenly introduced his lover and it was complicated. Anyhoo, this woman could be construed as a cookie-cutter stereotype or cartoon character, but she did show more than one side. And even though at some points I hated her and what she had to say, the one-hour episode had lots of important things to say.

I was kinda disappointed they concentrated mostly on her and not the couple she stayed with but maybe because they were a bit more reserved than last week's hosts---last week was about a meat-eater living with vegans and the vegan host was a bit more outspoken. So, yeah what was funny was that this woman in this episode was crying and hated being confronted and kept saying she wasn't an expert on the subject and what is funny about that is that is how I feel most of the time when confronting hostile straight people. What I hate the most is when they don't see homophobic and say they aren't but still say hurtful things and are so smug about it. So she felt attacked but that is how we feel most of the time. In the end, she didn't want to change or budge, even though she has grown to love them and didn't like that the kids didn't hang out with her anymore--it was because of the conflict between her and their parents. Many of the pro-people were pushing on her that if gay parents can't adopt, then many many children end up with no homes. And I agree, many they came up too absolute and too strong, but maybe that is how it was edited, but they could have attempted easing into it.

She expected to be civil with everyone even though they have opposing views and that is not a bad idea, it might be naive but it is an ideal. I wish we could all come to compromises in the name of our children's safety. And just because they are raised by a straight couple, it doesn't mean they will be raised by sane and people of honor. One thing I liked what one of the parents said, "Gay parents are not accidental parents." Indeed, they are the only parents who choose to be parents and are not like.. oops. I'm late!