Weekly Muppet Wednesdays: Girl Pirate

Today's post was written by Ed Castle. Special thanks to Chris Stulz for the great artwork.

GIRL PIRATE

Performed by...
Camille Bonara

Only appearance...
Muppet Sing Alongs: Muppet Treasure Island (1996)

Best known role...
No-nonsense girl pirate

WHO IS GIRL PIRATE?
The Girl Pirate, simply addressed as such, is a female pirate-type person who makes her only Muppet appearance in the Muppet Treasure Island Muppet Sing-Along home video release. At one point in the video, she admits that Kermit would make a great pirate, though Polly the Lobster doubts she knows anything about being a pirate. When confronted with this claim, she explains it all in true Muppet fashion, through the song "Real Pirate." She makes a second appearance later in the video, during the song "Let The Good Shine Out," kissing Kermit when he sings about giving love and having it come back to you.

WHY DO THE MUPPETS NEED THE GIRL PIRATE?
People keep saying that there aren't that many female Muppet characters. Okay, maybe not that many in the established core besides Miss Piggy, Janice, and Camilla. But there are plenty of them if you dig deep enough--not that you should have to dig enough. It is unfortunate that there aren't more female Muppets... but The Girl Pirate also represents a sense of female empowerment/achievement, that a girl can be anything she wants to be, breaking through the ranks of mostly male-dominated professional pirates.

The Muppet Mindset by Ryan Dosier, muppetmindset@gmail.com