News Update: March 18, 2014

MARCH 18, 2014

Kermit the Frog made a big-time appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon last night. He sat in as Jimmy's second guest and then performed "Bein' Green" accompanied by The Roots and Jimmy Fallon. It was a delightful appearance and Kermit was a lot of fun in the interview. Enjoy the videos below!





Miss Piggy stopped by Toronto's CP24 Breakfast show thiorning on her big promotional tour through Canada. Unfortunately, the video cannot be embedded, but you  can watch the fantastic nine minute appearance on the CP24 Breakfast website.

Tina Fey was spotted in Walt Disney World's Hollywood Studios theme park a few days ago. Obviously, she stopped by Muppet*Vision 3D. While she was there, she got to hang out with the Muppet*Vision version of Sweetums, and we got this stellar picture:

The Muppets overwhelmed QVC on Sunday, appearing on the network for almost nine hours straight. The appearances were fun and Muppety, but few and far between. However, we got to see Rizzo, Constantine, Bobo, Big Mean Carl, and Link Hogthrob (plus the frog, pig, bear, whatever, and prawn), so it's all worth it. Our friends at ToughPigs.com have collected all of the videos from the appearance in one massive post, and I highly suggest checking it out!

The Swedish Chef and Constantine appeared on ABC's The Chew this morning. The Swedish Chef helped cook some meatballs. Unfortunately, the videos are once again not able to be embedded, but the appearance is hysterical and felt like an old Swedish Chef sketch on The Muppet Show. You've got to check it out. Visit The Chew's website for the two videos.

Constantine is the subject of a great article from The New York Times which also features interviews from James Bobin and Matt Vogel. It's a really insightful article about the creation of the character and goes into detail about some of their difficulties in distinguishing Constantine from Kermit. Give it a read!

Entertainment Weekly has yet another clip from Muppets Most Wanted. In this clip, we see Kermit attempting to break out of the Russian gulag he's trapped in. Unfortunately for the frog, Nadya (Tina Fey), doesn't really like that idea. Watch below (or don't to remain spoiler free):



Muppet fans Ryan Dosier (hey, that's me!), Ryan Roe, and Joe Hennes (both from ToughPigs) were interviewed by The Wall Street Journal for an article profile on Muppet fandom. The article is incredibly well written and I'm so honored and thrilled to be quoted alongside my friends Ryan and Joe. Read the article over on The Wall Street Journal site.

Our amazing friends at ToughPigs.com have organized fan screenings of Muppets Most Wanted in major cities across the United States. If our base wasn't in the middle of nowhere, we would've jumped at the chance to host one of these. But look at all the cities covered: New York City, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Portland, Washington, DC, Dallas, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Salt Lake City, Chicago, and Phoenix! Incredible. For more information, check out ToughPigs.

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

Muppets Most Wanted Video Overload

As of today, we're only one month away from the U.S. release of Muppets Most Wanted. Obviously that means that Disney is going to pull out all the stops for promotion... and today's post proves that they undoubtedly have. Today alone we have six new promo videos for the movie. Watch them all below for lots of Muppety goodness from our most wanted movie of the year!

"Winter Games" TV Spot



"Curling at the Winter Games" with Gonzo and The Swedish Chef



The Muppets Celebrate Presidents' Day (posted on The Walt Disney Studios Facebook page)

Post by Walt Disney Studios.

"Confusing Plot" TV Spot



"More Muppets" TV Spot



"America's Favorite Frog" TV Spot



Check back tomorrow as we attempt to screenshot and explain every new piece of footage from the movie in one of our famous trailer breakdowns!






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

News Update: January 10, 2014

NEWS UPDATE: January 10, 2014

We're excited to announce that the Sesame Street Design Contest for WeLoveFine is now open for voting and rating! The grand prize for this contest is huge: a visit to the offices of Sesame Street where the winner will meet with the creative team and have the design showcased in their offices! Cast your votes and start ranking the best of the designs (because there are quite a few really, really lame ones). There are still 18 days to cast your votes because voting ends January 28th.

Muppets Most Wanted has gone publicity crazy this week. First there was a new promo video spot highlighting how excited the internet is about the movie, and then major entertainment websites across the internet posted awesome articles about how excited they really are! IGN has a fantastic article about their time on set in Los Angeles. So does Ain't It Cool News, and Bleeding Cool, and TotalFilm. Coincidentally, the days these big-time press people were on set in Los Angeles were the same days I was on set as well. It's such a blast reading this articles and reliving my unbelievable time with the Muppets. Hopefully I'll get clearance from Disney soon to post my own article discussing the awesome.

There was one more revealing video promoting Muppets Most Wanted released this week as well. It focuses on Disney Channel star Ross Lynch but it includes a lot of new content from the film. Check it out below! Special thanks to our friends at MuppetMusings for uploading this.









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

Muppets Most Wanted Poster Revealed!

The first poster for Muppets Most Wanted has been revealed via The Walt Disney Company and Entertainment Weekly. Check it out below in high resolution:

I don't hate the poster, by any means. It's fun and colorful and manages to get in all of the main characters, which is nice. Also, FOO FOO! And I can't say how much I adore the tagline "Taking The World By Farce"--absolutely brilliant. I do have some major issues though. First, Gonzo and Pepe are far, far smaller than they should be. Second, Animal, Sam, Foo Foo, and Constantine are the only Muppet poser puppets on here that weren't used constantly in promotion for The Muppets in 2011, which is disappointing.

But for the most part I'm just severely excited for this movie. Is it March yet?






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

Muppets Most Wanted at the D23 Expo

Today at Disney's D23 Expo in Anaheim, California, The Walt Disney Studios presentation, which lasted a whopping two hours, showcased the best in upcoming live action films from Disney, Marvel, Lucasfilm, and more. Among this more was Muppets Most Wanted, the upcoming Muppet movie, which commanded a lot of time and a lot of laughs during the presentation. We've managed to compile what happened in the presentation (even though we weren't there), thanks mostly to Twitter.

The Muppet portion started out by showing a longer, more detailed trailer for Muppets Most Wanted, which featured "Tina Fey singing" (@MouseInfo), "lots of good, Muppet-y gags" (@ThePlaylist), "more plot, better jokes" (@raysubers), and was "infinitely better" (@ThePlaylist) than the teaser trailer from a few days ago. There was also a lot of talk about how the trailer makes a big deal about Kermit's resemblance to Constantine. Danny Horn (@MuppetWiki) tweeted that there was a gag where "Fozzie has a newspaper with a mugshot of Constantine. Fozzie puts his finger over C's mole and Walter says, 'Hey, it's Kermit!' Fozzie takes his finger away, and Walter says, 'Wait! Where's Kermit? Where did Kermit go??'"

After the trailer, Ty Burrell drove "the tiniest car ever" (@marcgraser) onstage (which was seen in the teaser trailer) and got out to talk about his role as Interpol agent Jean-Pierre Napoleon. According to Stitch Kingdom, Burrell said that he was "'mesmerized' and told to 'stay focused' due to being Muppets starstruck." Based on both the trailer and Burrell's appearance, it seems that "Much of Muppets Most Wanted seems to be a buddy cop movie with Ty Burrell's French Interpol agent and Sam the Eagle" (@ThePlaylist). Danny Horn went on to say that Sam plays a CIA agent and he and Jean-Pierre Napoleon are forced to work together.

From Burrell's appearance, a "live" video of Miss Piggy, Tina Fey, and Kermit on the London set was shown. Piggy forced Kermit and Tina Fey to wear "P23" t-shirts (for Piggy 23). When asked what the 23 stood for, Piggy responded her age. Tina Fey turned and mouthed "No" to the camera. Kermit introduced a brand new full musical number scene. The song, apparently called "I'm Number One, You're Number Two" features Constantine and Ricky Gervais's Dominic Badguy (he's French, so it's pronounced Bad-gee, according to Danny Horn). Constantine leads the song and tells Dominic "Dance, monkey, dance" quite a lot. (Various sources for all of this.) All reports say that Constantine and the song are fantastic.

After that the Muppet portion was over, but below are a few other interesting tid-bits that happened during the presentation...

• "All the Muppets believe it's really Kermit except Animal who yells "Bad frog! Bad frog!" and bites him on the arm." - @EricIGN
• "YES, FOO-FOO IS IN THE MOVIE. Figured I'd start with that because nobody else would mention it." - @MuppetWiki
• "Danny Trejo, whose scene in a prison was cut from The Muppets, is in Muppets Most Wanted... in a scene in a prison!" - @EricIGN

And that's all we know! But based on this, Muppets Most Wanted sounds just as funny, exciting, musical, and magnificent as The Muppets. Hopefully the footage shown at the presentation will be released by Disney soon... but don't hold your breath.

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

"Muppets Most Wanted" Teaser Trailer Breakdown

Yesterday the Muppet fan world was shocked when Disney released the very first teaser trailer for Muppets Most Wanted! The trailer is fun, exciting, and hysterical--plus it features Scooter singing "Moves Like Jagger." Yup. Really. Anyway! Last time we had Muppet trailers coming at us, The Muppet Mindset painstakingly screencapped every trailer and broke down what was going on in each frame. We intended to do the same thing this time, but the awesome folks at Muppet Wiki already did the screencapping, so we all have to do is ramble about the images. Thanks, Muppet Wiki! Once again, you set the bar!

Ahhhh!! AN-I-MAL! Welcoming us right away. Wonderful.

When I first watched the trailer I thought they were just going to show clips from The Muppets... because this looks just like The Muppets. But then I looked closer at the collar on this frog...

It's Ty Burrell! As Jean-Pierre Napoleon! With Sam Eagle! And Kermit! And Fozzie! At the Tower of London! AWESOME.

Golden tuxedoes, canes, Muppets, dancing girls... This is going to be one heck of a number! It's also worth noting that I didn't even bat an eye at the fact that Scooter and Rowlf are in the forefront--which is crazy.

It's Kermit!! Wait... is it?! Note the odd short collar and the tiny green mole on his face. Methinks, ladies and gents, that this is Constantine! Also, not sure what's going on with Piggy's hair here, but there's her dog Foo-Foo!!

And here's Constantine doing karate! Something tells me that he might try to use this on a pig and it won't end well for him... but still, fantastic puppetry here.

Perhaps my favorite shot in the trailer... Walter, Fozzie, and Animal wandering all disciple-like through the desert. Beautiful, hysterical, wonderful... I cannot wait to see what the heck is going on here! Also, love Walter's walking stick!

Ricky Gervais as Dominic telling us it's going to be amazing. Plus, Constantine again!

THIS is awesome. It looks like Constantine (I think it's him at least) is dancing on some metalwork of a building. Or walking on it. Or something. Anyway, I love the puppetry.

I love how much Ty Burrell and Sam are together in this trailer. It looks like they may be partnered up in this, giving Sam a pretty big role, which would be great.

This. Is. Gorgeous. This whole film just looks so strikingly cinematic and beautiful.

Ricky, you dancing fool!

Perfect. Hysterical. I have a feeling Ty Burrell is going to steal the show.

And Tina Fey. Beautiful. She's going to give Ty and Ricky and the Muppets a serious run for their money. She already is hilarious. I can't wait for this Russian gulag number.

Now I believe this is Kermit. I think the black mole indicates Kermit. Plus, the collar looks longer. Also, this is hilarious.

Put. The Frog. DOWN.

I spy Danny Trejo in the bottom right corner!! Here's hoping the poor guy doesn't get cut out from another prison scene in a Muppet movie. Also, apparently Ray Liotta is the guy on the left and if you look closely Steve Whitmire is behind him!

I love this. The teeny tiny little Interpol car is hysterical! And, I could be wrong, but I think Sam Eagle is in the passenger's seat. This is SO Muppety.

Poor Chef... being chased by a shark (that he obviously had tried to cook) as Zoot and Janice watch on. Love.

Now for the onslaught of cameos! This is Bridget Mendler, who worked with the Muppets on Good Luck Charlie on Disney Channel, and Debby Ryan, who is also from Disney Channel. It looks like they're at some sort of fancy party.

There's Sean P. Diddy Combs and Pepe P. Prawnie Prawn! So very excited to see more Pepe and this scene looks hilarious.

There's Disney Channel's Ross Lynch, showing some vase twirling skills in front of the Tower of London.

Here's a cameo we didn't know about: the lovely Selma Hayek! She's a fantastic actress and looks hilarious here. Note Camilla in the bottom right corner and the target on her chest. Could she be part of Gonzo's stunts?

Yup. Sam and Ty Burrell are definitely teaming up--and it looks like they have a musical number. I love it!!

No big deal... just Rowlf and Lew Zealand hanging out. AWESOME.

Love this. So much. Scooter singing "Moves Like Jagger" with a bunch of penguins. It's so brilliant!!

Rizzo!! I think it's a great sign that he's featured in the trailer! Hopefully that carries over to the film.

Yaaaaay! More Walter! Gotta love that little guy!

Aww, this is just how I look when I watch Muppets with my friends. (Note: I'm Animal, my friends are Kermit.)

So there you have it, Muppet fans! The first teaser trailer for Muppets Most Wanted! Be sure to click the pictures for hi-res. Thanks again to Muppet Wiki for doing the grunt work!

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

"Muppets Most Wanted" Teaser Trailer!

Shooting on to the internet out of nowhere is the very first official, awesome teaser trailer for Muppets Most Wanted!! The new Muppet movie looks 100% incredible and absolutely perfect. Watch the teaser trailer NOW!



Try not to panic.






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

First Official "Muppets Most Wanted" Videos

Disney is ready to teach you all about the word synergy with the first official videos from the set of Muppets Most Wanted (or The Muppets Most Wanted, no one is really sure). These two videos feature Kermit and Miss Piggy as they interact with Disney Channel sensations and apparent cameo guest stars Ross Lynch and Debby Ryan. Normally, I'm not a fan of Disney Channel people shoe-horning their way into Muppet stuff, but these two seem pretty decent and their parts seem VERY small, so it could be worse. Anyway, watch the videos for some very brief snippets of Muppet footage including Kermit in an awesome gold tux!





Special thanks to our friends at ToughPigs.com for finding the videos!

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

New Muppet Movie Retitled "Muppets Most Wanted"

Yesterday SlashFilm.com and other entertainment news sites reported, based on a Disney press release, that the official title of the new Muppet movie has been changed from The Muppets... Again! to Muppets Most Wanted. All of these sites are also reporting that the title change is final and the name of the film will not change again (but if the entertainment industry has taught us anything, it's that nothing is set in stone).

To me, this is a very interesting title change. Muppets Most Wanted works and is a very fitting title for the plot of the film. It also has a pun element to it, perhaps insinuating that the Muppets are the most wanted entertainment out there. All that being said, I really dig the new title.

But at the same time, I'm a little disappointed to see The Muppets... Again! go. I had gotten pretty attached to the title for the film because it's both funny and clever... but what can you do. Both titles are good, catchy, and fun. Muppets Most Wanted is a less confusing title for people who don't obsessively read fan sites. I think the name change will go a long way in promoting the film as a heist epic and as a comedy.

However all of that is just my opinion. What do you think, Muppet fans? Do you like the new title, Muppets Most Wanted? Do you prefer The Muppets... Again!? Do you not care and just want to see a trailer already? Let us know by sounding off in the comments below, on Twitter, or on Facebook!

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

Muppets Most Wanted Cameo Rundown

Ryan Dosier - Long-time fans of The Muppet Mindset will remember way back in 2011 when news about The Muppets was coming almost weekly, we had a continually updated post called The Great Muppet Cameo Rundown. In this post, we collected all of the confirmed, rumored, and hinted at cameos for The Muppets, so we've decided to it... again for Muppets Most Wanted! Here we go!

Starring Alongside The Muppets (confirmed by Disney Press Release)

• Ricky Gervais as Dominic ("Number Two")
• Tina Fey as Nadya (Russian Gulag Prison Guard)
• Ty Burrell as Jean Pierre Napoleon (Interpol Agent)

Confirmed Cameos 

(NOTE: As with The Muppets, just because a celebrity is seen in a trailer does not necessarily mean they're in the movie for sure.)

• Frank Langella (confirmed by "Muppets Most Wanted Read-Along" Book)
• Sean "P. Diddy" Combs (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Selma Hayek (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Danny Trejo (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Ray Liotta (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Jemaine Clement  (confirmed by Muppets Most Wanted soundtrack list)
• Debby Ryan (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Bridget Mendler (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Ross Lynch (confirmed by Teaser Trailer)
• Tom Hiddleston as "The Great Escapo" (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Christoph Waltz (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Celine Dion (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Stanley Tucci (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Hornswoggle, WWE Wrestler (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Zach Galifianakis as Hobo Joe (confirmed by theatrical trailer)
• Usher (confirmed by StitchKingdom.com)
• Lady Gaga (confirmed by Muppets Most Wanted soundtrack list)
• Tony Bennett (confirmed by Muppets Most Wanted soundtrack list)
• Josh Groban (confirmed by Muppets Most Wanted soundtrack list)

Rumored Cameos

• Peter Serafinowicz (rumored by DigitalSpy)
• Dexter Fletcher (rumored by DigitalSpy)
• Til Schweiger (rumored by German news site)
• Randa Nelson (unconfirmed in theatrical trailer)

Other (Minor) Cameos

• Silvana Lovin (told The Age she filmed a cameo with P. Diddy and Pepe)

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