"Defunct TV: Jim Henson"

While I love the Defunctland channel anyway, they've completely outdone themselves with this fantastic six-part tribute to Jim Henson.  A wonderfully edited tribute to a wonderful man, it covers everything from "Sam and Friends" to "The Muppets at Walt Disney World".




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Art of the week:

I've Been Extremely Busy Lately So Here Come Links Of Interest!

Without further ado...

* - First of all, Flying Trilobite has a new website!

* - Ethan Kocak of "The Black Mudpuppy" has been drawing an outstanding "Tetrapod Zoology" comic.

* - Meredith Woerner of io9 pretty much confirmed my worst fears about "Maleficent".

* - Try not to cry during this Blank on Blank animation of one of Philip Seymour Hoffman's last interviews.

* - Between the latest entry in the Laser Age series and the Movie of the Week features about "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", the Dissolve has been knocking it out of the park.

* - The bizarre psychology of false beliefs.

* - Tough Pigs is working their way through "The Jim Henson Hour" in it's entirety and reviewing every episode.

* - Michael Crawford of Progress City did a nice overview of the history of the Disney Afternoon.

* - We know a few more plot details for "Jurassic Park 4ever After" and... they're *a little* reassuring.  A *little*.

* - Passport to Dreams' "The Age of Not Believing" explores a very odd period in the history of (mostly live-action) Disney feature films.

* - Why scary stories are good for kids, via Muddy Colors.

* - The new podcast KnightRaptor is quite good.

* - It's no news that Cartoon Network has a weird (to put it kindly) attitude towards toys, but man, they screwed up big by not producing this astounding thing.

* - And finally, here's a circa 1988 promotional video of Sullivan/Bluth studios in Ireland.  It's fascinating, yet sad in a way that's hard to put into words.

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Sketch of the Day! A Unicorn for Sketch Dailies:

Never mind Irene, let's watch this Amazing Disney Special Montage and InnerTube TV!

But before we do that, I got the kind of comment I write this blog for which prompted a major, major update on the Ranger Rick article, so go read it and see.

Alright, back to the subject at hand. Everything Is Terrible, you're my hero.





So this is thirty late-70's through early-90's Walt Disney World specials in thirty minutes. I remember SO many of these from when I was a kid. It felt like Disney made two of these specials every year (I don't even think they still do the yearly Christmas parade special these days).

One of the specials is a whole hour-long production with random celebrity guests and musical numbers dedicated entirely to the opening of Splash Mountain. A whole television special for the opening of one ride! Hell, Disney can't even get that excited about the Fantasyland expansion project these days.

More thoughts:

* - Let me guess. Little potential future robotics engineer who could have invented something that changes the world for the better instead learns the Power of Disney Magic! (Spoiler: Not quite, but close.)

* - They didn't know what the heck they were doing with Pleasure Island even back then.

* - For the 15 year anniversary of Walt Disney World, a random prize was given out at the ticket gate every fifteen seconds. You could randomly get anything from a pin to a free hat to free park tickets to a free Thunderbird! Holy sh*t! Right now the best WDW prize you could hope for is to be locked in a small room inside Cinderella Castle all night for one night. I don't even know if they're doing anything special for their 40'th anniversary.

* - Never mind that now: Two generations of Mouseketeers! Say, aren't today's kids long overdue for a Mickey Mouse Club of their own?

* - Totally Minnie: here to compete with Barbie and Jem. Yup.

* - Jeez, that free-roaming robot is terrifying!

* - But not as much as the "Too Smart for Strangers" clip they sneaked in.


* - I wish I could get excited about anything as much as the "Fantasia" crocodiles get about pizza.

* - My God, the Gepetto song is chilling...

* - I could swear I saw that "Spirit of America" parade as a kid. Now I've got the song back in my head. Great.

* - Giant. Babies.


* - That vulture is so ashamed to be with Chicago Taio Cruise Pablo Cruise instead of soaring over the Serengeti.

* - Anyone know who the weird singing redheaded Justin Bieber lookalike and the really lanky guy who falls down the manhole are? (EDIT: Thanks Anonymous Commenter Person!)

Speaking of Weird Disney Things, I am so very happy to learn, right from the Mouse's mouth, that I didn't imagine this. Somewhere, Xzibit is shedding a single tear at it's beauty.

And then, on a totally different note that is too cool not to share, there's "InnerTube TV":



I had a fever dream on the morning I wrote this post. It wasn't nearly as awesome and random as "InnerTube TV". This was a very early and very weird pilot for what would eventually become "The Jim Henson Hour". Note the strange early versions of characters who'd be modified for "Hour". You can also spot characters in the house band who'd be modified and eventually show up in the equally all-but-forgotten Jim Henson production, "Faffner Hall". I like the incredibly catchy songs -- and the fact that Kermit is fully aware that this version of the show doesn't have a chance clicking with people.

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Sketch of the Day!

My new Sketchbook is huge...



The book (which I cannot wait to read) and Carnegie Collection Parasaurolophus are there for scale. It's a little tiny bit awkward carrying this size Sketchbook around, and it will fit no scanner there is, but I have been drawing more so that's good.



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Important: So... I might not have power or internet access by the time this publishes. Please be patient with regards to comment moderation, ect. Thursday's scheduled feature will hopefully make everything all better.

The Jim Henson Hour and "Monster Maker"

One of my unstated goals here at the Obligatory Art Blog is to write a bit about things that I recall from childhood that I have seen mentioned almost nowhere else online. And recently I mentioned that it usually turns out to be very hard to write about such remembered things when there is so little information about them online. I may luck out and find a book or video on the subject (and you may have noticed that the book/video often is the subject), but this happens very rarely.

Fortunately, there are a wide variety of Jim Henson fan-websites out there in this vast digital sea, so it isn't too hard to find information about "The Jim Henson Hour". This was a truly ambitious series that, back in the late 1980's, looked and felt like something that had popped right out of the Aether in spite of everything just to make me happy. Just watch the introduction here, which is basically Jim Henson Productions saying, "Look at what we can do NOW!" over a very awesome late 80's pop-rock instrumental. You knew you were in for something special when you saw this.



The series has never been released on DVD largely thanks to the number of hoops whoever has the rights to the show would have to leap through in order to settle things with whomever owns the rights to the shows' various segments and characters. See, "Jim Henson Hour" was an anthology show. It was very similar in format to "Walt Disney Presents"/"Wonderful World of Color"/"Magical World of Disney"/etc. A few - a very, very few- of the individual features on the show have been released on DVD. One or two more are on Netflix Instant, and we'll get to one of these in a bit. And of course, a few full episodes are available on that great repository of barely-remembered 80's television, YouTube.

Now, it's funny how your memory works when you are eleven. I remember watching this show for an entire summer, loving it to death and so happy to finally have a "Muppet Show" equivalent to call my generation's own. This is just the kind of show that, had it appeared ten years later, would have gained a rabid cult following online. Chiefly, I remember the show going on for far longer than it did (this in spite of the fact that I only recalled a handful of episodes) and being way, way popular.

You can imagine my surprise to learn that the show lasted for a grand total of under four months. Poor thing was relegated to the dreaded Friday night death slot and was, well, WAY geeky. Save for maybe three of them, the new Muppet characters didn't click with people and most of the rest of the show was dedicated to the Creature Shop strutting their stuff in obscure story adaptations and other, stranger things.

And that brings us to "Monster Maker". One of the better-remembered episodes, this was based upon a novel by Nicholas Fisk, who, I was happy to learn, is responsible for one of my very favorite science fiction short stories ever. I'm not sure what the book is like, but the short film adaptation is essentially the Creature Shop's love letter to... itself. I say that because they were proud enough of their creature puppets in the episode to showcase them in many different later compilations.

And the puppets are amazing. "Monster Maker" is a very poignant viewing experience in the year 2011. In an age of CGI whatever you want, there it is, it's kind of mind-blowing to watch this film about a special effects house that has to actually stop and think about such questions as, "How do we get these little monsters to walk"? "Can we build a dragon puppet that's large enough to convincingly interact with human characters?" When facing the Ultragorgon dragon, Harry Dean Stanton (in full-on Harry Dean Stanton mode) has a wonderful monologue about believable creature design and animation. Heck, the Ultragorgon himself is fantastic; he's the one thing I recalled very clearly from "Monster Maker".

I hadn't seen "Monster Maker" in full since the episode of "The Jim Henson Hour" in which it was featured way back in 1989. So it is with a very heavy heart that I have to note that everything in it aside from the monsters isn't very good. It is worth watching, especially at a scant 45 minutes, but I will warn you that the story makes not one lick of sense. Also, the lead kid gets a Jake Lloyd Award.

Since most of the show's problems have to do with the story, it's Spoilertext time! So, what was the moral of "Monster Maker"? I guess it was, "Children, give up your lifelong dream. Even if your dream is to work in a very, very specialized creative field that is hard to enter, and the greatest person in the business has already taken you in as an apprentice which is basically a million to one lucky chance. Or, you know, don't give up on your dream. Follow it right into the sun, even if the guy who took you in as his apprentice turns out to have been playing mind games with you all this time and is kind of a terrible person. Also, after either giving up on your dream or not giving up on it, go back with your father. Even if your father is kind of a worse person who has always openly discouraged your dream and wanted you to stay in the family's boring-ass auto repair business, and who deals with incredibly shady people for... some reason they never elaborated on."
I did learn this: if I am ever lucky enough to lead my own nominal studio, I am totally going to build a giant robot dragon puppet to use as a secret test of character on new interns.

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By the way, you'll notice that I am speaking about a barely remembered and way, WAY geeky late 80's television show while everyone else seems to be doing their Harry Potter retrospective. I, of course, did my Harry Potter retrospective posts two years ago. Derp.

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Sketch of the Day!



Of course, this show reminded me that it's been a while since I drew any dragons...