For some kids it was Sesame Street, for others it was the Smurfs, for my best friend Jon it was Nightmare on Elm Street (which explains… a lot), but for me I grew up watching Fraggle Rock. I’ve always believed that the Jim Henson created 1983 television show was vastly underrated. Meanwhile the characters have earned cred in the hipster crowd in recent years. We’re coming up on the 25th anniversary of the series and The Weinstein Co have announced that they will be producing a live-action musical feature film.
The bad news is that Cory Edwards, the guy who directed the animated Hoodwinked! (which as you can tell, I wasn’t too fond of) has been hired to helm and write the project. The story will supposedly involve the Fraggles leaving their home to interact with the Aliens (humans) in “Outer Space”. Past rumors have involved a storyline where they go in search for Uncle “Traveling” Matt. While this seems like the logical direction to go in for a big screen adaptation, I think it’s a bad idea. The great thing about Fraggle Rock was, well, Fraggle Rock itself. You take the Fraggles out of Fraggle rock and all you have is a bunch of muppets running around in the real world. And we already saw how that worked out in the last few Muppet films.
The television show ran for 96 episodes over five seasons and focused on a group of creatures called the Fraggles, who live in a system of caves called Fraggle Rock. he series focused on one tight-knit group of Fraggles in particular; Gobo, Mokey, Red, Wembley, and Boober. The “Theme song from Fraggle Rock” was actually a top 40 pop hit in Britain.
According to wikipedia, the vision of Fraggle Rock articulated by Jim Henson was to depict a colorful and fun world. Also a world with a relatively complex system of symbiotic relationships between different “races” of creatures, an allegory to the human world, where each group was somewhat unaware of how interconnected and important they were to one another. Creating this allegorical world allowed the program to entertain and amuse while seriously exploring complex issues of prejudice, spirituality, personal identity, environment, and social conflict.[1] Fraggle Rock generally refused to over-simplify any individual issue, instead simply illustrating the consequences and inherent difficulties of different actions and relationships.
You can watch the classic opening of Fraggle Rock below:
Discuss: Should the Fraggles leave Fraggle Rock for the big screen movie?
source: Variety
May 12th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Agreed. There is a fundamental problem with the Fraggles leaving the Rock.
The Fraggles away from the Rock is just another Muppet movie.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
May 13th, 2008 at 12:02 am
It’d be cool if they made them huge like WTWTA….and if they made it kinda creepy like the Dark Crystal. I would pay to see that and nothing less.
May 13th, 2008 at 12:24 am
@Jonny:
Why not just watch the upcoming sequel to The Dark Crystal?
May 13th, 2008 at 4:51 am
I own the first three seasons on DVD. I love that someone wants to do the series some justice but no justice can be done I’m afraid. Not only is Jim Henson gone but so is Jerry Juhl, the main writer for the series. I personally can’t stand the muppet movies post Jim Henson. They shouldn’t go near this show, but at the very least, they definitely shouldn’t take the fraggles out of fraggle rock. That was definitely one of the coolest things about the show. But unfortunately, that’s kind of the obvious way to take things for a movie.
May 13th, 2008 at 7:03 am
Decades to late! Fuck them. Where we’re the Weinstein’s when I was 10 and would have killed to see this.
May 13th, 2008 at 7:48 am
The plot should be one of the Fraggles get kidnapped by a Gorg so the others have to go save him.
While picking radishes in the Gorg garden, Mokey (since it’s her job to pick the radishes) is taken by a Gorg. When the others find out about this, they sneak into the Gorg garden at night, after getting useful advice from the Trash Heap, and must sneak into the Gorgs house to save her.
May 13th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Fraggles with no rock is unacceptable. Who comes up with these ideas? Can’t they see that without the interesting world around the Fraggles they are just more muppetPlus is without the regular Muppet’s recognition value….If you are interested in a traveling muppet creature movie help make sure the new Muppet Adventure is top quality instead…leave the Fraggles alone!
Plus if they leave the rock how are we going to see more of that sweet dog from the show.
May 13th, 2008 at 8:38 am
this reminded me how much i want jonze & kaufman to do the jim henson movie.
May 13th, 2008 at 9:29 am
I don’t like the idea for the plot. Didn’t they do an episode
with Gobo out to “outer space” to look for his uncle?
I’ll have to the check the DVDs I have home.
When I think about a movie moving forward I feel skeptical.
Can they recapture the magic of the show? I’m not sure.
May 13th, 2008 at 9:57 am
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May 13th, 2008 at 11:30 am
Leave the fragles where they are. dont make a cray movie with a love story. that is the mupets. Make a new daily show.
May 13th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Fraggle Rock - so close to my heart. I grew up near St Anthony’s lighthouse, where the live exteriors were shot, so every Cornishman of my generation has a special childhood memories of the show. I can only hope that it will be treated well, but I guess that’s unlikely.
May 13th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
… then it would just be… Fraggles… the rock’s gotta be there.
I agree Fraggle Rock has been way underrated throughout the years.
May 31st, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Yea think of all the cool stuff just in the fraggle world. Wonder Mcmouch the gorgs the invisable garboyle. You take the fraggles out of fraggle rock and you leave the magic behind. And you can not leave the magic!