Meet The Adorable New Muppet In The 'Muppet Babies' Reboot
Get ready to meet the next cherub-cheeked Muppet who will be joining the toddler versions of your favorite Jim Henson characters.
The Muppets first transformed into hand-drawn toddlers in Henson's animated series The Muppets Babies, which ran from 1984 to 1991 on CBS. The adorable munchkins will finally be returning to the small screen as a Disney Junior series. The new Muppets Babies reboot will not only give the Muppets a computer-animated makeover, it will introduce an all-new character.
Meet Summer, a cute purple baby penguin who will be joining Kermit and Gonzo in the playroom and on the wild adventures through their imaginations. She was introduced by Entertainment Weekly, who has the exclusive first look at Summer. Disney Junior also tweeted this first look.
Meet Summer Penguin! She's the newest little Muppet in the playroom! #MuppetBabies premieres March 2018! 💜 pic.twitter.com/pqipDYIXZo
— Disney Junior (@DisneyJunior) January 25, 2018
Muppet Babies executive producer Tom Warburton says he felt the pressure of reviving a popular series that brought the Muppets to so many children for nearly a decade. "It's this crazy, scary honor dropped in my lap," Warburton said. "It's kind of one of the most exciting things in the world."
Warburton came up with Summer when he and art director Chris Morena were doodling together. Warburton told EW:
"I came up with this little sketch of a lollipop-shaped penguin with a turtleneck. We probably did a hundred different characters trying to figure out who this was going to be, and when we came into Disney Junior with this penguin and a couple others, they immediately went to the penguin and said, 'That one.' We have that original drawing hanging in the studio now."
Summer will be the only other female character in the daycare across from Miss Piggy — Skeeter won't be a regular, EW reports. She's voiced by Jessica DiCicco (Flame Princess on Adventure Time), and is described by Warburton as "kind of our art girl." He continued, "She's super creative, he continued. She loves to draw, she loves to paint, she loves to dance—all at the same time. She's the smallest of the group, but she definitely has the biggest heart."
The Muppet Babies was a cult hit in the '80s and '90s, and helped popularize the Muppets for a whole new generation of kids. It's part of a whole slate of '90s reboots that are overtaking family-friendly cable networks, like Disney Jr.'s new social media-savvy Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Disney XD's Duck Tales, and Warner Bros.' Animaniacs is coming to Hulu in 2020.
The new Muppet Babies will premiere in March 2018 on Disney Junior.