Who doesn’t love The Muppets? Nobody, that's who.
Who could possibly not be excited for a new Muppet movie? Me, that’s who.
And apparently I’m a heartless bitch for admitting it. But, honestly, the trailer makes me weep into my cereal.
A friend of mine called me a buzzkill when I told her how much I hated the preview. I wanted to defend my stance but I'm no good at arranging my thoughts into a cohesive, intelligent argument on the spot, so I made some flailing, ill-worded attempts to explain why I hated the preview and she probably shook her head and thought "Oh, Sally; you hate everything that's new." Which isn't true. I just hate most things that are new.
In this case, however, it has nothing to do with the fact that it's a Muppet movie made after The Great Muppet Caper. I love Muppet movies (I never saw Muppets From Space or The Muppets Wizard Of Oz, but that's mainly out of laziness and not wanting to believe that Gonzo is an alien) and I was genuinely looking forward to this new one, even in spite of the fact that IMDB has been threatening a Rachael Ray cameo.
But then I saw the trailer and all my optimism and excitement went down the toilet. And now that I've had time to think about it and put my thoughts into cohesive, tangible sentences I can now share with the world (or, you know, the two people who might read this) why I hate that preview.
PROBLEM # 1: The set-up is awful.
Here’s Amy Adams and Jason Segel being a cutesy couple in love. No indication is given as to what he does for a living, but she seems to be a grade school teacher, meaning Segel is doomed to forever play characters in love with redheaded grade school teachers (for those of you who don't know, that's a reference to How I Met Your Mother. For those of you who knew that, I'm sorry I explained to you something you already understood).
They go to Hollywood, he forgets their anniversary, she walks out on him, the audience stabs themselves in the eyes so they won’t have to watch this nonsense anymore. The preview has succeeded in completely turning its audience against it.
Then Kermit The Frog shows up.
PROBLEM # 2: The Muppets deserve better than this.
You have beloved, iconic characters starring in a brand new feature film. What in the name of all that is right in the world would make a marketing executive try to sell that movie with a trailer that is horrible by design?
Until I saw this preview I would have thought it was impossible to screw up an ad for a Muppet movie. In fact, if someone asked me “What’s the one way not to sell a Muppet movie?” my reply would have been “Make the audience hate you, then show them Fozzie Bear.”
Hell, a trailer of a blank background that just says “NEW MUPPET MOVIE IN NOVEMBER!” would have been boring and questionable ("Hooray! New Muppet movie! ... What's it about? ... Who cares? Muppets!") but still more effective than this nonsense ("This is bullshit. This is awful. This preview is the worst. I would never pay money to watch this crap. ... Wait, why is Kermit there? Fuck! This piece of shit is a Muppet movie? Why would they do this?!").
At least the people who designed the poster understand the minimalist approach is better in this case.
This makes me actually want to see the movie. It almost washes out the bad taste the trailer left on my brain.
PROBLEM # 3: What does this mean about the movie itself?
You’ve shown me a preview for a movie that’s purposefully terrible, you’ve thrown in characters I love (which didn't win me back over to your side like you thought it would but further angered the beast instead) and then you finished with a few quick shots of some dancing and Amy Adams making “aren’t I so adorable” faces that would be obnoxious coming from an eight-year-old, let alone a woman in her forties.
What you haven’t done is given the audience the slightest idea of what the movie’s about. If you're not going to go with the "blank screen that just says 'NEW MUPPET MOVIE' on it" approach, you have to give the people some inkling of a plot. And I'm not sure if we got one or not.
We got a fake trailer for a movie that nobody wants to see on account of its being godawful. So I really hope that's not what the movie's about. But it's the only shred of plot we're given, so maybe it is what it's about, in which case we're back to the problem of that movie being godawful and nobody wanting to see it. You've taken the easiest job in the world (sell a Muppet movie) and turned it into a catch twenty two of gimmickiness.
You know what it means when a preview uses a gimmick rather than its own merits to sell a movie? It means the movie’s not any good.
For instance, trailers for Paranormal Activity showed no footage from the movie but instead the fearful reactions of audiences full of people watching the movie (who apparently find arguments and sleeping terrifying).
This goes back to my second point, which is the fact that a Muppet movie should be the easiest thing in the world to sell. Show some Muppets, show some slapstick, throw in a couple jokes and you’re done. The fact that the marketing team instead went with a gimmick that tells us nothing about the movie implies that the movie isn't any good. And that is very sad.
Be seeing you.
-Sally
