'The Muppets Mayhem' review: The Electric Mayhem rocks, but the humans are a snooze
The Muppets Mayhem begins with a rather brilliant idea: Center a comedy series on the chaotic but charismatic band Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem.
Since debuting on the pilot of The Muppet Show in 1975, this madcap musical act has delivered wackiness and bliss while appearing alongside a dazzling slew of stars. Their new Disney+ show is at its best when it leans into these sweet spots, playing toe-tapping songs and lining up cameos that range from surprising to deranged. However, where The Muppets Mayhem fumbles is in its dogged interest in the human hangers-on of this epic band.
Essentially, when the spotlight shifts from the Mayhem to humans, things get meh.
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What's The Muppets Mayhem about?
For decades, the Electric Mayhem has been touring the U.S. nonstop, making famous friends and fields of fans along the way. However, they've yet to record an album.
Leave it to an ambitious record exec (Lilly Singh) to change that. To save a company on its last legs, Nora must get the band to deliver the album they took an advance on ages before. However, troubles pop up at every turn (well, in every episode), and she's always ill-prepared. Despite the record industry being her vocation, Nora knows virtually nothing about this band that's so seminal that they're beloved by music legends like Tommy Lee, Lil Nas X, "Weird Al" Yankovic, and Paula Abdul.
While the band battles past demons, reveals touching origin stories, and grapples with their creative insecurities, The Muppets Mayhem binds its A-plot to a boring businesswoman who exists chiefly to nag and manipulate to get her way. Yes, yes, Nora will learn life lessons along the way, much as you'd expect from a Disney property. But why did the writers pick "selfish suit" as the archetype to center the show around? It's as inexplicable as when The Smurfs movie was pegged to a make-up executive.
Adult audiences aren't tuning in for the human actors paired with the nostalgia-tweaking critters they love, and kids won't care about the stakes of a record company going belly-up or the tedious love triangle between Nora, Mayhem fanboy Moog (Tahj Mowry), and tedious biz bro JJ (Anders Holm). The Muppets Mayhem also works in themes about sisterhood by wedging in Nora's TikTok-obsessed influencer sibling Hannah (Saara Chaudry). How else would they work in Animal doing TikTok dances? (Yes, the arc about the band falling hard for social media is forced and terrible!)
The Muppets Mayhem is bliss when it dares to be stupid.
Creators Adam F. Goldberg, Bill Barretta, and Jeff Yorkes punish Muppets fans by making us endure the insipid Nora storylines, but their writers' room has done a remarkable job of recapturing the magic of Muppet Show banter and the gleeful capriciousness of the band. Cold opens boast quick and silly setups and punchlines that spark chuckles, which ring out over the rocking theme song. The comedy of this crew is enthrallingly silly. For instance, when the band is challenged to write a new song, they get stuck, writing a string of beginnings, middles, and ends, and the rule of threes means each of these is increasingly silly, poking fun at the music industry with a gentle foam finger. (All the same, you might be singing their clumsy choruses to yourself because they are catchy.)
Over 10 episodes, The Muppets Mayhem has space to relish in each of the bandmates. Mumbling Lips (Peter Linz) has two running gags: being indecipherable in his speech and the most well-connected Muppet in Hollywood. He's often entering a scene with a big celeb on his arm, and there's a contagious joy in watching these stars genuinely giddy to be working alongside Muppets. (Who could blame them?)
Spaced-out Zoot (Dave Goelz) has terrible recall from too many years — uh — tripping on the road. His confusion over the concept of a documentary about the band (a groan-inducing promotion for Disney+'s Beatles doc) leads to actors popping by to audition in costumes that are a cross between funny and frightening. Elsewhere, Animal bops about with bunnies and drums, playing the eternal kid brother to the band. Meanwhile, Janice's hippie-dippy philosophies lead to a gentle mockery of the self-help industry and the blurry line between wellness centers and cults.
Floyd and Dr. Teeth prove to be the fuzzy heart at the center of Muppets Mayhem.
Unquestionably, bassist Floyd Pepper (Matt Vogel) has always been the hottest member of the Electric Mayhem. I won't be addressing questions. This is fact. Here, the minds behind the Muppets smartly tap into the Pedro Pascal effect, though sadly not by casting the actor in a cameo (just imagine!). Instead, they tap into Pedro's Protective Daddy energy in The Mandalorian and The Last of Us by creating an origin story for Animal that makes Floyd into a crushable father figure. But that's not all.
An episode unfurling the origins of the group's iconic van, Dr. Teeth's name, and how he and Floyd started the band proves to be an emotional lynchpin in the series. Flashbacks give compelling complexity to these long-goofy musicians. The episode plays into themes of parents at war with their art-aspiring kids, bringing the Muppet bounce to a serious topic; the results are familiar but reassuring and fun. Dr. Teeth also gets a fiery old flame, some psychological analysis, and the chance to explain how he's not really the frontman, despite the band's original name. And this is where The Muppets Mayhem is at its best.
While these characters might have been created for musical bits and pithy punchlines, this series shows there is more to them. And it's a thrill to watch them play together, even when they play rough. In their van, there's always cheerful chatter, dumb jokes, and good vibes. It's a pleasure just to get to hang out with the Mayhem. This show could have just leaned into the chaos of this motley crew as a series of sketches, surreal and sweet. It's such a bummer when the show leaves them to return to Nora's tiresome Sad Girl Tour.
Muppet productions can work when centered on a human, as The Muppet Christmas Carol proved with a deeply committed Scrooge in Michael Caine. However, this only works when the human meets the level of energy or intensity of the colorful kooks around them. (See also Tim Curry as Long John Silver in Muppet Treasure Island or Charles Grodin as the lusty cat burglar in The Great Muppet Caper). Here, the humans aren't legendary baddies; they're just flustered millennials. Moreover, Singh and company aren't giving theatrical, weird Muppet movie performances but are putting on woefully sanitized, broad 'n' bouncy Disney Channel acts. (Please remember Grodin went so far as to insist he and Miss Piggy had a torrid affair.)
Even with the bland human hangers-on, The Muppets Mayhem is a rollicking delight. I binged a bunch of episodes in one sitting and repeatedly paused because I was cackling too hard to hear what the band had to say next. So, I unreservedly recommend Muppets fans young and old to jump on board this bombastic bus and rock along with the Electric Mayhem...Just keep the remote handy to scroll through the human drudgery.
And if the show gets a second season, here's hoping it embraces the Mayhem and kicks their too-human entourage to the curb.
The Muppets Mayhem streams exclusively on Disney+ May 10.
Kristy Puchko is the Entertainment Editor at Mashable. Based in New York City, she's an established film critic and entertainment reporter who has traveled the world on assignment, covered a variety of film festivals, co-hosted movie-focused podcasts, and interviewed a wide array of performers and filmmakers.
