Things I Read For Love: Muppet Snow White

First, A Quickish Intro

One of the great things about being in a relationship, or even a friendship in some cases, is that being around someone with very different tastes and interests exposes you to things that you would never have come across otherwise. Josh, my ever faithful fiance, has been introduced to things like Supernatural and Once Upon a Time, the joy of searching for Monster High dolls, and the awesome concept of Chinese food because of me. In turn, I've sat through Futurama and Venture Brothers, and learned lots of varied uses for hot sauce. So with this in mind, I'm presenting Things I Read For Love as a new semi-regular post, to appear perhaps once a month or so, in which I read and review something from his bookshelf. And what better choice could there be than a fairy tale retelling.

This graphic novel features all the usual Muppets in the roles of the Snow White characters--Miss Piggy as the evil queen, Kermit as the prince, Electric Mayhem as the seven dwarfs, and so forth. Gonzo and Rizzo play the Brothers Grimm and serve as narrators. This leads to a lot of "behind the scenes" and "forth wall" jokes, and makes for a fairly original and entertaining retelling.

Positive Comments

The Muppets are fun. Certainly this would appeal to a child audience, but it isn't limited to that. It's not so babyish that you feel stupid reading it. There are jokes and references that only long time Muppet fans are likely to get.

It's well drawn. I'm far from an expert in art of any kind, but my few prior experiences with comic books have taught me that bad art can be supper distracting. Fortunately that's not the case here.

I liked the humor. Gonzo has always been my favorite Muppet character, and he and Rizzo are undeniably amusing in this book. I liked some of the liberties they took with the story, and how they helped to enhance that humor.

Critical Comments

They break the forth wall too often, in my opinion. That kind of humor works for me in part because of it's rarity and unexpectedness. When you do it on every other page, it loses that unexpectedness and just becomes corny.

I also felt that there were way too many added characters. Pepe annoyed me, but I find that that's true in almost everything he appears in. Bobo shows up and is amusing, but also unnecessary. It felt as though the author wanted to cram in as many Muppet characters as possible, whether they would serve a purpose to the story or not.

Recommendation

This happens to be impossible to find at the moment. Occasionally a used copy will show up on Amazon for an only semi-ridiculous price, but that's about it. Still, if you do come across a copy and you're a fan of the Muppets, I'd recommend it. It was worth my time. 3 stars.

Josh's Footnote: The title character is played by seldom seen Muppets Tonight character Spamela Hamderson.

Miscellaneous Mondays: Thanksgiving and The Muppets

In this week's Misc. Monday I'm going to share with you some of the things I did/watched over break, when I wasn't doing family things. I hope everyone's week was as relaxing as mine!

The Muppets

 Josh had been looking forward to this new Muppet movie for months. The Muppets were a huge part of his childhood, so the nostalgic value was up there with how I feel for Beauty and the Beast. For me, I didn't see most of the movies until a bit later in my life, with the exception of The Muppet Christmas Carol which I love. I enjoy them, but I'm not the fan that Josh is. So I went in expecting to feel pretty apathetic. Well...I cried. It was the Rainbow Connection number that did me in, and I'm a weepy person in general. Nonetheless, I cried at a Muppet movie, and I laughed a lot too. Overall, it's about as good as you can ask for from a family movie, so I highly recommend it.

How to Train Your Dragon

I rented a ton of movies, and this was probably the one I enjoyed the most. Obviously I love fantasy books and movies. And, damn it, there just aren't enough dragons in movies these days. It has a cliched plot with a geeky son who's warlord father can't accept him. The son befriends a dragon that he's supposed to kill...it's pretty predictable. But it's also funny and clever in some respects, and it gave me my dragon fix so it was a winner in my book.

Beastly

This was the other notable rental for the week. I've been on this whole fairy tale kick, so I picked this one up even though I sort of knew it wouldn't be very good. And it was pretty awful. The dialogue was awkward, the acting was terrible for the most part, and the romance felt lukewarm. There were some cool or at least interesting ideas, like the tree tattoo on Kyle/Hunter that changes with the seasons. There were moments where I really wanted to like it. I really think that modernizations or re-imaginings of fairy tales can work, but it has to be done with thought as subtly. This movie is anything but subtle about everything from it's character personalities to it's overall message, and that more than anything is why it was a fail for me.

Lego Harry Potter (Part 2)

Yet another indulgence for my inner child. Josh and I played the first game and loved it, so I went ahead and got him the second one for his birthday. The Lego games are great for me because they're fun, easy, and low pressure. When you die, you lose coins, but you pop right back up on the screen. That's good because in video games I'm extremely death prone. I didn't play any when I was growing up, so it just isn't a skill that I've acquired. In any case, I really enjoy playing as my favorite Harry Potter characters--Tonks! Luna! Snape!




Poll Results!

Time Machine was the favorite of the mad scientist inventions. I think it's best, however, that this one never be invented. Think of all of the paradoxes we'd cause just trying to go back in time to kill Hitler or forward in time to memorize lottery numbers. The world would be a mess! It's a lovely thought though.
This week, since I shared with you my love of dragons, I'm asking what classic fantasy creature is your favorite! Take a second to vote in the poll on the right side of your screen! Thanks a bunch, and Happy Reading!