Charles Dickens Watches "The Muppet Christmas Carol" [R. E. Parrish]

Website: https://reparrishcomics.com/

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I mean, he might have liked it, it's not a bad movie and it's not a terrible adaptation of the story either. Probably would have to first explain the context of what the muppets are and a bit about the various characters to really get some of it though
- Puppets have been used in comedy and cultural commentary since Punch & Judy and before. Dickens would have dug it.
  
  I meant more the context of the individual characters. Like, having Statler and Waldorf as Marley is funnier if you know who those two are
  
  Also he'd need to know who Bob Marley was in order get the Jacob and Robert gag...
  
  Punch and Judy appear in the background of at least one of the opening scenes of The Muppet Christmas Carol
- J. Draper, London historian and, from what I gather, popular TikToker and YouTuber, has an interesting hour-long video comparing the Muppet version to the original as well as the various things that wouldn't necessarily be covered in the original, like costumes and how London looked. It's not quite a watch-along, but it does cover things in movie order.
  Watch here
  If you're of short attention span (not judging, I'm in the same boat), put in on in the background while doing something else.
  
  I just watched this last night! Her takeaway is that is pretty good overall. Most of the costuming is pretty spot-on, even the muppets’, and she makes concessions for some of the things that aren’t true to the book since it’s ostensibly a kids movie and there is stuff that just wouldn’t make sense. A lot of the script is pulled directly from the book. Her big critique is about Scrooge’s childhood but she even finds a possible reason they decided to change that too. It’s really quite interesting! Also, as an American, I find it absolutely hilarious that she can’t comprehend that Americans don’t know what a Christmas pudding is. To us, pudding means something completely different!
  
  She doesn't point out why the extra Marley might have been given the name Robert [1] (or maybe I missed a subtle raised eyebrow somewhere), nor did she show the shop front entitled Micklewhite's [2], but I don't suppose those fun facts are particularly relevant to a comparison / review.
  [1] Bob Marley. Geddit? Funny joke is funny.
  [2] Michael Caine's birth name was Maurice Micklewhite. He only made the legal change to his stage name fairly recently, well after the Muppet Christmas Carol even, because he found that people were confused and made suspicious by his documents not having "his name" on them when he was travelling.
  
  Ooooh I didn’t catch the Marley joke, brilliant. And I didn’t know that about Michael Caine! Great insights!
  
  Not many people know that.
- I think you'd have to explain tv first.
  
  "You've been to the theater, now you can have the theater in your living room."
  Done.
  Shakespeare predates Dickens by a couple centuries, and the ancient Greeks predate him by a couple millenia.
- It's the only adaptation that has Dickens himself portrayed. Admittedly I don't think Gonzo is an accurate depiction, other than the clothes, but it did allow them to put far more of the actual text of the book into the movie than any other adaptation, because they had a narrator.

23 comments