Jim Henson, Sesame Street, and Disney

Sesame Street is 40. To say it’s been influential would be an understatement. How many generations have grown up on a steady diet of Big Bird, Elmo, Cookie Monster, Oscar, Bert and Ernie, and the rest of the gang?

Many people forget that Muppets creator Jim Henson created all of the famous puppets that people love so much. In many ways they were his greatest achievement. More people have watched Sesame Street than the Muppets. Sesame Street has been far more successful than the Muppets as well.

When you think about it how many amazing characters did he create for that show? I can’t name them all but here are the ones I remember. Keep in mind I haven’t seen the show in 23 years. You know they were memorable if I can remember them 23 years later.

Elmo

Count von Count

Cookie Monster

Grover

Big Bird

Oscar the Grouch

Bert

Ernie

Aloysius Snuffleupagus

Sully

There have been a few cross over events over the years. Have you seen “The Muppets Take Manhattan?” If you have you’ll remember the cross over event at the end. You’ll notice Big Bird shows up for the wedding at the end. Kermit has also done cross over work. He’s showed up on Sesame Street a few times.

I’m not an expert on the Muppets or Sesame Street so I don’t know if we’ll ever see another cross over. I don’t know if Disney owns the rights to the Sesame Street crew or not. That would be a good question for Jim Hill. I’d think if Disney did own the rights we’d see the Sesame Street characters somewhere in the parks. I think they’d at least be part of Muppet Vision 3D.

Who knows maybe if Disney doesn’t already own them, they’ll acquire them. After all that would make more sense than buying Marvel.