Ask any child of the ’80s for a list of his or her most memorable Saturday
morning cartoon experiences, and we guarantee that eight of ten of them will
bring up Muppet Babies. And five of those ten will most likely be able to
sing you a few bars of the theme song.

“When your world looks kinda
weird/and you wish that you weren’t theeeere/Just close your eyes/and
make-believe/and you can be anywheeeere…”

Case in point.

The
animated Muppet Babies bore the same endearingly bizarre traits that
characterized Henson’s live-action puppet variety series. And everyone watched
in part because the characters were already familiar and the prospect of
discovering what their lives as children was really intriguing. But Muppet
Babies also worked on another level, as its own entity because of a few
original, added concepts:

1. Did you know that Baby Skeeter, the twin
sister of live-action muppet Scooter (who also appeared in the animated series),
was created specifically for Muppet Babies, in order to appeal to the
little-girl demographic? Another trivia bit: Skeeter was initially voiced by
Howie Mandel.

2. Muppet Babies was a sort of mixed-media concept,
as it often included footage from films and live-action TV/film clips, behind
the mystery doors the babies tended to open in pursuit of answers to questions
or adventures outside their nursery.

3. Nanny. The most obvious unique
component of the cartoon was Nanny, a character solely interpreted as a pair of
green and white striped stockings with the calm, wise voice of Barbara
Billingsley behind them.

Muppet Babies ran for seven seasons
(1984-1991). The first season will be available in a boxed DVD set this
summer.