I knew i forgot another film in the list, how could i forget The Dark Crystal…
a great example of the skills of Henson puppetry is Farscape, not only do they have 2 Henson animatronic puppets as regular characters, a lot of the incedental characters/lifeforms are Henson puppets, and they look utterly convincing as real creatures (esp. later in the show)
Amusingly enough, the Halosians in the “Out of their Minds” episode bear a remarkable resemblance to the Skeksis (in fact, John Crichton refers to them as such later in the show), i’m sure they must have reused the puppets, making minor modifications to them so they didn’t look exactly like the Skeksis
up until the Vogons in HHGTTG, the most sophisticated puppet was the Farscape character Pilot (Rygel was a close second), this is a puppet that seems just as real as the humanoid cast on the show, you literally feel for the poor guy
yes, early episodes had the “I’m really a puppet” feel to them, but it’s forgivable, as the puppeteers were getting used to the very sophisticated controls, but around Season 2, Pilot’s animations became smoother and more lifelike, from “The Way We Weren’t”* onward, it’s hard to see him as a puppet, you can sense the joy as he looks to the stars and dreams of travelling amongst the stars, his fear of the unknown as he’s brought onboard Moya, and the guilt and sadness in his eyes when he says that he feels responsible for the fate of Moya’s original pilot, or in “Bad Timing”, when he’s being cut free of Moya, and screaming in agony, you can’t help but feel his agony, both physically and mentally
Seeing Aeryn reacting to Kermit in “Kansas” or Rygel watching Kermit was perfect and hillarious
the Vogons facial animations are done so well, it’s hard to believe they’re not real, subtleties in the eyes, the lip motion, etc… all look like they’re on a real lifeform
*i know i keep referincing TWWW, but it really is a brilliant episode
you can’t get much better than Henson