Jim Henson's Creature Shop

[Irishman]

@Finagle

The judging on this show is odd – their main complaint with a number of the creatures was that it was “too cartoony”. These are muppets we’re talking about, right? The creators were charged with making, this week, something that blended into a swamp. But there was not, as far as i heard, any requirement that the creatures couldn’t be goofy, cartoonish, or funny.

They are trying to do special effects creatures. Think less Sesame Street and more Farscape. You’re supposed to believe that Rygel and Pilot are every bit as real a creature as D’Ago and Claudia Black’s character. Also, I think the task descriptions do say something about realistic and believable.

This show is clearly a Face Off spin-off, but I note that there’s a slightly sharper bite to the judges and the contestants, in general, don’t seem to work and play together quite as well. Just a hint more smack talking and, in the episodes I’ve seen, not as much “let me help you out with that”.

I’m actually impressed with the judging. We are shown their evaluations, both positives and negative assessments for each person. And their points are valid. Yes, there was a bit of drama played up by the editing of the show. I doubt the contestants themselves are significantly different, just the way the producers want to craft the program for drama.

@Cayuga

Ben was bottom looks (do they use that term on this show?) because the face was too cartoony and because a creature hiding inside a rock isn’t camouflaged. The first one – yeah. But for the second one, there’s an easy fix. After being warned by the shop manager, why didn’t he just stop calling it a rock and start calling it the creature’s shell that’s evolved to look like a rock?

At one point early on, he described it as “turtle-like”. Somehow that wasn’t conveyed in his description to the judges. But more significantly, it didn’t get visually conveyed. It didn’t read to the judges like a creature that looked like rocks, it read as a pink muppet hiding inside a rock. Their medium is visual presentation - how it conveys on the screen test. Having a good story during the interview is nice, helps explain things, but the screen test has to read well or you’re not a puppet maker, you’re a script-writer.

[Hershele_Ostropoler]

@Jinx

These shows are all the same. Someone in Hollywood created a template called “Reality TV” which is anything but. Heck, I could make a show challenging people to make something with Pla-doh under the same conditions. These shows get old real fast. I don’t know what keeps people tuning in again and again.

@simster

In this case - I watch because I like seeing the process and the techniques used to make the creatures - it has nothing to do with the ‘game’ or ‘reality’ aspects of it.

They don’t make creatures, they sit around in their panopticon bitching at each other, then eat grubs and get voted off the island. All reality shows are exactly identical, so there’s no reason to bother watching it before passing judgment.

[Noelq]

Seeing Rygel sitting there, un-alive, was just… creepy. And made me sad.

[simster]

@Hershele_Ostropoler

They don’t make creatures, they sit around in their panopticon bitching at each other, then eat grubs and get voted off the island. All reality shows are exactly identical, so there’s no reason to bother watching it before passing judgment.

what?

[Irishman]

This week’s episode was great. The challenge was staggering: 3 days to make an alien representative to a press conference, where the alien is traveling in disguise. They had to fabricate an outer alien shell with a different alien puppet head hidden inside. The challenge included the need for an interesting reveal. They would have 3 professional puppeteers for the screen test, and had to include a mechanism in the inner head.

Nobody had any major screwups. Everyone had good work. It came down not to eliminating the worst, but picking the three best. That’s always good.

Ben took the win with his ambitious design. He crafted an insect-like alien for the inner head, and then a different insect look for the outer head. His big winning factor was he had the most creative, ambitious, and interesting reveal. His outer head had a front and two side panels that dropped, and then the rest of the top rotated 180 deg around behind and folded down out of the way so it didn’t detract from the inner head. And then his sculpt for the inner head was awesome, too. He used the fingers of the puppeteer in the sculpt to make feeler-like fang things that could move independently, and that gave his face a lot of insect-like character. And then he mechanized the eyes with eyelids and moving eyeballs that moved side to side and up and down. The judges were really impressed. If he had a flaw, his outer head was a little less dramatic and impressive when it came out, but given the level of the rest of his work, he had to skimp somewhere. And it wasn’t bad, just didn’t pop.

Second was Robert. His outer puppet had the most original and alien look to it. He had a huge vertical mouth with teeth and then 8 eyes running vertically along the head (4 each side of the mouth). This gave a very non-terrestrial look, and is the kind of thing I was hoping to see on the aliens.* The reveal involved opening the “mouth” and the head showing. His inner head sculpt was less original. Kirk Thatcher described it as a cross between the Grinch and ET. My thought was it took a lot of inspiration from ET and Rygel. I thought he didn’t have a very original inner head, the sculpt was very reminiscent of aliens we’ve seen before. But he had very detailed sculpt. The judges said his was camera ready, so his work was very complete and thorough.

The third pick was Melissa. Her concept was a small, old frail creature that wore a disguise because it was weak, so she made a green headed thing that looked wrinkly and small, and then made a huge hulking body suit. What caught the attention of the judges about her outer suit was the reveal involved opening the head in a different place than they expected. It looked fairly obvious to me, but I had been seeing her construction work.

The eliminated contestant was Jake. He had a large-headed inner puppet that had a detailed and soft mouth with a lot of movement. His eyes were actually well mechanized, but the paint scheme hid some of the work. The judges liked the way his big head popped out from the body, but the outer head was not very good and the reveal was boring. He had a single plastic shell face that hinged upward. Given that the challenge was specifically about having a creative reveal, that put Melissa ahead of him on the results.

Some really good comments tonight from their shop mentor.

This brings us to the Finale next week for the final three.

---

• Three of the inner heads were fleshy heads with eyes, nose, mouth in human pattern. The fourth was an insectoid with the same layout. While I understand that makes it easier to connect with emotionally while the puppet is acting, I was thinking that a truly original idea might be the reverse of what Robert did: make a truly alien type creature, no obvious eyes, different mouth, something non bilaterally symmetric. And then hide the strange and hideous creature inside a head that looks more typical and normal, with a standard face. He’s trying to blend in with all the other races until time for the reveal, when we see he is truly different and strange. Alas, I couldn’t pull something like that off, and you have to have the inner head able to talk and convey emotion and all that, so that would make the challenge more difficult. I guess that’s why nobody tried that.

[Irishman]

And the finale is in.

For the finale, the remaining three (Ben, Robert, Melissa) were given a complicated challenge. Their setting is a fantasy crossroads tavern, where their creatures are travelers who meet up and exchange their stories. They have to do a full body creature to walk into the tavern set, then get a reset for the close up work where each tells his story. Additionally, they have to have a prop that is involved in their story, and they have to have some special effect (like spitting or vomiting or breathing).

For this, they were given 3 days and assigned two of the eliminated contestants each. They also were assigned their own shop mentor.

Before the challenge began, Brian Henson spoke with each contestant individually to give personal advice. He told Ben that he couldn’t do the Ben show, because if he tried to do everything himself, he would lose. Point blank.

The teams were fairly well balanced and there didn’t end up being any drama. So that was good.

Melissa came up with a hairy beast that was carrying an elixir of life, but it was cursed that it would give you 100 years of life but then if you couldn’t give it away, it would drain your life energy. Ben created a lime green creature that was affected by some disease that killed off his race, so he had a fetus of his son in a jar and had to give it away because if he kept it, the child would be contaminated by the disease. Robert created a tall ape-like creature that was carrying around a crystal ball that somehow was corrupting his people and needed to be controlled.

I didn’t like Melissa’s hunchback shape and the head protruding forward. It looked off-balance. But the puppeteer did a real good job on the walk into the tavern. Her face sculpt was good and paint was great, but they dinged her for not having much face dynamics, and having a flat black mouth interior, no teeth or anything visible. Melissa’s special effect was he had a pipe and she rigged smoke to come out the creature’s nostrils. It was complicated but pulled off well.

Ben’s creature’s paint job was “monochromatic”, i.e. he didn’t have a blend of color layers to give depth and texture to the paint, it was bright green. But my biggest complaint wasn’t even mentioned, it looked like ET. The face shape was not very original, very similar to a lot of alien creatures everywhere. Also, the cowl stood up very tall over the creature’s head, and there was a large empty pocket above the head inside the cowl. That seemed weird and was commented on. Ben’s effect was he had his creature cry tears when handing over the child in the incubator. That part worked very well and read well on the close up. The judges really liked his story and the way his effect was tied to the dramatic climax of his tale.

Robert’s creature had a good face sculpt, and he incorporated a sneer into the creature’s upper lip. He used as his effect a sneeze, which worked well. His story wasn’t great and his crystal ball prop didn’t really come off right.

For the screen test, they performed in front of an audience made up of their family members and employees of the Jim Henson Company. It was a close result.

In the end, the judges based the decision on which creature was best finished for filming, and that was Robert’s.

My observation: they praised Ben’s story and prop integration, but are they selecting a writer or a creature fabricator?

[vislor]

I was bummed as I wanted Melissa to win. But I’m mostly glad it wasn’t Ben. I did agree his paint job wasn’t as good. In fact, overall, they had good comments for them, about the props, story and creatures made.

I agree, Irishman, that the qualifications are strange and seem to change. They have to do everything! Paint, sculpt, draw, design, write, etc. It seems strange how much they want them to do.

What I want to know is if this is the normal process to work for Jim Henson? Is Robert going to start out as an intern? Or will he be higher due to this but not doing his own stuff and instead other projects? Further, wouldn’t they be interested in all of the finalists? I guess I want “the rest of the story” and to know what the other finalists did after this.

[Cayuga]

Yeah, I don’t understand he criteria either. But given that Robert’s story and effect were so amazing, I’m thinking he might have won had he just painted the damn thing better.

I know, the cowl thing, but it’s easy to hand-wave. Just slap some paint on the inside and say it’s his garment and not his shoulders.

I was struck — and pleased — by how little attention they paid to the horribly annoying woman (Tina?) this week. We literally didn’t hear her say a word, while we at least heard the other crew members have conversations with their team leaders.

[ZipperJJ]

I was kinda disappointed in the finale because Melissa and Ben had big problems with their creatures (Melissa’s mouth was just…so bad). I think Ben was the best throughout the series but he blew it in the finale.

What a fun show, tho! I am going to miss it!

[Irishman]

@Cayuga

Yeah, I don’t understand he criteria either. But given that Robert’s story and effect were so amazing, I’m thinking he might have won had he just painted the damn thing better.

Possibly. Woulda coulda shoulda. But he didn’t.

I know, the cowl thing, but it’s easy to hand-wave. Just slap some paint on the inside and say it’s his garment and not his shoulders.

I don’t think anyone assumed it was the shoulders, rather the cowl stood up very tall over the head, and people just don’t wear outfits like that. The problem is Ben never looked at it from the outside, which he could have done. But he was doing the Ben show.

I was struck — and pleased — by how little attention they paid to the horribly annoying woman (Tina?) this week. We literally didn’t hear her say a word, while we at least heard the other crew members have conversations with their team leaders.

Agreed.

[Miller]

@Irishman

My observation: they praised Ben’s story and prop integration, but are they selecting a writer or a creature fabricator?

They’re selecting a designer, and a good designer needs to have reasons for his design choices.

Imagine the characters from the finale, not as protagonists, but as background characters, like from the cantina scene in Star Wars. None of them have any dialogue, they’re just on camera for a second or two each as the movie establishes setting. You see one guy with a box. What’s in the box? That’s sort of an interesting question, I guess. Then you see a guy with a glowing potion. Just having a glowing potion tells you a little about the setting, so that’s kinda cool.

Then there’s the guy with the fetus lantern. There’s a whole lotta story being implied right there, and you don’t need a line of dialogue to do it. That’s a valuable skill in a designer.

Also, note that despite the judges all agreeing that Robert had the weakest story, he still won. So while it’s important, it’s not that important.

[Finagle]

I think they all did a pretty good job, although Melissa’s creature looked too hunched – maybe it looked better in real life. I think the judges made a reasonable decision – I suspect it was the sneeze that sold it. That little sneer on the face was quite remarkable. If Ben’s paint job had been a tad better, I think he would have taken it.

I admit to feeling just a tad too gleeful that Melissa did not win, based on having to hear, probably twenty times through the episode, just how *important and stressful* it was to be in the final and just how *awesome* it would be if she won.    I'm sure she's a lovely person in real life, but the way they edited the show had her getting on my very last nerve.