When Kermit Goes Cynical

These aren’t your father’s Muppets.

The new show, debuting Tuesday on ABC, discusses gender fluidity, breast augmentation and addiction. You know, kid stuff.

Oh, and Miss Piggy and Kermit are no longer an item, even though he is the producer on her talk show, “Up Late with Miss Piggy.” In one scene, Kermit’s new gal pal is shown sucking on a straw in a sensual fashion. So, yeah.

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And, of course, Jim Henson’s most famous creation is set to air at 8 p.m. ET, or earlier in other time zones. That means children curious about Fozzie Bear and friends may still be up and watching TV when these new Muppets appear.

Whatever happened to “The Rainbow Connection?” Kermit on a bicycle? Gonzo shooting out of a cannon like Wile E. Coyote — and living to tell the tale? The Muppets of yore straddled the line between kiddie yuks and adult amusement. The characters never made anyone uncomfortable in the process. You might wince at a bad pun, nothing more.

The Muppet brand once stood for sweet, positive entertainment for decades. The jokes were corny. The sentiment was true and pure. But no more.

Why fix something that isn’t broken? Easy. Because the culture at large saw two recent Muppet movies and essentially shrugged its shoulders. The 2011 film “The Muppets,” starring Amy Adams and Jason Segel, proved a modest hit. The hope was that it had planted the felt-covered seed for the next generation of Muppets fans. Guess not.

It physically hurts to see what ABC have done to (Kermit).

The sequel, 2014’s “Muppets Most Wanted,” landed with a thud. No more film franchise. It didn’t help that these new Muppets took sides in the culture wars by mocking Fox News, ridiculing Big Business via the villainous Tex Richman, and remade Miss Piggy as a feminist.

The franchise still had life, the folks at ABC figured. Brand names matter to TV and movie executives, even if said brands deserve a rest. If they could green light a movie like “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.,” based on a TV show most teens today never heard of, then the Muppets could be reborn as a mockumentary TV show. By the way, “U.N.C.L.E.” flopped.

But even TV critics, a jaded lot who embrace cynicism, can’t stand the new-look Muppets. Here’s how The New York Times critic assessed the creative liberties taken with these iconic characters:

“Kermit and company are real, dammit, as real as Walter White or Leslie Knope. Their character integrity is just as important, and crucial to that is their unironic sweetness, optimism and sense of fancy.”

The Guardian, a reliably progressive news outlet, isn’t amused, either.

“This Kermit badmouths fellow celebrities, openly discusses his sex life and, at one point, describes his life as ‘a living hell.’ That’s not who Kermit is. Kermit is the perennial wide-eyed optimist, the figure who grounds the chaos around him in sincerity … It physically hurts to see what ABC have done to him.”

We’ll soon see if these “Muppets” gain enough new fans to keep the show aloft. If not, the ABC show will likely fade from memory while the old-school Muppets live on in the minds and hearts of both young and old.