SnoopyStyle The Muppets in NYC are lined up to get their Christmas letters mailed. Gonzo screws up the post office machinery. Little girl Claire gives Gonzo a letter but Gonzo forgets. It's Christmas Eve. The post office is closed and the gang has to deliver 3 letters to the North Pole. Everybody gives up but Gonzo convinces Kermit and Fozzie to try. Rizzo and Pepe come along.I wonder if the post office paid to get the Muppets to do this special. I would have prefer the group stays together. It's always more fun with more Muppets. The cameos are fine but they are not the big draw for me. I'm also not a big fan of Rizzo and Pepe as being the main characters. I love Kermit with Miss Piggy. I like that Gonzo, Fozzie and Kermit are together but I miss Miss Piggy. The songs are OK but nothing special. The letter from the airport security guy doesn't really make sense. It's not the strongest Christmas special but it's still the Muppets.

TheLittleSongbird I love the Muppets, the show and most of their movies. However, this special was a big disappointment. Granted it has its good points, I loved the chemistry between Kermit and Miss Piggy, the production values are at least decent and I liked Gonzo very much here. Also the Muppet performers do do a decent job with weak material.Pretty much everything else is a big disappointment. The story was fresh and original I agree at first glance, but it was a completely different story when it came to the execution. Most of it actually is very predictable and rushed. This isn't helped by the fact it is too short.I also agree about the special's writing. The script is pretty much terrible, Gonzo and Fozzie have their moments but most of the other Muppet parts are under-written and very rarely was it funny. The jokes were also very lame and childish, and the sentimentality gets mushy.The music was also a big disappointment. Other than Gonzo and Fozzie's duet, which was compared to everything else delightful, the music is little more than mediocre and I say forgettable too. The lyrics are also trite and the melodies are unmemorable afterwards.The Muppets do try their best, and I was thrilled at the return of some old favourites, but let down severely by bad material, and I missed Gonzo and Rizzo's chemistry which was always delightful. The cameos are even more disappointing. Some of the characters are somewhat superfluous to the story or are poorly explored- I concur that the whole believing in Santa thing was quite poorly done- and Paul Williams' cameo especially is completely out of place and unfunny.In conclusion, I am a Muppet fan, but I have to agree, A Muppets Christmas:Letters to Santa is quite weak. It has its moments, but it is a shame especially about the writing and music. 4/10 Bethany Cox

almostgone-1 The script was DREADFUL, the "star-studded" cast was jaw-droppingly lame, the music limp and meaningless, the child actress too, too precious and affected... can't think of anything that was good about it. (Okay, the costumes were alright- Uma Thurman got the best ones.) It's just too bad, really, but apparently no one involved with the creative part of Muppets productions has any memory of what made them so special, so charming and funny and INTELLIGENT in the first place. Was it all because of Jum Henson? Because the productions, including Sesame Street, have gone straight to smirky, smarmy, dopey, predictable, kids'll-watch-anything so it doesn't matter Hollywood h*ll since he died.

Virginia Blankenship I almost lost my holiday spirit this year. Haven't even bothered to haul the tree down from the attic. The soul of Christmas is now being sold by Circuit City, anyway (and they're going bankrupt)--much like Jim Henson's legacy was sold to a newfangled corporate Disney™ following his untimely death in 1990. I am pleased to report that the post-Henson muppeteers have finally redeemed themselves in "Letters to Santa".Henson's son Brian took his first stab at continuing the holiday genre in 1992 with a remake of Dicken's "Christmas Carol." A little creepy but forgivable, given the circumstances. Alas, "A Muppet Family Christmas" (1995) was no "John Denver and the Muppets' Rocky Mountain Holiday" (1983). "It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie" (2002): forgettable (it starred David Arquette. Ring a bell?). "Letters to Santa" puts all of the above to shame (curiously, the junior Henson served as neither writer nor director in this one but did provide the voice of a very unmuppety "Sal Manilla". Why?).The premise is totally believable (compared to, say, "Muppets in Space" (1999), which was kind of awesome, but there's no way sponge chickens can breathe in space, okay). I'll spare you any spoilers.Pepe the Prawn is the new Beaker, but it's time to retire Bobo the Bear.The cameos were mostly spot-on, but I'm not sure that today's kids will know who many of these faces are (and some faces they shouldn't, e.g., Steve Schirripa, or the dude from "Law & Order"), in the same way that I recognized Joan Rivers or Liza Minnelli in the 1984 classic set in Manhattan. Nevertheless, Paulie Walnuts turned in an Emmy-worthy performance. Uma: good move. Never looked better. Glowed like an angel. And mad props to Michael Bloomberg for, well, being Michael Bloomberg.Decent music. Modern yet timeless. Sweet and corny. Someday my kids will watch it every year the same way I still look forward to "Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas" (1977). Whether they like it or not.