Cartoonist Jim Henson explains why ‘Muppet Babies’ isn’t streaming and what Nanny really looks like

Muppet Babies is one of the rare ’80s animated series that isn’t available to stream, and Jim Henson cartoonist Guy Gilchrist reveals why.

During a recent appearance at LA Comic Con, Gilchrist offered some answers as to why that is Muppet Babies was not available to stream on any of the digital platforms.

Gilchrist said there were “copyrights and trademarks” as the reason the show couldn’t land on a streaming service. The cartoonist says this in an interview Dennis does LA that there was a “camaraderie” between the studios in the 80s that no longer exists today given the big corporate takeovers.

“Other than using things that were in the public domain, like the silent stuff we used in the dream sequences… Don’t forget, the editing of it was incredibly amazing. We used a lot of film clips from many different areas including Robber [of the Lost Ark], war of starsand all that,” Gilchrist said of the studios’ collaboration with each other.

“Jim was very good with George Lucas. George came in and continued to work labyrinth with Jim and it wasn’t their first collaboration,” he continued. “Their first time they worked together was… they sat across from each other. Jim was filming The Muppets and George did it war of stars on the other side of the street. Yoda didn’t work, so Jim, Frank and Kathy Mullen fixed Yoda. Then Steven Spielberg was also a very good friend of Jim’s, and Jim fixed ET because ET wasn’t working.

Knowing how the studios worked with each other, Gilchrist went on to explain how the tracks were used Muppet Babies made it to the show and how different it is now.

“Everybody loved us back then,” he explained. “They loved Jim and would do anything for us. We didn’t fill out any forms, requests, this or that. We basically did everything we wanted to do with the blessing of all the studios. These days things are owned by Disney, Universal … and there’s not the camaraderie at the creative level that we had in the 1980s.”

He continued, “I’m sorry to say, that’s why you won’t see the original.” Muppet Babies. And this is the question I get asked the most. I had a lot to do with it Babies. I know how much you love this Babies and would like to have her back. But I don’t really know how that will ever happen. Unfortunately, it’s copyright, trademarks and things like that.”

Muppet Babies aired on CBS between 1984 and 1991 for eight seasons and a total of 107 episodes. The show featured toddler versions of the Muppets living in a day care center.

Another incognito of the Muppet Babies is the face of Nanny, the babies’ caretaker. The show was viewed from the babies’ perspective and viewers were only shown nanny’s legs. Now Gilchrist reveals what she actually looked like.

“Barbara Billingsley, Mrs. Cleaver [from Leave it to Beaver]“She was a nanny,” Gilchrist said. “Now you know what Nanny looks like.”

Gilchrist said it was “an ode to Nanny’s striped socks.” The Wizard of Oz.”

Muppet Babies had a remake in 2018 that aired on Disney Junior between 2018 and 2022 with a total of three seasons and 71 episodes. The reboot retained some of the original characters, but the animation style was different, opting for 3D computer-animated graphics.