Anyone who watched Adam Carolla, Jimmy Kimmel and Daniel Kellison’s Crank Yankers knows that puppets are filthy, vulgar creatures that often make us laugh. And if you’ve seen Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, you know that pairing stalwarts of children’s television with hard-boiled procedurals is, if nothing else, memorable.
That’s still true now. A trailer for The Happytime Murders, a movie about puppets and humans coexisting, is so uniquely bizarre that it’s hard to believe these are creatures from Jim Henson’s universe. There’s a joke 30 seconds in, for example, that finds a muppet offering Melissa McCarthy 50 cents to, well, we’ll let you watch in the trailer above.
The Happytime Murders looks like it isn’t afraid to poke fun at the obvious comparison people will make between Henson’s lovable, completely PG muppets, Sesame Street and the unfathomable world these miscreant puppets inhabit. That’s part of the joke. Puppets saying bad words is funny, get it?
A synopsis provided by STX Entertainment reads:
No Sesame. All Street. THE HAPPYTIME MURDERS is a filthy comedy set in the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles where puppets and humans coexist. Two clashing detectives with a shared secret, one human (Melissa McCarthy) and one puppet, are forced to work together again to solve the brutal murders of the former cast of a beloved classic puppet television show.
The Happytime Murders, directed by Jim Henson’s son, Brian Henson, will be released on Aug. 17.
