There's been a lot of talk lately about Disney arguably ruining a certain giant franchise. You know, the one that begins with "star" and ends with a surname-obsessed old woman harassing a bored teenager in the desert. Putting that old debate aside, we'd like to focus on another iconic beacon of nostalgia that was acquired by Disney, only to be run into the ground: the Muppets. Since they currently have no shows running or movies in the pipeline, the biggest recent platform for Jim Henson's beloved creations was an ad for Facebook Portal, an online chat service that presumably opens up a "portal" between you and pervy Facebook employees.

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Sure, the Muppets have appeared in tons of commercials before, from their earliest days to the time Denny's forced Miss Piggy to devour her dead friends and relatives on camera. But this ad somehow seems extra depressing -- not just because the Muppets are shilling for Facebook, but also the spot's storyline, which finds them scattered across the globe and only able to talk to each other through Portal (apparently Skype doesn't exist in their universe). Didn't the Muppets just get back together? Is this commercial canon? Regardless, this bummer of an ad perhaps inadvertently serves as a perfect encapsulation of the sad state of the Muppets.

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To truly understand modern Muppet-dom, we have to look at the Jim Henson Company's history with Disney, which makes George Lucas' fraught relationship with the Mouse House look downright cozy by comparison. Disney was all set to buy the Muppets in 1989, for $150 million. They even planned to promote the sale by replacing Disneyland's costumed characters with an all-Muppet roster for an entire year. The entrance to the park would be re-dressed to read "Muppetland," animatronics of Miss Piggy and Animal would randomly show up in classic rides, and the Matterhorn was going to be painted Kermit's shade of green -- which, conveniently, would also camouflage any evidence of motion sickness.

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Walt Disney Parks and Resorts

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After Henson's untimely death, his family had "second thoughts" about the merger, which then fell through. The Hensons even sued Disney for "continued use of the Muppets," accusing them of "outright theft of Jim Henson's legacy." Disney countersued, claiming that they had an oral contract with Henson. Even though things got uglier than a Skeksis butthole, the two sides eventually settled.