Audiences will have to decide awesome for themselves, but strange is true enough. In an obsessive re-creation of the oddball antics that made “The Muppet Show” beloved to a generation of TV viewers, the new movie features dancing chickens, a rapping villain (played by Chris Cooper) and a barbershop quartet that harmonizes Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Disney thinks “The Muppets,” which opens on Wednesday and cost under $50 million to make, has blockbuster potential. But it’s anyone’s guess whether puppets can resonate in the Pixar era. (To quote one of Kermit’s catchphrases, “Don’t count your tadpoles until they’ve hatched.”)

What is certain: “The Muppets” — as underscored by how Walter came to life — is a rare example of the corporate committee getting out of its own way and letting the creative folks take the lead. (Previous efforts to revive the Muppets were built more around consumer products than compelling content.)

There were moments, of course, when Disney tried attaching synergistic baggage to “The Muppets,” said Jason Segel, who also wrote and stars in the film. “Somebody asked in one meeting, in all seriousness, what part of the script would make the best theme-park ride,” he said. But Disney executives, perhaps partly because they were distracted by a painful studio restructuring at the time, did not manhandle the film, allowing it to be weird, witty — “Muppety” in Mr. Segal’s words — and even a bit risqué (as evidenced by a close encounter between Miss Piggy’s pelvis and Jack Black’s face).

“The Muppets” also does not tiptoe around the elephant in the room, which is the dilapidated state of the entire franchise. It’s a sore point for Disney, which has struggled to figure out what to do with the family of felt misfits created by Jim Henson. Once international superstars, Henson’s Muppets have not had a major box-office hit in 32 years. The last five Muppets pictures garnered less in total domestic ticket sales than “Toy Story 3” collected in its first five days. As Kermit, contemplating a comeback in his lonely “Sunset Boulevard”-style mansion, sings in the new movie, “Would anybody watch or even care, or did something break we can’t repair?”