Whatever Happened To. . . Muzzy?

You know you were a child of the 80’s or 90’s when just hearing the words “Je suis la jeune fille” brings back a flood of memories of Muzzy. Those Muzzy commercials seemed to be everywhere for a good 10 years. Everyone knew the commercials by heart, but no one I knew ever actually had it. Whatever happened to Muzzy? Well it turns out he never really went anywhere, just adapted. And by the way, “Je suis la jeune fille” means “I am a young girl”.

You know every word in this commercial, don’t you?

Apparently, Muzzy is some kind of alien who came to Gonzoland and was jailed for eating parking meters, as his diet consists of generally inedible items, like clocks and other metal stuff. In jail he meets Bob, the royal gardener, who was imprisoned because the evil scientist Corvax snitched on Bob when he tried to elope with the princess, because Corvax is in love with her and wants her all to himself. Corvax uses his computer to make duplicates of the princess, but they all hate him, just like the real princess does. Bob realizes that Muzzy eats metal, and so has him eat through the bars of the jail cell, some shenanigans happen to Corvax’s computer creating more and more duplicates, Corvax tries to run away but is caught by Bob, and Muzzy acts as the duex ex machina and repairs the computer to save the day, Bob and the princess marry, and then Muzzy flies off in his spaceship. The end. Pretty basic standard kids show type stuff.

In addition to the light story, there were all the educational elements to aid in the language learning. For example, as Bob tends to the garden, he counts all the flowers repeatedly to show off number skills. Each of the duplicated princesses wears a different colored dress to teach about various colors. When Bob and Muzzy first meet to try to save the princess, she tells them to wait until 7:00 p.m to teach about time concepts and clock reading.

The whole concept was developed by the BBC in 1986. Its original purpose was to teach English as a second language to immigrants. They soon realized it could be easily adapted to do the opposite, and teach foreign languages to English speakers. The original set was 4 VHS tapes, two audio tapes, and some activity books to reinforce the concepts taught. The whole video series, including the sequel, was only about 2.5 hours, so I don’t know that you can really say it “taught” a language beyond the very basics. Muzzy was advertised heavily for years until two things kind of killed the original business model of VHS & audiotapes: DVD and the internet.

In the late 90’s, VHS was slowly dying, being replaced by DVDs. The same was true with cassette tapes. Muzzy was rereleased in the late 90’s converted into DVDs and CDs, but the major nail in the coffin for Muzzy was the internet. With the wealth of information readily availible online, there was really not much use for a single DVD that taught a limited vocab set. Muzzy was pretty quietly retired in the early 2000’s. Oh, he was still around and you could still buy it, but marking was largely scaled back, and there were no further changes to the format. The actual content hadn’t been changed since its inception, just the underlying physical format.

That was until last year, when Muzzy was completely remastered. His dated 80’s animation was redone in slick CGI. Now in addition to 6 remastered DVDs, you get access to Muzzy Online, which also includes the Muzzy app for your phone and tablet. Muzzy Online has 165 games to reinforce the details from the video series (in all 8 languages online, not just the language of the video you bought physical copies of). Check out the commercial for the new Muzzy version below, or checkout the website for Early Advantage, the distributor. You can get a month trial for only $10.95. Or here’s the crazy part. You can get all the DVDs and a years access to Muzzy Online for just $199, which is pretty much the same as it cost in 1986. If you have kids, this new version looks like it would be way more fun than watching the same 4 VHS tapes over and over again.

JohnScott is the proud owner of a life size replica Captain Kirk Chair. He is a hoarder of Comic Books, Transformers, and Star Trek action figures. He attended Space Camp as an adult. He has taken vacations to the closing of the Star Trek Experience and the final night Shuttle launch. He has been known to yell at his television when the kids can't put together the damn statue in the Shrine of the Silver Monkey. When not writing for InsufficientScotty, he is a Software Engineer for a major healthcare communications company. You can Email or follow on Twitter @NotEnoughScotty or Facebook