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Movies we saw while vegetating in Palawan—#25: 300, which seems brilliant after you’ve seen 300 Rise of Empire. #26: The Help, the Civil Rights movement done Hallmark movie of the week-style. #27: The Matrix, still a ton of fun even after it’s been ripped off over and over and over again.

…that we nearly missed because we did not know it was already showing. It is funny and crammed with star cameos from Tom Hiddleston to Frank Langella to Hugh Bonneville. It has clever and memorable songs by Bret McKenzie, and as the opening number declares, it knows exactly what it is. Tina Fey as the commandant of a Siberian gulag leads the inmates in a doo-wop song, and tough guys like Ray Liotta and Danny Trejo perform a scene from A Chorus Line. Sam the Eagle and Ty Burrell as a CIA and an Interpol agent, respectively, have a contest as to whose badge is bigger. Christoph Waltz does the waltz, and Usher, well, he ushers. We see the possible offspring of miscegenation in the muppet universe. Gonzo finally gets to do an indoor running with the bulls number. We like it better than the Muppet Movie from two years ago, where Kermit and company were second banana to the people (Jason Segel, who is going to play David Foster Wallace. What??). The muppets are the protagonists, the humans are the guests.

Apparently few of us think so, because the reviews are so-so and the movie is a flop. Maybe we’re inclined to love the muppets because we grew up with them (and regard them as more real than some humans)? Or maybe the audience expects too much of felt performers and too little of human actors?