As a paid-up fan of The Muppets for a long, long time, few feelings can match the crushing disappointment I felt when the credits rolled on Muppets From Space. Appreciating that many of you out there warmed to it, I just couldn’t go for it at all.

Considering it had followed The Muppet Christmas Carol and Muppet Treasure Island onto the big screen, it just seemed to rip up the charm and quality of those films in favour of something really quite messy and only sporadically entertaining. ‘Gutted’ doesn’t begin to cover it.

I’ve thus been watching with caution the plans to reboot the Muppets cinematic franchise, tempering my enthusiasm for the idea with the memories of what happens when the finest felt stars in the movies are taken in the wrong direction.

It could be that The Muppets are in safe hands with Jason Segal, however. Rumoured to be called The Greatest Muppet Movie Of All Time, Segal pitched and wrote the a film (in collaboration with Nicholas Stoller), and it’s now been revealed that he’s signed up to star in it, too. The director has been set as James Bobin.

The story is set to follow one man’s journey to reunite The Muppets, in a bid to save the original TV studio where the classic Muppet Shows were made. It sounds a darn sight better than the gush of straight to DVD projects that The Muppets have had to lend their presence to over the past decade.

We’re not quite sure when shooting is set to start, but the project easily sounds the most interesting thing that the Muppets have been attached to since the mid-90s. Here’s hoping it all works out.

In the meantime, here’s that Hollywood Reporter piece.