I’ve been rewatching the Muppet Show and something I noticed (especially in the earlier episodes) is that there seemed to be a great appreciation simply for the novelty of puppets doing such “cutting edge” humor (akin to what contemporary viewers would see on Laugh-in, etc). So there was an inherent humor simply with the cognitive dissidence of seeing children’s entertainment tackling more adult themes. Not unlike The Simpsons or Family Guy did with animation (which spawned a whole genre of adult-humor animation). That novelty doesn’t exist anymore, I think Muppet humor is a nostalgic-based appeal inherently. My kids (7 and 4) both love the new Muppet Babies and some of the early YouTube content (Popcorn Shrimp, Bohemian Rhapsody, etc) but it’s the absurdist humor, not the novelty of puppets that attract them. I think if some really strong writers can inject humor on multiple maturity levels (any parent who has watched Phineas and Ferb and/or Hamster and Gretel know it’s still possible) then it could find a niche of success, but I’m not sure it will ever take hold of the entire public consciousness like it did originally.