Kermit's Swamp Years is a lacklustre direct to video film aimed at younger kids as older kids will find it too childish and boring. Adults will just find it lacking the wit and imagination of The Muppet Show.

The older Kermit returns to the swamp where he grew up after many years away and reminiscences on his younger days when he and his his frog friends Croaker and Goggles ventured out of the safety of the swamp into the outside world where they were hunted down by a biology teacher looking for frogs to dissect at school. Goggles is captured by a pet store owner and the other two with the help of a stray dog called Pilgrim who knows more about the outside world go to look for him.

The story has a hint of Toy Story films but without the charm. It just looks like a cheapo sequel with vary little care put into it and some not very good songs. You also of course miss the other Muppet characters, although you see a few variations of them. You do see younger versions of Waldolf and Statler though.

I had seen all the Muppet movies that went to cinemas and made for television, and this was the only one left that I hadn't, before the release of Muppets Most Wanted of course, I knew it was most likely going to be average, but I was still willing to try it. Basically Kermit the Frog (Steve Whitmire) is reliving memories whilst revisiting his swamp home, where he came from before becoming famous (not exactly the same one as in The Muppet Movie, but never mind),and the film flashes back to when Kermit was twelve years old and one of his earliest adventures. Young Kermit enjoyed life in the swamp, with his best friends Croaker the frog (Bill Barretta) and Goggles the toad (Joey Mazzarino),but he wonders what else is out in the world beyond the swamp. But then Goggles and bullfrog bully Blotch (John Kennedy) are kidnapped by pet shop owner Wilson (William Bookston),and sold to scientist Dr. Hugo Krassman (John Hostetter) and his assistant Mary (Kelly Collins Lintz),Kermit and Croaker are forced to venture out of the swamp to rescue them, but they also get the opportunity to see the world for what it is, good and bad. Kermit and Croaker are accompanied by stray dog named Pilgrim (Cree Summer) who is seeking a new owner, and after all kinds of small events along the way they reach where their friends are, and they realise Krassman's nasty plans for all toads and frogs he has kidnapped, they are all to be used in school for biology classes for dissection. In the end Krassman realises the error of his ways and lets all toads and frogs free, Pilgrim is adopted by Wilson who also turns out to be nice, and all four frogs head home to the swamp, where Kermit continues to live happily, with more freedom to get out and about when he feels like it. Also starring Steve Whitmire as Jack Rabbit , Bill Barretta as Horace D' Fly and Roy the Frog, Dave Goelz as Waldorf, John Kennedy as Arnie the Alligator and Jerry Nelson as Statler. This is about as good as you're going to get from a straight to DVD release, it's a pit they weren't able to get at least one celebrity cameo like other Muppet films, children watching this certainly won't have many complaints, and it is reasonably good fun, not a bad fantasy comedy. Worth watching, at least once!

Kermit's Swamp Years will likely be a delight for little kids - very little ones - preferably those who have not been acquainted with the Muppets. I employ this statement with emphasis because I feel that anyone who has had any kind of relationship with the Muppet characters we've come to know and love will find this film dreadfully childish and a few steps away from being an insult to the iconic characters' respective legacies.

I can't say they'd be incorrect; this is a pretty immature affair, combining an annoying amount of bathroom humor with a subpar, obligatory fish-out-of-water story that results in tedium and boredom with only a seventy-five minute runtime. It concerns Kermit (voiced by Steve Whitmire, who, I'll say, does a pretty damn good job) who is returning back to his homeland, the swamps, after an extended absence. While cruising down the road on his scooter, he recaps a keen adventure he had with his pals Croaker the Frog and Goggles the Toad, as they naively ventured outside the boundaries of the swamp into, gasp, the land inhabited by shiny creatures (automobiles) and humans.

This lands them in a direct battle with a high school biology teacher (John Hostetter) who wants to collect amphibians for his class's forthcoming dissection. When they team up with a dog named Pilgrim (Cree Summer, who has voice credits on Clifford The Big Red Dog, Drawn Together, and Rugrats),they try and find a way to survive out in the newland and return to their homeland.

For a film titled "Kermit's Swamp Years," very little of the film actually takes place in the swampland. We open with widescale shots, mostly aerial ones, of the swampland and its inhabitants. The scenes provide one with almost a travelogue-esque image of the swamp and warm our hearts with the beauty and the incomprehensible majestic qualities below. Then a fly swoops into the picture, makes some horribly childish jokes, and then we see Kermit on his scooter and the plot begins. We're in the swamp maybe fifteen minutes before we're taken to the archetypal territory of the mainlands, which are no fun in comparison.

In addition, I can't help but feel that Kermit's Swamp Years, in itself, is disrespectful to the proud, invaluable legacy Jim Henson left behind. His Muppet characters had heart and wit, and would never stoop down to the level of inane bathroom-talk as a means of humor and cheap laughs. The relationships with each other - man or Muppet - felt genuine and real; the characters' names you knew for a reason. Watching several Muppet shows when I was a child, I never wanted to get up and leave the couch or have the show end. It was a magical, priceless world I was inhabiting, and I had no intention of leaving it; the real world seemed monotonous and drearily perfunctory. I almost couldn't wait to be done with Kermit's Swamp Years for the exact opposite reason.

I return full-circle to the point I began this review with; this film will be enjoyed by little, little kids. Seven and up may want to move on to old-school Nickelodeon.

Starring: John Hostetter. Voiced by: Steven Whitmire and Cree Summer. Directed by: David Grumpel.