The Mutt Mackley Show

The Mutt Mackley Show is a shelved idea for a puppet show series created by Dozerfleet Productions. It features the hand puppet Mutt Mackley, and his gritty world of Muppet-like friends and foes in a fictitious city. Currently, only shorts based on the idea have been produced. This includes the shelved 3-13: The Movie and Kings in the Corner. Mackley and Gambino have also featured in a music video to Linkin Park's song "Somewhere I Belong." While ambitions for it date back to 1999, KitC is considered the first tie-in to be made, and was released in February of 2003.

History
The idea for the Mutt Mackley show originated with Annihilators Aerodynamics, a Power Rangers knock-off that the Dozerfleet founder put on to entertain himself with as a child. Several figures were used for it, including several action figures from Batman: The Animated Series and several Ninja Turtle action figures.

One of the "Zords" used in this spoof was a hand puppet dog that had been in the family since the founder was a small child. After the founder outgrew the spoof and the associated action figures, the dog puppet was decided to be put to good use doing other things.

By high school, a good use was found. For a speech class, the founder used the dog as a newscast associate. The production was ruined, however, by the camera operator's poor choice for a camera angle, ruining the illusion. Originally not having a voice, the dog's new voice was inspired by the character Typhus from the kids' show Big Bad Beetleborgs. The new name given to the dog character was Mackley.

The idea for an actual Mutt Mackley program didn't come about until 2003, after the success of Kings in the Corner. The idea would be pursued further with the 2007 music video set to Linkin Park's "Somewhere I Belong" featuring Mackley and co-star Gambino Penguin. It would be pursued again in 2008 with the short film 3-13. However, the idea remains shelved for the time-being as far as actual show production is concerned.

Cast
The cast remains fairly under-developed at the present moment, but some characters have already become staple figures for its cast.


 * Detective Hooper, the ever-devoted guardian of justice.
 * Mutt Mackley himself plays various roles throughout the piece.
 * Gambino Penguin is the ever-conniving street villain in the show, but hardly the most evil that is intended to appear.
 * Smiley Toucan is a not-too-bright bird who always finds himself having fun or trying to. His naivety make him vulnerable to danger.
 * The MMS-based story Kings in the Corner featured a bee-like character named Officer Hornet, played in that film by an action figure alternate form of Buzz-Off from the He-Man toy franchise. It is unknown if Officer Hornet will make another appearance.

Inspirations
The casting of characters and their PSA-friendly subject matter is inspired loosely by Sesame Street, though content is intended to be reasonably more mature. This is evidenced by the fact that 3-13 and Penguin on Drugs both talk about the dangers of drug use openly, using a powdered sugar bag as a prop stand-in for cocaine.

Content
This is the first time that a Dozerfleet work has ever explicitly depicted street drugs being used by characters. While drugs are alluded to briefly in Ciem, they are an afterthought of being the activities of gangs. Unlike the Ciem trilogy, however, the Mutt Mackley programs avoid talking much about sex; and feature only comical violence and very little if any bad language. Euphemisms for offensive words make up the majority of swearing in Ciem, but there is almost none in TMMS.

By contrast to TMMS, Ciem contains a lot more reference to the characters' various and often complicated sexual situations. In 3-13, the closest TMMS comes to a sexual reference is Mackley pretending to have separated from his (non-existent) wife due to her intolerance of his implied alcohol abuse - all of which is a lie; so he can distract Gambino by gaining his sympathy.