It took Jim Henson multiple tries before he was able to successfully create a television show starring his Muppets, and he and his team created more than one pilot to try to convince networks to pick up his idea. Tales of the Tinkerdee is one of these unaired pilots.
In this pilot, a witch named Taminella Grinderfall is the only one in the kingdom not invited to Princess Gwendolinda's birthday party at her castle. Taminella and Charlie, her idiotic ogre henchman, attempt to infiltrate the party, hoping to steal the Gem-Encrusted items that foreign kings are giving to the Princess as birthday gifts. Believe it or not, Hilarity Ensues from this. (It's The Muppets: what did you expect?)
Kermit makes an appearance as The Bard, narrating the events as they unfold, but apart from him, no characters that made it to The Muppet Show as cast regulars appear, though King Goshposh does make an appearance in some of the shorts that aired with The Muppet Show in the United Kingdom.
Tropes
- Agony of the Feet: Taminella's version of a Dope Slap is to bash Charlie on his feet with a club whenever he does or says something stupid, causing him to howl, "Oooch!"
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Taminella's threats to the King if he doesn't invite her to the party: she'll destroy the castle, burn the countryside, poison the river, and turn everybody purple.
- Bad Boss: King Goshposh can be harsh on his minstrel when he botches a rhyme or makes a bad joke, but that's about as bad as it gets for him. Taminella Grinderfall, by contrast, is outright physically abusive to her ogre minion Charlie.
- The Bard: Kermit takes on this role, and is never seen without his lute. His narration is full of bad jokes and shoehorned rhymes.
- Birthday Party Goes Wrong: King Goshposh orders a birthday cake with two hundred and sixty seven layers, but the chefs think he wanted two hundred and sixty seven candles, resulting in a one-layer cake that resembles a porcupine. The King also orders five hundred peanut butter sandwiches for the party—but, due to a mix-up in the purchasing department, sixty-seven thousand are sent. It gets worse when Taminella shows up to steal Gwendolinda's birthday presents.
- Card-Carrying Villain: Taminella refers to herself as "The Witchiest Witch of Them All!" and seems proud to have no scruples.
- Cigar Chomper: King Goshposh is always seen smoking a cigar.
- Cool and Unusual Punishment: After Taminella's caught at the end, the King sentences her to the dungeon. She won't be allowed out until she eats the sandwiches. "All sixty-seven thousand of 'em!"
- Did Not Think This Through: Sure, Taminella: order Charlie to "smasheroonie" as soon as he sees Princess Gwendolinda. Then go in disguise as Princess Gwendolina, and approach the very window where you already know Charlie is lurking, while he's still under those orders. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
- Dope Slap: Taminella's version of this is to club Charlie on his feet when he says or does something especially stupid, prompting a loud "Oooch!" from him each time it happens. King Goshposh also takes a swing at his prime minister with his scepter when he confuses his orders rather stupidly, though the prime minister ducks in time.
- Dumb Muscle: Taminella's ogre henchman Charlie is definitely not the sharpest tool in the shed: he's stupid enough to call her "Tammy" while they're both disguised, risking blowing their cover, and he even mistakenly clubs Taminella on the head while she's disguised as the princess that Charlie was ordered to clobber and kidnap!
- Eldritch Abomination: It's somewhat implied that the Gruncheon, a creature Taminella keeps in her lair, is one of these—he eats kitchen chairs, is too horrible to show on-camera, and is too horrible to describe.
- The Good Chancellor: The nebbish Prime Minister genuinely is on the king's side, and helps him both to put together the birthday party for his daughter and to figure out who the evil witch truly is.
- The Good King: King Goshposh can be a downplayed Bad Boss at times, but what he wants is a good birthday party for his beloved daughter, and—except for Taminella—he invited the entire kingdom to the party, including the poor.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy: A single guard at the gate is tricked by Taminella's Paper-Thin Disguise when she pretends to be Santa Claus, and Charlie pretends to be Rudolph. Somewhat downplayed in that he does ask some questions about why Santa would be there in the middle of summer, and no one else sees through her disguises, either.
- The Heist: The whole plot boils down to this, albeit taking place in a fairytale kingdom, and most of the screentime is the Wicked Witch attempting to remain undetected: the presents Taminella is there to try to steal only receive about a minute of screentime!
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Taminella disguises herself as Princess Gwendolinda at several points during the plot, and at one point, this backfires when Charlie obeys her previous orders to club Gwendolinda on the head, and she gets too close to the window where Charlie is lurking. Now it's her turn to say:Taminella: Oooch!
- Master of Disguise: Apparently Taminella is this in-universe, as she successfully tricks other characters into believing she is Santa Claus, the Prime Minister, the Princess, and a sculptor. That being said, from the audience's perspective, every disguise she pulls off is a Paper-Thin Disguise.
- Minion with an F in Evil: Charlie is a borderline example: he's nice and polite to everyone as long as he isn't under orders to restrain or club them, but once he gets those orders, he Would Hit a Girl. Though even then, he does have a tendency to miss...
- No Fourth Wall: Taminella and Kermit both explicitly address the audience directly, and even the king and prime minister seem to get in on that act when they crowd the camera and say the phrase that Princess Gwendolinda catches all the time. Heck, in-universe, it's kind of implied that the king knows he's being watched by Taminella when she uses a clairvoyant spell: he says "over and out" just as the spell is ending!
- Paper-Thin Disguise: The audience won't be fooled by Taminella simply putting on a wig, a false beard, or a hat. But the other characters seem taken in by her disguises, with a partial exception of the prime minister noting that a "sculpture" of the Princess looks more like the Princess than she does while Taminella is impersonating the Princess.
- Phrase Catcher: Princess Gwendolinda is repeatedly described as being someone for whom any knight in the kingdom would gladly risk his head.
- Pie in the Face: The supernatural rules of the setting mean that, when a witch takes a custard pie to the face, lightning flashes. Just roll with it, folks.
- Princess Classic: Princess Gwendolinda is a beautiful princess, for whom any knight in the kingdom would gladly risk his head.
- A Rare Sentence: The spell to release Gwendolinda from her Taken for Granite spell is to say a sentence Taminella is sure no one will ever say: "My uncle was bouncing through the ice cream on his pogo stick." However, King Goshposh decides to reminiscence on the ice cream party where his uncle brought a pogo stick...
- Spot the Imposter: Parodied. Immediately after Gwendolinda is released from her Taken for Granite spell, King Goshposh finds himself confronted with the real Gwendolinda and with Taminella, who's wearing a curly wig and masquerading as the Princess. Despite the fact that Taminella looks nothing like Gwendolinda, the King can't tell which is the Princess and which is witch. The Prime Minister recalls an old Tinkerdee saying: "Hit a witch in the face with a custard pie, and lightning will strike." Sure enough, when Taminella gets a custard Pie in the Face, there's a bolt of lightning, along with Instant Thunder.
- Surrounded by Idiots: King Goshposh orders a birthday cake with two hundred and sixty seven layers, but the chefs think he wanted two hundred and sixty seven candles, resulting in a one-layer cake that resembles a porcupine. Then, instead of five hundred peanut butter sandwiches, sixty-seven thousand of them are sent to the party. The King is not happy.
- Surveillance as the Plot Demands: Taminella is capable of clairvoyance with a particular magic potion and spell, at least for a limited amount of time. She uses this to spy on a conversation between the prime minister and the king, and finds out that the king has zero intention of sending her an invitation, even though nearly everyone in the kingdom, poor and rich alike, got an invitation.
- Taken for Granite: Taminella freezes the real Gwendolinda solid with her magic, and then disguises her as a statue, then disguises herself as Gwendolinda—all to steal the valuable presents.
- Uninvited to the Party: Taminella is the only one in the kingdom who didn't get invited to the party. When her forty-two letters demanding to know where her invitation is are ordered by the King to be burned, she vows to attend the party without one.
- Vile Villain, Laughable Lackey: Taminella has an ogre henchman, Charlie, who's played by a human actor, but is only visible from the waist down. And while Taminella is fully capable of coming up with and adjusting schemes that come dangerously close to working and wields dangerous and effective magic, Charlie is a dimwit who frequently receives abuse from his boss when he says or does something idiotic.
- Wicked Witch: Taminella Grinderfall is a fatter example than most, but with her dark clothing, dingy lair, magical cauldron, spellcasting skill, lack of any kind of real scruples, and the monstrous company she keeps, she definitely fits the trope!
- Would Hit a Girl: Charlie attempts to hit Princess Gwendolinda with his club twice, missing both times. He kind of succeeds the third time, if you count successfully clubbing his Wicked Witch boss while she's disguised as the Princess, that is. He isn't squeamish about restraining the Princess while Taminella casts a petrifying spell on her, either.
- Xanatos Speed Chess: Taminella's plans keep going awry, and her stint in the castle is basically a continuous streak of adjusting her plans of the fly with disguise after disguise. Though at times even she gets them mixed up, and her clumsy dunce of an ogre minion isn't always up to speed on her plan, particularly while he's ordered to club the very princess that Taminella had disguised herself as...
