| “ | Hey, maybe this frog does everything. He talks, he sings, he dances, he tells jokes, he even rides a bicycle. Max, find me a frog and a bear in a tan Studebaker. | „ |
| ~ Doc Hopper |
Doc Hopper is the main antagonist of the 1979 comedy film The Muppet Movie. He is a heartless Southern businessman who wants Kermit to work as the spokesman for Hopper's failing frog-legs restaurant chain, and plans to kill and stuff Kermit if he does not.
He was portrayed by the late Charles Durning, who also played Otis Hazelrigg in Dark Night of the Scarecrow, and voiced Francis Griffin in Family Guy.
Personality[]
Doc Hopper is a wealthy and apparently somewhat influential restaurateur. He uses a charming and friendly facade to get what he wants, and treats his bumbling assistant Max well. However, by his own admission, he has no talent, leading him to pursue Kermit, who does.
Hopper is shown to be extremely greedy, intending to pay Kermit only $500 a year to work for him while claiming it is a large sum. He is said to keep the frogs whose legs his restaurants serve alive, oblivious to the gruesome nature of doing so.
Underneath his ignorant-at-worst but overall warm exterior, however, Hopper is actually secretly a complete sociopath, progressively shifting his goal from hiring Kermit willingly, to brainwashing him, to outright getting rid of him for saying no. When Kermit tries to appeal to Doc to let him and his friends follow their dreams, Doc only becomes angrier and orders the rest of the group killed out of spite.
Hopper’s only somewhat redeeming trait is his fondness for Max, whom he views as a friend. He gives Max a large raise when the latter tries to quit early in the film, and is saddened when Max insists they are no longer friends.
While his frog-leg business is legitimate and legal, Hopper has no issue with getting involved in organized crime, hiring henchmen, an insane scientist, and even an assassin. He also illegally uses Kermit’s likeness on a billboard and later hijacks a radio broadcast to threaten Kermit.
Ultimately however, Doc is a coward who relies on others to do his dirty work for him. When roared at by an enlarged Animal, he is so terrified that he abandons his car and runs away on foot.
Biography[]
Doc Hopper is introduced to Kermit through the window of the El Sleezo Cafe by his assistant Max, who had encountered the frog that day and took a liking to him. After Kermit exits the bar, Doc introduces himself and fails to persuade Kermit to become the new spokesman for his failing frog-leg restaurant chain (Hopper currently does his own television commercials, with poor results). Doc and Max begin following Kermit and his new traveling companion Fozzie Bear, who are both en route to Hollywood.
Hopper creates a billboard for his chain with Kermit’s likeness on it, but this again fails to persuade Kermit, whose words of “millions of frogs on tiny crutches” strike a nerve with Max. Max refuses to help Doc any further but the latter offers to double his percentage, causing Max to change his mind.
They next encounter Kermit and Fozzie after the Electric Mayhem band learns of their plight and repaints Fozzie’s car to disguise it. Though they are spotted by Doc and Max, they avoid being caught by camouflaging with a billboard. After Gonzo, Camilla, and Miss Piggy join the group, Hopper comes across them again and tries to shoot out the car’s tires, but fails. He instead ends up inadvertently helping the group, shooting down Gonzo, who was lifted into the air by some balloons. Disgruntled, Hopper hires several criminals to threaten Kermit into doing his commercials.
When Kermit and Piggy go out to dinner, Hopper lures her into a back room and has her kidnapped as leverage against Kermit. German scientist Professor Krassman attempts to brainwash Kermit into complying with Hopper’s demands, but Miss Piggy overpowers Krassman and lobotomizes him with his own machine.
Giving up on having Kermit work for him, Hopper begins plotting to get rid of him to deny his talent to anyone else. Hopper hires a group of thugs to hunt Kermit down, including a professional frog killer named Snake Walker, and threatens him via radio broadcast.
Hopper’s increasing extremism proves too much for Max, who disguises himself as a motorcycle cop and pulls over the Muppets (now traveling in the Electric Mayhem’s bus) to warn them. Refusing to spend his whole life running from a bully, Kermit tells Max to go back to Hopper and tell him to meet in a nearby ghost town.
Kermit and Doc have a final stand-off in the middle of the ghost town, backed up by their respective groups. Kermit attempts to reason with Doc, saying he has a dream he simply wants to share with his friends. Doc removes his hat, seemingly thinking about Kermit's words. However, Hopper has become so obsessed with getting Kermit to be his spokesman that he will resort to murder to get him. After even Max declares that he is no longer on Doc’s side, an enraged Hopper orders his thugs to kill not only Kermit, but all of his friends for getting in the way. Before they can shoot the Muppets, Hopper and his minions are ultimately scared away by Animal, who has taken more than enough of Dr. Bunsen Honeydew's Insta-Grow Pills and appears as an oversized monster. Hopper and his cronies flee into the desert, never to be seen again.
He was mentioned in It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie, where his restaurant is a successful fast food chain in the world where Kermit was never born; it is unknown exactly how this happened, since his plan to expand his business in the movie was to make Kermit his mascot, which he could obviously not do if Kermit did not exist.
Billboards for Doc Hopper’s Frog Legs appear in establishing shots of Los Angeles in a few episodes of the 2023 series The Muppets Mayhem. However, it is unlikely that Hopper himself is still the one running the operation by this point, given his age.
Memorable Quotes[]
"Max! Follow that frog!"
"Max!"
"Follow that frog with *me* in the car!" -Doc Hopper berating Max, before they chase after Kermit and Fozzie Bear
"Come back, you! No Frog's gonna make a monkey outta me!" - Doc Hopper, swearing revenge, after losing Kermit and his friends on the road
Trivia[]
- Doc Hopper is an obvious parody of Colonel Sanders from Kentucky Fried Chicken. The two even have the same outfit.
- Jim Henson originally wanted Hopper to be redeemed, but Frank Oz talked him out of it.
- His fate is unknown, but it is likely that Hopper became alone and friendless as he did not wish to share his dreams with anyone else. It is implied in It's a Very Merry Muppet Christmas Movie that his chain of restaurants eventually shut down, and only continued to exist in the world where Kermit was never born. However, The Muppets Mayhem later confirmed that his business is still active, even if he is not.
- Gaston from Beauty and the Beast is similar to Doc Hopper as they both wanted someone to do what they want and threatened them with death if they refused (Hopper wanted Kermit to be his restaurant mascot while Gaston wanted Belle to be his wife).
