In ‘The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,’ the Fraggles take a big leap outside their world

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”

The holidays can be a stressful time — even for a Fraggle.

Apple TV’s new holiday special “The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” premiering Dec. 5, finds Gobo (John Tartaglia) struggling to write the perfect holiday song. The arrival of only one snowflake adds to Gobo’s severe case of writer’s block. He wants to write the song everyone is expecting and make it even better than the one he wrote the year before. Tartaglia, who is the puppeteer and voice of Gobo, describes the special as a “love letter to the fans.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” from the Jim Henson Co., features several groundbreaking moments for longtime viewers of the series, which first premiered in 1983 and was rebooted by Apple TV in 2022 with “Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock.”

The only guide you need for holiday entertainment.

“We felt this passion to make a holiday special that could be aired in 15 years and feel just as relevant and meaningful and emotional,” says Tartaglia, who is also an executive producer of the special. “There’s more music in this. There’s more magic in this. There’s more effects. There’s a much more complex storyline. There’s things you don’t always have time to do in a typical episode. It felt like we were firing on all cylinders for the special.”

For the first time, Gobo goes to “Outer Space,” which is how the Fraggles refer to our world. “We’ve been contemplating for a while how fun it would be to see Fraggles in the real world,” says executive producer Lisa Henson, who is the daughter of Jim Henson and chief executive of the Jim Henson Co.

Having a big, game-changing plot development felt appropriate for this special. “It’s a chance to do something you don’t usually get to do with the series,” says Tartaglia. “You need to take a big leap forward.”

Gobo’s foray into our world will become part of the show’s canon. “It is something that hopefully we could expand upon in future projects,” says executive producer Alex Cuthbertson, who co-wrote the special with executive producer Matt Fusfeld. “In bringing Gobo into the real world, we’ve kind of tested the waters of bringing other Fraggles into the real world.”

“The First Snow of Fraggle Rock,” the second “Back to the Rock” holiday special, is filled with little moments devoted fans may recognize. The show films in Alberta, Canada, and when Gobo first arrives in Outer Space, he’s on a street in the town of Canmore. “We put Gobo into this beautiful setting that we all visit when we are taking days off from shooting the show in Calgary,” Fusfeld says. “It’s sort of fun that the first time we see him out in the human world, we see him there.”

While in Outer Space, Gobo meets Lele Pons, the Youtube star and singer, who is facing her own form of writer’s block. Pons was pregnant with her first child during the filming, a fact that is worked into her appearance. “I’m just wondering what kind of song I’m going to write when I’m in a moment that I’ve never been in before,” she tells Gobo. The two sing a reimagined version of “Our Melody,” one of the most beloved songs from the original series.

Gobo travels to the human world, or Outer Space to the Fraggles, and meets Lele Pons, the Youtube personality and singer.

(Photo from Apple)

“It’s one of those things that felt like kismet,” Cuthbertson says. “She is dealing with this moment of incredible expectation where she is thinking about how things will look and how things will be. She had such an interesting angle for understanding what Gobo is going through.”

Tartaglia also makes a cameo appearance in the special when he and Gobo meet for the first time. “It’s totally a moment for the fans,” Cuthbertson says. “As a show that is really driven by the idea of love and inclusion, giving something to the fans feels like a fun little gift.”

When Tartaglia first saw in the script that he would meet his on-screen alter ego, he thought it was an inside joke just put there to make him laugh. He didn’t think Cuthbertson and Fusfeld were serious. “It just felt so on the nose,” he says. “Now I watch it and I really love it. I love playing Gobo so much. He’s my favorite character I’ve ever played. I just love the joy that he is. It’s almost like I am kind of talking to my heart [in that scene].”

“First Snow” also features the arrival of the new Gorg baby. In the second season finale, Ma Gorg announced she was expecting. The holiday special finds Junior Gorg grappling with the arrival of his new baby sister, something any older sibling can relate to.

“Gorg’s subplot is quite robust because he’s been an only child for all this time,” Henson says. “He’s basically very spoiled, so the idea that a little baby Gorg is gonna come in and disturb that dynamic is quite rich. At first, he’s so excited. Then when the baby hatches, he’s scared of it. But eventually he embraces the baby and loves it more than he ever hoped to. That simple little kind of story with that character is very rewarding.”

“First Snow” features the arrival of a new baby Gorg.

(Photo from Apple)

The show’s enduring popularity is rooted in the show’s positivity and timelessness. “The only thing they would ever argue about is like, ‘I love you more. No, I love you more.’ They would never argue or be snippy with each other,” Fusfeld says. “There’s absolutely no pop culture in it. They don’t exist in culture and they have their own culture.”

All agree that Tartaglia is the in-house “Fraggle Rock” expert. “John knows the show inside and out. There’s not an episode that he isn’t completely familiar with,” says Henson. “He knows whether there is a song from one of the old episodes that we could possibly reuse, whether there’s a character we might want to bring back. I think having one superfan is like having a hundred regular fans. He’s amazing and he totally carries the torch for ‘Fraggle’s’ past, present and future.”

Tartaglia, who grew up watching the original series, says he never thought his “nerd knowledge” would pay off in this way. “I was 7 years old and I was like, ‘That’s what I want to do. I want to work for Jim Henson. I want to be a puppeteer,’” he recalls. “‘Fraggle Rock’ has always, for me, been the gold standard of what family television should be.”

In the end, Gobo and the Fraggles realize that holidays (and songs) don’t have to be perfect and that, like a snowflake, every moment and every holiday is unique.

“The holidays don’t need to be what they were last year. And it doesn’t need to be what your neighbors do. It doesn’t need to be what your friends do,” says Cuthbertson. “It doesn’t need to involve a certain amount of money or a certain amount of consumerism. It really just has to be about a feeling, and that feeling is something that’s sort of ephemeral and improvised and beautiful and unique. And we love the idea of putting that all together in the sort of physical metaphor of the snowflake and letting it really speak for what the holidays could be.”