To promote awareness and entice viewership, Muppet moguls staged a "real-life" breakup of Kermit and Miss Piggy. It made headlines on such news outlets as CNN.
Jim Henson was the original puppeteer and voice of Kermit. After Jim's death in 1990, Steve Whitmire, who joined the Muppets back in 1978, accepted an offer from Jim's son Brian Henson, to take over as Kermit the Frog. Steve portrayed Kermit from 1990 until October 2016, when he was fired from the role by Disney, partly due to Whitmire having irked showrunners during production of this series, by providing detailed notes over what the Muppet characters would and would not do. Matt Vogel was then handed the role of Kermit after Whitmire's departure.
In episode twelve, "A Tale of Two Piggies," Miss Piggy suffers a wardrobe malfunction, which, Sam the Eagle tells Kermit, prompts the "One Million Angry Parents Association" to protest Up Late with Miss Piggy. This is a reference to the real-life protest staged against this show by the group One Million Moms, which deemed the series "unsuitable for family viewing" months before it even started airing.
Some viewers were shocked to hear Miss Piggy and Kermit the Frog broke up for the 2015 series, but older fans may not be surprised. On May 4, 1990, Jim Henson's last appearance was on The Arsenio Hall Show (1989) season two, episode one hundred forty-four, "Episode #2.144." When asked about Piggy, Jim puppeteered Kermit and had Kermit say that things between himself and Piggy were not going too well, and that her celebrity lifestyle was contributing to them drifting apart. Jim died afterwards on May 16, 1990. The new 2015 show opens by showing viewers Kermit had a last straw moment because of her celebrity lifestyle and Kermit broke up with her.
A ten minute "Muppets" mockumentary was shown at the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con. This mockumentary was the reason ABC ordered a full series.