Reading Digest: Ranking ToH Segments Edition

“What kind of show you got for us, Mr. Burns?” – Reporter
“Well, the ape’s going to stand around for three hours or so.  Then we’ll close with the ethnic comedy of Dugan and Dershowitz.” – C.M. Burns
“Sensational!” – Reporter

Happy Halloween, everybody!  This week we’ve got a bunch of Treehouse of Horror related links, include quite a few to people who decided to list individual segments.  As always, some are better than others and Zombie Simpsons only gets the occasional pity mention (if that).  In addition we’ve got some live sightings of Simpsons clothing, video game ideas, cool tattoos, and a new food blog.

Enjoy.

Patented Space-Age Out of This World Moon Waffles – Someone actually made them.  And it’s part of a new Simpsons food blog.  And that blog is called “Eats Like a Duck”.  Yes!

Along came these two cool dudes…. – Some truly excellent Simpsons tattoos, including donut-headed Homer, Kirk van Houten’s album, the Space Coyote, and Scrabble letters.

The Definitive List of the Best Simpsons Episodes Ever – This certainly isn’t definitive, but it’s a very good list and has lots of great YouTube.

Five Simpsons Games that Need to Get Made – The kart racing idea pops up from time to time, and done right it would be excellent and have tons of things that put the Luigi Stare to shame.

What Do You Think of the Simpsons World? – Let us hope that these things will be fixed:

Not all the features FXX promised are up and coming yet, the video playback is not quite as consistent as that of Netflix or HBOGo, and most importantly, the show isn’t screened in its original 4:3 ratio, cropping the older episodes and hurting many of the sight gags (fortunately, FXX has promised these problems will be resolved soon).

Have they actually said that they’re going to change the player to do 4:3?  I don’t think I’ve seen that anywhere, and they seem really wedded to everything being widescreen.

Simpsons World: Maybe Not The “Worst. App. Ever.” – One more very mixed review.

Does Anybody Want the Last Homer? – A clever cartoon, possibly from the Planet of the Donuts.

13 great Simpsons Treehouse Of Horror Halloween stories – The only thing from Zombie Simpsons is “Night of the Dolphin”, which I’ve always kinda liked, so hooray for this list.

The 9 Best Treehouse of Horror Segments According to Critics – Some schmuck from NPR picked a Zombie Simpsons segment, but other than that this one is great.

Top 5 Halloween TV Episodes – Wisely, the kids at the University of Arizona didn’t try to cram all the Treehouse of Horrors in, they just said watch ’em.

Spooky Wednesday List: Top 5 Halloween Specials – This one just recommends “Treehouse of Horror V”, but sagely points out that there are many more.

Big Ten Power Poll: The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror Edition – Two of these are from Zombie Simpsons, but it’s mostly very good.  (And, dear god, does Michigan need access to a time machine.)

The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe – It just wouldn’t be Halloween without Poe, James Earl Jones, and The Simpsons.

Subsequently Strange – A top five list of Treehouse segments, with nary a trace of Zombie Simpsons.  Bravo.

Where Have I Seen Dan Castellaneta? All His Non-Simpsons Acting. – Shame on you, Uproxx, you neglected to include his stint as the very Hibbert like “Dr. Stein” on Arrested Development.

All 25 ‘Treehouse Of Horror’ Episodes Of ‘The Simpsons,’ Ranked – Better, Uproxx, better.  Though why you ranked this year’s above “X” or “XI” is beyond me.

Halloween 2014: The best Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episodes to watch this Halloween – There’s one Zombie Simpsons episode in here for some reason, but other than that it’s solid.

Now that it’s happened how do we hide the fact that it’s happened? – Bad husbanding, here:

Apparently when your pregnant wife tells you to hold her drink while she goes to the toilet you’re supposed to drink it, not stand there like an idiot and return it in its undisturbed state. This happened to me more than once. I’m pretty sure that Jo viewed me like this scene from The Simpsons.

Heh.

New breed of dolphins venture on land in hunt for food – The dolphin apocalypse is still a long way off, but you can’t talk about them eating on land without mentioning that one segment from Season 12 (with .gif).

Today on the tray: Greasy foods – Apparently last Saturday was Greasy Foods Day.  Dr. Nick approves.

Enjoying a Beer With Irish Zombies on the Boardwalk: A Quick Recap of the Last Five Days – Now that’s truly scarifying:

I took a vacation day to await the arrival of my new pantry. David Henne told me that was the least manly reason to take a day off from work, but I think that’s hyperbole. Maybe it would’ve been more acceptable if I spent the day watching 10-15 episodes of The Simpsons, but the best my DVR had to offer was latter-day “Treehouse of Horror” episodes.

Classic Vintage “The Simpsons” Neck Tie – That’s actually a pretty good Simpsons tie, what with it having just the kids and an actual pattern on it.

It’s a Simpson’s Family Pizza Dinner – Lego Simpsons sitting down to eat.

Artist creates comic posters titled ‘Homerization’: Indianised version of Homer from Simpsons – And lots of them.

When Flanders Failed – Episode #038 – Ash is back on his game with a twofer this week.

Bart The Murderer – Episode #039 – Nobody ever said Homer was a good parent:

Two things I noticed during the scene with Bart’s room being stocked with cigarettes due to his boss’ warehouse being full:
1. How did that amount of cigarettes get into the house without anyone even noticing? That was until Homer walked by and
2. How does making Bart smoke every single cigarette teach him a lesson? What lesson was Homer trying to teach him here? How to smoke?

The life of a Writer … – Heh.

#TBT post – Simpson fashion in the wild at Universal Studios.

New trending GIF tagged tv television the simpsons… – Teacher.  Mother.  Secret Lover.

New trending GIF tagged cartoon loop the simpsons… – Homer, trying to see what Bart wrote on the back of his skull.

New trending GIF tagged the simpsons nicki minaj… – Skinner tying his shoe, and the Sir Mix-A-Lot subtitle is great.

Quote of the Day

“Well, Kang, it seems the Earthlings won.” – Kodos
“Did they?  That board with a nail in it may have defeated us, but the humans won’t stop there.  They’ll make bigger boards and bigger nails, soon they will make a board with a nail so big it will destroy them all!” – Kang

Book Review: The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets

“What’s your favorite subject?” – Dr. Hibbert
“Arithmetic.” – Lisa Simpson 
“Oh, arithmetic.  Now, before you know it, you will be back among your polygons, your hypotenuse, and your Euclidean algorithms.” – Dr. Hibbert 

As an academic subject, math has always stood at the extreme end, as the hardest of the “hard” sciences.  Even physics has uncertainty built right into it; math simply has things that have not yet been proven.  That’s all well and good for mathematicians when it comes to inter-disciplinary dick measuring contests, but it also makes math more abstract and difficult to explain to the uninitiated.  Worse still, that very “purity” makes math more resistant to analogy and simplification than any other field of study because the big things in math are irreducibly incomprehensible.

The physics of a black hole, the biochemistry of a chameleon, the geology of a volcano, years of study and graduate degrees lend the best possible understanding of them, but the basics can be grasped by anyone.  Textbooks, TV specials, and museum exhibits can contain simple diagrams and awe-inspiring pictures that make even hideously complicated events and processes seem kindergarten simple.  Math is too abstract for that kind of stuff.  You can come up with pretty visualizations of prime numbers, for example, but someone who doesn’t have a day-to-day familiarity with them or their underlying concepts isn’t going to understand it in the least.  Prime numbers can’t be analogized to anything else, nor can they be simplified (almost by definition), you simply have to use them a lot to really get them, and most people don’t.

That abstract unfamiliarity has always been the great bane of popular writing about math.  The most fundamental concepts exist only on sheets of paper or inside someone else’s mind, so all an expert writing for a lay audience can do is cite fun examples and hope that at least some of them click.  Wisely, Simon Singh’s The Simpsons And Their Mathematical Secrets follows exactly that template, and does so rather well.

The book isn’t a grand explanation of math or its history, it’s a collection of math concepts and back-stories that have surfaced in The Simpsons or Futurama over the years.  Singh naturally focuses on the many writers (of both shows) who have serious academic credentials, and we even get pictures of both Al Jean and Mike Reiss with their high school math clubs.

The best parts of the book are the ones that directly combine the shows and the numbers.  For example, in the chapter about pi, there’s a long discussion of Apu testifying against Marge in “Marge in Chains”.  When Apu says that he can recite pi to forty-thousand places, that was indeed the record for memorization of pi at the time.

Further, and I certainly didn’t know this, the 40,000th digit really is 1.  They literally sent away to a guy at NASA, who printed out the whole thing and mailed it to them.  (That, in turn, was referenced in “22 Short Films About Springfield”, when Moe sent away to NASA to calculate Barney’s bar tab.)  There’s a whole chapter about the various equations and numbers that pop up in the “Homer3” segment of “Treehouse of Horror VI”, and another dedicated to the smart kids in “Bart the Genius”.

Later in the book, Singh gets into Futurama and the many (many) math heavy jokes, references, and even entire plots they went through.  Like The Simpsons sections, some of these are dedicated to the general nerdery of the show, while others are about specific concepts and equations.  The best of them is about “The Prisoner of Benda”, the episode that famously led Ken Keeler to write a proof of the “brain switching” problem the writers created for themselves.  It’s a really clear explanation, and there’s even a picture of Keeler standing on the office couch, scribbling away on a white board.

Since the book is by necessity somewhat scattershot in the subjects it can broach, some parts are weaker than others.  In particular, one of the longest chapters in the book is little more than a rehash of Moneyball, (based on that crashingly dull Zombie Simpsons episode “MoneyBART“).  True, there’s math and the Simpsons here; but when the text gets to the 2002 Yankees buying up all the players, it’s wandered pretty far from the subject at hand.

Happily, though, most of the chapters are much shorter and on point.  The trickier concepts are explained cleanly, and illustrated where necessary or possible.  And Singh manages to walk the line of keeping the tone light while simultaneously keeping the math serious.  You can always tell someone is a real math and/or programming geek when they start things with 0 instead of 1, as confusing as that is to most people.  But while this book starts with “Chapter 0”, it also has an “Eπlogue”, and that balance is maintained throughout.

All in all, it’s a short and easy read that will either introduce (or refresh) a lot of mathematical ideas for casual readers.  And along the way you’ll even learn some Simpsons and Futurama trivia, what’s not to like?

Note: Thanks go to Diana Morgan at Ruth Killick Publicity for sending me a copy all the way from merry old England.

Quote of the Day

“Hello, once again.  As usual, I must warn you all that this year’s Halloween show is very, very scary.  And those of you with young children may want to send them off to bed- . . . Oh, my, it seems the show is so scary, that Congress won’t even let us show it.  Instead, they’ve suggested the 1947 classic Glen Ford movie, ‘200 Miles to Oregon’.” – Marge Simpson

Happy 20th Anniversary to “Treehouse of Horror V”! Original airdate: 30 October 1994.

Quote of the Day

“Homer, just give him the donut!  Once he has it, that will be the end of all this horror.” – Marge Simpson
“Well, okay.  If it’ll end horror. . . . Don’t you ever get tired of being wrong all the time?” – Homer Simpson
“Sometimes.” – Marge Simpson

Happy birthday Dan Castellaneta!  

Quote of the Day

“I’m sorry, Mr. Blackbeard.  We’re low on chairs, and this is the last one.” – Marge Simpson
“Arghh, this chair be high, says I!” – Blackbeard

Quote of the Day

“What are you spraying me with?” – Homer Simpson
“Rum!  So no one will believe your story.” – Kang

Quote of the Day

“Nice try, Floyd.  But you were designed for scrubbing and scrubbing is what you shall do.” – Professor Frink

Quote of the Day

“They are all against you, Bart.  You must kill them all.  They all must die.” – House
“Are you my conscience?” – Bart Simpson
“I-…yes, I am.” – House

Happy birthday Nancy Cartwright!

Reading Digest: Hopeless Lawsuit Edition

“I’m going to write a figure on this piece of paper.  It’s not quite as large as the last one, but I think you’ll find it fair.” – C.M. Burns
“I think we should take it.” – Lionel Hutz

There were two big Simpsons news stories this week.  First, the “Simpsons World” app/website finally launched.  I took a quick look, but it spent lots of time buffering and seemed to be struggling under launch-day loads, so I’ll come back to that next week.  (We do have quite a few links about it, however.)  The second was that an actor who played a minor character in Goodfellas is suing the show for [Dr. Evil pinky] two-hundred-and-fifty-million-dollars [/Dr. Evil pinky] because Legs looks like him.  It doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell, and even if they someone convince FOX to pay them (which would be very un-FOX like), it’ll be a teeny tiny fraction of that.  Yet for some reason this hopelessly longshot lawsuit got tons of press.  It was linked all over the place, with plenty of them just mindlessly repeating the big scary number.  We’ve got a link, but there’s basically nothing to it.

More importantly, Halloween is next week, and the annual crush of costumes (and tattoos!) has begun.  There are some really good ones in our first link, and there’s more where that came from.  And, of course, there’s lots of other random items as well: the Homer computer doll with infrared eyes, Harry Shearer just being himself, Jean dutifully slogging through another interview, a decidedly unlicensed music video, and much more.

Enjoy.

Classic Simpsons Trivia Chicago Costume Contest 2014 – I put this up on Twitter, but it’s really worth a look.  I can see why the Clown Bed won, but Dr. Hillbilly and the Iron Yuppie should’ve at least gotten some kind of couples or group costume award.  Ashley Grant and the Luann in her jacuzzi suit are also pretty damned awesome.

Never miss an episode with smart Homer Simpson – This is awesome.  Someone took a Homer doll, slapped some electronics into it, and now it automatically turns on the doll’s eyes whenever the show is on.  Bravo, tech geeks.  Bravo.

5-sentence review of ‘The Simpsons: Treehouse of Horror XXV’ – Heh:

The appearance of the Simpsons characters as the originally appeared in animated shorts on “The Tracey Ullman Show” is proof that even “The Simpsons” is nostalgic for the pre-dull “The Simpsons.”

Good one.

The Simpsons in Retrospect – A thorough breakdown of the decline of the show that includes a chart of the ever declining popular opinion of the show.

How Harry Shearer Discovered the Soul of Richard Nixon – There’s a little bit of Simpsons stuff in here, Shearer calls Burns more purely evil than Nixon, but this is my favorite part:

MJ: Is there any other president you’d like to play?
HS: Well, I’ve, on my radio show I’ve played every one since—
MJ: How’s your Garfield?
HS: Poor. But who’s to know?

Ha!  Shearer is the best.

Counting Down To Halloween With The Simpsons #1 – These are a series of posts about just what makes the Treehouse of Horror episodes so great.

Counting Down To Halloween With The Simpsons #2 – This one’s about Marge’s warnings before the first ones.  It’s good to remember this:

What few people realize however is that in the very first Treehouse of Horror this warning was not a gag or gimmick as it became later but was meant to be taken seriously. In 2014 The Simpsons have pretty much become part of the furniture in western society so its easy to forget that when it first aired in 1989 it was a highly controversial show.

I’d say it’s still a gag, even if, yes, it was meant to actually deflect anger.  But that speaks to the brilliance of the show: they knew they were going to piss people off, so why not pre-ignore them as well?

Counting Down To Halloween With The Simpsons #3 – Amusing tombstones.

Counting Down To Halloween With The Simpsons #4 – Scary credits.

DisfiguredStick – Milhouse – That is a great Milhouse costume, and the backpack is a nice touch.

It’s Never Too Late to be Marge Simpson – Husband and wife go as Homer and Marge.  Great wig.

Essential Halloween Viewing – “Treehouse of Horror V” makes the list here, along with several other old cartoon specials.  I actually remember that episode of Ghostbusters.

Top 10 TV Halloween Specials – V and VI make this list.

Goodfellas Actor’s $250 Million Lawsuit Against The Simpsons – This looks like a hopeless attempt to squeeze some money from FOX.  The headline number is just there for press attention, which it got a ton of.  (Thanks to Rob K. for sending it in.)

Poochie? That you? – An ad for hot dogs with a serious Poochie look alike.  Nice find.

Do You Even Stretch Bro? Stretching and the gym. – Exercise advice for when you go to the all night gym.

Top Man Simpsons Prints – High fashion Simpsons stuff is no longer just for the ladies.

On this day in history… – Celebrating the anniversary of “Rosebud”.  Go to hell, you old bastard.

Things Get Violently “Simpsons”-Like In Girl Talk’s New Video – Indeed they do:

“Suicide (Remix)” is the latest video to come from the collaboration between mash-up artist-turned-beatmaker Girl Talk and journeyman rapper Freeway. In it, artist Lisa Ramsey unleashes a violent stream of animated mayhem that was clearly, ahem, inspired by The Simpsons. The colorful pastiche puts shotgun-toting Bart Simpson and Milhouse van Houten on skateboards–and the skateboards themselves are about as far as the faithfulness goes. By the time a fully grown and blessed out Lisa makes the scene, sway-dancing while puffing on a joint–it’s clear that we’re worlds away from Springfield. Still, it’s mandatory viewing for anyone who has ever wanted to see the sailboat painting from the Simpsons’ living room attain sentence and spit bars.

Don’t forget the daggers that come out of Krusty’s eyes.  Video at the link.

How Do I Get The Simpsons World FXX App? Everything You Need To Know. – I’d quibble with “Everything”, there, but the main outline seems solid.

Simpsons World: A Streaming Archive of American History – A hands on look at the site.

‘Simpsons’ go streaming: Al Jean talks new site – Jean doing a publicity interview.  No real news, but he was talking to CNN, so that goes almost without saying.

How ‘Simpsons World’ Went from Deal Point to Immersive App Via FX Networks – Apparently Brooks insisted that if they were going to sell streaming rights, the streaming had to be something special.  Of course, this is Variety and it uses phrases like this, “The app…allows lean-in users to customize their searches”, so take it with ten thousand grains of salt.  (I’m not sure what marketing dictionary “lean-in users” came from, but please put it to the torch immediately.  Thank you.)

Catching Up With The First Family Of TV – This is a nice writeup of how one guy came back to the show through the marathon.  It’s also yet another example of how gun shy people are about bringing up Zombie Simpsons.  Every example he cites is from early in the show, and there’s even this:

Every episode ever. Whatever you want to watch. Not sure if your in the mood for season 3 or 17? Hit random and maybe you’ll get something nice from season 6.

Season 17 is a wasteland, Seasons 3 and 6 are not, but to say so explicitly is to invite trouble when all you want to do is relax and laugh.  I get it.  I just wish it wasn’t so prevalent.

Embiggened: Here’s a Look at “Simpsons World” From A-Z (GQ) – An alphabetical list of stuff on the site, like the above link, mentions only stuff from non-Zombie Simpsons seasons.

Some Changes Need to be Made to Simpsons World – Seems like they’ve still got some kinks to iron out:

However, there is one change that needs to be made and it needs to be made immediately.
The placement of commercials is goofy. Last night while watching “A Star is Burns” I was awaiting my favorite quote from the episode when Hans Moleman says “I was saying boo-urns.” I love that quote and say it all the time.
What I got was Moleman saying “I was saying boo” cut to a commercial “oo-urns”.
Now while watching “You only move twice” I was greeted with a commercial, in the middle of the opening title sequence.
During “Lard of the Dance” I saw a commercial in the middle of a sceen.

Get your spook on: Hallowe’en flash sheets in Brighton and beyond – Some cool Simpsons Halloween themed tattoo designs.

Tattoo Artist Turns Bart Simpson Into Horror Icons! – These are from a different source, and they’re all Bart.  Candyman and Beetlejuice are pretty cool.  More at his website.

Stark Raving Dad Episode #036 – Ash starts in on Season 3.

The 10 Greatest Simpsons Horror Movie Parodies – There’s one from Zombie Simpsons at #10, almost out of pity.

When you get the last slice, you be all like… – Animated .gif of Bart laughing after Homer brings him pizza in “Itchy & Scratchy: The Movie”.

New trending GIF tagged tv the simpsons eating… – Homer snacking while watching football.

New trending GIF tagged horror cartoon simpsons marge… – Marge’s hair exploding into bats.

The Simpsons has now officially been bad for longer than it was ever good – And finally (via @dailysimpsons), I get to not only end with someone who agrees with us, but it’s even in a real publication:

The first segment took the Simpson family to Hell: a city, it seems, very much like Springfield. It was amusing to begin with, but soon pointlessly repeated itself. The last segment had the family confronted by doubles of themselves: a comment, I think, on the endless proliferation of Simpson images and on the repetition compulsion referenced above. The middle segment — well, I can’t tell you about the middle segment because I’ve forgotten it already. Honestly.

[…]

The Simpsons has now been bad for longer than it was good, but when it was good it was great. Television has never provided as many inspired jokes per minute, sometimes per second, as The Simpsons did; has never been as consistently, ruthlessly, creatively
irreverent as The Simpsons was. It taught a generation to revere wit and to distrust authority, two hugely important achievements. Now the irreverence has shrunk to mere random rudeness, and the jokes are flabby and far between. Everything’s gone slack.

Testify!

Quote of the Day

“It’s probably nothing, but we just wanted to be sure.” – Marge Simpson
“Ahh!” – Dr. Hibbert
“Is there anything you can prescribe, doctor?” – Homer Simpson
“Fire.  And lots of it.” – Dr. Hibbert
“Oh, that’s your cure for everything.” – Marge Simpson

Compare & Contrast: Treehouses of Horror Ending in “V”

“This sandwich tastes so young and impudent.  Seymour, what’s with the good grub?” – Mrs. Krabappel
“Well, perhaps I ought to let you folks in on a secret.  Do you remember me telling Jimbo Jones that I’d make something of him one day?” – Principal Skinner
“Are you saying you killed Jimbo, processed his carcass, and served him for lunch? . . . Ha!” – Mrs. Krabappel

This year’s Halloween special had three segments: one about a hellish version of Springfield Elementary, one about a Kubrick movie, and one about the Simpson family co-existing with different versions of itself.  Twenty years ago, the Halloween special also had three segments, one a Kubrick movie parody, one about Homer traveling between different versions of his family, and one about a hellish version of Springfield Elementary.  Except for the order, they match up perfectly.  Since The Simpsons always takes precedence over Zombie Simpsons, we’re going to follow the order from “Treehouse of Horror V”.

“The Shinning” vs. “A Clockwork Yellow”

Like most big name directors, Stanley Kubrick made some great movies and some crappy movies.  From a parody and satire point of view, however, what made his films great was the sheer number of iconic and memorable characters, images, and lines.  Whether it’s the Monolith, Jack Nicholson hacking his way through a door, or Malcolm McDowell and his gang strutting down the street in suspenders, bowler hats, and cod pieces, Kubrick movies are full of moments that stick in the audience’s mind, which makes them perfect for comedy.

The Simpsons exploited that all the time.  There’s Homer at the “Dawn of Man” in Lisa’s Pony; there’s Bart reaching for the cupcakes in “Duffless”, there’s Frink with the Strangelove glasses in “Homer Defined”.  “Sideshow Bob’s Last Gleaming” not only features R. Lee Ermey from Full Metal Jacket, but even has a complete war room from Dr. Strangelove.  None of those defined an entire episode, they were just quick little things put in there for fans who cared to notice them.

“The Shinning”, the first segment from “Treehouse of Horror V”, was different in that it retold an entire movie.  All the major plot points and characters from the 144 minute film are condensed into just seven minutes of screentime.  All by itself that’s damned impressive, but what turns it into a Simpsons masterpiece is the way that each thing they reproduce is recognizable as the original yet still creative and funny in its own way.  The blood spilling out of the elevator isn’t a moment of gore soaked terror, it’s a ho-hum hotel regularity, no more interesting than fresh towels or the luggage carts in lobby.  It just usually gets off at the second floor.

The hedge maze, the ghostly bartender, Homer getting locked in the fridge, the typewriter being a window into madness, even Bart’s titular “shinning” and Willie’s failed rescue attempt, these are all recognizable to anyone who has seen the film and each is given its little twist.  But, and this is crucial, no one needs to have seen the movie to get any of them.  It helps, sure, but you don’t need it.  Homer declining his Nicholson destiny (“Can’t murder now, eating”) is funny all on its own.  The references to the film augment the story and the jokes, not the other way around.

The same cannot be said for “A Clockwork Yellow”, which reads like mismatched excerpts from a Kubrick film guide.  This is plenty apparent right at the beginning, where pretty much everything is a weird and senseless reenactment of A Clockwork Orange.  Moe has a gang just like Malcolm McDowell did.  But where McDowell’s gang turns on him for being a crappy leader; Moe’s gang turns on him just because that’s what’s supposed to happen.  Not only is it reductive rather than creative, but weak references are left to stand alone.

Remember this part of that one movie?  Yeah.  Cool.  Well, good talk.

Consider what is maybe the most famous scene from A Clockwork Orange: McDowell with his eyes propped open, forced to watch terrible things so that he won’t ever do them again.  In “A Clockwork Yellow”, Moe wears a similar contraption, but he’s doing it for no discernible reason:

Moe: These eye clamps are the only way I can tolerate today’s TV.
Announcer: Tonight on FOX!
Moe: Ahh, turn it off, I’ll be good.  I’ll be good!

If there is a joke in the final line (debatable), its premise is completely negated by the first.  If he’s wearing it voluntarily, it makes no sense for him to beg to have the TV turned off.  The sad reality is that he’s only wearing them because you can’t use A Clockwork Orange as your source material without someone getting their eyes propped open; setups, punchlines, and common sense be damned.

See, Zombie Simpsons?  It’s not hard to work this in and have it make sense.  It’s really not.

This complete dependency on making references is shaky enough early on, but the segment collapses completely at the end when the show just blows through references as fast as it can.  There’s the guy from Full Metal Jacket, there’s a thing that – again for no discernible reason – looks briefly like the Monolith, there’s some dudes dressed like they’re in Barry Lyndon, there’s a bunch of naked people like in Eyes Wide Shut.  And that’s it.  There’s no coherence, no jokes, no indication whatsoever that the writers have taken something, parodied it, and made it their own.  They’re just showing you stuff you’re supposed to recognize.  It’s less a television segment than it is a police lineup.

“Time and Punishment”  vs. “The Others”

Despite the fact that one of these is about time travel and the other is about ghosts, the basic concepts here are very similar.  In each case, we see different versions of the Simpson family.  Like the Kubrick mess, however, the transparent thinness of Zombie Simpsons is immediately apparent.

In “The Others”, the old ghost-Simpsons just stand around and don’t really do anything.  Ghost-Marge gets the hots for Homer, and they spend basically the entire segment stretching that piece of nothing far past its breaking point.  Ghost-Homer eventually gets around to killing regular Homer, but not until after he’s stood around and not done anything for a good long time.  Once Homer is dead, ghost-Homer goes back to not doing anything.

Their habit of having most of the family just sort of stand there (ghost-Lisa literally doesn’t get even a single line) carries all the way through to the end when, in a desperate bid for internet attention (and how sad is that?), they create more versions of the family to stand there.  For starters, this has nothing to do with the rest of the segment we just saw.  The house was haunted, so older versions of the family appeared.  Now a bunch of randoms show up because . . . well, just because, that’s why.  If this was funny or joke filled, that’d be one thing, but it’s just more unsupported references.

They can’t stand this any longer.  Somebody please pay attention to them!  

“Time and Punishment” takes the idea of multiple different versions of the Simpsons seriously.  We see them not only as rich and perfect (in a world Homer doesn’t know rains donuts), we see them as obedient to Flanders (the unquestioned lord and master of the world), we see them as giants and with lizard tongues.  Each incarnation is very brief (much shorter than the “The Others”), yet the whole family is given things to do, lines to say (even Maggie!), and we get a glimpse of each world Homer visits in just a few seconds.

There aren’t any orphaned references, either.  When the episode runs through all those versions of the Simpson home, including underwater, the Flintstone’s house, Sphinx-Bart, and a fairy tale inspired giant shoe, not only is it lightning fast, but it fits with what Homer’s doing.  Because the writers bothered to show us several fleshed out parallel worlds already, the quick references to others add to that instead of being something tacked on to fill screen time (like a bunch of other Simpson families standing on the lawn for no reason).

“Nightmare Cafeteria” vs. “School Is Hell”

The main axiom of Springfield Elementary on The Simpsons is that it’s a waste of time and nobody wants to be there.  The students don’t learn much (even the likes of Martin and Lisa learn and excel more out of the classroom than in) and the teachers don’t care, but everyone has to show up, so they do.  In its own way, it’s already a kind of hell, so making it somehow worse for Halloween takes some imagination.

“Nightmare Cafeteria” pulled it off by taking the grim realities of normal episode Springfield Elementary and taking them to insanely logical Halloween episode extremes.  It’s one of the only Treehouse of Horror segments that doesn’t involve anything supernatural and that’s part of what makes it so great.  The faculty crosses over from merely being apathetic and passively hostile towards the students into murderous cannibalism . . . but they do so because of budget cuts.  Authority figures devouring children because they couldn’t make decent sloppy joes any other way, it’s hard to think of a more Simpsons concept than that.

Sloppy Jimobs are pretty damned horrifying.

By contrast, Zombie Simpsons not only doesn’t do that, they actually make Springfield Elementary nicer and more pleasant than it normally is.  I’m going to repeat that because it is an unusually clear example of just how witless and unmoored this show is.  They made the school in Hell more fun and enjoyable than the one on Earth.

As with so many Zombie Simpson ideas, it could’ve actually been interesting if it wasn’t done in the shallowest imaginable way.  But they didn’t go for “Earth is Hell” style irony, or even a particularly inventive version of Hell.  They just recreated Springfield Elementary with funkier looking students and flames outside the windows.  Even the Skinner-Chalmers monster is less evil than the two of them usually are.  Can you imagine the real Chalmers saying this?:

Hell Chalmers: As educators, our job is to gently nurture your child’s passion.

It’s sincere, it’s genuine, and it means he actually cares about Bart!  It’s antithetical to everything Chalmers is and does.  Again, had they made that sort of the point (Hell Chalmers is a better educator than real Chalmers), it could’ve worked, but two layer thinking is way too deep for Zombie Simpsons.  Instead, we get a montage before Homer shows up to be tortured for some reason.  There are a couple of chuckles in there (Yankees class, for example), which makes it the strongest segment of an anemically weak episode, but even in Hell the bright and sunny attitude of Zombie Simpsons makes everything simple, shallow, and harmless.

Halloween will always be better served by the Skinner who condemns a kid to suffocation for a paper airplane (even before he starts eating them) than by one who wants Bart to achieve his full potential.  The same goes for Simpson family members who are twisted and weird rather than still and silent.  Ditto thoughtlessly repetitive Kubrick references vis-a-vis full blooded (and full bodied) satire.

Twenty years on, there are reasons “Treehouse of Horror V” often tops Halloween lists.  “Treehouse of Horror XXV” will be lucky to even be remembered.

Quote of the Day

“Oh, Homer, you’re not going as a hobo again?” – Marge Simpson
“Going where?” – Homer Simpson

Quote of the Day

“What he’s typed will be a window into his madness. . . . ‘Feelin’ Fine.’, well, that’s a relief. . . . ooh, this is less encouraging.” – Marge Simpson

Quote of the Day

“Simpson, look what you’ve reduced me to.” – C.M. Burns
“Please!  Please!” – Mr. Smithers

Behind Us Forever: Treehouse of Horror XXV

“Stupid party, wish we was trick or treatin’.” – Bart Simpson

The annual Halloween episode tends to be pretty bland in the hands of Zombie Simpsons, and this year was no different.  The first story was about Bart going to school in Hell, where he does better than he used to do at Springfield Elementary.  The second is a bunch of meandering references to Stanley Kubrick movies that ends with Kubrick himself staring right at the camera for some reason.  The third one involved the old Tracey Ullman versions of the characters being ghosts.

– Give them this, if they’re going to sneak in Kang and Kodos for no reason, at least this opening didn’t take too long.

– Oof, this thing about “penal”, “penile” and “penis” was probably funnier when it was doodled on an actual fourth grader’s notebook.

– Hey, now Lisa’s here.

– The Hell chalkboard punishment “Eternal Torment Is The Only Just Punishment for the Unbaptized” is pretty good . . . and they didn’t even read it off to us!  Happy Halloween!

– But it didn’t last long.  Lisa just explained to us that snow is cold.

– Then Bart told us how he’s feeling about his teacher.

– The “Burns Hellport” wasn’t terrible.

– Guh, even in Halloween episodes though, we’re reminded of how cushy and comfortable the writers have gotten.  Homer just went on a rant about private schools sending parents twenty e-mails a day.  I bet they also hate it when your worthless butler washes your sock garters but they’re still covered with schmutz.

– And now Hell-Chalmers is expositing pointlessly.

– The montage didn’t even take too long.

– So, this thing with Bart torturing Homer was supposed to be some kind of ending?  Even here they need exposition:

Bart: That’s my Dad, I can’t hurt him.
Homer: No, boy, I want you to do it.
Bart:  What, why?
Homer: Bart, you went to Hell and came back a winner, like Jesus.

Tedious crap like this is why even when they do manage some decent jokes, these segments will always be bland and unmemorable.  “Hell School” is a decent enough little concept, but they can’t give it a coherent plot or not spend time explaining the jokes even in just seven minutes of runtime.

– For a show that got a little pious over Family Guy‘s rape joke, this “In-out” thing sure goes on a long time.

– Moe’s cutesy narrator language is already grating:

“Everything was all fish and chippie until Dum collected himself a twiggy-wick”

– The montage in the first segment didn’t take too long.  This one . . . not so much.  Homer just bounces around his room for a while.

– And we’re back to explaining things.  Homer’s going to marry Marge, then Moe asks a rhetorical question/joke setup, then Marge explains things.

– I get that this segment is just a scattershot of Kubrick references, but it kinda undercuts the joke of Moe being forced to watch FOX when he pleads to have it turned off, and then immediately takes the Clockwork Orange helmet off without a problem.

– Now Nelson, Jimbo, Kearney and Dolph are beating Moe up.  Nelson was already in the house, thus making Moe talking to Kearney at the door pointless.  Is five consecutive seconds of narrative coherence really too much to ask?

– Speaking of sloppy writing, despite the fact that we saw a title card called “Years Later”, Homer just said it’s been a few months.  If that’s a joke, I sure don’t get it.

– And on the topic of narrative incoherence, Moe reacts to his beating by trying to get his old gang back together.  I assumed it was to get revenge, but we never see the bullies again.  Instead we’re off to an incoherent mash up of various Kubrick references.

– Topped off by more expository narration from Moe, and Kubrick himself getting hit on the head with a pen.  This one seems to have just petered out rather than ended, but maybe that’s for the best.

– Onto segment three, where the TV is apparently only playing Married With Children.  I get that’s a show from forever ago, but it might’ve helped for there to be more to it than that.

– Homer and Marge are in bed, then Marge leaves because Grampa was there too, then . . . you know what?  Screw it.  Basically nothing happens and what little does happen is explained to us.

– Lisa just called ghost-Bart burping “unmotivated”.  Maybe they do know what motivation is.  That’s the only evidence from the last five years or so, but still.

– Also, it’s nice that they’re trying to do the old style voices, but twenty-five years has made that impossible.

– Speaking of “unmotivated”, what’s with ghost-Marge and regular-Homer falling in love?  Ghost-Homer just kinda stands there.

– And now Marge killed herself.  Uh, okay.

– Good question from new-ghost-Marge, “Won’t the other Homer be a problem?”.  That little reminder slightly preceded Homer getting killed by ghost-Homer.

– And now Lisa and Bart are dead too because . . . I really don’t know.  I guess they all want to be ghosts for some reason?

– Dr. Marvin Monroe is now also back as a ghost.  His butt gets stuck in the wall.  (Comedy!)

– “Let’s not fight anymore, let’s make him decide between us!” – Not only are they telling us what’s happening, they’ve once again forgotten the older Homer.  Then both Marges explain themselves, because ghosts explaining themselves is a significant fraction of the dialogue here.

– Now both Marges are hugging their respective Homers.

– And we end on many different Simpsons versions.

I expect basically nothing from this show, so it’s hard to call myself disappointed in any of this, but that final segment is still kinda disappointing.  It’s a neat idea to bring back the original character models and you could probably have some fun with the old and new versions interacting or going at cross purposes, especially in a Halloween episode where you’ve got basically no rules.  Instead, Homer and ghost-Marge have a weird non-romance and most of the segment is people killing (themselves or others) and explaining how they feel.  What a waste.

Anyway, the ratings are in and it remains good to be behind football.  Last night’s dutiful episode reminded 7.64 million viewers that this show used to do much better Halloween specials.  As with previous weeks, that’s good for this year and very bad historically.

Quote of the Day

“My baloney has a first name, it’s H-O-M-E-R.  My baloney has a second name it’s H-O-M-E-R….Ahhh!” – Homer Simpson

Sunday Preview: Treehouse of Horror XXV

On the annual spooktacular Halloween special, Bart and Lisa are transported to a demon-filled alternate universe after Bart reads a set of Aramaic symbols he finds on the underside of his desk; Moe’s “Clockwork Orange”-style gang is disrupted when Dum (Homer) falls for a girl (Marge) who wants him to give up the thug life; and, in an homage to “The Others,” the Simpsons are visited by their former Tracey Ullman-era versions of themselves

Happy almost-Halloween everyone, it’s time for the annual installment of THOH.  This is the 25th such episode, which I guess could be celebrated as some sort of milestone, if one wished to do so.  I’m not going to, but I am a bit of a jerk.

 

Quote of the Day

“And so, just as things looked their worst…” – Marge Simpson
“I realized I could make money selling my medication to Deadheads.” – Abe “Grampa” Simpson
“Grampa, what are you talking about?” – Marge Simpson
“Uh, nothing.” – Abe “Grampa” Simpson

Quote of the Day

“A lot of you would think I was crazy if I did this.” – Homer Simpson
“He’s crazy!” – C.M. Burns