Quote of the Day

“Oh, there’s so little left . . . creamed eels, corn nog, . . . wadded beef?” – Marge Simpson

Quote of the Day

“Floor feels a little gritty here.” – Ned Flanders
“Yeah, we ran out of floorboards there so we painted the dirt. Pretty clever!” – Moe

Quote of the Day

“We got new clothes from the donation bin. I’m a surfer!” – Todd Flanders
“Look, Daddy, Todd is stupid and I’m with him. And now Mommy’s stupid.” – Rod Flanders

Quote of the Day

“Dear God, this is Marge Simpson. If you stop this hurricane and save our family, we will be forever grateful and recommend you to all our friends. So if you could find it in your infinite wisdom to-” – Marge Simpson
“Wait! Listen everybody . . . the hurricane’s over.” – Lisa Simpson
“He fell for it! Way to go, Marge!” – Homer Simpson

Quote of the Day

“Oh, it’ll be fun! We’re gonna go through our old cancelled checks and receipts and give ourselves an audit, make sure we don’t owe anything extra.” – Ned Flanders
“Oh, I’m sure I’d be a third wheel.” – Homer Simpson
“Oh-no, siree, we’d be happy as hens to have-” – Ned Flanders
“I would make it my business to be a third wheel.” – Homer Simpson

Quote of the Day

“Reverend Lovejoy, with all that’s happened to us today, I kinda feel like Job.” – Ned Flanders
“Well, aren’t you being a tad melodramatic, Ned? Also, I believe Job was right handed.” – Reverend Lovejoy

Quote of the Day

“Ooh, I better go take down the Manger scene. If Baby Jesus got loose, he could really do some damage.” – Ned Flanders

Quote of the Day

“Hope you like it, neighbor! We didn’t have the best tools or all the know how, but we did have a wheelbarrow full of love.” – Homer Simpson
“And a cement mixer full of hope and some cement.” – Apu Nahasapeemapetilon

Quote of the Day

“Was that toilet always next to the refrigerator?” – Ned Flanders
“Ah, Ned, you ever try lugging a toilet up a flight of stairs.” – Chief Wiggum

Quote of the Day

“Meantime, Springfield bowlers will be happy to hear that the Bowlarama is back in business at its new location: teetering over the Carter-Dixon tunnel.” – Kent Brockman

Quote of the Day

“Oh, Neddy, it was terrifying.  I thought I was headed for the eternal bliss of paradise.” – Maude Flanders

Quote of the Day

“Stand behind the flaming garbage cans!  We’ll be letting you into the store seventy people at a time.” – Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
“Let’s just beat him up and take his stuff!” – Kirk van Houten
“No, no, no, do not listen to that man.  Remain calm.  You will all have a chance to be gouged.” – Apu Nahasapeemapetilon

Quote of the Day

“Hey!  Hey!  Get down from that bookshelf, please.  Most of those books haven’t been discredited yet.” – Dr. Foster

Quote of the Day

“And the weather service has warned us to brace ourselves for the onslaught of Hurricane Barbara.  And if you think naming a destructive storm after a woman is sexist, you obviously have never seen the gals grabbing for items at a clearance sale.” – Kent Brockman
“It’s true, but he shouldn’t say it.” – Marge Simpson

Quote of the Day

“I think a hurricane is coming!” – Lisa Simpson
“Oh, Lisa, there’s no record of a hurricane ever hitting Springfield.” – Homer Simpson
“Yes, but the records only go back to 1978 when the hall of records was mysteriously blown away.” – Lisa Simpson

Quote of the Day

“Okay, it’s the standard Grampa drill.  Everybody into the cellar.” – Homer Simpson

Response to Denise du Vernay

“We need someone so irritating that Ned simply will not be able to repress his rage.  Homer, can you be that annoying?” – Dr. Foster

Over New Year’s, our old friend Denise du Vernay wrote a blog post about resolutions she’d like to see other people adopt here in 2012.  The fourth item on her list was this:

4. Stop saying The Simpsons should be canceled, that it used to be better, or whatever mean thing you say about it. This one is going to be contentious, but hear me out.

First things first, Denise loves the show, knows all about it, and has written a ton on the subject, so she’s someone whose opinions are to be respected and who deserves to have her statements taken seriously.  Obviously I don’t agree with that particular resolution, but she makes a number of points that crop up routinely, both around here and in other Simpsons parts of the internet, so I’m going to go through the whole thing.  Let’s hear her out:

First off, I don’t go around saying that I think your favorite show should be canceled. It’s mean-spirited and moot. If I don’t like something, I mostly just turn the channel or leave the room. Its existence doesn’t bother me because no one is making me watch said shows just like no one is making you watch The Simpsons.

I know that no one is making me watch it, and believe me when I say that for a long time I did exactly that.  Between late 2002 and early 2009 (Seasons 14-20, roughly) I don’t think I watched a single new episode from start to finish.  I assumed that the show would simply wither and fall off the schedule at some point.  But it didn’t.  It just kept on going, all the while making the great years of The Simpsons harder and harder to find in syndication and tarnishing the original show’s reputation among fans new and old.

That’s what makes Zombie Simpsons different than any other show on television, and it’s why telling critics of Zombie Simpsons to simply not watch it is a hollow argument.  Five years from now, no one is going to care about the Real Housewives of Wherever, Jersey Shore, Work It or any other wretched, forgettable crappy television shows.  But five years from now people are still going to be talking about The Simpsons, and drawing a clear and bright a line between the good years and the bad years is the only way to offset the pop culture cost Zombie Simpsons imposes on my favorite television show. 

Also, some of my friends work on The Simpsons, so when you say that, it’s actually hurtful to me because you’re saying that people I care about should lose their jobs.

If I had the power to cancel the show and I cancelled it, you’d have every right to be angry with me for hurting people you care about.  But I don’t have that power, and neither does anyone else who complains about the modern iteration of the show.  If fan criticism was going to end this thing, it would’ve happened by now.

Next, TV, like all art, is subjective. I have no interest in Harry Potter, but I totally get that the books and movies are terrific. I have a hard time with the violence in Tarantino films so I avoid them (except Pulp Fiction, of course), but I know he is phenomenal. Archer does nothing for me. Nothing. I thought Inception completely sucked. Now, I am positive that these are all my issue, my shortcoming. Thus, I don’t insult others who like these things.

To take the last part first, I don’t insult people who like Zombie Simpsons.  Oh sure, I’ll tease them every once and a while, but I’ve never said that someone’s opinions aren’t valid or that they aren’t entitled to like Zombie Simpsons.  I don’t think I’ve ever written that someone is stupid for liking it, and the simple reason for that is that I am keenly aware of all the low brow pop culture that I enjoy.  I am in no way shape or form an arbiter of good taste, and I don’t claim to be. 

For the first part, opinions on Tarantino, Harry Potter and Inception are irrelevant for the same reason as the “don’t watch it” argument.  But as a thought experiment, what would happen if J.K. Rowling lost control of Harry Potter tomorrow and some publisher started pumping out crappy books by hacks to cash in?  Wouldn’t long time Potter fans be completely justified in criticizing those books as long and loud as they pleased? 

Are many of my favorite Simpsons episodes from the ’90s? Why, sure. But many of them are more recent, too. And how do I know that my affection for certain episodes isn’t because of the emotions, memories, and events surrounding them? I won’t know until I’m gray and post-menopausal.

I’m glad you like them, happy for you even.  Everyone’s entitled to enjoy what they enjoy, and in a world where there’s often more pain and aggravation than there is relaxation and pleasure, I say take whatever joy you can.  But if you can only enjoy things that no one else has ever disliked, then your list of awesome stuff is going to be awfully short.  I guarantee you that every album, movie and show you love has a review on the internet by someone that hated the fuck out of it.  That doesn’t mean you ought to let it bother you.  Your reasons for liking or disliking things are your own, as are mine. 

Finally, when you say mean things about The Simpsons, I know you’re full of crap. How do I know? Well, because if you’re not watching the show, then you don’t know how good it is and therefore, you’re full of crap and should be quiet. If you are watching it, you’re enjoying it (why else would you watch it?) and therefore, you are simply saying you don’t like it to sound cool, which also makes you full of crap.

I would submit pretty much the entire content of this blog as a refutation of that.  We do watch it, and we do come up with a lot of well documented reasons why it simply isn’t as good as the old ones.  Again, these are all opinions and you are free to disagree with them, but if there is one thing we cannot be accused of, it is being uninformed about the current state of the show.

It became cool for people to say they didn’t like The Simpsons sometime around 1994 because when something becomes widely popular, some early fans reject it. Happens all the time. It happened with the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Swatches, tapas, Juno, and it might even happen to you.

This is an argument I’ve never understood.  The only people saying that they didn’t like The Simpsons in 1994 were the deepest of computer nerds.  And if we define “cool” as a few people taking a fashionable point of view before it becomes uncool when too many people jump on the bandwagon (e.g. Swatches), then disliking the current state of the show has crossed that boundary and gone back again several times.

More importantly, the popular opinion on the quality of The Simpsons relative to Zombie Simpsons isn’t very fluid.  There’s a general and long established consensus that the show fell apart, and pretty much everyone will give you the same approximate timeframe for when it happened.  There’s even charts and numbers to back this up.  If being “cool” were a major influence on people’s opinions, I’d expect to see some swing in those numbers, some change in the overall tenor of conversation about the show over the last decade.  But we could’ve started this site five or even ten years ago and we wouldn’t be writing things all that different than we’re writing about now.

I know there are a lot of people that like Zombie Simpsons, and I don’t begrudge them that.  But there are real differences, quantifiable and identifiable, between The Simpsons and Zombie Simpsons; and I, for one, am not going to stop pointing them out.  You are welcome to disagree or simply ignore me; but if my criticisms affect your enjoyment of the show, that’s on you, not me. 

All that said, let me heartily endorse her fifth point:

5. Get off your phone when you’re doing something else. No matter how good you think you are, you actually suck as a driver when you’re on the phone.

Quote of the Day

“I’m sure your insurance will cover the house.” – Marge Simpson
“Uh, well, no.  Neddy doesn’t believe in insurance.  He considers it a form of gambling.” – Maude Flanders

Crazy Noises: Angry Dad: The Movie

“Yes, Mr. Sherman, everything stinks.” – Calmwood Mental Hospital Doctor

In our ongoing mission to bring you only the shallowest and laziest analysis of Zombie Simpsons, we’re keeping up our Crazy Noises series for Season 22.  Since a podcast is so 2004, and video would require a flag, a fern and some folding chairs from the garage, we’ve elected to use the technology that brought the word “emoticon” to the masses: the chatroom.  Star Trek image macros are strictly forbidden, unless you have a really good reason why Captain Picard is better than Captain Kirk.  This text has been edited for clarity and spelling (especially on “jowl”).

Among the shorter of the many long (long, long) skits during “Angry Dad: The Movie”, Zombie Simpsons had Homer stick a deck of playing cards (he happened to be carrying) down the back of his pants and shuffle them with his ass. The cards eventually emerge (unstained) fanned out from his waistline. Then they make a big show of him opening a bottle with his butt. That last concept is so inventive that I was only able to find three videos of people doing the same thing after one search on YouTube (plus a deer). But the butt-shuffling sent my mind instantly to the episode of The Critic where Marty’s in the talent show. Skip to the 4:25 mark here, and listen to Jay Sherman, in response to his son smoking a pipe with his belly button, say:

“You know, my butt can deal blackjack, but this is Marty’s night.”

The Critic was a show that never got the chance it deserved, and since it was funny as hell it makes sense that Jean and company would raid it for material, but inherently goofy things like this work much better when alluded to rather than spelled out.

Charlie Sweatpants: Ready to get this over with?

Mad Jon: Yep

Charlie Sweatpants: I am not at a complete loss for words about this episode, but the only three that come to mind are "what", "the", and "fuck".

Mad Jon: Yeah, once again it was quite the effort to watch. I turned it on right when I got home from work, and I still feel exhausted.

Charlie Sweatpants: There were so many things that were a minute or longer when they could’ve been two seconds.

  The Ricky Gervais thing might not have even been worth two seconds.

Mad Jon: I know the idea was to piggy back on the "Angry Dad" episode all those season ago, but I really felt it had to be thought of in the light of "The Front". A goal that was exponentially more difficult.

  I can’t figure out why Gervais is in everything. I really don’t find him funny.

  Also I am not British.

Charlie Sweatpants: I don’t have anything against him, I’ve seen him be pretty funny, but this was a trainwreck.

Mad Jon: It took me a few minutes of the tip scene to even figure out who he was. It really didn’t look anything like him.

Charlie Sweatpants: I swear I could almost see him turn to the camera and say "That’s it. That’s the joke."

Mad Jon: Ha ha, yeah that’s about right.

Charlie Sweatpants: Then I can yell "You suck, McBain!" and all would be well.

Mad Jon: Did you notice how long the guest voice credit roll went? I was only aware that there were like 2 or 3. Boy, was I wrong.

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, it was like six deep.

  And everyone got to do the same thing: voice themselves and pretend to make fun of themselves.

Remember when this show loathed the rest of the entertainment industry? Good times.

Mad Jon: Yes, once again it was their turn to ride the bike.

  Yes, Yes I remember, back when travel was done on Blimps and Taco Bell used meat.

Charlie Sweatpants: There were the Pixar parts, and the Wallace & Gromit part, and the Triplets of Belleville part . . . these aren’t parodies, they’re more like love letters that lack even a hint of originality.

  Dear Pixar, we love you, signed Zombie Simpsons.

Mad Jon: Also the clips went on for fucking ever.

Charlie Sweatpants: Oh, I know.

Mad Jon: The clips from "The Front" look so much better in comparison than they already are.

  "Clip not done yet"

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, they used to actually create stuff. Now it really is like those "Epic Movie" pieces of crap where they photocopy something and expect me to slap my fins together for understanding the reference.

Mad Jon: Well, the references were topical. -ish.

Charlie Sweatpants: I’m sure they were very proud of themselves for that little photo of Gervais that said not to allow him to host.

  I didn’t even watch the Golden Globes and I got that one. Savvy.

Mad Jon: Oh yeah, I probably should have picked up on that while I was struggling to figure out who he was.

  I also didn’t watch the Golden Globes.

Charlie Sweatpants: Well, we kinda just did. There are few things ugly in deeper ways than when big budget entertainment pretends to satirize itself for its foibles.

  While we’re on the topic of things that went on way too long, how about that Itchy & Scratchy thing?

Or Bart’s ride around the house?

  Or the awards receiving montage.

Mad Jon: Yeah I was hoping you’d bring that up. There wasn’t one last week right? That’s good, this weeks was bad enough for both.

Charlie Sweatpants: Someone on the staff has a lot of kung fu movies with five star ratings on Netflix.

Mad Jon: I remember a few weeks ago I tried to defend a few of the new I&S. Man I look even stupider than that time I burned my eyebrow off with a flaming shot of Yukon Jack.

Charlie Sweatpants: That was pretty bad, but this is worse.

Mad Jon: Why does everything have to take soooo long?

Charlie Sweatpants: The training montage alone was longer than many classic I&S skits.

Mad Jon: probably twofold as long.

Also, how many more episodes this season do you think will have a Banksy reference?

Charlie Sweatpants: Well, they like him. He did more for them publicity wise than anyone else recently. And that’s despite episodes like this one where they cram in guest stars cheek by jowl.

Mad Jon: Soon enough they will run out of A-listers to throw 3 or 4 in each week.

Charlie Sweatpants: There are always new celebrities.

Mad Jon: Yeah, but this seems like a locust swarm to me as of late.

Charlie Sweatpants: There does seem to have been an inordinate number of episodes with two or more guest voices this season.

Mad Jon: Like most Zombie recurrences, it kills a bit of time and can be crammed in pretty much anywhere.

Charlie Sweatpants: Very true. This one displayed an unusual level of apathy towards storytelling, even by their standards. The Pixar guys don’t get defeated, the chair guy vanishes halfway through the episode, Lisa’s at the table read with Bart for some reason. They really can’t be bothered.

It’s impressive in a way, like when a three year old tells a story and begins every sentence with "And".

Mad Jon: Yes sir. The difference being that I would applaud a three year old for being excited to tell me a story.

I really did forget about the Aero chair guy until you just mentioned him.

Charlie Sweatpants: That’s exactly my point. He vanishes like a puff of smoke halfway through.

Mad Jon: It’s a good point.

Charlie Sweatpants: Anything else here? Normally I ask if there’s anything good, but I can’t think of a single decent thing that I saw that wasn’t immediately ruined by going on ten times longer than it should. Homer’s Taco Day line at the power plant comes to mind.

Mad Jon: Yeah, it turns out he still has a job after all.

  I really can’t think of anything else good, or really bad that we haven’t mentioned.

The only time I smiled was when Lisa mentioned that she saw all the Pixar movies and slipped in "except for Cars".

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, that was at least decent.

  And true. Cars sucked.

Mad Jon: Notice how the decent things in the last few years are always two seconds long.

  But that’s all I got. Like I said, I had to struggle even more than usual to pay attention.

Charlie Sweatpants: This was less of an episode and more a series of YouTube ready videos that someone, someday will figure out how to – excuse me I have to use a bad word here – "monetize" on Hulu.

Mad Jon: Think about the future.

Quote of the Day

“You ugly, hate filled man.” – Ned Flanders
“Hey, hey, I may be ugly and hate filled, but I . . . um . . . what was the third thing you said?” – Moe