“Lisa, get away from that jazz man!” – Marge Simpson
“But, Mom! Can’t I stay a little longer?” – Lisa Simpson
“Come on, come on, we were worried about you. Nothing personal, I just fear the unfamiliar.” – Marge Simpson
Happy 30th anniversary to “Moaning Lisa”!
“That was beautiful. What’s it called?” – Lisa Simpson
“Oh, it’s a little tune that I call The I Never Had An Italian Soup Blues.” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
Happy Birthday, Mike Reiss!
“She doesn’t look sad. I don’t see any tears in her eyes.” – Homer Simpson
“It’s not that kind of sad. I’m sorry, Dad, but you wouldn’t understand.” – Lisa
After last week’s little experiment, it’s back to regular Zombie Simpsons this week, including plots that don’t make sense, two clock eating montages, several unnecessarily self-voiced celebrities, the standard hacktacular ending, and plenty of characters telling us exactly how they’re feeling. As a sort of bonus, some of this week’s exposition is written down rather than spoken.
The story here is – and stop me if you’ve seen this one a dozen times before – Lisa is sad. She goes to a therapist who tells her to do “art therapy”, which turns into a comic book that she writes and Marge draws, which turns into a Broadway musical, which turns (at long last) into the end credits. There isn’t really a b-plot this week, so they tossed in some random scenes of Bart and Homer doing brief sketch pieces.
– No couch gag or title sequence, which means this one ran long, which is not a good sign, especially when the opening is Lisa having a dream that she narrates to us.
– Waking up, Lisa runs into Homer and Marge’s room where, in the span of just thirty seconds, they manage to do the “Homer wakes up instantly” joke twice.
– The family ends up at Springfield community college so Lisa can get discount therapy. Since this episode is mostly filler, they encounter Lenny on the front steps:
Lenny: I only paid a student dentist twelve dollars for this brand new crown. [He pulls out his tooth.] See?
Marge: I don’t think it’s supposed to come out.
Lenny: That’s why I paid a student para-legal to sue him. I lost! [He tosses the tooth aside and walks off.]
After this scintillating exchange, Homer looks at the family, then smiles and nods vigorously. This is funny, but not for the reasons the show wants.
– They walk by Dan Harmon teaching a class. He gets pelted with spitballs and falls down. This is the first of many useless self voiced celebrities.
– Homer tosses Bart into a dog grooming class because, hey, that’s funny.
– We finally get to the therapist, who is clearly pregnant but who also tells us she’s pregnant. I swear they sometimes read the stage directions out loud and nobody notices.
– Effort alert: there are a couple of book titles in the counselor’s office, the only one of which I liked was “The Social Psychology of Student Loan Debt”. But, hey, they’re kinda trying. Right?
– The Bart-as-dog thing is still going on as Lisa struggles to draw her feelings. Then Marge comes in and draws Lisa’s feeling for her. This leads to our first montage as Marge’s drawings of Lisa’s life are animated. This includes thought bubbles for this week’s distinguishing feature: written exposition.
– Lisa goes back to the community college therapist to show off her drawings and, dun dun dun, they’re not in her backpack. Outside we see Comic Book Guy and that wife they gave him finding the pages and deciding to publish them as a “Sad Girl” comic. This leads to more exposition from Lisa, who says, “It’s been a week and I still can’t find my therapy comic. I’d be just mortified if even one person saw my private thoughts.” They then walk by the comic book shop which has them in the window. [sad rimshot]
– This leads to a minute long scene that involves YouTube, exposition, a bear costume, more exposition, and then even more exposition until Lisa agrees to let them sell the book. Jebus, that took a while.
– Lisa becomes famous, with random people in the supermarket asking for her autograph and Mel shouting out the word “zeitgeist”. This leads to our second montage, which is accompanied by a one-word substitution “parody” of the old Rod Stewart song “Infatuation“. The credits will later inform me it was sung by Kipp Lenon, a/k/a the guy who did the singing for Michael Jackson back in Season 3. There’s your trivia moment for this one.
– After the montage, there’s a Homer and Bart sketch that uses the Andy Griffith Show theme song. That is all.
– Moving the plot along to a comic book festival, we get a women-in-art panel discussion with Marge, Lisa, and three self voiced celebrity writers/cartoonists. This takes a while and ends with Marge being jealous because all the questions are for Lisa. No, it doesn’t make any sense.
– Later, Marge wants to write her own comic, gets in a fight with Lisa, and then Martin Short shows up doing a half hearted impression of the voice he does on the PBS version of Cat in the Hat. He’s playing an “impish genius” who wants to turn the comic into a musical. I know he’s an “impish genius” because they tell us twice.
– A big part of what they think works here is recitations of previous shows this guy did. Lisa says he did a “Waiting for Godot” where Godot showed up, and an all dogs version of “Cats”. There’s gonna be like four more of these, all recounted seemingly out of nowhere.
– The Homer-Bart sketch interludes continue with Homer now thinking he’s going to be rich. I will update you as necessary.
– The next minute and a half is Martin Short rambling and Lisa getting jealous of Marge because the show is so off beat that “Sad Girl” is barely in it. This is conveyed to the audience via Lisa’s explicitly saying it, “Mom, he’s ignoring my story and making this all about your drawings.”
– Lisa flees back to the therapist, who now has a crib that she’s gently rocking. Remember, she was pregnant and they told us so. Now she obviously has a kid and they will tell us that as well. The need to make even the most obvious things explicit is among the seven or eight most annoying tics of this show.
– Homer is now planning to get a sail boat.
– The show finally starts and it’s basically montage #3, with lots of music and crazy stuff happening because wordless musicals are a good way to eat time.
– After one final scene of Martin Short yelling and explaining things, the music devolves into chaos and the audience flees.
– And we end at a bar where everyone is drinking and Marge and Lisa exposit their reconciliation.
The numbers are in, and thanks to a late Packers-Cowboys game, 5.25 million people saw Lisa be sad and felt the same way. Remember, ratings are meaningless and no one in charge of anything knows what they’re doing.
“I’m just wondering: what’s the point? Would it make any difference at all if I never existed? How can we sleep at night when there’s so much suffering in the world?” – Lisa Simpson
“Well . . . uh . . . come on, Lisa! Ride the Homer horsey! Giddy-up, weeee!” – Homer Simpson
The Simpsons always took a pretty dim view not just of human nature, but of human existence generally. Misdeeds are rarely punished, triumphs are rarely recognized, and justice is all but non-existent. After all, if there’s one thing Homer’s learned, it’s that life is one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Flanders was dead.
So, in honor of Simpsons Day, here are some of the show’s most existentially bleak lines. This list is by no means meant to be exhaustive, so feel free to suggest your own in the comments.
“Please don’t make me retire. My job is the only thing that keeps me alive. I never married and my dog is dead.”
We only ever see Jack Marley in “Marge Gets a Job”, and he breaks down sobbing at this short, horrifically bleak summary of his own life. Worst/funniest of all: later we see him not get his job back, which means that the reason we haven’t seen him again is probably because he died shortly thereafter.
–
“Sir, six cinder blocks are missing.”
“There’ll be no hospital then. I’ll tell the children.”
The children – presumably very sick ones – who’ve been waiting for a new hospital so they can get better, will now continue to suffer and die because Homer Simpson wanted a crappy bookshelf. Truly, fate is cruel.
–
“I’m trying to turn it off.”
“No, bear want to live!”
The first time I saw Rick & Morty‘s ultra-depressing butter robot, I thought of Frink’s doomed bear. It’s a sentient being staring into an unanswerable existential crises because it was somebody’s side project. At least the robots in Westworld are magnificent masterpieces, the bear and the butter robot are hopeless.
–
“I used to be with it, then they changed what it was. Not what I’m with isn’t it, and what’s it seems weird and scary to me. It’ll happen to you.”
Even youth cannot protect you from obsolescence and death. There’s a reason I see this line quoted all the time as one of the show’s best: it’s depressing when you’re a kid, and it just gets worse with each passing year.
–
“Most of you will never fall in love and marry out of fear of dying alone.”
Happiness is only ever attained by a few people, and certainly not by you. Congratulations on your nuptials.
–
“I guess one person can make a difference, but most of the time they probably shouldn’t.”
Your beliefs and activism are probably futile, and even if you succeed it won’t have the effect you wanted. Vote Trump.
–
“Before we sit down to our delicious turkey puree, I have some happy news. The following people have relatives who wish they could be here today: Antonovsky, Conroy, Falcone, Martin, Thorson, and Walsh . . . oh, and Mrs. Spencer, you too.”
“Oh, I knew they wouldn’t forget me.”
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: nobody got it worse on this show than old people. This poor, lonely old lady has her heart warmed because the family that imprisoned her in the Springfield Retirement Castle (Motto: Thanks for not discussing the outside world) sent a fax. Forget just on The Simpsons, that’s one of the saddest things on television ever.
–
“Asa Phelps spent his entire life in Springfield except for four years service in World War II and one high school day trip. He worked at the United Strut and Bracing Works as a molder’s boy, until he was replaced by a molder-matic and died.”
A funeral with no guests, save two men who were waiting to profit from his death, now that’s bleak. A life spent entirely in Springfield, his only skill made obsolete, and then an unnoticed demise, Asa Phleps had it every bit as bad as Frank Grimes. At least Grimey’s funeral had mourners.
“Just take mine. A simple cupcake will bring me no pleasure.” – Lisa Simpson
This week we’ve got two links hearkening back to Season 1’s melancholy masterpiece “Moaning Lisa”, and two different fond remembrances of the first time someone ever watched the show. Season 1 often gets overlooked for the very understandable reasons that it both looks and sounds quite different than it would even in Season 2, but those episodes still resonate with people, and that’s astonishing. In addition to that, we’ve got a great Spider-Man put down, new old bootleg Bart, some .gifs, and a horrifying soccer mascot.
Enjoy.
Tom Holland is Spider-Man’s New “Hat” At A Time When I Wanted a Lisa Lionheart – Excellent usage:
The makers of Malibu Stacy, the Simpsons stand-in for Barbie, respond with an all-night brainstorming session where it is decided to release a Malibu Stacy which is exactly the same but has a new hat.
A River of Melted Hot Butter – This is a transcript of a diary from when the author was a kid, and this is great:
After dinner we went to ACE and got some candy. I got some gum. It was so good. I’m chewing the gum right now. I am also watching The Simpsons. It is my favorite episode. At 7:00, Jamie is coming to spend the night. Anyway, it’s almost seven and she’s going to miss The Simpsons. That’s okay, she saw it when she came over today.
But what episode is it??
Three Men And A Comic Book – This is true:
-Wow, they got away with Homer saying “T.S.” on prime-time television, in the early 90s. Sure, it was just an acronym, but it was still pretty bold for the time.
Also, too, I was about the only kid I knew who hated The Wonder Years, so I’ve always loved when Homer keeps interrupting Bart’s narrative staring.
Sex and The Simpsons – And none of the examples are from Zombie Simpsons, hooray. Also, there’s a .gif of Homer in the Mr. Plow jacket.
The Shearer Situation: An Overview – Our old friend Noah takes a look at the why of Shearer’s departure:
So, why would he leave then? Well, these seem to be the three prevailing theories:
Be Street – Bootleg Bart Creative Contest – Modern takes on classic Bart. Notorious B.A.R.T. is great.
Hank Azaria on Harry Shearer’s Simpsons Dispute – No real news here, but at least Azaria’s got a sense of humor about it:
Azaria, who conceded, “If he really doesn’t come back, the show has to continue in some way at least for a while … Maybe we’ll do a YouTube thing, like how they found that Asian guy that sings for Journey.”
LISTEN: The Simpsons ‘Moaning Lisa’ Review – Just what it says. I love that episode.
Caitlyn Jenner is given The Simpsons treatment with her Vanity Fair cover – That same Italian artists strikes again.
Is Pixar’s Inside Out Just a Herman’s Head Rip-Off? – Excellent usage:
Oh, really, Pixar, you’re going inside the mind of an 11-year-old girl to visit the personifications of her primary emotions – Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Fear (Bill Hader), Disgust (Mindy Kaling) and Anger (Lewis Black), all of whom congregate in “headquarters.” In the immortal words of George Harrison watching the Bee Sharps perform on top of Moe’s Bar on The Simpsons, “It’s been done.”
Incidentally, Inside Out was fantastic.
Pixar’s Inside Out: Riley is a feminist hero. – Double excellent usage:
They’re clearly well-meaning, but they’re guilt-tripping their kid. (The scenario echoes a 1990 Simpsons episode in which sweet Marge Simpson implores a down-in-the-dumps Lisa to “take all your bad feelings and push them down, all the way down past your knees, until you’re almost walking on them.”)
And:
The only thing to do is forgive yourself and try to do better next time. (Marge Simpson came around, too; she apologizes to Lisa and says, “Always be yourself. If you want to be sad, honey, be sad. We’ll ride it out with you.”)
Perfectly quoted and apt (and have I mentioned Inside Out is really good?).
Eye On Springfield: Ross Mckendrick – Fantastic:
What is your history with the Simpsons? Do you remember the first time you saw the show?
I was born in 1988, so The Simpsons has been around pretty much my whole life. I was aware of it from a very young age but my family never had satellite TV, which was the only way you could see episodes in the UK at that time. The first time I ever saw the show itself must’ve been Hallowe’en 1994, because it was the Treehouse Of Horror episode with ‘The Shinning’ in it.
I only managed to catch it because my mum had taken me out guising (which is what we call trick-or-treating in Scotland), and as we reached the house about 2 doors down from ours the episode was just starting. I invited myself into this family’s house, plonked myself in front of their TV and pretty much refused to leave for most of the episode.
I was totally enthralled by it, I didn’t even bother doing my ‘trick’, which was my pretty killer Jim Carrey impression (I had dressed as The Mask; green face, zoot suit and everything). I thought the fact they had a Scottish character was awesome, and even more awesome was the fact it was a cartoon, but it had axe murders in it. I seriously thought the whole show was like that; a twisted cartoon take on movies I wasn’t allowed to watch yet.
It was love at first sight.
Al Jean has 90 hours (and counting) of Simpsons commentaries under his belt – Not a great deal of big information in this Jean interview, but this is kinda funny:
AVC: Have you found that people know your voice from the commentaries now?
AJ: Yes, in a very spooky fashion. I was at an airport restaurant in Arizona, and I hadn’t given my credit card, and the guy goes, “Oh, you’re Al Jean from The Simpsons!” That is a bizarre feeling.
Homer and Marge address the ‘split’ rumours – The show put out a ninety second video to keep attention on them for CNN’s fuckup. You will be unsurprised to learn that it contains a lot of exposition and Homer gets badly hurt and yells.
Partick Thistle’s new half sun/half Lisa Simpson mascot is absolutely terrifying – That is serious nightmare fuel.
Top Five TV Sofas and Chairs – Even British furniture companies know that the Simpsons couch is iconic.
Fashion Spotlight: Fighting Scottish, Doof Warrior vs The Mad, and Fight Like A Princess – Groundskeeper Willie as athletic mascot.
agoodcartoon: fumbling but well-meaning, the… – Reader Ethan P sends in this Tennessee political cartoon featuring, Burns, Homer, and a mouthwatering donut. Thanks, Ethan!
New trending GIF tagged reaction the simpsons simpsons… – It’s TS for Ralph.
New trending GIF tagged reaction the simpsons laughing… – Burns laughing maniacally.
New trending GIF tagged the simpsons simpsons via… – Barney turning into Minday and back again. Think unsexy thoughts, think unsexy thoughts.
Eye On Springfield: Kathy Bejma Of Metalcakes/Faberge Egg Salad – And finally, I get to end the way I like, with someone who agrees with us. This is an interview with the blog author who did the recipes I linked last week, and in addition to having some great Simpsons patches and buttons (which you can see at the link), there’s this:
Do you still watch the show? If not, do you remember what made you stop watching?
I don’t watch the show anymore. I’m a fan of seasons 1-10. There are 2 or 3 episodes I like in season 11, but that’s it.
I stopped watching when the jokes weren’t clever anymore. More times than not, I was laughing because I was uncomfortable, not because it was actually funny.
Amen, sister.
“Alright, class, from the top: one and two and three and. . .” – Mr. Largo
American primary schools are filled with godawful bands. While a few students might genuinely like playing music and even have some skill, most of the members are kids that have no particular aptitude for music, aren’t overly fond of their instruments, and/or are only in the band because their parents made them join. In this context, “band” is just another class or after school activity, something most of the kids will go through the motions for, if only to keep the adults off their backs. At the head of this artistically doomed enterprise is the music teacher, someone who has, for whatever reason, ended up teaching on the lowest rung of musical education.
Mr. Largo perfectly exemplifies every bad stereotype there is about school music teachers. He’s an authoritarian, he long ago lost whatever passion he had for music or his work, and, as Lisa would reveal in Season 2, his most profound lesson to probably his best student was that “even the noblest concerto can be drained of its beauty and soul”. We can see all of these traits in Largo’s brief two scenes in “Moaning Lisa”.
In the first, at band practice, he not only lashes out at Lisa for not playing along dully like the rest of the students, but evinces not a whit of empathy for her or the hardscrabble Americans she invokes as her justification for straying from the sheet music. All he cares about is making those kids play “My Country Tis of Thee”, and if their rendition is off key, off rhythm and only barely recognizable as the song they’re trying to play, well, he doesn’t care about that.
In his second appearance, just after Marge has given Lisa her terrible advice about smiling no matter what, he point blank tells Lisa that he doesn’t want any more “creativity” from her. For Largo, music isn’t about being creative, it’s about muddling through with strict adherence to the original, however inadequate or terrible sounding.
As a character, and despite his inclusion in the opening credits, Largo never developed into a standby the way many other Season 1 creations did. He didn’t become Lisa’s foil the way Krabappel and Skinner were Bart’s, and except for background shots he rarely appeared outside of the school. But as with so many other characters, Largo didn’t need a great deal of backstory or his own star turn in an episode to make him seem like a real person. He was a music teacher who, by temperament, talent and good, old fashioned apathy, was cut out to be little else. He didn’t really like his job or his students, and that made him a perfect fit in Springfield and at Springfield Elementary.
“My friends call me Bleeding Gums.” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
“Eww, how’d you get a name like that?” – Lisa Simpson
“Well, lemme put it this way, you ever been to the dentist?” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
“Yeah.” – Lisa Simpson
“Not me. I suppose I should go to one, but I got enough pain in my life as it is.” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
“I’m still trying to figure out what’s bothering Lisa. I don’t know, Bart’s such a handful, and Maggie needs attention, but all the while, our little Lisa’s becoming a young woman.” – Marge Simpson
“Oh, so that’s it. This is some kind of underwear thing.” – Homer Simpson
Beneath the unvarnished cruise line agitprop, the hastily dropped money saving plot, and that bizarre encounter with penguins in Ant-fucking-arctica lies what may be the most half-assed aspect of “A Totally Fun Thing That Bart Will Never Do Again”, its blisteringly simplistic and incomplete handling of Bart’s serious melancholy. Though the episode doesn’t really get around to what Bart’s actually feeling until past its midpoint, the Bart we see here is floundering among the deep and unanswerable questions of life. Is this all there is? What should I be doing with my life? Since Zombie Simpsons always – always – follows in the footsteps of The Simpsons, it’s worth looking at the first time the show handled a youthful crisis of self doubt and existential dread, Season 1’s “Moaning Lisa”.
The driving idea of “A Totally Fun Thing That Bart Will Never Do Again” is Bart’s unhappiness, his belief that because he doesn’t have enough “fun”, his life is a total waste. To its surprising credit, Zombie Simpsons actually portrays this rather grimly, by having Bart imagine himself on his death bed, looking back on a life wasted at school and work, the only real accomplishment of which was to produce a son capable of wheeling him into the hospital to die.
It’s more bleak than funny, but I’m almost impressed.
Of course, being Zombie Simpsons, they viciously undercut this rather depressing concept in a number of ways. Not only do they place it right after their pathetic song-vertisement, but they actually have Bart say out loud exactly what he’s feeling three (3!) times in succession. First, young Bart laments that vacation will end and fun with it. Then old Bart says the same thing. Then they cut back to young Bart who repeats it again. You can make a case for the third one, because it does have Bart resolving to keep the cruise going forever, but the first two are 100% unnecessary filler.
Being aware of how full frontally bad your writing is doesn’t make it okay.
As poorly and as late in the episode as Zombie Simpsons is presenting it, however, this is some heavy shit Bart is dealing with. (And no, the montage at the beginning doesn’t count, even as foreshadowing. It’s fluff that gets discarded as soon as the cruise commercial comes on.) Even though he’s only kinda sorta still a kid, to have a ten-year-old imagine his unhappy death is both sad and morbid. It’s a meaty enough concept that you could, were you so inclined, base a decent episode around it.
Now that’s foreshadowing.
Naturally, “Moaning Lisa” is better than just “decent”, and that’s due in no small part to the fact that it takes her feelings seriously enough to introduce them at the beginning of the episode and then show us why she feels that way. Lisa is unhappy because her father is a terrible parent, her brother torments her night and day, and her mom doesn’t understand her, and we see each of those happen.
Homer doesn’t mean to make things worse, but that’s exactly what he does:
Homer: Why don’t you climb up on Daddy’s knee and tell him all about it.
Lisa: I’m just wondering, what’s the point? Would it make any difference at all if I never existed? How can we sleep at night when there’s so much suffering in the world?
Homer: Well, uh, eh . . . c’mon, Lisa! Ride the Homer Horsey!
That’s followed by Marge telling her to take a bath, Bart yelling at her, Maggie declaring her love of the TV, and then Homer telling her to stop playing her saxophone in the house. Even at this early stage of The Simpsons, everything is interspersed with jokes and comedy (and there’s the great video boxing B-plot), but the story takes precedence because without it, nothing else matters.
Consider the scene with Bart, Lisa, Maggie and the television. Bart’s mad at Lisa, Lisa’s sad, and both of them are doing everything they can to get Maggie on their side. When Lisa gives up, and Maggie heads for the television, it works not only because she chose the box over her siblings, but because the stakes have been raised so high. Loving television over people wouldn’t be nearly as funny if it weren’t so serious. It’s the difference between slapping some unrelated jokes into a story, and telling a story that is itself both poignant and funny.
Teacher. Mother. Secret Babysitter.
Of course, that distinction is totally lost on Zombie Simpsons. They’ve got this profoundly ominous cloud hanging over Bart’s head, but instead of making use of it, for comedy or story, they tuck it off to the side so they can continue with their hyperactive gibberish. After Bart manages to convince the ship that the entire world has been destroyed, itself a plot twist that makes no sense on any level whatsoever, all the things he had been loving about the cruise vanish. No more good food, no more water slides, no more endless amusement.
Bart doesn’t react to any of this; he, and he alone, is completely untouched by what’s going on. Like so many other things, this could’ve been used constructively. They could’ve had the family show Bart that it wasn’t the ship that he loved, but being with other people or some such nonsense. Instead, Bart remains bafflingly immune to the horrors all around them while the show trots out whatever apocalypse gags were left over after the “Outlands” episode a couple months ago.
However, even that level of head scratching weirdness isn’t enough for Zombie Simpsons. They decide to ratchet things up even further by stranding the family in Antarctica before finally, at long last, getting Bart to realize some kind of lesson about making the most out of life. Even then, they have to club you over the head with it, though in this case the expository narration is necessary because what they’re showing you – trapped in Antarctica and freezing to death – is so wildly different than what they’re saying:
Lisa: Well, sure life is full of pain and drudgery, but the trick is to enjoy the few perfect experiences we’re given in the moment.
Homer: Yeah, stupid. Stop thinking about fun, and have it!
By this point, the realization, and the depression that necessitated it, are hardly even footnotes to what’s happened and what’s happening. Leave it to Zombie Simpsons to ask the audience to take emotional satisfaction in an ending after enduring the near seizure level mood swings between “triple upgrade”, Homer with an orange mohawk and spiked shoulder pads, and a survival situation that’s set to kill them all very soon.
By contrast, “Moaning Lisa” doesn’t end until the story wraps itself up by actually addressing the problem Lisa’s been having since the beginning. In the car on the way to school, Marge makes another attempt to help Lisa:
Marge: Now, Lisa, listen to me. This is important. I want you to smile today.
Lisa: But I don’t feel like smiling.
Marge: Well, it doesn’t matter how you feel inside, you know? It’s what shows up on the surface that counts. That’s what my mother taught me. Take all your bad feelings and push them down, all the way down, past your knees until you’re almost walking on them. And then, you’ll fit in, and you’ll be invited to parties, and boys will like you, and happiness will follow.
This is terrible, repressive and retrograde advice, but at this moment in the story it’s the best Marge can do. She still doesn’t understand what’s wrong with Lisa, so she falls back on what she was told by her mother, which we in the audience already understand since we saw it earlier.
As soon as Lisa steps out of the car, she starts doing what her mother told her, and this is when the episode shows us both a) how disastrous it is, and b) Marge realizing how disastrous it is. No sooner has Lisa opened her mouth than she’s being taken advantage of and letting her hopes and passions die. That in turn prompts Marge to swoop in and tell Lisa what she’s needed to hear the whole time: that even though it sometimes doesn’t feel like it, Lisa is loved and valued for who she is.
Not only is Lisa’s emotional burden lifted, but we the audience get a fulfilling ending, with Marge and Lisa bonding and the whole family going to the jazz club to see Homer embarrassed by Lisa’s song. By comparison, Zombie Simpsons brought up a lot of serious emotions, ignored them for its preferred pastime of lunatic zaniness, and then dropped in a glib and hollow ending at the last second because it had literally reached the end of the world. One of these is thoughtful and funny, the other considered being thoughtful, but dropped it because penguins.
“You know, Marge, getting old is a terrible thing. I think the saddest day of my life was when I realized I could beat my dad at most things, and Bart experienced that at the age of four.” – Homer Simpson
“Now, Miss Simpson, I hope we won’t have a repeat of yesterday’s outburst of unbridled creativity.” – Mr. Largo
“No, sir.” – Lisa Simpson
There are two horrible, glaring problems with this episode that we didn’t cover at all in the discussion below. The first is that while the Conchords provide what little levity this episode has, they also make no sense, and that’s before they fly off the roof at the end. (Lucy Lawless did that, let me check, eleven seasons ago . . . in a Halloween episode. Bravo for originality.) The idea is that they’re poor artists, fine; but aren’t they also camp counselors? Maybe they made an aside about how that’s their other job or it doesn’t pay the bills or something and I missed it (and there’s no way I’m watching it again to check), but I don’t think so. Once again, plot problems that could be solved by the insertion of a joke or a quick aside are simply ignored because they just don’t care.
The second massive problem here is the numerous missed comedy opportunities that demonstrate just how little they’re really trying. They go to all that trouble to pack Krusty’s trial with as many European stereotypes as possible, and then when they show him in prison it’s not some nice, cushy Euro-jail, it’s a boring old regular prison yard. (The fact that it took them about a minute to make a DVD region joke didn’t help either.) They bothered to create an arts camp, and then did basically nothing with it. There isn’t all that much of the real Brooklyn left that looks like Not Brooklyn, but instead of satirizing gentrifying artsy types, they went with the thirty-year-old ghetto stereotype and even dropped that pretty quick. It’s almost like they think developing ideas is beneath them.
Charlie Sweatpants: Shall we get on with it?
Mad Jon: Sure.
Do either of you or have either of you ever watched Glee? I have not and have no idea about the show.
Dave: I’ve not watched it; I’ve heard enough about it to know I’d hate it.
Charlie Sweatpants: I also have not watched it, so I don’t really have an opinion. But the Glee kids were hardly in this episode. Like most of the non-Simon Cowell judges from the American Idol episode, they were here for the briefest of cameos and then they vanished.
Mad Jon: So the ‘artists’ weren’t glee cast members?
Dave: They played some of the other campers I think.
Mad Jon: Ahh.
Dave: The whole episode felt like a bad Flight of the Conchords episode.
Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, they were those other kids.
I was never a big Conchords fan for the simple reason that it always felt very hit and miss. A lot of the time you’d be bored for eighteen of the twenty two minutes. Those other four minutes could be hilarious, but they were capable of missing entirely, which they surely did here.
Dave: Fair enough. It was a love or hate it kind of thing.
Charlie Sweatpants: Even having said that though, they were easily the best part of this episode.
Mad Jon: Who? The Glee members?
Charlie Sweatpants: No, the Conchords.
Mad Jon: Ahh.
Dave: They were, basically because they stayed in character and did what they always do.
Charlie Sweatpants: The Glee kids, like pretty much the whole camp scene, were so fleeting that it’s hard to have a strong opinion.
Dave: Yeah, it didn’t turn out to be the Glee-lovefest I thought it’d be.
Mad Jon: They didn’t really do anything except sing about being at camp did they?
Charlie Sweatpants: That was it, and then they were gone.
So that Lisa could . . . do what, exactly?
Lisa feels creatively stifled at school is not something you can hang a plot on in your twenty second season.
So they invent this whole Not Brooklyn thing, where she does . . . nothing.
Dave: Except pout.
Mad Jon: Doesn’t she learn a lesson about artists and how you shouldn’t be one, but then you do?
And work at Not Subway?
Dave: There was a singing falafel sandwich.
Mad Jon: That is true.
There was a lot of singing, but no Lee Marvin. Not that he could have done anything, at least based on our discussion a few months ago.
Charlie Sweatpants: True, but the songs sucked too, especially that one at the camp.
Mad Jon: They were at best forgettable, I can’t even think of the tune, let alone the words.
And I watched this thing like 2 hours ago.
Dave: 30 minutes. Beat that.
Charlie Sweatpants: This is a cruel comparison, but when you stack that song up against "Hail to Thee Kamp Krusty" it’s not even a contest.
The Kamp Krusty song is nothing but jokes, and it makes sense in context. The arts camp song was a full on musical number that had one joke that I can remember, the one about Marge paying with her Visa. The rest was just cartoon dancing and repeating the refrain.
Mad Jon: That would be a low blow. But it would be deserving. Although you are comparing a Ferrari to a broken down Pinto used as a toilet by drunken bums.
Charlie Sweatpants: And it goes on for, let me check, almost a whole minute.
The refrain is "You’re gonna like art camp Lisa". Is there a word that’s the opposite of clever? Because that lyric is that word.
Mad Jon: I was just asking my wife for the proper opposite of memorable.
Dave: Tedious.
Charlie Sweatpants: Well, that would be forgettable.
Mad Jon: That’s what she said, and that’s what I typed.
Charlie Sweatpants: Which they could’ve made a joke with when they brought out the "Roofi" CD, but didn’t.
Mad Jon: Didn’t he get his own plot line like 5 seasons ago?
Dave: Yep.
Something resembling a baby-filled Woodstock.
Mad Jon: Wow, this is the show that keeps on giving!
Charlie Sweatpants: While I’m on the subject of pointless things that happened in the car, they actually got Ira Glass and they still couldn’t make fun of something that’s crying out to be made fun of, like "This American Life".
Mad Jon: They tried.
Mad Jon: Having actually heard a few "This American Life"s, it was pretty close to the truth.
Charlie Sweatpants: But that’s part of the problem.
You can’t get Ira Glass and make fun of "This American Life" in anything but the most gentle terms.
Mad Jon: Fair enough. That’s that intelligent humor I guess, "Oh look I’m a playful radio hipster who knows people think I have a monotone boring public radio show, but I’ll show them! I can laugh at myself!"
Unless, it’s a meta-joke by Glass, about how even his jokes about himself are funny on the pretentious side.
But now I’ve gone too far….
Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, you did. That’s giving both him and Zombie Simpsons far too much credit.
Paul Harvey and Rush Limbaugh got skewered, Ira Glass got to make a cameo.
Just saying.
Dave: Instead of talking about Ira Glass, let’s talk about the terrible Krusty b-plot.
Mad Jon: Please.
Dave: I didn’t expect the stupid twist, and it was just that and nothing more, stupid.
Charlie Sweatpants: The B-plot was a complete waste of time.
Mad Jon: Yes, with the Nobel prize that wasn’t
Dave: And the trial that wasn’t.
Charlie Sweatpants: It has nothing to do with anything, and isn’t even a plot, B or not.
Mad Jon: But somehow Krusty’s diva-crap ended apartheid?
Charlie Sweatpants: It’s an excuse for them to show Krusty clips that also weren’t funny. That Electric Company thing dragged on forever.
And Bart and Homer were there in yet another, "Hey, we know this is stupid but we’re doing it anyway."
Mad Jon: They must have used their ‘A’ material in Israel.
Dave: Something like that.
Mad Jon: Or they’re saving it for New Brunswick, or where ever they’re heading in a week or two.
Dave: No more bringing up future episodes. It hurts my head.
Charlie Sweatpants: Actually, I think they used their A material twenty one seasons ago. What are the plots of this episode? Bart saves Krusty from jail, and Lisa is frustrated in music class during "My Country Tis of Thee"
Dave: Nailed it.
Mad Jon: Not in the mood for my not thought out sarcasm tonight are you Charlie…
But you are very correct.
I wondered out loud how many frustrated Lisa episodes there have been already…as well as Bart saves Krusty… I can think of a solid handful of each, and they would all be in the first 12 or so seasons.
Charlie Sweatpants: The entire "Lisa is frustrated" thing at the school was completely phoned in. And yet another instance of them not giving a shit about anything. She’s at a summer camp, now she’s at school, Bart’s in Europe the whole time but it’s never mentioned.
Honestly, you could’ve showed Act 4 first and Act 2 third and it would’ve made just as much sense.
Mad Jon: I didn’t even pick up on that but you’re right again, absolutely no continuity for Lisa. How long was she in Sprooklyn?
Charlie Sweatpants: Long enough for the Conchords to kill some more screen time.
Dave: 2, 3 songs?
Charlie Sweatpants: About that.
Mad Jon: That’s probably a fault of the algorithm the ‘writers’ put into the iPad app they used to write the script.
You know, to balance the equation. Or something.
2 songs probably equals homer laughing for 30 seconds.
Charlie Sweatpants: Nah, say what you want about Apple, but they take pride in their work. Zombie Simpsons, not so much.
Mad Jon: Well, I wasn’t trying to ding Apple. Just the writer’s laziness.
Charlie Sweatpants: I understand, I just don’t think Apple would be this apathetic about the quality of the finished product.
Mad Jon: I agree. You don’t get to wear a black turtleneck every day if you aren’t willing to put in the time.
Charlie Sweatpants: Ha.
I have only other thing to add, then I’d like to be done. Harry Shearer can’t do Otto’s voice any more. This is not his fault, he is in his late sixties, but it’s true.
Mad Jon: I was wondering about that.
It sounds too much like him not to be Shearer, but something was definitely wrong.
Dave: Time for a 23 minute episode to kill off Otto.
I’m sure it will be miserable.
Mad Jon: Maybe they’ll let Katy Perry’s boobs do it.
“Lisa . . . Lisa Simpson! Lisa, there’s no room for crazy bebop in ‘My Country ’Tis of Thee’.” – Mr. Largo
“But Mr. Largo, that’s what my country’s all about.” – Lisa Simpson
“What?” – Mr. Largo
“I’m wailing out for the homeless family living out of its car. The Iowa farmer whose land has been taken away by unfeeling bureaucrats. The West Virginia coal miner coughing up-” – Lisa Simpson
“That’s all fine and good, but Lisa, none of those unpleasant people are going to be at the recital next week.” – Mr. Largo
Happy 20th Anniversary to “Moaning Lisa”!
“You know, you play pretty well for someone with no real problems.” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
“Yeah, but I don’t feel any better.” – Lisa Simpson
“The blues isn’t about feeling better, it’s about making other people feel worse, and making a few bucks while you’re at it.” – Bleeding Gums Murphy
The internet is filled with people who love television and video games, and so the brief Halo/teabagging bit from last Sunday’s Zombie Simpsons was mentioned in many places. I saw it on Joystiq first, but this description from Kotaku sums things up well:
I guess we can move the trend marker for “Teabagging in Halo” on the downward trajectory of its lifespan, just to the right of the shark fin.
That’s about right, by the time Zombie Simpsons gets around to mentioning something it’s usually well past its expiration date. But this also provides a good excuse to demonstrate the pervasive laziness of what passes for jokes on Zombie Simpsons.
To illustrate just how flimsy Zombie Simpsons is we must look back to one of the thirteen underappreciated masterpieces of Season 1. In “Moaning Lisa” Homer and Bart play a boxing game against each other; last Sunday, Homer sat in his fantasy bachelor apartment playing a facsimile of Halo. Let’s compare and contrast.
Even in "Punch Out!!" you couldn't actually dance on someone's grave.
The boxing game in “Moaing Lisa” bears a vague resemblance to Mike Tyson’s Punch Out!!, far and away the most famous video boxing game of the time. But instead of simply using the game as is, the show brought its own sensibilities to it, including graphically sophisticated cartoon violence that 1990 video games couldn’t actually do. Fast forward nineteen years and there’s no creativity whatsoever to the Halo clone in “Waverly Hills 9-0-2-1-D’oh”; it’s basically a straight copy and paste job (and it’s not the only one). The game in the episode appears more or less as it does on the XBox and the “joke”, such as there is one, is to simply show something you can do in the game.
This is just another example of the collapse of humor the show has experienced over the years. Back then, it took a popularly understood video game concept, played with it a little to make it funnier, and worked it into the overall plot. Now, it takes a well understood concept, unmodified in any way and completely unrelated to anything else in the episode, and expects the audience to laugh simply because they recognize the reference. There’s no joke, there’s no satire, it’s just repetition.
Finally, let me say one quick thing as a Halo player. I’ve been been teabagged on numerous occasions (often by opponents whose voices make it abundantly clear that their testicles have yet to descend, which makes it both weirder and funnier), and I’m not above the occasional teabagging myself. So take my word for it when I say that the refreshingly crude culture of on-line games like Halo, essentially a forum for the unrestrained id of the American male, is a very rich comedy vein (witness Red vs Blue). Zombie Simpsons didn’t even try to tap it.
charliesweatpants.com
(The crotch really does wear out too fast.)
Dead Homer Society 
The Mob Has Spoken