Watching Simpsons

There doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of hard news, recently, regarding The Simpsons. Any time one uses a fish related story for a blog, one gets that feeling. At any rate, somebody has put together another list of favorites. Over on myfoxcolorado.com, the staff writers put together a “Top-8” list of what they consider to be the best episodes of the show’s lengthy run. The resulting article, however, starts with the following disclaimer:

There is not one definitive list of the top episodes of the Simpsons. It would be impossible for fans and aficionados of the hit FOX television to agree on such a list.

Of the episodes chosen, one can’t argue. All of them were equally memorable and hilarious. There’s the time that Homer went into to space, but a green rod gets all the fame and glory from it. There’s also the one where Homer and Flanders actually become friends, with little hostility on Homer’s part. There are others too, but as for ranking, I agree more with the opening two sentences of the article. No list, I think, will ever win over every fan of the show.

The Simpsons, Television, Comedy, Sitcoms, Animation, Cartoons, Fox Television

Pop culture always makes for good metaphor, partly because, through the act of comparison, it can make one’s point easier to digest. For example, one can take the intricate and somewhat complicated aspects of computers and blogging, and, through a Simpsons metaphor, make the information a little more accessible to some. The key, however, is that a person needs to be fluent in the pop culture being used. So, if one were to compare the state of animation to Adult Swim’s Robot Chicken, it’s not going to work for most people, because a small group of people watch that show. (No offense meant to fans of Robot Chicken, by the way). Most people have some idea who the Simpsons are, due to their longevity on television.

So, lately, there’s been another metaphorical use of Springfield. This time, it comes from the world of sports writing. Basically, Michael Zuidema of The Grand Rapids Press has been pondering the current situation with the Detroit Tigers. To do so, he has employed a series of comparisons between baseball players and Simpsons Characters. Here are a few examples:

Curtis Granderson — Bart Simpson

Don’t have a cow, man. (Full disclosure: I once owned a Bart Simpson T-shirt that contained that phrase. I wish I could find it and wear it ironically like the people who wear fake-vintage shirts from Urban Outfitters. Wait, I have some of those, too. Man, I’m such a poseur.) Doesn’t Granderson remind you have a certain talented smart-mouth with loads of potential? Now let’s just hope Granderson isn’t an underachiever and proud of it.

Placido Polanco — Ned Flanders

Sigh, life would be so much better if Polanco would grow that iconic mustache. Because he already resembles the type of nice guy who goes out of his way to help everyone else before himself and never gets enough credit for it. Plus, Placido Polanco vaguely sounds like Hiddly-Doodly.

Gary Sheffield — Krusty the Clown

An aging star, who occasionally is accused of being cranky and appears to desperately need a hug. Plus, he’s allegedly been linked to the type of illegal substances that have Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens in hot water.

Of course, the comparisons are not complete or total. Still, Zuidema has chosen to isolate key character traits as his focus. Krusty, the joke goes, is a has-been, even though, in Springfield, he’s still widely popular. In writing about Sheffield, Zuidema is choosing to ignore that in favor of aging, crankiness, and substance abuse. Basically, Flanders is helpful, but in comparing him to Polanco, the evangelical Christianity is left out, among a few other things. Still, that’s fine. Metaphors work when they’re relatively close. Most readers fill in the rest of the meaning for themselves, anyway.

Detroit Tigers, Baseball, The Simpsons

There are many reasons why I love the show, “House.” Hugh Laurie plays a cranky doctor exceptionally well, but at this precise moment, I’m reminded of one of my favorite quotes: “Can you rephrase that in the form of a metaphor.” House, and his assistants, always wax metaphorical, partly because they have to. Much of that show deals with technical and baffling medical diagnostics, and if the show were poorly written, it would sound like Star Trek at it’s worst – filled with techno babble. A good comparative metaphor can put the scientific into layman’s terms.

That’s why I find a recent blog post over at Blogging Experiment fascinating. Ben Cook has chosen to talk about the ins and outs of blogging in an interesting way. He’s chosen to use The Simpsons as his metaphors to help make his points. For example, he mentions the fact that Homer has LOTS of hair-brained schemes, most of which fail spectacularly: gaining weight to go on disability, taking Flanders to Los Vegas, starting up a tow truck or snow plow business:

The first lesson of blogging that we get from this hilarious animated family is that not all of your plans are going to work like you expect them to. Hopefully your plans will be more thought out than Homer’s harebrained schemes but no matter how much planning and preparation you put in, things just don’t always work out like we think they should

The post is about blogging for money, or turning one’s blog into a profitable enterprise. Some of the topics covered is branding, involving a community, and paying close attention to detail. Of course, one the golden rules, when it comes to blogging, is this: create interesting content that a potential reader can’t get anywhere else. That certainly seems to be the case with that Simpsons related post. All too often, sites offering how-to advice regarding the internet get swamped with jargon, so it’s refreshing to see something else instead.

The Simpsons, Blogs, Blogging

By using Google’s “blog search”, I thought it might be interesting to take a random sampling. So, around the Internet, here are some reactions to the brand new DVD:

Over on Show Me SciFi:

Sure sure Futurama is a cartoon..and it’s funny and insolent.

But i just finished watching the new movie - Bender’s Big Score - and guess what? It’s actually really solid plot wise with a really intricate time travel plot thread that really works.

Time and time paradox have always been a part of Futurama but never in such an intricate and well thought out way.

Evan Primakow writes:

What can I say, it was great. Really, it was beyond great. I have no doubts that part of what made it a phenomenal movie was the anticipation, but even having watched it a second time, it’s still incredible. It fits perfectly with previous episodes of Futurama and fulfills any expectations I had of the movie. As with every previous episode the humor ranges from slapstick to extremely intelligent and the entire film is filled with quotable lines which I’m sure will be a part of my regular speech in due time.

Over on Popmatters:

Now, the first one is here and it was well worth the wait. Subtitled Bender’s Big Score, and featuring the return of all the original characters (including some you thought the show was through with), this revamped version of the Futurama premise remains true to its tenets.

While most of the response seems overly positive, Scott Weinberg, over at Cinematical, provides a loving bit of constructive criticism:

Owing to the fact that the movie will one day be broken down into a quartet of semi-stand-alone cable episodes, Bender’s Big Score is a convoluted, over-plotted, and structurally confused little movie. (Let’s just say it’s a lot like Back to the Future 2, only more contorted, if you can believe it.) There, that’s pretty much my only gripe: There’s almost too much going on! But given that Fry, Leela, The Professor, Bender, and (more importantly) their creators are clearly enjoying their first jolt of post-death resurrection, such a complaint can easily be forgiven. (By me, anyway.) What’s important is this: The fans will adore this mega-packed movie, because all the major stuff is there: The smart and the silly, the characters and the craftsmanship, the eye-popping and the rib-tickling. Call me a Futurama mega-nerd if you like, but Bender’s Big Score is simply one of the most WELCOME DVD releases of the year.

That’s all for now.

Futurama, Bender, Bender’s Big Score

Voice acting is a unique talent, and being able to juggle more than one voice at the same time is actually hard work. Yet, the masters of it, like Phil Hendrie, make it both look and sound so effortless. Hendrie, for those who may not know, once hosted a radio show where we played the role of host and his guest. A large chunk of the listening audience was hip to it, but Hendrie was so good at this, he quite often fooled a number of people, who bought it hook, line, and sinker. Then, they would call into the show, enraged about something stupid and controversial that Hendrie’s “guest” had said. Hilarity ensued. And, one might be able to think of The Phil Hendrie Show as a reverse prank call. Well, it’s been a few years since Phil Hendrie officially retired, although his website has remained active with mp3 updates and independent podcasts. On occasion, Hendrie has lent his talent to Matt Groening, as he’s appeared on Futurama a few times. Still, his really is rare talent, and podcasting, like radio, requires a level of craft.

Recently, this has become evident with Vox Talk, a podcast targeting voice actors. Over the summer, they hosted a Simpsons related imitation competition, and the special podcast, with the resulting winners, is now available. A lot of the imitations are close, but definitely not spot on. Still, a lot of the voices featured jump in and out of character, and that definitely is the interesting thing here. It may sound a little schizophrenic, but try it sometimes. It’s a far from easy feat.

The writers strike, beyond the talk shows, has yet to be felt among the sitcoms. As has been mentioned everywhere else, shows like The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, The Colbert Report, and Conan O’Brien have to come up with content more often and more quickly then live action and animated comedies and dramas do. Still, I have often asked myself what I would do when the strike ever touches The Simpsons. New episodes are always welcome, but since the show is so old now, watching it in syndication or even off of DVD most often provides a chance to view missed episodes, or even one that have been forgotten.

Yet, that’s never enough. For some, there will always be a thirst for fresh Simpsons and Futurama content. If that’s the case, there’s always Groening’s considerable publishing empire, and those are always a good tool for scratching the intermittent Simpsons itch, especially the Bongo Comics line and collections available at book and comic stores just about anywhere. In truth, reading a Simpsons or Futurama – or other Bongo titles like Radioactive Man – is a lot like reading story boards for episodes that were never made. The hilarity is still there, and to a degree, the comics are not constrained by time limits or television program formatting. But then again, comics are sequential imagery, and in the end, they do not take the place of the animated shows.

That said, there’s a very useful Simpsons blog out there, when it comes to Bongo Comics and all it’s Simpsons and Futurama related titles. When Bongos Collide provides an exhaustive source of info and links. Plus, The Simpsons Channel, a more generalized Simpsons-centered blog, features a monthly round up which comics has been released, giving every episode a short synopsis.

The Simpsons, Futurama, Bongo Comics, Comic Books

Can’t Get Enough of Futurama, which looks to be one a pretty exhaustive, in depth Futurama blog, has an interesting interview with producer David X. Cohen. Here’s Cohen on Bender’s Big Score, as well as the other Futurama movies about to come out:

The goal was to maintain the tone of the show while giving the overall presentation a more cinematic feel. For that reason, we went to widescreen for the first time ever, and mixed the audio in 5.1 surround sound. The writing process was largely the same, however — just supersized. All of the writers on this project were veterans of the series, so I think it will feel pretty consistent… at least, no less consistent than when we were on the air. And the animation is beautiful.

Of course, the movie is a different format then the TV episodes:

Going to feature length was definitely a challenge. But there were benefits, too, since in virtually every one of our original episodes, we had trouble cramming the plot into 22 minutes, because we were almost always going for grand, movie-like stories anyway. So on one hand it was a relief to have more room to maneuver; on the other hand, we were in uncharted territory.

I’d wager the producers of The Simpsons Movie probably faced similar challenges.

Television is filled with absurdities, sometimes. Take Maggie Simpsons, for a moment. She’s absolutely one of the smartest toddlers on television. Think about it for a moment, she’s managed to shoot Mr. Burns, and on other occasions, escape day care, and even rescue her dad from a tow truck guy’s basement prison. These feats alone bespeak of an intelligence far more advanced than a mere two or three year told. And that’s kind of where a touch of irony comes in. For all of Lisa’s social awareness, the smartest of the Simpsons clan is the one that fall downs a lot and sucks on a pacifier. Yet, in one of the strangest touches, the writers of the show decided that Maggie needed a rival, a natural enemy. And so, the gag about the baby with black eyebrow was born. It’s probably one of the most pointless thing in the show – even if the segment was kind-of funny. Most of their “feud” consisted of the two infants glaring at each other.

Still, as pointless as “Maggie vs. Unibrow” is, it didn’t make the top ten list posted on bspcn.com. Neither did Bart’s pranks calls to Moe. Still, what the site has listed as “The Top Ten Pointless Feuds” is still instructive, and rather funny. Number seven is Wile E. Coyote vs. The Road Runner, where a chase usually ends with a poof of smoke at the bottom of a canyon. The listed number one, however, is even more instructive:

Ned Flanders is a completely selfless, moral, upstanding citizen to every fellow human he meets, free of anger and vulgarity and incapable of any action other than compassion, and yet, Homer Simpson’s unbridled hatred for Old Painty Can Ned is completely and utterly believable. No matter how many times Homer forgets the name of his third child or gets pulled over for a DUI or makes his daughter’s suitors tar his roof, every child in the world would choose his love over Ned Flanders’ locked-out satellite dish and unflavored ice milk. It’s the most unique, humorous, and impossibly relatable rivalry in contemporary history, and I would compare it to the readers’ inherent fascination with Othello’s rival Iago, but I’m just not sure Shakespeare’s quite on that level.

There’s a great point to that. After all, most rivalries between neighbors are as pointless as they are petty. Homer is jealous, even so much that he wrote an annoying song about Flanders.

The Simpsons, Homer Simpson, Ned Flanders, Maggie Simpson, rivalry

With the new game out there, it’s interesting to take a quick, ramdom sampling of the reactions found on technorati:

at Gosu 7, there’s a sharply critical take. This is the intro, followed by bullet points:

While The Simpsons has enjoyed a fairly healthy video-game franchise- from its early arcade roots to Hit and Run and Road Rage, the formula has finally started to become stale. Knowing that, The Simpsons Game is a parody on video games itself, with the comic book storekeep calling attention to blatant cliches…the only problem? The game itself is a cliche.

Over on Loot Ninja, there’s this more positive take:

This game is made for Simpsons fans to enjoy the humor, the gameplay could have used some work from what I have seen so far, but for the parts I got to play with my friend (before my Xbox died!) was pretty fun. It is the equivalent of watching a Simpson’s episode.

Variety has the following to say:

There’s nothing groundbreaking in the gameplay, which involves a lot of puzzle-solving and simple fighting, but it works well enough in service to the comedy, which is the point. Offline co-op play is an option, but hardly necessary, as the game is quite easy. On the rare occasions when players die, they’re greeted by Nelson’s trademark “Ha ha!”

Graphics are excellent, and all of the characters feature authentic voices. Oddly, however, half the pre-animated cut-scenes look like rough drafts that were never completed.

The only other serious complaint that can be lodged against “The Simpsons Game” is the number of targets it didn’t get around to parodying. Where’s “Halo”? Or “Guitar Hero”? One can only hope the Simpsons will live half as long in interactive form as they have on TV, so they can get around to skewering those games and all the deserving ones yet to come.

The AV Club is also critical:

Early hype for The Simpsons Game promised it would be a clever, Simpsons-style satire-from-within about the game industry. Instead, it’s blunt, dumb, ridiculous, and almost never funny. Never mind that this action platformer is buggy, dull, and handles like wet cardboard, or that the faces look like they were drawn on an Etch-A-Sketch. A weak game could pass, if only it had some good laughs.

At anyrate, a consensus seems that the game is a little lackluster. I must admit though, the concept of satire itself was funny, at least.

The Simpsons, The Simpsons Game, Games, Consoles

Mark Justice, who hosts Pod of Horror, the most informative and entertaining horror podcast out there, is also an avid collector of comic books and old pulps – Doc Savage, The Shadow, old crime noir, superheroes, and much more. His blog, I Was A Bronze Age Boy, always has interesting content, whether it’s Justice’s informed reviews of vintage novels, or some of the strangest, and the most interesting, old comic book and paperback covers. These alone make stopping by his blog well worth the visit. After all, he posts everything from Lois Lane covers (with her having, for some strange reason, hairy and clawed feet) to westerns and old sleaze – which was written in the 1950’s, with a 1950’s sensibility of things that just make their “Scandalous” nature utterly hilarious.

On his blog, however, I found something truly fascinating, as it relates to The Simpsons. Matt Groening, if we sit through enough of Fry and Bender’s adventures in Futurama, must have loved old-school science fiction. It goes much further than that, however. Kang and Kodos, those lovable aliens who want to take over and dominate Earth in most Tree House of Horror episodes had their predecessors and precursors. Notice, in the graphics posted below, the striking similarity between the pulp aliens and the ones from the cartoon. Remarkable, isn’t it? Of course, I can’t prove that if any of the Simpsons creators saw this cover at any time in their life. Still, I like to think of this as further proof as to how deep, sometimes into obscurity, that the Simpsons ventures with their satire.

The Simpsons, science fiction, sci fi, aliens, Kang, Kodos

When the Simpsons Movie came out, there was a lot of interesting marketing that took place. The Burger King ads were largely a success. Homer did a guest spot on Leno, where he tried to guest host and bombed with a bunch of stale jokes. There were plenty of other ways that Groening and Fox tried to shill the movie, but one of the most interesting, by far, was 7-11’s willingness to remodel a few select stores into “Kwik-E Marts.” These strange portals into “Springfield,” covered most every aspects, from changing “Slurpees” into “Squishees” to stocking Homer’s favorite Duff Beer and life sized cut outs of Simpsons notables like Apu, Chief Wiggum, Comic Book Guy, and a few others. These stores brought out the ardent Simpsons fans, as well as curiosity seekers. The sad thing, however, was not everybody lived next to one of these places.

Well, the value of the internet, it seems, is that there’s just about everything for a blog these days. Somebody, it seems, chose to blog the Kwik-E Mart experience, and posted lots of pictures of the stores, with descriptions, at simpsonskwikemart.blogspot.com. (That’s where the “El Barto” graffiti picture from above comes from). The blog itself has finite coverage, as it contains only eleven posts from the month of July. Still, really, that’s all that’s needed. One gets a good sense from the posts what the real life Kwik-E Mart experience entailed. The time limit on these stores has come and gone. The movie has come in and out of theaters, and one doubts that DVD release will get the same treatment.

Simpsons, blogs, 7-11, stores, The Simpsons Movie

The Simpsons