Watching Simpsons

This week’s episode had Homer learning a valuable lesson about revenge, or rather ignoring a lesson or two about revenge. The Simpsons are taking a trip and are cut off by the king of Texas cliches. Homer immediately pulls out a bat and vows revenge. Before he can take out the sideview mirror of the offending party, Marge begins on the story of The Count of Monte Cristo. Marge takes us back to historic Paris, France. Homer and his family are enjoying French chocolate, French wine, French schooling and French accents. As you might have guessed this story follows very closely to the story of the real Monte Cristo, with a few minor adjustments. Homer is thrown in prison after Moe reveals a poem that Homer supposedly wrote about how much he loved England. Homer is sentenced to life for treason. In prison he meets old man Burns who allows Homer to use the hole he has been digging for 30 years and gives him a map to his treasure. After a few failed attempts at escaping through this rather easy escape route, Homer is finally free to build his revenge off the gold Burns left him. 5 years later, Homer springs his revenge on Moe. It is an elaborate plan that has Moe sit on a “relaxing chair” where he is first sprayed in the face with water, this kicked in the stomach, slapped in the face and finally dumped into a frying pan to be made into a crepe and then burned. Ah, sweet revenge.

The lesson to be learned here was that seeking revenge causes you to lose everything you care about.

This still doesn’t sway Homer as he bops his head to Jamacian beats from their new satellite radio.

Lisa now cuts in with her story of Revenge of the Geeks. The poor geeks of Springfield Elementary are being constantly bullied by well..the bullies. They get together and create a glove tied to a backpack. But it is no ordinary glove tied to a backpack. This model can zap any bully you desire and cause wedgies, wet willies, and other such bully tactics. Milhouse gets to use it because he learned how to juggle at camp. Milhouse goes through the whole school and zaps every enemy in sight. Soon the school is a happy place once again where no one lives in fear. But Milhouse starts to remember everyone who ever did anything to him, so he goes zap happy on the playground. But when it comes to zapping Lisa, he just can’t do it. Milhouse gives up his weapon only to have it snagged by Nelson who then zaps Milhouse.

The lesson here is that when you take revenge on your enemies, you end up as bad as your enemy. But Homer is now about to take his revenge and nothing can stop him, so Bart steps in with his tale of Bartman Begins.

Bart is the young billionaire who parents are shot by a ruthless criminal. Grandpa Simpson comes along to help Bart get his revenge. After all, Grandpa used to be the Crimson Cockatoo. Bart trains and is finally ready for battle. He takes out every conceivable enemy he meets, even the cross-dressing Lenny. Finally it is time to take revenge on the man who shot his parents, Snake. In one final battle at a swanky party, Snake goes down and Bartman stands triumphant. Lisa then asks him how he feels, expecting an answer of “empty”, “not happy” or something. Even though Bartman doesn’t have his parents back, he says he feels a little bit better and is excited about the prospect of having all that money and no parents to boss him around.

The lesson was that revenge is a good thing. But Homer and the poor Texan driver have already made amends and now stare at the stars and ask life questions of one another.

The End.
I liked the episode, but I don’t ever like episodes done in this fashion as well as just a regular episode. The story telling thing isn’t my thing I guess.

The credits then paid tribute to everyone who died in Star Wars. Let’s have a moment of silence for:

Darth Vader
Darth Maul
Greedo
Uncle Owen
Storm Trooper #5
Jango Fett
General Grievous (Droid)
Storm Trooper #22
Dak
Obi Wan (Ben) Kenobi
Whoever Jimmy Smits played
Hutt, Jabba The
Sy Snoodles
Unfortunately, Not Jar-Jar Binks
Everyone on both Death Stars when they blew up

The Simpsons, FOX, Star Wars, Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, Maggie, Bartman

-Anna