(originally aired April 22, 2007)
Another good episode? And J. Stewart Burns writing two in a row? What is going on? Despite a few quibbles, mainly with the A-story, both plots here are fairly well constructed, work within our characters, and provide a fair amount of laughs. Just as her husband did five years prior, Marge discovers the world of the Internet and quickly becomes hooked, in a lame, very Marge way, finding cheap prices for paper towels and sending holiday e-cards. She stumbles into a game called Earthland Realms, an MMORPG similar to games like Everquest or World of Warcraft. Of course we see our regular characters are all playing for some reason, but at least they all give explanations for why they’re there, like Mrs. Krabappel looking to find a man who can afford a computer. Then there’s appearances by Skinner, Sideshow Mel, Smithers, people I don’t think would waste their time with this stuff. But it’s par for the course to have some of our regulars here, so I don’t mind that much. The main thrust is that Bart is this super powerful warlord in the game, and Marge ends up finding a way to extend her overbearing mothering into the virtual world. Bart ends up accidentally killing Marge’s character, and to make things right, he sacrifices most of his life bar to revive her, leaving his avatar to be mercilessly slaughtered by the other players. A simple resolution, but done pretty effectively.
I actually really love the B-story, despite a somewhat rocky start. Lisa has taken up soccer, but there’s no referee. Who will step in? That wacky Homer of course, as we see a montage of him ripping off his sports bra and vomiting in an orange cone. But once we get past that, we get the actual story, where Lisa finds she can exploit Homer’s favoritism to cheat at the game. It’s startling nowadays to see her actually act like a kid, and even though it’s pretty dicey to have her act this self-serving, it’s still within the realm of an eight-year-old to act. Homer actually becomes a competent ref, and when Lisa’s transgressions are exposed, he throws her from the game. Even the superfluous guest spot is amusing: Brazilian soccer star Ronaldo singles Lisa out as a “flip-flopper,” but his acting is so wonderfully bad, and his character so unusually malicious, it ends up being pretty funny (“Another family broken up by Ronaldo. Yes!”) To make amends, Homer gets Lisa a PBS tape about the violent history of the sport, and in the end, Lisa apologizes to her father for the way she acted. I’m beside myself with this premise; Homer doesn’t irritate the shit out of me… instead, I empathize with him. And Lisa acts like a bratty kid, and then learns a lesson and we still love her too. I liked “Homerazzi,” but I think this subplot is the best thing I’ve seen on the show since the classic years. Good show, Mr. Stewart Burns.
Tidbits and Quotes
– I love how Marge comments how she can make her avatar into anyone she wants, then just proceeds to make it look just like her, as does everyone else in the game, apparently. It’s like in simulation games like The Sims where people make little virtual versions of themselves, when really the options for character creation are endless.
– It’s odd to see Dr. Nick make a cameo in the game as a dismembered head. We really haven’t seen much of him lately. And then he’ll be killed again in the movie, for real. Or not. I’m sure made a reappearance at some point.
– I really like the bits of Marge smothering Bart in the game, it’s pretty adorable (“What a fun quest! Aren’t you glad I made you take that nap in the middle?”)
– Lisa cites she was inspired to take up soccer by Bend It Like Beckham. It’s odd that in the flashback we see Apu stand up in approval of an arranged marriage in the film, considering how he tried so desperately to wriggle out of his own.
– I love how pissed Helen Lovejoy is at Homer discrediting her daughter (“You are so blind even Jesus couldn’t heal you!” “Helen, please, don’t drop the J-bomb.”) And I really mean no disrespect, but the way Ronaldo reads his lines is so off, but it’s hysterical (“Now, Ronaldo away!”)
– The scene of Bart and Homer ending up on the couch, both in hot water by the Simpson women, is fantastic. The conflicts are believable, and the two take a momentary solace in each other’s company (“I’ll never understand women if I live to be forty.” “Big ‘if.'” “You said it. Enjoy me while I last!”) Hey, these two are actually kind of amicable instead of being antagonists to each other! There’s a lot of small bits in this episode that echo to the golden years. Even the part with the phony Moe and the real one tied up in the back room was just the right amount of bizarre to still be funny.
Me Blog Write Good 
Enjoy the fun while it lasts because you have to deal with Jerkass Springfield come next episode
I’m probably the only person in the face of the Earth that LIKES “The Boys of Bummer”. Really curious to read your review on that one.
Jave what’s your reasons for liking the episode?
First I’ll say I understand why people don’t like the episode. It is rather cruel and focused on dark humor, but I like dark humor if done right.
I mostly see the episode as a satire on obsessed sports fans, who take a simple mistake in a match that costs them the whole game to ridiculous levels, as if their whole lives are ruined because of this. I think that viewed from that angle the episode works, because, well, the satire is pretty spot-on. I’ve seen examples in real life of people that have flunked not as bad yet humiliated worse.
The setup to Bart getting humiliated is also executed well. At the beginning of the episode, in the previous game, Bart steals a catch from Milhouse that makes them win the game. So Bart being a show-off earlier helps mitigate feeling bad for him.
Also, look at how Bart messes up the catch. He totally makes a fool of himself. So even if the crowd wouldn’t have humiliated him, he did it to himself in the end.
Getting past that, a lot of the episode moves on jokes. My favorite moment is the second act break, with Bart falling off the billboard and LaBoot trying to catch him but misses. Grandpa passes by and yells “You still stink, LaBoot!” “Damn!”. Perfect timing. Also loved the joke where after Marge chastises the crowd for humiliating Bart, someone pulls a sign that reads “We’re sorry”. It was done before in “Brother From Another Series”, but here it’s executed differently so I let it pass.
Finally, I like the ending. It’s stupidly absurd, but in the context of the story it fits. The montage of Bart missing the catch on so many different ways is hilarious, my favorites being Homer catching the ball and the Charlie Brown one. And by the time it’s over, nobody cares anymore. Possibly the best outcome for Bart since in the end, he got off easy. The future ending with old Bart and Milhouse and dead Homer and Marge WAS a bit too much, though.
I feel the episode gets a huge bad rep it doesn’t deserve because people see the “Everyone is mean to Bart!” aspect and dismiss everything else (I know at least one guy on Toonzone refused to watch the episode after reading the description), when in reality I find the episode to be very well written.
Oh yeah, the “Homer gets yet another job” subplot. It was okay. Not the best, but fine for filler. I just didn’t like that it was something they could have fit into any other episode, with no connection to the Bart plot. But on its own, I didn’t mind.
While I get where you are coming from Jave, and I agree, people take sports way too seriously, it’s just not funny. Dark comedies are still supposed to be funny, and this one ain’t. It’s as bad as Million Dollar Abie was last season.
I’ve only seen this one a couple times, but I recall it having a really bad act break: “I was killed in the game, by my own son!” Way to state what we the audience already know, Marge.
I can’t remember who copied whom, but the MMORPG plot (complete with characters looking like themselves in the game, with the same voices) also happened on American Dad and King of the Hill around the same time. Always so odd when all the Fox comedies do the same specific story.
^ Yeah, I brought up that issue in the G-I-D’oh post as well.
One thing I was disappointed about with this episode is that the MMORPG didn’t look that much different from the regular Simpsons universe, from an art style standpoint. At least on American Dad, we got unique visuals not usually seen on the show to emphasize the differences.
Yeah, but then people would have complained that they ripped off South Park and American Dad (honestly though, I do not remember AD doing one) more than they already did.
This episode was awesome back when it first aired and it is till awesome to this day. I love the mockery of WoW and those who get addicted to it. I also love Marge’s addiction to the internet with her whole, “Oh no, I wasted a whole night,” and then Bart jokes about it being Sat. That makes two great episodes in a row…
UGH! There is absolutely nothing – NOTHING! special about this episode!
Nope, hate this one. The Ronaldo cameo is one of my mosted despised moments in the show’s history. Maybe it’s just that the football fan side of me wants to curl up and die at the use of the term “flopper” instead of “diver”. Is that an American expression?
Never heard it before – probably just a word they made up out of nowhere. Also, the fact that they use the word “soccer” isn’t enough for a complaint, as that’s what they call it in America so yeah, why not use it?
What a crap episode. So every character of Springfield play that online game? Another situation where they are needed only to do their visual dumb joke.
And once again Lisa is out of character here. Writers can’t write for a kid which is both precocious and innocent, so in this episode she’s in her helpless kid mode. Pathetic writing.
It may be the best episode outside the classic years, but it’s ultimately just a lesser version of South Park’s “Make Love, Not Warcraft”.
I decided to watch this one because you liked it, and, unfortunately, I was incredibly bored by it. It’s another Zombie Simpsons episode, full of nonsensical stuff:
-In the MMO, how much does it take for Marge to go to any place?
-How did she (and the other players) know where was Bart’s dungeon located?
-Why can the Springfield players do in this MMO what even the most realistic MMO available today hasn’t implemented yet? Remember, way back in “The Simpsons”, when videogames looked at least a little like contemporary videogames?
-Why didn’t we see players from Shelbyville, Capital City or from any other part of the U.S.?
-Why the other players didn’t riot Bart’s dungeon until they magically know he revived her mother and lost a lot of his life bar?
-Why would Bart be the best player? I could accept CBG. Oh well, yet another Zombiesode with a Simpson member being the best at something.
-Why didn’t Marge know her son spends hours playing a MMO?
-Did Bart tell Marge he was gonna revive her? Because after giving his energy, Marge’s character starts moving.
-Why couldn’t Marge create another character? Why would Bart care about the older one?
And those are only from the A-plot, because the B-plot is pure garbage. Plus expository dialogue, directionless plots, overexplained jokes, etc. There was two or three decent ideas buried here (one of them being Lisa exploiting her father’s favouritism), but it’s an unimaginative piece of crap, as always.
What it made me angry was this:
“I love how Marge comments how she can make her avatar into anyone she wants, then just proceeds to make it look just like her, as does everyone else in the game, apparently. It’s like in simulation games like The Sims where people make little virtual versions of themselves, when really the options for character creation are endless.”
That’s a clever joke and a very Marge thing to do, and then it was ruined by making Apu, Edna and others have their same faces as in real life. Skinner? OK (why would he play the game, that’s another story). Edna? I can still buy it. Apu or Bart? No fucking way.
The main plot had nothing going for me. What I like most about this episode is the subplot: like you said, Lisa letting her childish side show for once, Homer being competent at something (well, just enough that he doesn’t break character), and most of all, Homer trying to do right by one of his kids after fucking things up for the umpteenth time. Also, Ronaldo used to be one of my childhood idols (I’ve always been a huge soccer geek, what with being Brazilian and all), and seeing him here gave me a bit of a fuzzy feeling, even though he was entering the twilight years of his career by the time this episode aired. All in all, nothing memorable, but a shiny nugget in the sea of crap that was this season (although the two or three preceding seasons are much worse in my opinion).
Oh, and for some unknown reason, I like how Marge finds her house on what looks like Google Earth (mainly because I’ve done that myself) and finds Homer lying naked on a hammock in the backyard.
Wow, the comments section is like… odd. There’s all these postives and then suddenly the lower you get, the more the hate comes out. I’m sorry, but I feel like some of you hated the episode just because it is a modern Simpsons one rather than because it wasn’t written up to your impossible standards.
Does Marge really need to know that her son is playing an online RPG? She didn’t even know what the internet really was. How would she know her son is playing a game on that? Why is that important for her to know?
For Bart’s palace, she probably looked on the map or asked someone. Have you ever played a video game before?
Also, why does it matter if Bart is the best player in the game or not? It was a commentary on how some of a game’s biggest trolls are just kids.
Anyway, I thought this episode was fantastic. One of the best episodes the show has had in years and everything that dealt with the online game was great. As for your question Mike as to why Skinner would be in the game, since Krabappel was, it makes sense that Skinner wanted to try to win her love back. As for Burns, I bet he is playing out of boredom while we all know Moe is lonely, so of course he would play it.
Now for the B plot with Homer and Lisa, it stinks. First off, it doesn’t help that it was an episode featuring soccer, one of the dumbest sports out there. Secondly, Lisa was out of character, but I will agree that at least she was acting like a child. Third, that soccer player guest star was stupid as hell as it seemed like they were sucking his dick rather than doing anything funny with him. Lastly, it was just the plot of “Bart Star” all over again but with soccer. JOY!
BTW. is this the first episode to feature Adaggio of Strings? That song gets played a lot in the show these days but I don’t recall it being used before this one.
“I’m sorry, but I feel like some of you hated the episode just because it is a modern Simpsons one rather than because it wasn’t written up to your impossible standards. ”
You may be a teacher and I respect you (and many comments of yours), but please, stop with judging other people everytime only because your standard is really low (I mean, have you ever read what kind of arbitrary justification you come up with with the episodes you like? Here with Moe, Kabrappel, Burns, playing a fucking Online Game? What? Like in real world everyone play those games… ridiculous). Who told you my standard is high? I just want a DECENT episode at this point. If anything being biased against it should help the show when I watch it.
I never played Online games, and know none who play those stuff; still I highly enjoyed South Park episode about it. Here, it is just like one of those utterly boring Trilogy Episodes with characters put in a context, no matter if it make sense, we just need them to say their dumb jokes about gaming! LOL HILARIOUS!
I’d rather watch that abomination of Kill the Alligator and Run. At least it’s not boring and predictable.
Ugh, I know this one is characteristically lazy. Even the catalyst to Marge discovering the game (hitting refresh to make the ad banners change) is lazy. They do the bare minimum with the game itself. It’s so generic medieval fantasy I think it’s unintentional parody and the characters only do the same thing in the game as their players do in their real lives, yet…
I can totally nerd out to this one! Every gamer dreams of being in their games at some point. It may even be the future. I love that The Simpsons did this. When I bought Season 18 it’s only ’cause it was the only one in the shop and I was DVD collecting at the time. I’m glad I happened to buy the season with this one on it. A really fun little episode even though the B-plot pretty much blows for me, topped off by a celebrity footballer playing in the Simpsons’ backyard at the end for no apparent reason.
Interesting comments section indeed…
My take is: A load of crap. I’m staggered how Mike and how others find this episode to be ‘best since the classic years’ worthy. What exactly was so good about it? Standard level of comedy for Season 18, piss poor characterisation all the way through, plots you simply didn’t care about and believability missing throughout. And most of all like Al Jean Simpsons – lazy.
Everything’s so lazy. For example, with Homer – there really is a sweet spot in regards to his stupidity and selfishness which the classic years more often than not absolutely nailed. 1998 onwards, the writers either knowingly or unknowingly miss this sweet spot so, so often. What they do is they exaggerate everything. Why? Because it’s easier… it requires less effort. And as we’ve seen over the years, the likeability of Homer has dropped massively. Because they were too lazy to aim for the sweet spot, they went for the food monster, psychotic selfish retarded maniac.
Why am I focusing on Homer when he actually wasn’t too bad in this episode? Well, he was still an unfunny jerk in that montage, but at least it was serving a point storywise… not really an excuse but eh. Anyway, my wider sentiment is that the show is lazy and even though Homer’s characterisation wasn’t dreadful in this episode, Lisa and to a lesser extent Marge’s was. It’s interesting that due to the severe lazy writing of Lisa over the years making her this rather astutely put, ‘PC thug’ – that anything not ‘that’, is crowned as good, crowned as child like. However, it doesn’t mean it’s in character for Lisa.
I’m not saying Lisa couldn’t ever cheat in sports – but she needs a Lisa motivation. A ‘for the greater good’ reason, to try and level up injustice or due to an already known character flaw. Take for example ‘Lisa Gets an A’… she cheats in that episode but she does so out of her own paranoid fears of being educationally inadequate which has been established in the show since the beginning. Then the decision not to tell the truth is solidified because the school needs the outstanding grade to fund their computer lab which will help other children learn.
“Mmmm… that’s good character led motivation!!”
What we have in Marge Gamer is… well we have nothing. Lisa just randomly decides she’s going to cheat to win and when her Dad realises it’s not fair, she claims he’s ruined her life? Like WTF?? Mike, are you reading this? What’s going on buddy? How is this adored by you? Yeah, at the end she realises she was wrong but we saw no soul searching, we saw no exploration into why Lisa was acting the way she did. IF for example, this hissy fit was an entry into a bigger problem in Lisa’s life at the moment, then again that’s fair enough but we got none of that. The show just doesn’t care.
It also doesn’t care that Marge is genuinely pissed off because her Son ACCIDENTALLY killed her in a VIDEOGAME. Again, I would have bought it if Marge was cramping Bart’s style in the videogame and he actually did decide to kill her character (Or be behind another in game character killing her). Then Marge could be upset and it becomes an interesting debate. Sometimes 10 year old’s need space to be 10 and here Bart had found a place where the chaos he was creating wasn’t hurting any real people. And eventually Marge realises she suffocating him. There’s genuinely something in that. Better than this crap.
AND make the videogame footage look like videogame footage please. So fucking LAZY. The show made Homer 3d in 1995, we’re in 2007 and the show can’t be bothered to do anything interesting. By changing the animation, it would automatically engage the audience more and make it (ironically) feel more real to us.
Season 18 is easily the worst season so far. I’m not sure if it was because they were focusing on the movie at the same time but it really is a drop off from an already poor level. So I was looking forward to re-watching an episode (After 14 years) which was raved about – and I’m just confused. And I’ve not even mentioned Ronaldo in their backyard.