Season Five Revisited (Part Three)

11. Homer the Vigilante

• It’s funny watching now that Bart’s most prized possession was his very small portable TV. I remember having one of those in my room as a kid.
• Nelson delivering his “Haw haw!” via telephone to Bart is not only a great joke, but a great example of how at this point, the show acknowledges its own running jokes by exaggerating them to the nth degree. “Haw haw!” was only a little over two seasons old, and they’re already making fun of it. Later this season, they do an even crazier version of this joke where Nelson literally has an out-of-body experience to laugh at Bart from miles away. It’s just interesting how they were already demonstrating how played out these gags are, and meanwhile over twenty years later, they will continue to come up with new variations of “Haw haw!” after the joke has already been done to death.
• Chief Wiggum erroneously reports the Simpsons’ robbery at 723 Evergreen Terrace. What was the episode that locked in their actual address? We’re midway into season 5 and it’s still not set in stone yet.
• The scene of Professor Frink’s walking house model bursting into flames is absurd enough (“The real humans wouldn’t burn quite so fast…”), but it becomes even funnier that in the next scene we see the real walking house that breaks down the exact same way. One of the show’s greatest immediate callbacks.
• “Lisa, never, ever stop in the middle of a hoedown!”
  
• I like out of all of Homer’s gang’s brought-from-home uniforms, Barney’s is clearly one from a fast food restaurant.
• This episode is another great usage of Homer as “the bad guy” in perfectly representing the average American. He and his crew quickly abuse their power, relishing in being unchecked authority figures, just like real-life neighborhood watches or absolute psychopaths who harass or even kill people in public for “justifiable” reasons. Jimbo accurately surmises this absolutely pathetic mindset (“It makes me feel like a big man.”)
• The pause after “I’d be lying if I said my men weren’t committing any crimes!” is just the perfect length before Kent finally responds.
• Sam Neill feels like an underrated guest star. I’m honestly not that familiar with him outside of Jurassic Park, and Taika Waititi’s wonderful Hunt for the Wilderpeople, but he gives a very subtle, charismatic performance. You want to let him off the hook just as much as the mush-headed people of Springfield do.
• “Professor, without knowing precisely what the danger is, would you say it’s time for our viewers to crack each other’s heads open and feast on the goo inside?” “Yes I would, Kent.”
• The Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World ending mostly works. As an homage to a movie featuring a wacky cast of easily manipulated people getting tricked by their sense of greed, it definitely fits contextually with the ending of the episode. But then you have them directly recreating the bit of Phil Silvers’ car drowning in the lake, with Bart replacing the waving kid. It’s funny on its own, I guess, but it really makes no sense if you don’t know the source material.

12. Bart Gets Famous

• “‘Today will be a day like every other day.’ D’oh! It just gets worse and worse!” This always stands out as an essential Homer quote to me, a man who enjoys life’s simpler pleasures, but is always painfully aware of his sorry lot in life. When later seasons would depict Homer as too carefree or becoming an immediate success at something, I’d always think back to this quote.
• The Box Factory may be the funniest individual set piece of the whole series. Every single line the tour guide gives is so damn good, from him talking about how the completed boxes are actually done in Flint, to talking about how the neighboring TV station films “Krusty the Klown and other non-box-related programs.” The best bit is the tour of his office. The fact that he has a yellow line painted on the floor indicates how much he’s devoted to this tour, and I love that.
• When I was younger, I had a tie featuring a mostly naked Homer saying, “You’ll have to speak up, I’m wearing a towel.” What a bizarre joke to put on a tie, and even more bizarre for a kid to wear said tie to their 8th grade dance. 
• I love the gag revealing Bumblebee Man’s real accent, as well as the first act break callback where he subs in for a disgruntled Kent Brockman. Also, isn’t he on Channel 6’s competitor station, Channel Ocho? What’s he doing filming on their set?
• Two great Homer deliveries related to the box factory: his loud, passionate “Damn you! A box!!” and his panicked build-up to Marge about their poor box boy (“I have some terrible, bone-chilling news!!”)
• It’s great that Homer’s rant about poor people is met with complete silence by the rest of the family, who just continue to have their conversation as normal
• The gag where Bart desperately tries to point his name out in the credits reminded me of how annoyed I was when I was younger when networks would squish credits to the side of the screen. I was of the belief that it’s “disrespectful” to the crew that worked on it, which is a fair point, but looking back on it, the aesthetics of having the credits on one side and a commercial on the other just looks off to me. It’s become even worse in recent days, in the few bits of live TV I’ve seen, where they have the credits play at 500% speed at the very bottom of the screen as the next program has already started. It looks like absolute shit. Anyway, I like how Nelson stands up for the hard-working crew of Krusty’s show by punching Bart in solidarity (“That’s for taking credit for other people’s work!”)
• I love how absolutely remorseless Krusty is in abusing Bart through the entire episode: overworking a child to the point of them longing for death in act two, and shamelessly exploiting his image for his own gain in act three. Then when he ceases to be useful to him, he slams the door in Bart’s face. That’s show business, kid.
• I’d love to hear the full recording of Dan Castellaneta doing Sideshow Mel’s nauseous ranting from the bathroom.
• This frame has been used for a bunch of different shitpost trends. A recent, topical example would be, “All the other networks waiting for FOX News to call it for Biden.”
  
• “Ah, Oliver North. He was just poured into that uniform.” Totally forgot about this line. I guess Homer’s man crush on Oliver North confirmed? C’mon, Homie, you can do better.
• I think they wrote the Conan bit before his new show even premiered, but it makes me happy to think how thrilled the writing staff was for their friend to get his own late night show, that they jumped at the chance to honor him at his old stomping grounds at The Simpsons. And, of course, we get the classic line, “Sit perfectly still. Only I may dance.”
  
• I like that toward the end of this goofy episode, we actually get a real emotional beat with Bart feeling discouraged that he’s just some flash-in-the-pan fad with a dumb catchphrase (also very meta as well.) I feel like later versions of Bart would make him more ignorantly bratty in his success, but I like that he has enough self-awareness to feel some shame about his integrity. But of course, he bounces back  (“I’m in television now. It’s my job to be repetitive. My job. My job. Repetitiveness is my job.”) When I’m not angrily reviewing new Simpsons episodes through gritted teeth, I cut promos and trailers, and whenever I worry about leaning on the same editing tricks or reusing the same sound effects one too many times, I always think back to that Bart quote. It’s my job. My job. My job.
• I just talked about the show making fun of Nelson’s “Haw haw!,” and here, the entire ending is making fun of all of the show’s overused catchphrases. Again, when you reach this level of self-awareness, it feels like you should be nearing the end of your run, or you need to come up with some new material. It’ll be interesting going through these seasons again and seeing how the show pushes past these on-the-nose self-aware moments of its own shelf life to soldier on, be it by breathing new life into itself (the Oakley/Weinstein years) or devolving into a dumb, goofy cartoon version of itself (the Mike Scully years).

13. Homer and Apu

• The Bite Back barking dog is so funny. I love how long it goes at the front and back end of the scene, and then you hear it again later when Apu comes under fire. Semi-related, did you know McGruff the Crime Dog had his own music album? I’d highly recommend listening to the whole thing, it’s incredible. The Alcohol song has a strong Steely Dan feeling, and I imagine would be a real chill listen to get hammered to.
• The animation of the hot dog rolling towards camera is so great, as it quickly gets more detailed and disgusting as it comes closer to view.
  
• “Sir, I was only following standard procedure.” “True. But it’s also standard procedure to blame any problems on a scapegoat, or sacrificial lamb.” “Uh-huh, and if I can obtain for you these animals?”
• At the start of act two, Homer gives a prolonged plea for his life to Apu, but in that time, Apu is just frozen in place, still with an angry scowl and gritted teeth. Obviously it’s just a held frame before he gets to speak, but it always feels weird to me, given he’s immediately apologetic and explains the bait-and-switch joke of him asking for forgiveness, despite the fact he was just staring daggers at a begging Homer for five seconds. Apu was right, many probably have died needlessly.
• Ah, James Woods. Despite being exposed in the last few years as a complete piece of shit, he’s really one of the funniest guest stars. His delivery and cadence are so good, and he totally elevates every line of dialogue he has. Him telling Jimbo not to jerk him around, having a one-sided conversation with his agent, cursing loudly about the cheese in the microwave, all great stuff.
• It’s always funny to me hearing the Simpsons talk about picking up simple grocery items at the Kwik-E-Mart when they have an actual grocery store in town. Springfield’s geography is purposefully inconsistent, but I assume the Kwik-E-Mart is within a short distance to the house that if Marge needed to pick up a carton of milk or some other food item real quick, it’s more convenient to go there than drive to the grocery store. I grew up in a suburb, so this concept might be a bit alien to me, but do people in smaller towns go to 7-Elevens or other gas station stores to pick up basic groceries? The Kwik-E-Mart is a convenience store, so I guess it could also sub in for like a local corner store, but more often than not, it feels like a place to just buy a bunch of junk food on impulse.
• Monstro-Mart’s slogan always makes me laugh (“Where Shopping is a Baffling Ordeal”)
• “That’s even worse than the album Grampa released.” Now that’s an episode I’d like to see. What a bizarre line, I’d forgotten all about that.
• “Who Needs the Kwik-E-Mart” is still one of the classic show tunes. I love Hank Azaria’s sorrowful “I doooooo” in the reprise, almost like a sad dog howling, and of course, Homer’s anger at being lied to through song (“I hate when people do that!”)
• It’s almost funny how casually Homer and Apu just up and fly to India for just a few minutes of screen time and then they go home. 
• Another praise for Azaria for Apu’s hummingbird noises. I’m always a fan of using the doppler effect for comedy, so hearing that “eeeeeee” fade in and out is incredibly funny to me.
  
• Why is the robber who shoots Apu not Snake? He’s literally held him up at gunpoint at least a dozen times by now. Maybe it felt too real to show him actually do it, and they decided to replace him with some nameless mook (“Well, Mr. Woods, your next song is gonna be number three, with a bullet!” “I’m not a singer.” “Shut up!”)

14. Lisa vs. Malibu Stacey

• My only knowledge of Matlock comes from it being referenced on this show as something old people like, so I was surprised not only to find the title character was played by Andy Griffith, but it was an at-the-time currently running series, ending in 1995. I always assumed it was an older show that seniors had nostalgia for, but now, seeing that it’s about a heroic older attorney, I totally get why such a show would be revered by the elderly.
• The moment Homer stepped on the giant piano, my brain immediately played yet another amazing Dankmus remix. Also, I have never seen Big. Does that movie hold up?
• God, I could listen to Abe’s rants forever. Act one is just full of him rambling on and on and on and I love it (“There’re sure a lot of ugly people in your neighborhood. Oh! Look at that one!”)
• This camera move is really tremendous, just capping off Lisa’s frustration. I also love before this when she’s shaking the doll in Bart’s face, there’s extra attention paid to Stacey’s ruffled hair being flung back and forth, really emphasizing Lisa’s shaking.
  
• Once again, the show is examining its own tropes and characters in showing the family getting a bit tired of Lisa’s frequent moral stances (“Ordinarily, I’d say you should stand up for what you believe in… but you’ve been doing that an awful lot lately.”) This episode is probably the pinnacle of a righteous Lisa episode, in showing her believably upset about an issue that would affect her as a child, but also realistically depicting her and those around her. Also, we get this great newspaper photo.
  
• The Malibu Stacey video calling her “America’s favorite eight-and-a-half-incher” is yet another amazing covert dirty joke.
• Kathleen Turner is another tremendous guest star, and probably the perfect person to voice Stacey Lovell (“I was forced out in 1974. They said my way of thinking just wasn’t cost effective.” “That’s awful!” “Well, that, and I was funneling profits to the Viet Cong.”) The “I’m too drunk” bit is also hilarious. I wonder if that’s actually Turner doing her own slurping drink noise.
• While Abe is doing his knee-slapping dentures-in-the-hamburger-bun bit, his sullen teenager coworker is stuck in an animation cycle of repeatedly wrapping burgers and dropping them into a bag for the drive-thru. Including the teeth burger he grabs from Abe, it’s seven burgers that we see go into the bag, which is a pretty hefty order for the drive-thru. 
• “You all have hideous hair! …I mean, from a design point of view.”
• Krusty’s VO session is one of his greatest scenes of all time, I just love how absolutely disinterested he sounds through the whole thing. Bonus points for forgetting Sideshow Mel’s name and not even skipping a beat to pick the line back up.
• The joke with Bart desperately trying to get everyone’s attention is funny in concept, like as a meta gag that he’s gone underutilized this episode and wants a spotlighted moment, but in execution, it’s kind of weird how Homer, Marge and Lovell are just kind of standing there awkwardly not saying anything while Bart goes off in the background.
• It feels very strange how much Kent Brockman’s daughter looks like him. But hey, she was right about the Berlin Wall. She’s clearly the real brains behind the family (“Though it was unusual to spend twenty-eight minutes reporting on a doll, this reporter found it impossible to stop talking. It’s just really fascinating news, folks.”)
• I really don’t know how this show manages to have its cake and eat it too in regards to having moralistic endings and undercut them at the same time without undermining the emotion, but my God, when it does, it’s just perfect (“You know, if we get through to just that one little girl, it’ll all be worth it.” “Yes. Particularly if that little girl happens to pay $46,000 for that doll.” “What?” “Oh, nothing.”)

15. Deep Space Homer

• “Union rule 26: Every employee must win ‘Worker of the Week’ at least once, regardless of gross incompetence, obesity, or rank odor.” The first scene really perfectly tees up Homer’s motivation for the episode, that a literal inanimate object gets more respect than he does. I also love the long shadow he casts upon challenging the carbon rod to an “inanimate-off.” It’s just so dumb, but I love it.
  
• Hank Azaria doesn’t do a great Tim Allen, but he’s got kind of a non-descript voice, so no matter. I also assume that “I guess it’s back to jail for me” is in reference to him getting arrested for cocaine and squealing on his dealers. Allen is also a shithead who compared being conservative in Hollywood to living in 1930s Germany.
• I love the minor joke that Homer pronounces NASA as “Nassau” when he’s yelling at them on the phone.
• This definitely feels like a better version of a Homer/Barney rivalry than “Mr. Plow.” Unlike his snow plow business, Homer actually has a specific goal in going up into space, so the friction between them feels less vindictive and more comically exaggerated (“Here I am, right on time! I don’t see Barney ‘Let’s crash the rocket into the White House and kill the President’ Gumble!”)
• “When I found out about this, I went through a wide range of emotions. First I was nervous, then anxious, then wary, then apprehensive, then… kind of sleepy, then worried, and then concerned, but now I realize that being a spaceman is something you have to do.” Julie Kavner delivers this line so beautifully, but moreover, I appreciate that even in one (lengthy) line, we establish that Marge actually had her own emotional journey grappling with her husband going off into outer space and didn’t just say “I’m so proud of you, Homie” like she would later mindlessly say in later season episodes when Homer has some new stupid dumbass job. Marge says, “I’m so proud of you” later in the episode, but it’s after Homer gains his courage back in wanting to go through with the launch, so it actually genuinely feels earned when she says it.
• Buzz Aldrin’s “Second comes right after first!” is the greatest line ever written for a guest star. Even better is the awkward pause as Homer, Barney, even the NASA staff is completely silent and not knowing what to say. The man literally went into outer space, and the fact that the writers are taking the piss out of him immediately on their stupid little cartoon show is just astounding. And if that weren’t enough, they later have the trained astronaut say, “Make rocket go now!” Fantastic.
• Great drawing of a petrified Homer after watching the too-relevant space-themed Itchy & Scratchy.
  
• Homer at the gas station payphone talking to Marge is one of my favorite scenes of the entire series. It completely grounds this otherwise absolutely ludicrous story. Homer going into outer space is still, thirty-two seasons in, one of the craziest things they’ve ever done in concept, but everything in the episode plays out “believably” within its established context. And here, they sell it even more in depicting Homer as genuinely frightened to leave the planet, just as anybody would. On top of that, Homer tearfully talking about not getting to see Mr. T at the mall as a comparable missed opportunity to not going into space is one of the absolutely brilliant bits of writing (and performing) that feels completely emotionally on point, but is so damn funny. And on top of that, you have the touch tone joke as well. Such a fucking great scene.
• Homer floating in zero-G eating the potato chips is undeniably a classic scene, it’s just so beautifully animated. I especially love how when he screams out as he floats toward the ant colony, big chunks of mushed up chips fly out of his mouth.
  
• NASA’s complete obsession over TV ratings over any actual real work feels a little different after we’ve just had four years of Donald Trump basically operating the same way.
• James Taylor is another slam dunk guest star, maybe one of the best guests appearing as themselves. Right off the bat, he openly subverts his public image (“Listen, Aldrin, I’m not as laid back as people think. Now here’s the deal: I’m going to play, and you’re going to float there and like it.”) Every bit that follows is great: editing “Fire & Rain” on the fly, then his suggestion to fix the shuttle’s dilemma (“But I’m sure you high-tech NASA people could care less about our resort-town ways…”), and then when the situation goes sour, he swiftly makes his exit.
• HAIL ANTS! (“This reporter was possibly a little hasty earlier and would like To reaffirm his allegiance to this country and its human president. It may not be perfect, but it’s still the best government we have. For now.”)
• Abe’s “Of course he’ll make it, it’s TV!” line is such a brilliant double-layered joke. It plays perfectly in-universe as an senility gag, but it’s even better as a meta joke, like yeah, of course Homer’s going to return to Earth just fine, and you’re a dope for thinking otherwise.

16. Homer Loves Flanders

• “Warning: tickets should not be taken internally.” “See? Because of me, now they have a warning.”
• It’s great how Homer is slow to anger realizing Bart easily conned him with the wig store coupon, then he immediately retreats into one of his more bizarre fantasies. He really is a sick, sick man.
  
• I love Homer’s rapid succession of “D’oh”s when he pops all of his tires driving over the road spikes. Also, for some reason, his car is green throughout the first act?
• Mr. Burns giving a pep talk to the team about the little boy he crippled is definitely a syndication cut that I can’t say that I missed.
• Homer’s nacho hat feels like it would be really cool in concept, but in reality, that thing can’t be very stable or functional. You could only break off so much of the brim before it would start to fall apart, and then you got a big basin of hot cheese right above your head just waiting to scald you. Sadly, some dreams are better left as just dreams.
• The religious sheep cartoon is so great, as is Todd’s displeased commentary (“It’s all well and good for sheep, but what are we to do?”)
• Moe reading to sick children and the impoverished is a great character detail exposing his softer side, which feels a lot more endearing than later seasons when they’d beat you over the head with how pathetic and sad he is. Watching Greta Gerwig’s Little Women, I’d be lying if I said Moe’s tearful reading of the ending of the book didn’t cross my mind before the credits rolled.
• “Can’t talk, seeing Flanders, later, sex.” I like that even Marge is bothered by how much time Homer is spending with Ned. She knows him better than anyone, that when he gets laser-focused on something, it’s really hard to pull him away.
• I love how Homer gingerly eats Ned’s food as he crawls through the window inviting himself for dinner. It somehow makes him even more aggravating than if he had just plopped himself down and started making a pig out of himself.
  
• It’s a short moment, but I love at the picnic when Marge and Lisa have their annoying brush with Maude over their Advisory Board-approved fruit punch (“I’m sorry. Our boys don’t eat sugar.” “But why would the Advisory Board give us bad advice?” “No sugar!”)
• I absolutely love the third act where Ned is dealing with the strange new emotion of actually hating somebody. Right away, he tells Homer a lie in front of his kids to get out of spending time with him, but is unable to talk his way out of rationalizing it to Rod and Todd (giving us the great line, “Lies make baby Jesus cry.”) It’s all about Ned slowly unraveling until the climax, and it’s all done so wonderfully. I also like that part of Ned’s irritation is from Homer accidentally stealing his spotlight as the town’s most charitable person, showing even more that he’s not immune to basic human pettiness.
• Of course, this episode gave us this incredible gif.
  
• Homer’s nose whistling being the final straw for Ned is just perfect, this mildly irritating behavior that just eats away at him (the sound design of it getting louder and more nasally is excellent) until he just bursts (“Stop it!! Breathe through your damn mouth!!”)
• I really love this episode, and the ending is an absolute triumph. Homer’s speech in defense of Ned is a living contradiction. We know he’ll go back to hating his annoying neighbor-eeno. In fact, it happens one minute after he gives the speech. But within the episode’s context, it’s absolutely authentic and brings about a heartfelt mending of fences between the two men that is inherently “wrong” for the show, but still feels completely right. Following this is the actual ending, which leans right into showing how the status quo has been restored, with a wonderfully bizarre tag highlighting another TV trope: a dead relative’s will forcing the Simpsons to spend the night in a haunted house. Again, it feels telling that the show is getting this meta and deconstructionist already in season 5. You can only strip the show down so much before you either have to build up something new (something the Oakley & Weinstein years attempted) or just tear it all down and cancel it (season 32 and counting!!)