(originally aired December 15, 2002)
I’ll reiterate what I’ve said in the past, that while “Brother From Another Series” feels like a suitable finale for Sideshow Bob, it doesn’t mean that they couldn’t bring him back. The plot conceit here is actually ripe with potential, and could have been perfect as a return for Bob (we’re just ignoring “Day of the Jackanapes” here, I’m sure none of you mind.) Now somewhat rehabilitated, Bob uses his intellect and experience as a criminal to help uncover an assailant after a member of the Simpson family, bringing him within close quarters of his archenemy Bart. That’s a plot that could actually work. But it doesn’t. It absolutely doesn’t, at least not the way they do it here. Brain dead Homer overload, a complete lack of focus and the sullying of one of the greatest one-off characters in series history kills this episode completely. We start with a family trip to a sauna, which is virtually joke-free, ending with an unidentified man trying to kill Homer by locking him in a steam room. When the police are proven inept to finding the perpetrator, as expected, there’s only one man they can turn to: Sideshow Bob, who agrees to help in exchange for first pick in the prison production of Man of La Mancha. At least that’s in character.

Strike one for this episode: the Simpsons are given a button that will activate a shock collar on Bob if he steps out of line. How often do you think they use that? Many, many times, in a lot of cases just used as a joke for joke’s sake, provoked by absolutely nothing. Even Marge does it once, which is completely outside her character. Speaking of, do you really think she would be okay letting a man who on multiple occasions has tried to kill her son into her house? But that’s the way it is with these later seasons: Marge, and to an extent Lisa, are mostly silent observers on the side lines while the Simpson men get into wacky antics. And by Simpson men, I typically mean Homer. Despite Bob and Bart’s history, the two have barely any interaction in this episode. It’s all about Homer, who is just a complete moron from beginning to end, more so than normal. He starts by listing off his enemies to Bob, which he has a lot of, most of which are related to incidents occurring in the last five seasons. Once a regular average man, now all of a sudden Homer has a laundry list of people who want him dead. Bob sets up a trap with a dummy Homer on the lawn, which is quickly brutally attacked by various members of the community. Patty and Selma drive by, chuck a cinder block at the dummy, ripping its head off, and drive off. Marge’s reaction to seeing her sisters seemingly murder her husband? “These are Homer’s friends and family, they don’t want him dead. They just want him to suffer.” Then Homer tackles his own dummy, like a mentally insane person. Bob asks the others, “None of this seems odd to you?” I feel I don’t need to say anything at this point.

As we close out act two, even though we see Bob has been watching fall preview week, it’s announced that Homer will be king of the Mardi Gras parade, as a result of someone stuffing the ballot box with his name. During the festivities, it turns out the brake lines of his float have been cut, just in time for Bob to finally put the pieces together of who the culprit is. Turns out it’s none other than… Frank Grimes, Jr. It’s not really a mystery as there’s no way to get us to this point, but besides that, as a fan, I knew something was up when we saw the guy earlier and he looked and sounded exactly like Grimes. So he wants revenge for his father’s death due to Homer’s idiocy. But Grimes was never married, right? “He happened to like hookers, okay?” Frank Grimes, the serious, button-down self-made man, knocking up a hooker? Okay, great. Why not make it his brother? Steve Grimes? It would be just as dumb, but at least I can buy that. Maybe. Whatever. We end with Bob finally about to kill Bart, but realizing he can’t; as he explains in song, he’s become more invigorated with the thrill of the hunt than the actual hunt itself. So at this point the Bob series is really over, as we’ve seen that he literally cannot bring himself to kill Bart, beyond the reason that the show would be over. But he’d be back again and again, extending his murderous aim to the entire Simpson family, even though we know that it will absolutely never, ever happen. An atrocious episode. Bob was better left staying down.

Tidbits and Quotes
– This is the first episode that was completely digitally colored, though it really doesn’t look too different than the last two seasons or so. It’s just one more step in creating the cold, sterile look of a modern day Simpsons.
– The spa set-piece is a lot of dead air, with a lot of desperate, bizarre attempts at jokes. The masseuse asking ten-year-old Bart to write him a check? The yoga instructor doing his Johnny Carson impression? What?
– Wiggum ordering his prisoners by level of craziness is a pretty clever joke, but they just keep it going too long. Having the one guy react indignantly, Wiggum addressing him by his crazy name, then the mild-mannered guy revealing himself to be incredibly crazy. The act of Wiggum asking the two to switch seats, the normal guy and the disheveled guy, is funny enough, but then they just kill the joke.
– We get the show’s first shot at Disney’s California Adventure, which aside from west coasters and theme park nuts like myself, speaks to absolutely no one. They would do it again next season in “My Mother the Carjacker,” a joke they were so proud of, I remember they even used it in the promo.
– Considering how they restrained Bob, it would have been neat if they had this episode just be full-blown Silence of the Lambs, with Homer and Bart going to Bob in prison to help track down the murderer, with Bob making increasingly vague threats to Bart. South Park did a similar parody when they had Officer Barbrady talk with a Hannibal Lector-type kid about a toilet-papered house. But this show just isn’t that clever anymore, unfortunately…
– “This man has tried to kill me so many times, it’s not funny anymore!” You’re damn right. The show has been self-referential in the past, but the way it does so now feels so pointed and gutsy. But gutsy in a way the show has no right to be. Yeah, these Bob shows aren’t funny anymore, yet you keep on fucking making them.
– Bob has a heart-to-heart with Apu about the dying art of robbery (“You were quite the gentleman. Today’s robbers, they are all snatch-and-grab. You understood the dance!”) What? Dressed as Krusty, Bob demanded Apu give him all the money, he took the money then ran off. He’s basically on the same level of someone like Snake, where’s the difference? Plus Bob was imitating Krusty, so he wasn’t being himself, persay. And plus it’s not like Bob revels in committing crimes, he sees them as a means to an end. The writers just referenced this old episode without really remembering correctly or understanding it at all.
– The assailant pokes a gun through the door at Moe’s and tries to take Homer out. Rather than going out and taking chase, Homer and Bob just sit there. And we get a montage of Moe’s precious memories with his pickle jar. Then next scene Bob is watching a pathetic TV parody. What is happening in this episode?
– Homer has been crowned king of Mardi Gras (“Woo hoo! Good things do happen to bad people!”) It’s a small line, but it’s very bothersome. Like Homer acknowledges the bad stuff he’s done and doesn’t think he’s a good guy?
– Fat Tony and his goons gun down some guy right in the middle of the parade and no one even bats an eye. As long as your joke works, guys, don’t worry about shit making sense, it’s OK.
– I like how Bob saves Homer by use of his old performing skills, shooting himself out of a cannon.
– Why the fuck do Homer and Bob go after Grimes on stilts? They could have caught up to him a lot quicker on foot. And Bob I can see, but Homer being able to use them? Just… whatever.
– So we have our dumb musical number and end on Bob getting shocked once more. The writers need to go back and watch the rake scene from “Cape Feare” and realize why it’s funny, because apparently all they see is someone getting hurt = funny, as we’ve seen them do countless times with Homer.

(originally aired December 1, 2002)
There are times when I’m writing about certain episodes when words start to escape me, because I just have no idea what the fuck is happening in certain scenes. Or, in cases like this, entire acts. The show had taken some pot shots at reality TV recently, since they were all the rage at the time, but here is their full episode devoted to the topic, and it couldn’t be more bizarre and ridiculous… in the worst way possible, definitely in one of the worst episodes of the series. We start with our mostly tangential opening with the Simpsons getting sky box tickets to a hockey game in exchange for Homer not suing the power plant for getting injured on the job. The sky box is so incredibly opulent, why focus on the game when you can get a massage or dip in the jacuzzi? So Homer and Bart begin to act pompous and holier-than-thou, which I guess is funny because the environment changes their entire demeanor? This kind of “joke” will occur later, but I just don’t get it. Homer acts like he is rich and earned this right to be above the common folk, but he can’t actually think that, can he? So is he play-acting? I haven’t a clue, really.

After helping Lisa helps player make a winning shot (using her hockey knowledge from “Lisa on Ice,” a nice callback), a Russian player gives her his hockey stick, which gets mounted on her wall. Unfortunately, the stick was filled with dangerous termites, which start eating away at the house. It will take six months to exterminate, leaving the Simpsons homeless, and with every hotel in town booked to boot. So where do they end up? At a TV studio looking to be on a brand new show, where a family gets to live in an old house, but must live like it’s 1895. Yep, that’s their only option. Why not live with Flanders? Patty and Selma? Not ideal options for Homer, but hey, that could provide some comedy. But whatever, the family are in this 1895 house, and everything about it is not funny. Plus, I don’t quite understand why people would like watching this show. Reality TV is all about sensationalism, quick cuts, music stings, what’s hip and new. Would modern viewers care about a family living in an old-timey house? It’s like a reality show on the History Channel.

After suffering for a bit, the family gets used to living like the olden days, and starts to speak and act like they were back then too, for no reason. The network needs to spice up the show, so they bring in David Lander, aka Squiggy from Laverne and Shirley to live in the house and taze people. Was this a thing on reality TV where they’d bring in washed up celebrities to be on shows with regular people? I dunno, but one scene later, they airlift the entire house off its foundations and dump it into a river. And the house floats perfectly straight up somehow and survives mostly intact down a waterfall. Then it collapses upon stopping at a bank. So what is happening? Where the fuck are they? The Simpsons just resign themselves to wandering around, not knowing where they are or what’s happening. Then they run into some other people, victims of a Survivor clone who were lost and never recovered, wanting revenge on the network heads that stranded them there. One of them says they’re in the Amazon, so I guess we finally know where we are. So they flew that goddamn house all the way to South America? Anyway, they revolt against the crew, and then they’re back home. I really don’t even know how to comment, because I don’t understand what exactly happened in this third act. Was there a point to this that I missed? I find it hard to believe that there is, but if someone can enlighten me, please do. But what I did understand from this show I absolutely hated. Complete garbage.

Tidbits and Quotes
– The sky box luxuries are exaggerated enough, then they have Larry Holmes there for no apparent reason. And it’s just ridiculous since Bart off-handedly mentions him, then he appears immediately.
– Moe, Barney and Otto notice Homer up in the sky box, and logically decide to get on each others shoulders to reach him. Bart and Homer comment from above like pompous arrogant assholes for some reason (“Heads up, Dad. Here comes the scum.” “Why can’t they just be happy for my success?”) Homer dumps scalding hot fudge on them, something that certainly would give them horrific burns, and would get him kicked out of the arena. But, nope.
– I don’t like that it’s Raphael (the sarcastic guy) who’s the terrible exterminator who gnaws at a table like a termite. Normally he’s competent at his jobs, they could have just made this some other guy.
– They recreate the King of the Hill opening, but it’s just like the Sopranos bit a few episodes ago, where it’s not really a parody as it’s just them recreating something note for note.
– I get them the family not wanting to live with the noise at Lenny’s, but they could have stayed with Comic Book Guy given they had no other options. I’d love to see that episode. I also like that CBG has some kind of meta awareness, referring to the Simpsons as “our favorite family.”
– “I’m Mitch Hardwell, creator of the 1895 Challenge, and by ‘creator,’ I mean I saw it on Dutch television, and tweaked the title.” So yeah, network executives steal other peoples’ ideas. But don’t worry, if you missed that joke, they’re going to repeat it again… twice.
– Bill Cosby auditions for the 1895 show, in an appearance not nearly as funny as the bit from “Children From a Lesser Clod.” One executive comments, “We need a family that hasn’t been on TV forever. Let’s try the Simpsons.” They’re thrilled with the Simpsons having a tiff at the dinner table (“They go to pieces over nothing! They’re perfect for reality TV!”) In the shot we see Marge and Lisa glaring at each other. What? For what reason? That’s the thing, this series has been marketed as a dysfunctional family, but it really isn’t. The only nutty cog is Homer, everyone else is generally normal. It makes no sense to me.
– To judge whether the show is doing good or bad, we cut to the residents of the retirement home watching, which makes sense that they’d like it since it’s all old timey. But is this the show’s demographic? Geriatrics? I guess it must be.
– Homer walks outside one morning, only to step into a big river. The other members of the family rush out to see what’s happening (“Lisa! Explain!” “I guess the network made our show more exciting by dumping the house in a river!”) Right, that’s a conclusion I would come to immediately. I think other thoughts would strike me first. Like, “What the fuck is happening?” “Holy shit, the house is in a fucking river!” “How did we not notice that the house was lifted into the sky and brought here?” And so forth. Homer then goes back in the house and has a dialogue with the network exec through the confessional camera, even though it’s seemingly just a one-way feed. But whatever.
– I still don’t know what to say about the third act. What aggravated me most is that we’ve never told what’s going on. The family could be just outside of town, and therefore, could just up and leave if they wanted, but we don’t know where they are. If the network exec told them they dumped them in the Amazon, or explained whatever new show they were planning to do with them, then I could understand. But instead it’s like… whatever. Bart makes an off-the-cuff comment, “Is it just me, or are you guys getting sick of crazy adventures?” It isn’t just you, Bart. It isn’t just you.

(originally aired November 24, 2002)
A transparent gimmick episode if I ever saw one… but I don’t remember my thirteen-year-old self complaining much about that. But now thanks to the Internet, I’ve seen every cartoon character in every sexual position imaginable, so who gives a crap if Marge’s tits are bigger this episode? How do we get so bankrupt of ideas that we come around to this plotline? And how do we possibly get implants stuffed into Marge anyway? Well, here’s the setup. Homer and Lisa help out at a Habitat for Humanity-type organization, only to have the former flocked by Lindsay Naegle and Cookie Kwan, both desperate to find a suitable husband. The two ladies pull up, narrate who they are and what they want, then focus in on Homer. Lindsay’s had many interactions with him at this point, and must know what a moronic clod he is. Marge ends up driving by and bears witness to Homer seemingly flexing for these women, which ends up being an amazingly insulting fake-out, where he was just demonstrating how his wife gave birth to his children, much to Naegle and Kwan’s cooing. Stupid.

One odd thing that struck me here is that Marge is… kind of dumb. Like she’s always had a strong air of naivety to her (“Well anyone who beats you up isn’t your friend,”) but she’s usually savvy enough to put two and two together in most situations. Seeing her husband, a humungous tub of lard, flexing his non-existent muscles for two women shouldn’t compute. There has to be another explanation. And even if that is what was happening, Marge would have confronted her husband point blank, as she’s done in the past. Here, she meekly asks him in bed whether he still finds her attractive, and is discouraged by his non-committed answer. So, convinced by Manjula, she decides to get liposuction, but the implants Mayor Quimby ordered for his assistant end up in her by accident. The surgeon tells Marge he can remove them in forty-eight hours. I guess there’s a medical risk if you rush things? I dunno. So the rest of this story is basically all men paying more attention to Marge, and her seemingly not being able to understand why. They even do a song about it, where the cast very obviously just stares at her breasts, which by the way may be the worst song the show has ever done. Not just content-wise, but it’s so without purpose or a catch. You stack it up with the others, there’s no comparison. “See My Vest.” “We Put the Spring in Springfield.” “You’re a Bunch of Stuff.” Yeah, that’s really the title. Later this season we’ll get “I Love to Walk.” Ugh.

There’s a B-story here too, which almost gets equal screen time with the A-story, but still feels like complete filler. Bart and Milhouse watch Krusty’s guest appearance on the old Batman TV show, and imitate his stunt on the playground, to disastrous results. As is the current trend, the community’s parents blame Krusty, and now the two boys must help repair his reputation. The Batman segment is pretty fantastic, but beyond that this story is pretty thin, which seems ridiculous given the satiric potential of the material. South Park made a whole movie about moral outrage on behalf of children, for God’s sakes, these guys can’t even squeeze it into eight minutes? Anyway, Marge ends up becoming a model for a convention, and between her back spasms and men pinching her ass all day, she begins to realize having an ample bosom is quite the burden. The two plots collide when Bart orchestrates a stunt to have Krusty look like a hero, rescuing Milhouse from being crushed by Stampy the elephant, who reappears for no real reason. But the plan goes awry, Marge distracts trigger-happy cops by flashing the crowd, Krusty manages to rescue the boys, Marge gets her old boobs back, the end. Not as offensive as I thought it would be, but still pretty awful. And not really offensive at all. This show as of late rides this line of being innocuous, then trying to “shock” you with mentioning hookers, or someone saying ‘penis,’ but when it comes to this episode that’s all about Marge’s tits, they hold everything back. I’d almost respect them more if they went completely crass and objectionable, but instead they took the safe route.

Tidbits and Quotes
– “We’re building homes for the homeless!” “You know it’s gonna be bad, but you just can’t prepare yourself!” The six thousandth joke about Homer’s long-running hatred of charity.
– It’s stupid and makes no sense that they’re there, but dammit, I still love the Three Stooges stuff with Carter, Bush and Clinton. They just match those personalities so well.
– Homer mentions Bart being “El Barto,.” Besides “Homer’s Odyssey,” can anyone remember a time El Barto was mentioned on the TV show at all? It was mainly a thing with the comics. Am I wrong on this?
– The Batman show is the best part of the episode, with Adam West and Burt Ward playing themselves. Krusty plays Clown Face, “the painted Pagliacci of Perfetti,” who along with his henchman, Hoo, Hah, and Hee, trap the dynamic duo in a merry-go-round of doom (“Show our guests to the twirly gates!”) Good thing Batman always carries his Bat Carousel Reversal Spray (“What don’t you have in that belt?” “Patience… for harlequin hoodlums like yourself!”)
– We really blow past Marge’s thought processes in this episode. She just immediately jumps to getting the liposuction, then later to go into modeling. Unlike Homer, Marge is not so quick to act. It took her desire for danger to slowly bubble until she decided to be a cop, it takes her longer to process and think things through. But hey, we gotta keep this plot moving, so let’s hurry it along, even though there’s minutes of filler we could shave off to devote to developing the main plot more.
– The plastic surgeon from “Pygmoelian” returns. I love Hank Azaria’s read on him (“I’ll come back alright, and I’ll bring my husband to do a little malpractice on you!” “Your husband? I’m sure he’s going to be furious.”)
– I remember seeing promos for this episode and there were a few scenes in the commercials that never made it to air, like Marge ducking down to hide her breasts in the double-sink, and her desperately pointing at her face as Bart has locked eyes with her chest. Even that stuff’s a little bit daring, but they cut it all out.
– I kind of like the cutesy innocence of Homer discovering Marge’s new breasts and the two enjoying each other… and then Homer falling off the bed.
– “Mom! What happened? Your endowment’s bigger than Harvard’s!” “Well that cinches it. Lisa gets the prize for best off-the-cuff response.” “Actually I saw them earlier and I was working on it in the hall.” So, upon seeing that her mother’s breasts were noticeably larger than before, instead of asking her about it, Lisa, an eight-year-old, decided to spend her time to come up with a clever joke to make and act surprised upon seeing them for the first time. Also Homer just used the word ‘cinch.’
– Good thing Mr. Burns, Mayor Quimby, Moe, Dr. Hibbert, and every other secondary character were all at Luigi’s so they could all do that musical ode to Marge’s breasts. And in the end, Marge is still naive about the whole thing.
– Krusty’s show has been handicapped, now unable to do anything dangerous or imitable. Nelson yells, “Bring out Mr. Teeney!” He’s there in the audience with the other bullies, Martin, Sherri and Terri… basically the crowd is 90% kids from the school. What is this, a field trip? But why design new kid models when you can just use the old regulars?
– Bart just randomly shows up in the Friar’s Club steam room to talk to Krusty (“How’d you get in here?” “The doorman died.” “Oh no, he was my agent!”) See, that works, an improbable event masked with a good joke.
– There’s really no reason to have Stampy be the elephant. It’s not like that gives Bart’s plan some safety since Stampy never listened to him in the first place. It’s just more call-backs to get some recognition points from the audience. Well, if they remembered Stampy, they must be good writers!
– I love the cat calling vendors (“Hey lady! I like the way your body looks!” “Stop objectifying my mom!” “I will, in a second. Woo, hey baby, you’re an object!!”)
– “Hey, it’s that clown who hates children!” “And flags!” “I say we judge him by what he does next!” More fucking narration explaining what’s happening, disguised as a “joke.” It’s just like the “It’s Lisa, and she’s winning us back!” line, and I fear we’ll have more jokes like this in the future.
– The shootout at the end drags on so long, with Stampy just hanging there in his hind legs. He’s got a lot of weight on him to stay hanging in the air like that, it’s like they’re in a freeze frame before Marge flashes her tits.

(originally aired November 17, 2002)
I got no intro in me for this one, so let’s just jump right in. We start with the Simpsons finally getting a satellite dish, because I guess they can afford one now. At least they give the courtesy of explaining how with a joke: Homer claims he can get one with “no risk.” Smash cut to him at the track winning his bet on the dog “No Risk.” A new satellite means a wide open opportunity for TV gags, but all of them pale to the stuff we saw in “Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment.” Endless viewing options keep Bart occupied for two whole weeks, when he should have been studying for a school aptitude test. When the results of said test are in, there are two startling announcements: Lisa has done so well she’s being bumped up to third grade, and Bart has done so poorly he’s being bumped back to third grade. So Bart and Lisa in the same class? That’s an idea that could possibly work. Maybe?

Things are sensible at the start: Bart is actually doing well, though only because he’s been through third grade before and has memorized answer keys, while Lisa is struggling a bit with the new challenge and is slightly frustrated. Their teacher is voiced by, surprise surprise, Tress MacNeille, and unlike Mrs. Krabappel or Miss Hoover, she has no real discernible personality. I don’t even know if she has a name. The only thing I got is she’s apparently a bitch since she scolds Lisa for being upset and raises Bart’s grade out of pure spite. The class goes on a field trip to Capitol City, where the identity of where Springfield is is obscured even further (“The time has come to redesign our state flag. This Confederate symbol is an embarrassment, particularly as we are a Northern state.”) The class is assigned to create a new flag in groups, leading Bart to sabotage Lisa’s efforts and greatly offend Governor Bailey, who we haven’t seen since way back in season two, here voiced by… guess… Tress MacNeille! She sounds less like Bailey and more like Joan Rivers here. Maggie Roswell was back on staff, why not get her to do the voice? Honestly, MacNeille is very talented, but not at creating distinct ancillary characters. At a point, they all start sounding the same.

Bart and Lisa get into a scuffle right as the bus is about to leave, leaving them stranded. Then they start wandering around in the woods and get lost. But… what? They were right outside the capitol building when they tumble down a hill, then they see the bus drive away. They could easily climb back up and go into the city and ask anybody for help. But instead they just wander around the wilderness for some reason. Why? I guess because this gives us the chance for the two to have a heartfelt reconciliation that lasts one scene and feels obligatory rather than sincere. And then the two are saved by some unkempt hillbillies who were lost on field trips and decided to just live in the woods. These characters with an insane back story just show up with two minutes of show left. What is happening? Bart and Lisa are finally reunited with their parents, and Skinner literally announces that status quo is God and has Bart and Lisa put back in their normal grades. This was just the writers throwing up their arms going, “Yeah, there’s no reason to make things go back to normal, but we’re doing it anyway.” Why not keep Bart and Lisa in the third grade? Develop that teacher character a bit more, throw in some new kid characters, why not? Oh yeah, that would require some work and creative thinking. Never mind. Yet another clunker.

Tidbits and Quotes
– We open on “Animal Survivor,” which is like Survivor… with animals. Some of these TV parodies featuring animal casts have kind of bothered me, like this, Monkey Trauma Center, the When Dinosaurs Get Drunk special, in that the parody aspect gets washed when the show seems completely asinine, or just impossible to film. Definitely in the case of the dinosaur one, but what is Monkey Trauma Center? Is it just monkeys they put in doctors outfits and have them roam around a hospital? But then the title card makes them have human mannerisms? I think I’m thinking way too into this…
– “If I wanted reality, I’d finally have this lump looked at!” You mean one of those anger lumps from “I Am Furious (Yellow)”? Come on guys, that was only like ten episodes ago.
– As a completely beaten down housewife, Marge just sighs and submits to slicing pie into her husband’s mouth as he lies on the couch in his own filth.
– Bart’s sleep deprived hallucination goes on for so long. The “Hava Naglia” could have been cut by half. Just killing time…
– The “M.C. Safety and the Caution Crew” stuff is fine, but pales to what South Park did in their “Butt Out” episode, which had the twist on top that the assembly made the boys want to smoke so they wouldn’t be as lame as them.
– The Capital City Goofball is apparently in politics, and still in costume. And colored incorrectly, and not voiced by Tom Poston. I am not pleased.
– When Skinner announces that Milhouse has taken Bart’s place as class clown, the writing is on the wall for the awful ending. Again, why bother complaining about character motivation through all this? Skinner certainly wouldn’t do this, nor would he bump Bart back up a grade for no apparent reason. And Lisa, the girl who pressured her mother to try to get Skinner to get her pushed into the third grade by any means necessary, apparently is fine with being a big fish in a small pond in second grade. So rather than tackle a challenge, she slinks back to the easy and familiar? That is not Lisa Simpson. To echo the final line of the show, “That’s just sad.”

(originally aired November 10, 2002)
Now this is a historic episode, as it’s the last one Mike Scully ever wrote. He wrote last season’s premiere episode, which was garbage, and wouldn’t you know it, this one ain’t much better. I have a lot to talk about with one, so let’s just get this out of the way first. This episode is about Homer attending “Rock ‘n’ Roll Fantasy Camp,” a one-week program held right outside of Springfield where people receive rock star training from the Rolling Stones and other famous artists. To complain that this story makes no sense is a fool’s errand. Why should I waste my time talking about how little sense this premise makes? The reality of this series has already been shattered, so this doesn’t even feel that egregious to me. I guess when you have such huge guest stars, you feel the need to really showcase them and put them on a mantle, but look back at “Stark Raving Dad,” where the show took the biggest celebrity in the world and made him a hulking, bald, ugly mental patient. Now we have the Rolling Stones on and Homer fawning how awesome they are. But whatever, when I gave up on the story, all I was hoping was that characterization made sense and that it was funny. I got neither.

Let’s rewind a bit and highlight this episode’s fatal flaw. Homer ends up so wasted that not only can he not remember how he got home one night, but he also spaced that he was filmed for a TV show “Taxicab Confessions.” He and his family watch as he drunkenly admits that he could have had a rock star life if it weren’t for his goddamn wife and annoying kids, which the other Simpsons are understandably hurt by. So what happens after this? They send Homer to the camp, and not only that, they empathize with him (“Even though what you said about us was incredibly thoughtless and hurtful, you had a point.”) So in honor of him going to work and sometimes being a decent father, they blow their vacation fund on this camp just for him. Then Homer acts like a loudmouth party rocker at the camp for some reason. Since when is it his dream to be a rock star? I guess it kind of fits with the wackier, more high-energy Homer of later seasons, but what happened to the lazy son-of-a-bitch I used to know and love? At the end of act two when camp is finally over, Homer is crestfallen. The opening of act three is him whining and sobbing like a four-year-old. I don’t think I’ve thought this before, but Homer is absolutely pathetic here. Not a good quality for your lead to have.

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards feel sorry for Homer and allow him to be a guest at their benefit concert the following night. Homer manages to welch a bunch of front-row tickets for his family and friends, and is all ready to rock out on stage! Except the musicians just want him to do the mic check. Why the fuck did Homer think he would be performing? The whole ending makes absolutely no sense. We get the sad music as Homer walks on stage to the crowd cheering, but I felt absolutely no sympathy because Homer is completely deluded, yearning for a dream that we never knew he fucking had, and makes no sense for him to have. Then he does the mic check, and the crowd is disappointed, for some reason, even Marge for some reason, who I thought would be smart enough to realize that Homer was not going to perform (“Why is he performing the duties of a roadie?”) Then the Stones prove to be just as moronic. Rather than pull Homer off stage when he starts playing guitar, they drive a giant fucking Satan head around the stage and end up crashing into the audience. Then they have to apologize to Homer. That’s what this whole show is: Homer being an inconsiderate, hyperactive moron, and everyone else having to apologize to him. I wasn’t as pissed off as I was with “The Parent Rap,” but this episode is just abysmal, and a real uncreative waste of such high profile guest stars.

Tidbits and Quotes
– Sympathetic Moe of later years can go two ways for me. I kind of like showing his crushing desire to be accepted in certain situations, but him feeling bad for not giving Homer a beer without paying? And then offering him a free beer? The man who wouldn’t even give one to those Iranian hostages? I don’t think so.
– Homer arrives home only to find that it’s dinner time. He’s quite confused (“Wait, was last night the night we set the clock ahead eight hours?”)
– I don’t know what I feel about the Disco Stu bit. Him admitting he hates disco is sort of like the jokes we’ve had with ancillary characters in the past rebuking their entire gimmick (“Yarrr, I hate the sea and everything in it,”) but I dunno. I feel kind of bummed that Disco Stu is apparently really depressed with his lot in life, and I know how fucked up that is for me to be concerned with the well-being of a tertiary character, but I love Disco Stu. I just want him to be happy! Is that so wrong?
– The editing of the family watching “Taxicab Confessions” is so sporadic, we cut back and forth way too many goddamn times. We cut back twice to have the family laud Homer for being so nice, then like four more times when things start to go sour. You really only need half of those cuts to get the message across, but instead, it just lays it on way too thick. The family loves Homer! Now the family hates Homer! Yeah, we get it.
– The family acts evil and laughs maniacally when Homer gets in the car for no real reason. The fake-out is drawn out so long and handled so clumsily.
– Here’s the only complaint I’ll give about the fantasy camp. All the other campers are known faces, of course. Here’s the line-up: Otto, Barney, Apu, Wiggum, Herman, Louie, Kirk Van Houten, Dr. Hibbert, Frink and Gil. Now let’s put aside the notion that a lot of those characters have seemingly no inclination towards rock ‘n’ roll. A one-week instructional course taught by the Rolling Stones has to cost a pretty penny. I’d say even more than the Simpsons can afford, but let’s say the vacation money covers it. I would be generous in saying maybe half of the people there could afford this extravagant program. But completely broke characters like Otto, Kirk and Gil? Homer’s band at the end consists of Otto, Barney, Apu and Wiggum, so you don’t even need the others. They have no lines anyway. And the others barely have any. What a bunch of crap.
– There are a few choice lines at the camp that I laughed at, the first being from Mick Jagger (“Remember, rule number one: there are no rules! Rule number two: no outside food.”)
– The bit with drugged up insane Homer in the morning may be the most awkward scene in show history. It’s so completely bizarre, out-of-character and unfunny, combined with we’re just as uncomfortable during the scene as the other characters.
– My favorite bit in the whole episode is definitely Elvis Costello’s twinging eyebrow, and his shock when Homer rips off his hat and glasses (“My image!”)
– They filled the camp with recognizable faces, but Homer gets 85% of the lines. Why include them at all if you’re not going to have them talk?
– I like that the musicians have to get back home to do menial chores (“My lawn’s not going to mow itself!” “And I’ve got to put up the storm windows. Winter’s coming!”)
– “I was so close to being a rock star that now there’s a chance it might not happen!” Homer is truly a lunatic in this. Why should we feel sympathy for a character this deluded?
– Homer escorts his family to their front-row seats. Marge comments, “I’m so proud of you, Homie!” Proud of him? You were there when you saw your husband cry like a little baby until he got what he wanted. What the fuck is there to be proud of? Why does everyone assume Homer’s going to get on stage and be a rock star? Wouldn’t they care more about seeing the Rolling fucking Stones perform than this fat idiot?
– I hate everything about this ending… except (“Test one, test two, test three, test four, you test me like the water in El Salvador!” “Wooo! El Salvador!”)
– Actually, the biggest laugh I got was at the end when Keith Richards takes a drag off his cigarette while Mick Jaggar is talking. He blows out smoke, then it just holds on his open mouth, so while the scene goes on for another three more seconds, Richards is just standing there wall-eyed with his mouth open. It’s kind of telling when my favorite part of the episode is an animation mistake.