Original airdate: March 21, 2021

The premise: Six years ago before Christmas, Marge throws Homer out of the house after accidentally getting drunk at the power plant holiday party. Staying with the Flanderses and desperate to be home before the holidays, Homer must figure out what grand selfless gesture will get him back into Marge’s good graces this time.

The reaction: Another milestone has come and gone. Thankfully, the self-congratulation didn’t extend any further than a chyron “700th Episode” below the main title. And wow, two flashback episodes in a row, what a treat! I seem to recall another episode where Marge threw Homer out on Christmas for not coming home, but it turned out he was staying with Moe who was borderline suicidal. This time, Homer promises not to drink at the Christmas party, but Lenny spikes his soda and Homer makes an ass out of himself. “I don’t want you coming home until I know you’ve changed!” Marge weeps as she leaves Homer behind. As the episode continues, 4-year-old Bart and 2-year-old Lisa repeatedly will ask their mother that they miss their dad and why won’t he be home for Christmas. This is really uplifting stuff! Homer’s been thrown out many a time over thirty years (to the point that it’s deflated any sort of drama or realism), but the best storylines to use that card wait until the final act because of how sad the situation is (utilized to heartbreaking effect in “Homer’s Night Out,” when Lisa asks her brother, “I wonder when Dad’s coming home,” at an incredibly awkward family dinner.) Here, Homer’s gone for almost the entire episode, made even more devastating since Bart and Lisa are just little tots. It’s an incredibly sad scenario, leaving little room for any actual fun to do jokes. On top of this, what Homer must do to prove he’s “changed” is not only totally nebulous, but even more pointless than normal given this is a flashback episode, and we know all of the fucked up crazy shit Homer will do over hundreds of ensuing “present day” episodes. Considering this exact plot has already been done in the aforementioned “I Won’t Be Home for Christmas,” there’s no real reason this needed to be a flashback episode, except for our grand, continuity-building finale. Homer stays with the Flanderses, with an irritable and pregnant Maude, and of course, on Christmas Eve, Maude goes into labor with Ned out of the house helping the homeless, so it’s Homer to the rescue! No mention of them calling Ned, who presumably would not have gone far, but it’s dawn when he finally returns, so who knows where the fuck he was. Marge seemingly breaks into the Flanders house because she just shows up at the doorway of the rumpus room as Homer comforts Maude before the birth, and all is forgiven. So all Homer had to do was deliver a child to prove he was a good guy? Why didn’t she say so? To express his gratitude, Ned names his newborn son Todd Homer Flanders, so there’s another worthless piece of canon to add to the fan wiki. We also learn about “a never-before-seen room in the Simpson home,” as teased by the promotional blurb for this episode: the small storage space above the garage that Homer camps out in as he ponders his next big move to win Marge back. Cool! With these “revelations” and the upcoming episode shining a spotlight on Sarah Wiggum, this almost feels like a new tactic for the series, solving unanswered questions about different characters and locations in Springfield, because I guess hardcore fans might care about that stuff. Too bad this fan cares about engaging stories with characters we care about, and that ship sailed about 500 episodes ago. Happy 700th, one and all!

Three items of note:
– The couch gag is yet another Bill Plympton animation. This is, what, his sixth? As usual with this show, anything that’s special once must be repeated as much as possible until it becomes bland and unremarkable. One of his earliest couch gags was like Homer fucking the couch and it got pregnant. Is that right, or did I imagine that? Now it’s just this simple, cute little animation that does nothing but eat up time so the writers can get away with writing a few less pages.
– Maude Flanders has made sporadic appearances in dreams or flashbacks over the last fifteen years or so since Maggie Roswell returned, but this is her meatiest role yet. She’s definitely much gruffer and ornery here, which at least makes sense given that she’s nine month pregnant and about to burst. But outside of demeanor, her voice definitely sounds different, and it’s not a matter of Roswell losing her step or anything, it’s just that we’re twenty years out from episodes where Maude was alive, and she definitely sounds two decades older. Likewise, Mr. Burns sounded considerably tired in his brief appearance, the 77-year-old Harry Shearer still trying his best. And, of course, there’s Marge. Part of me feels like a piece of shit mentioning this over and over… this is, what, my third or fourth time this season? But honest and truly, during her opening monologue setting up the flashback, I genuinely was having trouble understanding her gravelly, weakened voice. This became even more pronounced in the flashback, given Marge is supposed to be 30-ish, but sounds like an elderly woman. All of this is a problem with no answer, but it’s a pretty glaring sign that maybe your show shouldn’t last over thirty years on the air.
– It’s never been established (I think?) exactly how old Rod and Todd Flanders are, but I always assumed they were always in-between Bart and Lisa since they’re not in either of their classes, making them 11 and 9 respectively. Rod is taller than both Bart and Lisa, so I figure he’s older. But now, I guess Todd is 6 in this new timeline? I don’t really give a shit about them breaking continuity, but this seems like a big oversight. I know no one really remembers or cares much for the Flanders kids (to the point that even the Simpsons wiki lists Todd as the older brother in the first sentence, and says he’s the youngest member of the Flanders family in the second) but come on.

7. The Two Mrs. Nahasapeemapetilons

• Moe’s rictus grin as he walks across the stage to a sea of scornful women’s faces is great on its own, but even better with the weird knockoff “Stayin’ Alive” music. Also, I’d like to think the Sea Captain would be a catch for some woman in Springfield. The man owns his own restaurant and lives on a cool houseboat! What more do you want?
• “Sold to the five desperate chicks!” Kind of rude of Krusty to say, since one of the women is his secretary Miss Pennycandy.
• This episode sort of re-frames Apu as a shy bachelor, whereas we’ve had previous examples of him being kind of a stud (dating Princess Kashmir in “Lisa’s Pony,” banging that one girl at the BBQ in “22 Short Films About Springfield.”) He seems to get back into the groove fairly quickly, so maybe he had just been out of the dating pool for a while. I wish there was more focus on Apu’s feelings through the episode, him talking about why he loves being carefree and single, as well as him separating leisure time from his grueling work hours… there’s weirdly not much Apu characterization in this episode that’s ostensibly about him.
• Homer growling suggestively at Apu opening a note from his mother… don’t care for it. It’s a joke off of him just reading a love note from one of Apu’s dates, but it plays so weird.
• “Is it me or does your plans always have some horrid web of lies?” “It’s you.” This really feels like the first of many, many, many zany Homer schemes over the Mike Scully years. When he innocently suggests that Apu tell his mother he’s already married, he feels more like a normal guy throwing out suggestions, but escalating it to pretending Marge is Apu’s wife and his attitude to the ruse makes it more ridiculous.
• Very nice touch that Apu rolls out a Krusty the Clown sleeping bag next to Marge’s bed, seemingly having borrowed it from Bart.
• I really like Lisa’s innocence in not knowing what Apu’s mother’s “dot” is. A modern show would have Bart ask that question and Lisa would chastise him for being culturally ignorant and give a long explanation about it, but here, Lisa just doesn’t know, because she’s an eight-year-old who doesn’t know the specifics of every culture on Earth. We also get this great exchange between Apu’s mom and Bart (“Surely you know the background to your father’s heritage.” “So long you have no follow up questions, then yes… we do.”
• Like I said, not a whole lot of Apu in this Apu show, because the second act is dominated by Homer living it up at the retirement home. It’s all fine material, I guess, but it just kind of becomes the wacky Homer show in the middle of what should be an Apu episode. Also, when he leaves the retirement home, Apu and Marge just let Homer back into the house when Apu’s mother was literally just about to leave, which is stupid and makes no sense.
• There’s a Homer line I hate, when Apu confesses to his mother, he judgingly reacts, “He lied to his mother…” This kind of tsk tsking attitude toward characters who are just saying and doing things that Homer pushed them into would reoccur a whole fucking lot over the next few seasons. Also included are jokes about his complete ignorance over stuff he himself started (“Oh right, the fake marriage thing. How’s that going?”) Homer really is pretty insufferable through most of this episode, and this behavior would only continue to get more flagrant as time goes on.
• Apu’s mother just stays at the Simpson house and expects the wedding to be held in their backyard, with no real explanation, despite hating the family that just bamboozled her. As Lisa says, why is she still staying there? Well, I guess they wrote that joke into the episode to wallpaper over the complaint, but as we will see time and time again, making a joke about a shit thing in your script doesn’t change the fact that it’s still shit.
• “No pansies for me!” “It’s the tradition in India.” “Alright, it’ll cover the gravy stains.”
• They make a meta joke about it, but why isn’t the elephant at the wedding just Stampy? They could’ve had a scene where the Simpsons get him from the wildlife reserve, or at least just have one line explaining how the hell they were able to get an elephant in the first place.
• The ending is kind of strange, in that it almost feels like the writers thought that making fun of arranged marriages would be too obvious, so their subversion was to make it seem like the marriage would actually work? They do the best they can; Manjula’s Fried Green Tomatoes question is clever and her interplay with Apu, what little there is, is sweet, but there’s no real emotional investment I can muster about Apu finding domestic bliss in an episode where he fought tooth and nail to avoid it. It’s more like him going, “Yeah, maybe this will work, hopefully.” As with almost all changes that would occur in the Mike Scully years, this character development doesn’t really amount to anything. He’s got a wife, and later kids, but Apu doesn’t change at all after this, other than he occasionally will do jokes about his nagging wife and screaming eight children are driving him to want to kill himself.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “This was, ‘without a doubt,’ as the CBG would say, the worst episode this season. Everything from the stupid premise to the tired, sitcom-standard gags were excrutiatingly unfunny and painful to watch; I probably cracked a tiny smile once. And, once again, Homer’s antics were much more grating than they could ever be amusing. Fortunately, this has been Richard Appel’s only real clunker; let’s hope he hasn’t totally lost it.”
  (note: Appel’s next, and final, episode was “When You Dish Upon a Star.”)
  

8. Lisa the Skeptic

• The boating scam set piece isn’t bad. A casual opening scene of Homer being wanted by the police doesn’t bode well for the future, but here, it’s just for 235 unpaid parking tickets, and Homer’s petulance and obliviousness to the whole scheme is pretty good (“Lousy cops. Lucky for you, I’m double parked!”)
• There’s a good amount of self-acknowledgement of Lisa’s rabble rousing, with her “Who wants to complain with me?!” and Kent commenting on her thirteenth appearance on her program. Her staunch, humorless position she takes through the whole show grows a little bit tiresome though, to be honest.
• It’s so weird how Phil Hartman’s death lines up right as the show started to tumble downhill. As such, his few appearances in season 9 (and one in season 10) feel weird to me. Lionel Hutz or Troy McClure showing up used to be such a reliable staple of the show’s high bar for quality, so them popping up even in mixed bag early Scully episodes feels a little off. Not to say he doesn’t provide bright moments, this is Phil Hartman we’re talking about. Hutz gets a solid line here (“It’s a thorny legal issue, alright. I’ll need to refer to the case, ‘Finders vs. Keepers,’”) and the character gets an entertaining, unintentional swan song next episode in “Realty Bites.” 
• Homer dragging the angel away chained to his car in an incredibly small amount of time in plain view of an entire crowd of people standing in front of it is a pretty huge cheat.
• “I’ll just leave it in here for a few years and let it appreciate in value.” “It’s probably a million years old, Dad, I think it’s as valuable as it’s gonna get.”
• A good chunk of act two involves the mystery of what the angel is, a lot of it playing out with suspense music (like when Lisa takes the sample for analysis) without many jokes. Why does it feel so serious?
• The Marge/Lisa emotional core of the show is a little interesting, but it definitely feels like something that would have benefitted with a lighter touch carried through the whole episode. Instead, Marge drops the bomb on Lisa that she believes in angels, and they have a way-too-serious dialogue about it, culminating in both of them saying incredibly hurtful things to each other (“My poor Lisa, if you can’t make a leap of faith now and then, well, I feel sorry for you.” “Don’t feel sorry for me mom, I feel sorry for you.”) Marge telling her daughter she feels sorry for her? That’s cold.
• “Science is like a blabbermouth who ruins a movie by telling you how it ends. Well, I say that there are some things we don’t wanna know. Important things!” This episode reads like patient zero for Ned Flanders’s insanely stringent religious stereotype he would devolve into. As is the case with most of these “first” episodes, it works in this “science vs. religion” episode context, but not in future examples.
• The best part of the show may be the Pope reading his newspaper in a flimsy lawn chair (“Your Holiness, there is word from America. They say an angel has foretold the apocalypse.” “…keep an eye on it.”)
• The ending as a concept is peak Simpsons, that the shopping mall owners would play on the townspeople’s emotionally-charged faith for a marketing gimmick, and said townspeople would be instantly won over by it is just perfect. I’m even willing to forgive the magical pulley track carrying the angel that clearly wasn’t there before the reveal. One big missed opportunity is we don’t get any final scene with Ned or Lovejoy, and how they react to being shoved off their pious high horse.
• It’s a pretty random guest spot, but Stephen Jay Gould is good for what little he has. I kind of like that he’s inexplicably an asshole, but it does feel weirdly unmotivated. Him shaking down a little girl for money is good (“I didn’t become a scientist for financial gain. Whatever little money you have will be just fine,”) but his ending flatly telling Lisa he never did the test (presumably after she paid him) is funny in how randomly cruel it is, but doesn’t make much sense.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “There was something curiously unsatisfying about this episode. Maybe it was Lisa’s irritating dismissal of the townspeoples’ faith, seemingly without justification for doing so. Maybe it was a childish fantasy, but she never gave us anything to back up this claim. Then, too, there was the annoying ‘look! they’re hypocrites!’ stuff, like with Moe voice-controlling the tv. Not that it wasn’t funny. Some of it was. But in past episodes, they have managed to take a serious issue (faith vs. science) and treat it with respect and humor. Here they just sort of hit us on the head with it.”

9. Realty Bites

• The opening bit where Homer thinks it’s Saturday is pretty great. I’ve certainly fallen victim to fake Saturdays in the past…
• Homer driving Li’l Bandit like a maniac, him abandoning Marge on the side of the road… we’re not even halfway through season 9 and he already feels like an entirely different character.
• “Trying is the first step toward failure” is a late game all-time series quote.
• The kids play-acting as a couple to help Marge study is pretty adorable (“We should have lived together first…”)
• Ah, our introduction to Gil. Funny that he shows up in Lionel Hutz’s last big episode, and would eventually sort of take his place. He would certainly get a bit overused as we got into the Al Jean era, but I like Gil more than I don’t, and he’s pretty good in his first outing (“I brought this wall from home!”) We also get introduced to Cookie Kwan, who is a bad character and I have nothing further to say about her.
• Never before has lumber seemed more enticing.
  
• We get our first (and only?) appearance of Sideshow Mel’s wife Barbara, and man, she’s quite the stunner! And she’s got her husband’s teal hair. She must really dig thespians.
• Homer goading Skinner about his dead high school sweetheart feels very sour. I dunno, it’s different from the tonal dissonance about him reminiscing fondly about Vietnam, or even the more exaggeratedly tragic flashbacks like the one from “I Love Lisa,” this is just sad.
• “The truth” and “the truth” is a grade-A Hutz scene (“It’s time I let you in on a little secret, Marge. The right house is the house that’s for sale. The right person is anyone.”)
• Poor Lenny. At least this scene became fodder for a lot of great shitposts.
  
• Marge being unable to hack it in real estate because she can’t stretch the truth is a pretty good premise, but it feels like there’s too many scenes of her about to lie before she decides not to, when we already get the idea. Also, her big moral dilemma about telling Ned about the murder house is pretty overbearing. The overdramatic music cues started to creep in during season 8, and now they’re being used in full force. Also, why is the Flanders family moving in the first place? It seems like a thing they’d at least make a joke out of, but they don’t even bother.
• The Flanderses lying motionless on the floor covered in “blood” marks is pretty stupid. If you’re going to do a “fakeout” gag like that, it better have a damn funny explanation, or have some kind of twist, but “we were painting a room red and we got tired and passed out” isn’t it. Todd’s “red room” bit is good, though; they should have just had a scene where they were all in the same room painting and done that joke.
• Homer fighting Snake is fucking dumb. Snake’s allegiance to his beloved car is a nice character flourish (“Premiiiuuummmm! Duuuuuddee!”), and I also like how he and his cellmate are able to easily eavesdrop on the police auction from their cell, but this B-plot just sucks, and how it literally collides with the A-story in destroying the murder house is even worse.
• The very ending at the unemployment office is really bizarre. Marge’s line feels weirdly demonizing (“Three hundred dollars for doing nothing? I feel like such a crook.”) It comes off kind of heartless, hitting even more so given how countless people got fucked out of their jobs last year. Then we end on a freeze frame of George H.W. Bush picking up his check… what’s that about? The man’s been out of office for over five years, what is this a commentary on?
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Dan Greaney, often Simpsons’ best writer, turns in a story that is at worst mediocre. Haven’t we had enough Marge episodes where Marge gets some job to spice up her life that she ends up failing at? That, in addition to the fact Marge fails at the hands of her own sense of honesty, makes this episode look like ‘Springfield Connection’ rehash.”

10. Miracle on Evergreen Terrace

• Busting the car heater, parking across three handicap spots, posing as a cashier to steal Christmas gifts… Jerkass Homer is out in full force immediately. It’s funny how the first two examples also happened in other episodes (“The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson,” “The Springfield Connection,”) but both of those instances had greater character or plot motivations; here, Homer’s just being a dick because that’s who he is now! Also, Homer’s reply to Marge asking why they waited until last minute to do their Xmas shopping (“You know me, Marge, I just love the hustle and bustle!”) is pretty telling. Homer is a lazy oaf who would love nothing more than to just sit on the couch watching TV, but he’s now Captain Wacky, searching high and low for his new scheme/crazy adventure.
• The kids watching the televised yule log in front of the real-life fireplace is a great quick gag, one I recall they copied verbatim in a recent episode, except they literally have Lisa explain the joke for the audience (“You know, we have an actual fireplace, and we’re watching a fire on TV! Isn’t that funny? Do you get it?”)
• Homer falling from the roof while decorating is an easy compare and contrast with “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire.” The more climactic and painful fall clashes with the simplistic, almost gentle tumble from the very first episode. I do like that Homer comes back into the house to call everyone outside, completely nonplussed by his accident, but the kids laughing in good nature at Homer’s small fall in “Open Fire” is much more adorable than them laughing at him here.
• I always liked this little animation of empty-bladder Bart leaving the bathroom (“How sweet it is!”)
  
• The tree on fire looks fantastic. I just love the fidelity of the old cel animation fire effects, I don’t know why they can’t create that great glow effect as convincingly with digital tools.
• “Cheer up. We’ll catch this guy.” “Uhhh, Chief?” “What? You can’t rule it out…”
• Kent Brockman gets a handful of great lines throughout the episode (“Is your husband or lover here, ma’am?” “Absolutely devastated? …absolutely devastated. The words of a heartbroken mother.”) I also love him cordially thanking the family at the end of his last broadcast, making it crystal clear he’s just doing his job and doesn’t actually give a shit.
• A remorseful Bart on Christmas is definitely reminiscent of “Marge Be Not Proud,” but in that episode, the conflict was much more relatable: a kid who disappoints a parent and has to make good. A bit too teevee-y? Perhaps at times. But it didn’t feel phony, has a satisfying emotional payoff, and is consistently funny throughout, never descending too deep into treacle. Here, for most of the middle chunk of the episode, Bart is racked with guilt over the ridiculous tree-destroying accident he pulled, so there’s nothing else to really grab onto. All you can do is count the minutes until the inevitable confession.
• It’s weird that the Crazy Old Man is the owner of the TV shop who shoos away the two orphans (“Come back when you get some parents!”) He was a well established resident at the Retirement Castle at this point, was this just a weird production mistake that they used his character model by accident?
• “Simpsons Scam Springfield/Angry Mob Mulls Options” is a great newspaper headline/subhead.
• The Simpson family impromptu traveling to Los Angeles so Marge can be on Jeopardy! for barely a minute of screen time doesn’t bode well for the ever shrinking reality this show has left. Luckily, Alex Trebek (RIP) is great in his small role. I love him rubbing his mustache after running the family out of the studio, and the fantastic ADR line from one of his goons (“They ain’t gettin’ the home version.”)
• I feel kind of mixed about the townspeople robbing the Simpson home ending. I like that it’s a cruel “twist” that isn’t a cloying and sappy happy ending, like how basically all episodes end nowadays, but it still feels pretty silly. What is Apu going to do with Santa’s Little Helper and Snowball II? Or Comic Book Guy with pants full of silverware? The people of Springfield are prone to riot and loot if provoked, but here, it comes off as almost pointlessly vindictive, which I guess is part of the point, but it doesn’t really work satisfyingly for me.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “I know these characters, but not from OFF.  The characters seemed to be caricatures of themselves in this ep. Trite plot, lack of humor, Bart-must-be-the-center style all contributed to the grade. The writers have sold out, yet again. I haven’t seen an ep like this since season 1. It also seemed as if the episode started in about the last minute — i.e. the entire ep could have been condensed into act I. All in all, a big disappointment.”

11. All Singing, All Dancing

• “Gump Roast” is handily the worst clip show, but this might be the most disposable episode of the entire series. If I want to hear any of the songs from the show, I’ll just listen to them off the CDs, or off YouTube nowadays. There’s no appeal to me having them all in one episode, and the framing device is pretty bad. Snake the hostage taker/attempted murderer doesn’t feel appropriate, or funny, to sustain an entire episode. The only saving grace is the first few minutes, the movie night set-up stuff is all good (“Did you get ‘Waiting to Exhale’?” “They put us on the ‘Waiting to Exhale’ waiting list, but they said don’t hold your breath,”) and of course, “Paint Your Wagon” is a tremendous sequence, but after Homer ejects the tape into the wastebasket, the episode completely tanks. Not much more to say about this one.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “I have to register my disgust at the utter lack of humor in last night’s episode. As a general rule, I am not a big fan of the Broadway-style singing engaged in by the Simpsons on occasion. However, I tolerate it as a necessary part of watching the best show on television and occasionally have a laugh at a cleverly worded lyric. But whoever the writer(s) is/are that insist upon this inclusion of non-funny, non-necessary musical filler should be drawn and quartered. Does anyone really feel that the musical numbers are necessary to the show? Perhaps once in a while, but not every show, and certainly not a whole show dedicated entirely to singing. Does Fox/Groening, etc. get some kind of feedback from some mythical audience that requests this piffle? To quote  Lisa, ‘Do they really expect us to swallow this tripe?'”

12. Bart Carny

• The opening with Marge trying to get the kids to do chores is actually pretty damn solid: Bart and Lisa’s “ding ding ding”s (and Homer running out for the ice cream man), talking about chopping their own hands off to avoid doing work, and Marge gloating in getting the upper hand when the carnival rolls into town, only to get undermined immediately by Homer. Marge gets the knife dug in even deeper at the carnival when Bart excitedly wants to go on the Yard Work Simulator (though she unnecessarily explains the joke, “When I ask you to do yard work…” when a simple frustrated murmur would have sufficed.)
• The Tooth Chipper is great, but definitely makes me wince. Between this and Homer chewing the tire bolts in “New York,” this is not a good season for my weird visceral reaction to dental mishaps.
• It’s not very clear why Homer deifies the carnies so much. I guess it would be okay if it were funny in any way, but it’s not. He’s slowly settling into being generally bothersome by default.
• Of course the Rich Texan would own Hitler’s car. Also, when Bart says while driving it, “Out of my way! I’m Hitler!” he seems to be doing kind of a Nazi salute?
• Homer butts in and pleads to be a carny with Bart, and the Rich Texan lets him because why not. What about his job or Bart going to school?  Also, maybe I’m overthinking this, but how could Homer and Bart doing grunt work at the carnival be enough to cover their debt in totaling an irreplacable antique car? How long are they in Springfield? None of these questions deserved answers, I guess.
• Agnes browbeating Skinner during the ring toss game to the point he switches to the knife prize is a dark joke I can get behind.
• Wiggum trying to get a bribe off Homer feels wrong; maybe it’s just me, but I consider Wiggum to be stupider than Homer. Also, he carts the ring toss game away, but isn’t the entire carnival crooked? Why wouldn’t he go after the Rich Texan as the owner? These details wouldn’t matter if the show were funnier; instead, this moment is enhanced with dramatic music, so I end up thinking about how this stuff makes no sense more clearly.
• I most certainly like how pissed Marge is at the start of act three as she grabs Homer by the collar and hauls him into the other room to chew him out for bringing two dirty strangers home. It’s a far cry from later seasons where she’s just a blank Stepford wife who puts up with all manner of crazy crap from her man child husband.
• The sunken “sister ship” is another great dark joke (“Went down with eighty-eight souls just last week,”) but it’s partially ruined by dumbass Homer and Bart taunting the shark. Marge daydreaming about a glass-bottomed car is a great bit though (“I can’t help but wonder what we’re missing!”)
• The Cooders squatting is pretty damn boring. I don’t know how you’d make the last act work better, but Homer’s hula hoop trick is a pretty damn satisfying conclusion. It’s just clever enough that I believe Homer could have come up with it, and them laughing through the mail slot, with their laughter cut off when the flap closes, is a great bit of karma.
• I wish Jim Varney was in a much better episode, but he gives one hell of a solid line reading for, “We were beaten by the best, boy.”
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Awful, awful first act, followed by very good, very funny second and third acts. What, was this episode written by John Swartzwelder or something? Bingo! While the laughs from later acts partially redeemed the ‘setup’ act, they didn’t entirely.”

13. The Joy of Sect

• The pay-off of the citizens of Springfield coming to see the home team return just to boo and riot is pretty great, as they proceed to turn their entire plane over. A truly hilarious final touch that I don’t know if I really noticed before is the inflatable ramp that unfurls after the plane is upside-down, causing the poor suckers trying to go down it to immediately fall to the ground.
• Homer repeatedly asking the Movementarians about the free weekend felt like a poorer imitation of his questioning of each letter in “VIP” from “Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington.”
• “Remember when those smooth-talking guys tried to sell me a timeshare vacation condo?” “You bought four of them! Thank God the check bounced.” “So I beat the system!”
• I’m fascinated by cults, so this episode has kind of a soft spot for me. They do a solid job presenting the Movementarians as a functioning pastiche of different famous cults. I love how act one is how all of the traditional manipulation tactics used by many cults just don’t work on someone as thick as Homer, and the usage of the Batman theme to finally permeate his psyche is excellent.
• “Church, cult, cult, church. So we get bored someplace else every Sunday. Does this really change our day to day lives?”
• Mr. Burns the God is a completely isolated diversion from the main story, but it’s still memorable all the same, and worth it if for nothing else the quote, “Ahoy hoy, lowly mortals!” One joke I don’t quite get is when Smithers tells Burns he’ll handle creating the religion’s logo after he throws out several copyrighted options (Special K, Mickey Mouse ears), we see the final version is a giant B inside of what is clearly a Christmas tree. Is the joke supposed to be that Smithers also picked a pre-existing symbol? 
• I like how Marge just gets more and more angry as act two goes on. The woman puts up with a lot of shit on a weekly basis, but she certainly has her limits (“Homer, you know I always try to put the best face on everything, but there’s no face on that damn bean!!”)
• Lovejoy being a little bit too ready to burn down the church is a great scene (“I never thought I’d have to do this again…”)
• Willie working with Marge, Ned and Lovejoy to reprogram the other Simpsons is a great usage of a side character, having them interact with other characters they normally wouldn’t in a whole new situation, and it turns out quite well (“I made some Rice Krispie squares for our hungry deprogram-orinoes!” “You ruined the atmosphere, you daft pansy!”)
• It’s so silly, but I love the trick with the hover bikes, and even better that Ned’s weird paper comb thing to make the noise is also used by the Leader at the end.
• The ending is pretty solid, if a little bit long, but I like the double fake out where even though a single drop of beer hits his tongue, it seems like Homer is still brainwashed, but then he goes to reveal what’s inside the forbidden barn, which is actually the foretold spacecraft. Of course we never think it’s real, but it still works really well. It’s also great that the beer thing is set up from the very beginning when the Movementarians tell him that alcohol isn’t permitted.
• After having watched hundreds and hundreds of awful new episodes, I was wondering if I would be a little more forgiving to the Mike Scully era of the series, but halfway into season 9, that really isn’t the case. I certainly would take any season 9-12 episode over season 32, but the fatal problems that start creeping into the forefront here and get progressively worse aren’t any more palatable. 
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “This episode can serve as sort of a litmus test for ‘Simpson’ fans. People who like the older shows will give a ‘C’ or lower, while the ‘New shows rule’ crowd will perhaps give an ‘A.’ I’m in-between, so I’ll award a ‘B-.’ The show’s best sequence, curiously, is also the most superfluous, but it’s generally funny when taken on its own merits.”

Original airdate: March 14, 2021

The premise: Through flashback, we see 90s teenage Homer’s dreams of being DJ to a Showbiz Pizza-esque robot band fall apart. In the present, the Simpson family’s efforts to recover the old robots to lift Homer’s spirits are dashed when they fall into the hands of J.J. Abrams, looking to reboot the property into a film series. Homer now has a new life’s purpose: to troll the movie online in efforts to stop it from being made.

The reaction: Holy shit, this episode was all over the fucking map. By the midpoint, I was just staring in confusion as to where the hell it was going and what the point of it all was. Can you even understand that premise I wrote up there? I watched the damn episode and I barely understand it. Act one is almost all flashback, as we see teenage Homer, now living in the 1990s, working as DJ at a Showbiz Pizza-type restaurant with an animatronic band. When he gets the chance to perform his own remixes with the characters, it becomes a true dream come true for him, until the establishment is shut down. In present-day, Homer is devastated when this memory gets triggered, causing the other Simpsons to try and track down the four robots to cheer Homer up. The episode presents this idea that this memory of Homer’s is so foundational that it causes him to have this severe emotional breakdown, but it’s just so incredibly stupid, and feels so far removed from what we know about Homer that it’s impossible to have any kind of investment. In fairness, Homer was in the Be Sharps, but being creative in any way is not really a big part of his character. You’d think being in a world famous music group in your 20s would be more important that dicking around with some pizza robots, but who knows where that shit lines up the timeline anymore, if at all. The final robot is absconded by J.J. Abrams’ people, and after hearing Homer’s sob story, he takes them all away to create a CG animated reboot. Now we’re into act three and I’m struggling to figure out just what the fuck is happening. Homer spends almost all of the following year becoming an obese slob obsessing over his Reddit board trashing Abrams’ upcoming movie, spurned on by Comic Book Guy, teaching him the ways of being an over-critical fan shitting on Hollywood reboot culture. So now it’s about Homer’s obsession about the creative integrity of the pizza robots? He himself was “rebooting” the characters as a teenager by making them contemporary to the 90s, having them sing “Whoomp! There It Is” in new hip-hop outfits, so how is this any different? It’s the sacred memory in his mind that’s most important to him, and Abrams’ new movie is an excuse for him to lash out to him for “ruining” it. But what the fuck does any of this matter? Why does he give a shit? In the end, Marge gets Abe to apologize for being a shitty dad, and Homer realizes that’s where his trauma came from all along. Oh fuck, whatever. Boy oh boy was this a huge turd. It’s for sure one of the worst of the season, though I don’t really hate it too much since it was just more baffling than anything. It was just a big confusing mess.

Three items of note:
– So I guess we have to talk about the floating timeline again. Some fans will complain about showing Homer as a teenager in the 90s as a contradiction, but it really isn’t. If Homer is 36 (or 38?) now in present day, then he was born in the 1980s, that’s just how it has to work. I don’t care about any of that as a concept (repeated references to Abe and Skinner still having served in WWII and Vietnam despite the increasingly illogical time difference is a different story.) My problem is what is the point of showing teen Homer in the 90s? The show already ran through the 90s, satirizing current day culture along the way. Perhaps looking back at the decade with a 2021 lens could make it different, but the first act is content enough to settle with namedropping Crystal Pepsi and Digital Underground and calling it a day. It’s the same problem with “That 90s Show” back in the day, it was just an exercise to see how many 90s references they could make in a story where Homer invents grunge music for some reason. I wonder why The Simpsons wasn’t doing on-the-nose reference humor in its early years? I guess they were too busy actually writing stories. For those keeping score at home, “That 90s Show” was written by Matt Selman, and now over a decade later, this episode was executive produced by him, so I guess he didn’t really progress much. Also, the fucking pizza robot band not only feels like material that’s been played on so many other shows from years and years ago (Dexter’s Lab’s “Chubby Cheese” comes to mind), but on this very show too. The Wall E. Weasel set piece in the first act of “Radio Bart” has dozens of jokes, and the robot band’s birthday song has been etched into my brain for life. To contrast, the pizza band here sings “Rock Around the Clock” with “pizza” replacing every third word. Solid writing.
– Act two starts with a seemingly normal Homer leaving the breakfast table for work. Marge nearly breaks down into tears, knowing that he’s devastated inside. Then we see little memories of all the fun things Homer used to do that he’s not doing, and then Moe randomly appears at the Simpson house and gives more memories. “He’s missing his youthful spirit! That spark that makes him who he is!” Marge croaks. This has to be the most egregious example of “tell, not show” this show has done in a while. This whole episode is basically about Homer’s obsessive emotional attachment to these pizza robots, and here we just have Marge and Moe explain how Homer is feeling, rather than actually see it from Homer in any way. After contently leaving for work, we don’t see Homer again for six more minutes.
If you want to see a story about people who truly, deeply care about their cherished memories of watching pizza robots, check out the documentary about the Rockafire Explosion, the Showbiz Pizza robot band. It’s a truly fascinating look at these people who revel in the nostalgia of their youth, and the lengths they’ve gone to to hold onto those good feelings. It really feels like this episode was directly inspired by the documentary, except they did an absolute shit job “adapting” it. Do yourself a favor and give it a watch, it’s really engaging and has a lot of charm, even as someone who’s never stepped foot in a Showbiz Pizza or a Chuck E. Cheese.
– I feel like it’s been a while since we’ve had a mega celebrity voice themselves in an episode that is just a sickening, fawning love letter to how great they are. John Legend and Crissy Teigan from a few seasons ago comes close, but they were more or less a cameo, while J.J. Abrams is pivotal to the plot of the latter half of the episode. There’s some gentle ribbing with  the introduction of Abrams’ underlings, scouring Springfield for nostalgic kitsch to fuel Abrams’ creative vision, but their worshipful reverence of their boss don’t really feel like jokes to me (“Master of story!” “He’s the ultimate architect of cinematic universes!”)  He sets up shop in Springfield in a huge warehouse with a loving staff, instantaneously buys the IP rights to the pizza robots and gets to make his “Agents of P.I.Z.Z.A.” movie without a hitch, winning over Homer in the end. Abrams’ pursuit in making a soulless piece of colorful cinematic tripe designed to deceptively pull at nostalgic heartstrings, and yet the third act paints Homer as the villain, aligning him with Comic Book Guy as an irritable Internet nerd never satisfied with any big budget Hollywood adaptation. It’s almost like the show is running damage control for Abrams and his critics, it’s really pathetic. One of the worst “jokes” is where Abrams lists off the gag names of all the digital effects studios who toiled away on his movie (Dream Prison, Indentured Servi-Dudes, Mr. No-Health-Care’s Wonder Emporium, “and too many others to count… or pay.” A guy in the audience shouts, “Yeah!”) It’s paying lip service to how VFX artists work horrible hours and get paid shit for it, but it’s coming out of the mouth of J.J. Abrams, big time Hollywood director/producer, who has serious industry pull to actually do something about this problem with the movies he produces, and instead, he just makes a joke about it. I speak as someone who used to work in VFX (and funnily enough, actually worked on one of Abrams’ movies) and has experienced firsthand the grueling hours and stressful work environment. I hold no grudge against Abrams, but it would be like if the producers of Sausage Party showed up in “Itchy & Scratchy: The Movie,” touring the Korean animation sweatshop instead of Kent Brockman. Like, ha ha, let’s laugh at these poor digital effects artists and how miserable their lives are because the major movie studios underbid for contracts the VFX houses need to stay in business, but those GODDAMN INTERNET TROLLS, they’re the real problem! Just terrible.

1. The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson

• Coming in under the wire at the very end of the eighth production season, Duffman is the last great character to come out of this series (Gil was funny at times, but forever living in the gigantic shadow cast by Lionel Hutz.) It’s like “Oh Yeah” was made for him and his bravado showmanship. I also like his reluctant, but contractually obligated support of the designated driver program when Barney brings the mood down.
• I feel kind of foolish not thinking of this before, but where the hell is Marge’s car? Why is Homer riding around on a scooter and building his own vehicle out of a mattress when the family has always had two cars, as angrily pointed out by Frank Grimes just three episodes ago.
• “If you do not remedy this malparkage within 72 hours, your car will be thrown into the East River at your expense.”
• Homer’s nightmare flashback to his bad New York experience is a wonderful sequence, it’s so expertly timed to the music.
• Obligatory “SIMPSONS DID 9/11” reference.
  
• The second and last (as far as I can remember) appearance of the Very Tall Man is sadly a syndication cut. It’s not the best joke, but to be fair, his first appearance was an all-time great, so to top that would be a tall order (ha ha ha.) Also interesting in that this episode is written by Ian Maxtone-Graham, the physical inspiration for the character.
• Watching Homer in this episode kind of reminded me of “Homer Goes to College;” he acts wildly exaggerated in both shows based upon preconceived notions in his head that cloud everything else. In “College,” he was convinced he was living in a bad college movie, and here, his one bad New York trip (which he’s most likely exaggerated in his head over the years) has created his irrational hatred of the city. He may be crazier here than he was in “College,” but I can accept his behavior in context for the most part. But of course, it’s a slippery slope for Homer from here…
• Homer biting the nuts on the tire really makes me wince. The sounds effects make it even worse, my teeth just recoiled inside my mouth.
• Marge and the kids traveling from NYC landmark to landmark definitely set the template for all future travel shows, where it’s just a matter of showing a handful of tourist locations, make your tepid jokes and call it a day. It’s pretty similar here, but the jokes are definitely stronger, and their wonderful day exploring the city contrasts Homer’s miserable escapades.
• “Chinese fire drill! Serious this time!!”
• “Checkin’ In” is one of the last great songs of the series, it’s very catchy and well-done, feeling very evocative of a Broadway-style tune. It’s also another song off the soundtrack CDs that I never quite understood as a kid. Not many cartoons back in the 90s talked about methadone clinics and Liza Minelli. Also, the lead actor seems to be modeled off Robert Downey, Jr., one of two RDJ jokes in the series about him being a washed-up druggie, which is especially funny in retrospect, since he’s been the highest paid actor in Hollywood for several years now.
• I totally get why some people would find Homer aggravating in this episode, but I love it. I laugh every time that boot just completely destroys the side of his car, and just how blinded with misplaced rage he is in his attempts to get the fuck out of NYC (smashing in the car radio as “Everything is Beautiful” plays is a highlight.) The only bit I don’t really like is when he tells Marge and the kids to jump in the car (“No time for the baby!”)
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Bland with little to laugh at – even with the contrived plot, there were plenty of opportunities for jokes that were missed. Homer was blazingly out of character, unless you prefer the idiot version of Homer, and the rest of the family, with much potential with NYC jokes, took a backseat to Homer’s antics. The age of the show is definitely showing, and seems to be lacking an overall QA manager.”
  

2. The Principal and the Pauper

• “Superintendent Chalmers!  Can I offer you a cup of coffee-flavored beverine?” “Yes, I take it grey, with creamium.”
• I like Agnes’ poorly-disguised deception in getting Skinner to his surprise party. I feel like up to this point, there have been just enough moments showing that Agnes depends on her son and cares for him to some extent, while past this point, it would just be an endless parade of scathing remarks about how she wish he were dead while Skinner just takes it like a wuss.
• “I’m an imposter. That is the real…” has become a really solid shitpost meme that’s been used for so many different things.
• So yeah, this will mostly just be talking about the controversial story of this episode, and hopefully I won’t just retread what I talked about ten years ago. I can’t imagine what I would have thought watching this when it aired, especially to have a bombshell show like this as the second episode of the season. Even with Skinner’s rewritten history not contradicting much from what we already know, it still recolors him in a less than favorable way. Skinner looking back fondly about the horrors of war, be it his nostalgic satisfaction finding his old POW helmet at a swap meet or his desperate attempts to recreate his beloved rice stew stateside, was incredibly funny irony, but also spoke a lot about Skinner’s character. Here, his Vietnam experiences feel more normalized, where he was a punk kid who learned to be a better man under the wing of his commanding officer. Depicting Skinner as a rebellious youth is an interesting idea, but it’s an episode I’d rather like to see as its own story, not in this overcomplicated misfire of a show.
• I know for sure I mentioned the audio commentary last time around, but I’d highly recommend listening to it, as writer Ken Keeler attempts to explain what he was going for (and admits himself it didn’t quite work out as he hoped.) He talks about how he never expected anyone to care so much about a secondary character like Skinner, a point seemingly represented in the episode with this Marge and Skinner exchange (“How would you feel if you suddenly found out Ned Flanders was an impostor?” “…who’s Ned Flanders?”)
• Exactly how much time goes by between Sgt. Skinner’s arrival and Skinner leaving town? Where was he staying, and what was he doing? Another sizable problem with this episode is just what a black hole of a character Sgt. Skinner is. I get that he’s supposed to be this weird interloper that the rest of the cast doesn’t quite gel with, but we only get that from Agnes getting upset that he was at a bar and he’s borrowing her car. But who is he? What kind of life does he want for himself in Springfield? His lifelong dream was to be principal, and we barely even see that. And why did he come home to change to a turtleneck? Creating a deeper contrast between the two Skinners and emphasizing how weird life is with the “real” Skinner back may have helped this episode, but it’s already juggling so much plot I’m not sure if it would have helped much.
• “Up yours, children!” is great, but why exactly are the kids just hanging by the storage center at night? Maybe the ice cream shop was just down the block.
• Skinner’s new job outside Topless Nudes is definitely one of the highlights of the episode (”They’re not even wearing a smile! Nod suggestively!”)
• Everything really starts to tear apart the more you mentally unravel it. You can say Agnes was an old woman who had forgotten exactly what her son looked like (even though they imply that she always knew, which is a whole greater topic I won’t even go into), but surely lots of other people in Springfield knew the real Skinner and would be confused as to what was going on. But the episode doesn’t really want you to think about any of that; as Homer explains at the end, “Do any of you care?” And the answer is yes, yeah, I kind of do. Ken Keeler is responsible for some of the greatest Futurama episodes (as well as Simpsons gems like “Two Bad Neighbors” and “Brother From Another Series”), but he really way over thought this one. The episode is a failure, but it’s an interesting failure, definitely enhanced by listening to the commentary. It also feels like Oakley & Weinstein’s very last meta deconstruction, but unlike “Poochie” and “Homer’s Enemy,” this one just really missed the mark.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Ken Keeler, I hate you. This episode is certainly a waste of tape. Abandoning all continuity and destroying a great supporting character in exchange for a few cheap laughs? I’m sorry, that might have worked on ‘The Critic,’ but if you haven’t noticed, this ain’t ‘The Critic.’ The only solace is that this appears to be Keeler’s final episode. Well, Mr. Keeler, with this episode, you have earned yourself the most welcome exit since Jennifer Crittenden.”

3. Lisa’s Sax

• Man, it’s so weird that Michigan J. Frog was the WB Network’s mascot. It was meant to appeal to kids and younger teens, but not only is he a relatively obscure character, but he’s a fucking frog who sings turn-of-the-century showtunes, and he’s gonna appeal to 90s kids? Whatever. When they finally retired him in 2005, WB chairman Garth Ancier commented, “The frog is dead and buried,” which is pretty hardcore.
• “It all happened in 1990! Back then, The Artist Formerly Known as Prince was currently known as Prince. Tracey Ullman was entertaining America with songs, sketches, and crudely drawn filler material…” The first big warning sign that the show’s been running too long is that the flashbacks are now officially clashing with show history. It’s a cute nod now, but it would become more of a nagging problem in the future.
• Li’l Jimbo’s bunny shirt is just adorable.
• I like Lisa’s demure clapping next to a more enthusiastic Bart and Lisa after Homer and Marge finish the first part of their story/song in the first act. It’s a great touch leading up to her outburst that they were telling the wrong damn story.
• Gotta love Curious George and the Ebola Virus.
• Li’l Bart’s troubling drawing is appropriately disturbing. Homer’s dismissive patronizing turned outright horror when he finally looks at it is a great performance by Dan.
  
• Dr. Pryor and the owner of King Toot’s make their first re-appearances in years, but neither of them have the same voices. Could they not have checked the old tapes to double check that?
• This episode has the first of what seemed like many Milhouse-is-gay jokes, with Dr. Pryor’s file about his “flamboyant homosexual tendencies.” The joke doesn’t really seem like it’s about the wild paranoia at overanalyzing and sexualizing young children, it’s more like, ha ha he’s gay/effeminate. Same with in “All Singing, All Dancing” with Bart’s lyrics “I hate to dance and prance and sing/That’s really more of a Milhouse thing.” 
• “The point I’m trying to make here is, that Bart must learn to be less of an individual and more of a faceless slug.”
• Yeardley Smith gives an adorable performance as 3-year-old Lisa (“Wave of the future!” still manages to touch my cold, black heart.)
• The plot of this episode is weirdly kind of start-and-stop, since we focus exclusively on Bart for the first half, then it becomes about Lisa up until the very end, with Bart getting a scene wrap-up to his story in act three. It’s funny that li’l Bart and li’l Lisa don’t even have any kind of interaction. But what we get is pretty good; Bart meeting li’l Milhouse (who is INCREDIBLY flaming, right?!) and his birth as a class clown feels very appropriate and satisfying. 
• I really like the jazzy end credits, which Homer angrily interrupts (“Lisa! Enough saxa-ma-phone already!”), then continues and closes out minus the saxophone part. It’s a pretty clever joke.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Hmmm. This episode read kind of like the old Simpsons- old in that they stuck to a plot, made some sort of sense, and still verged on hilarity. I liked it a lot, but there were a couple of things I just sort of shook my head at. The Fruitopia bashing, the WB bashing, etc- what’s the point they’re trying to make? It’s not satire, just bitter bad-mouthing. What was the whole ‘Simpsons is filmed in front of a live studio audience’ supposed to mean? Why were they reminiscing about the ’70s at the start of the show? All in all, it could have been a lot worse.”

4. Treehouse of Horror VIII

• God bless the FOX censor and robbing us of that bit about the crack pipe (“As the FOX censor, it’s my job to protect you from reality.”) It’s also probably the last clever TOH opening. The one next year with the twisted opening sequence where everyone dies is neat, I guess, but this one feels more creative.
• “I stand by my ethnic slur!” is a Quimby line for the ages.
• It’s weird that Homer refers to “The Far Side” calendar as a Gary Larson calendar. It couldn’t have been an issue of permission; why say the cartoonist’s name when most people would most recognize the name of the comic?
• There was a period where I thought the show writers had forgotten to put Kang and Kodos in this year’s special. Sadly, they were victims of syndication cuts, which sucks because it’s one of their best appearances; I like the idea of a reverse-UFO sighting and their shock at seeing the missile fly by.
• Seeing Homer in that theater full of corpses makes me really miss going to the movie theater. I’d even see a David Spade/Chris Farley movie, I don’t give at shit.
• I always smile at Homer singing along and responding to “War” (“Say it again! Okay!”)
• “The Homega Man” kind of falls apart by the end. The freaks and why they want to kill Homer feels kind of rushed, and we get an extended chase sequence that isn’t really funny, and Marge and the kids killing them as the twist ending feels more random than unexpected. The chase scene did give me Hit & Run flashbacks to the final Halloween level. Even the music felt kind of reminiscent of the game. Remember the last mission where you have to carry nuclear waste barrels to the spaceship, but you can’t drive too recklessly or else they’ll explode and you have to start all over? What a pain in the ass that was.
• Not only is the cat ear medicine the exact same type of can as a Duff, but it’s placed right between two Duff cans. Amazing.
• The two-headed Santa’s Little Helper/Snowball II fusion actually beat Nickelodeon’s CatDog to the punch by a year. FOX should have sued!
• It goes against Matt Groening’s long-attested rule about animals never acting too humanlike, but the spider shaking its fists at fly Bart as it escapes is still really funny to me.
• I love the touch of 1649 Krabappel having the scarlet A.
• Impressively, this show has gotten two equally funny retorts to Lisa quoting the same Bible verse to make a point (“Doesn’t the Bible say `Judge not lest ye be judged?’”) In “Bart’s Girlfriend,” Lovejoy murmurs, “I think it’s somewhere towards the back…” and here, 1649 Wiggum dismisses, “The Bible says a lot of things,” before ordering Lisa’s mother to be shoved off the cliff. 
• “Oh, Neddy, look at them up there, plotting our doom! They could force us to commit wonton acts of carnality!” “Pffft, yeah, that’ll be the day.” Great line, and interesting that 1649 Ned is considerably hornier than his modern day counterpart.
• It really is funny how quickly the dial is being turned on Homer’s characterization. This is the second episode of the ninth production season, and first to air, and we’ve got Homer angrily punching corpses, threatening Bart with an axe and an ending where he gets an angry mob to chase Lisa out of town. Season 9 still has a lot of the same writers as season 8, but Oakley & Weinstein must have tethered these impulses to some extent, and then Mike Scully moves up and I guess decided to just let the chains loose. And look how good that turned out!
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “While TOH VIII didn’t quite reach the heights of III or VI, it was a decent entry in one of the most unique holiday series on TV today. ‘Fly vs. Fly’ was the best episode; it lacked any jarring shifts in tone and had an abundance of good gags. The endings for ‘The Homega Man’ and ‘Easy-Bake Coven’ clashed with the shorts’ beginnings, but each short had something to recommend it.”

5. The Cartridge Family

• The soccer ad feels like a classic manipulative Simpsons commercial (“It’s all here: fast-kicking, low scoring, and ties? You bet!”) Also, Ariaga and Ariaga II is one of those jokes I absolutely don’t understand but love all the same.
• Great bit of Springfield history from Marge about the soccer stadium (“It’s hard to believe this used to be an internment camp!”)
• Great detail at the riot with Dr. Hibbert strangling Dr. Nick.
• “But surely you can’t put a price on your family’s lives.” “I wouldn’t have thought so either, but here we are.”
• Hey, have I mentioned Dankmus in a while?
• Homer in this episode feels reminiscent of “Homer’s Phobia,” where his character is being co-opted slightly to represent the average American man, previously in his latent homophobia, now with his loudmouth support of his right to own a gun. He definitely comes off worse here than “Phobia” for a few reasons, but the core of the episode feels sound to me.
• The episode has its fun with gun-nut culture, with the NRA group scenes feeling depressingly familiar over twenty years later. It’s not really even parody anymore. Moe’s closing joke of his story about shooting and paralyzing a would-be robber (”I guess the next place he robs better have a ramp!”) being met with raucous laughter from the crowd is quite literally something I’d expect to see from CPAC or a similar militantly right-wing meetup.
• Homer’s fantasy about the gilded life he would lead if he robbed the Kwik-E-Mart is another wonderful looping gif-worthy moment.
  
• I feel like I had greater anxiety with Homer’s reckless fooling around with his gun this time around. After the gun goes off twice during dinner, he sets it down on the table and it fires a third time. When we cut back to a wider shot of the kitchen, the gun is pointed incredibly close to where Maggie is sitting. Yeah, that scene is the breaking point with Marge, but Homer coming this close to shooting his infant daughter is pretty hardcore.
• Homer going to respond to Marge’s “I think you’d agree that I’ve put up with a lot in this marriage,” only to stop when he sees Bart and Lisa sternly shaking their heads is a great moment.
• Homer’s hiding place for the gun is pretty stupid, even for him, considering Marge is the only person in the family that would actually open the vegetable crisper.
• There’s been so many “last straw” moments in the last twenty years of the show, of Marge insisting this is the worst thing Homer has ever done, and that it may actually threaten their marriage and their family. Here, it really does feel like it. The episode does a solid job with Marge’s progression, humoring Homer’s new obsession, then her calm and concerned plea for him to give it up, then her justified outrage at his betrayal.
• Homer’s excitement over the gun is fine, but it goes too far by the third act when he’s gleefully shooting the TV and blasting every light in the house. It’s just way too silly.
• “Are you some kind of moron?” This one line from Cletus is not only funnier than anything we saw in “Yokel Hero,” but says more about his character than anything we “learned” in that episode. He may be simple folk, but even he has better gun sense than Homer.
• The episode really falls down at the ending, which I’m not even sure what to make of. Homer is exposed to lying to Marge again, but the day is saved by the other NRA members arriving, packing enough heat to frighten off Snake. So is this like a “good guy with a gun” happy ending? They joke about letting Snake get away, but characterizing reckless dimwits like Moe and Lenny as concerned citizens responding to the triggered silent alarm feels wrong and antithetical to the episode. Homer concludes he can’t trust himself and surrenders the gun to Marge, which I guess I understand, but then Marge decides she looks good with it and keeps it for herself, which I guess is the unexpected twist ending, but I don’t find it very funny.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “I find that this episode was confusing, trying to preach a lesson that it couldn’t sustain. Lisa’s statement that the Bill of Rights was out of date, picking out one section, while ignoring that her statements could apply to freedom of speech and religion, seemed far too radical for her. On the bright side, all of us that find Marge to be a sexy woman got two treats in this show. One, Homer’s mental view of her in a very sexy and revealing outfit,  plus Marge’s strut when she pockets the pistol for herself. I don’t think this one is destined to be a classic by anyone’s reasoning, but like any of the Simpson shows, it does have a bright spot or two.”
  (we don’t kink-shame on this blog, but what the fuck)

6. Bart Star

• I love Dr. Nick’s big goofy grin manning the “What’s Your Sex?” booth. What else could his procedure possibly entail other than groping the genitals of whoever is foolish enough to indulge him?
  
• The goaded fury which Milhouse repeatedly and violently kicks Bart in the crotch to test the cup is still very funny.
• Lisa’s attempts to rabble rouse pee wee football is a really wonderful scene. She’s raising a stink to get attention, but she’s clearly just a little kid who sheepishly backs down when her efforts are foiled. She doesn’t come off as unlikable or out-of-character; she’s exaggerated a bit to serve the purpose of the scene, but it’s not pushed too far. Thankfully, this would be the very last time Lisa would bitch about a self-righteous cause and she would go onto be a worldly beloved, non-problematic character. Thank goodness for that.
• The two teams both being the Wildcats is even funnier to me as my high school mascot was the Cougars.
• Is there a reason that Uter is depicted throughout the episode only wearing one cleat? Is that a reference to a specific athlete?
• Homer’s hatred of coach Flanders goes sour mainly because of how long it goes on for, as we see him badmouthing him and acting like a dick over multiple scenes over multiple weeks. It also comes out of a self-processed place of meanness, which is incredibly out-of-character of Homer (“Dad, that was really mean!” “I know, sweetie!”) Maybe if he had vied for the coach job and lost to Ned, he would have some kind of motivation, but here, he’s just an asshole. Meanwhile, Ned seems quick to anger, or at least strong annoyance, at Homer’s taunting, and seeing him climb up the stands, stare down Homer and insult him to his face made this feel like a sequel to “Hurricane Neddy.” 
• Homer’s flashback to his gymnastic days is great (Smithers’s excitement when we go from women’s events to men’s, Abe’s “You’re gonna blow it!!”) but it seems like it should have come earlier in act one, or a bit later in act two. As it is now, Homer acts like an overbearing coach dad to Bart for the first minute, then switches gears completely after the flashback. A little more breathing room in either direction would have helped.
• “Son, you can do anything you want. I have total faith in you.” “Since when?” “Since your mother yelled at me.”
• Joe Namath is fantastic, miraculously appearing to help Bart when he needs it most, only to leave without giving any actual information. I like how Bart cycles through all the things he said to him in his mind, trying to parse out anything useful, but ultimately comes up with nothing. On its face, the scene reeks of what would come later where celebrities will just appear out of nowhere and a character will announce who they are (“Wow! Joe Namath!”), but this was intentionally done like that. Plus, Namath ends up looking like kind of a dope, especially in his ending PSA.
  
• The King of the Hill guest appearance is pretty worthless. My mind wants to read it as intentionally underwhelming in response to a presumed big marketing push promoting the crossover, but it doesn’t really feel that way.
• Homer’s awkward mending of fences with Bart is pretty sweet, while being biting at the same time (“If you forgive me, I promise I’ll never encourage you again.”)
• The bait-and-switch ending with Bart taking Nelson’s place in the back of Wiggum’s squad car really works, it’s satisfying unexpected and feels like an appropriate ending.
• Simpsons Archive retro review: “Did anyone else notice how superficial Lisa’s lines were tonight? She only wanted to play football because she thought it was going to cause trouble! As soon as she found out there were already girls on the team, she ran away. I’ve seen writers that couldn’t handle Lisa before, but this time they were just plain wrong! The C.U.P. joke was neither funny nor subtle. The only people that will laugh at it, have either forgotten it, or never heard it before. Even then, it’s likely to be a weak laugh.”

Original airdate: March 7, 2021

The premise: After being incredibly moved by a jail cell serenade by Cletus, Homer vows to make him a music superstar, which he succeeds at. However, he must pull Cletus back down to Earth when he hires a new manager after fame goes to his head.

The reaction: I’ve long spoken of my desire for this show to flesh out its secondary cast in the pursuit of new and different stories to tell, but I don’t think every denizen of Springfield deserves to be put under the characterization microscope. Case in point: an episode about everybody’s favorite slack-jawed yokel Cletus. He’s played a part in a couple plot lines over the last decade or so, but this feels like his meatiest role yet. I guess you could make a substantial episode all about Cletus, but man, I am perfectly fine with keeping him a goofy side character, because I did not give a flying fuck about him at all in this story. It also doesn’t help that the premise is obviously lifted from “Colonel Homer” (they even directly reference it), and it’s not even worth comparing the two. Homer gets tossed in the drunk tank, missing yet another family dinner, and Cletus’ heartfelt song about family or something motivates him to be a better family man, which we know because he goes home and tells the family that directly. And like all good family men, he then proceeds to spend all his time managing a hillbilly’s singing career. Cletus sings about how he doesn’t need the finer things and loves his country life, but none of the songs are funny or catchy, or honestly, even intelligible, as I had trouble hearing his low singing voice over the music at points. He has no motivation to want to be famous, nor does Homer to actually give a shit about making him famous. His jail cell song didn’t move him in a profound way like Lurleen Lumpkin back in the day, at least it didn’t feel like it at all. When Cletus hits it big and he and Homer are on a private jet for some reason, he fires Homer, gets a new agent and moves to a fancy Shelbyville loft, content to shill low-grade moonshine on TV with tee-vee actors playing his kids. I’m finding it difficult to really parse through the plot, because I honestly and truly did not give a shit. Cletus abandons his family through one quick line to Homer at the agent’s office that it doesn’t even register, so Homer and Marge end up confronting him with his wife and kids, and Cletus makes good with them, and then that’s the end. But the episode was short, so we end on Albert Brooks’ agent character talking with an unnamed client for two minutes. Boy, maybe you could have used those extra minutes to flesh out the story some more? No matter, it would have been wasted anyway. But like I said, some characters like Cletus, or Miss Hoover earlier this season, you can leave well enough alone in the background, and they’re much better for it. Later this season, we’re going to get an episode spotlighting Sarah Wiggum. I think I’d put her right below Cletus on a list of characters I want to learn more about.

Three items of note:
– Homer’s desire to be a better family man ultimately translates into him being the good guy not wanting Cletus to abandon his family for his career. But he’s basically abandoned his own family to manage Cletus. It’s unclear exactly how much time elapses between the first montage and when they’re on the private jet before Cletus fires Homer. We see a bunch of magazine covers with Cletus’ face on it, and it’s implied they’ve been touring and working a lot, presumably with Marge and the kids stuck at home. In the third act, when Homer is finally back, rather than be pissed at all about this, Marge insists they both go get Cletus back with his family? Why? What loyalty does Marge have to this random hillbilly who lives in her town? It’s a big leap for me in certain episodes where she supposedly cares about Moe, but he at least has some connection to the family, but fucking Cletus? Ridiculous.
– The only scene devoted to actually showing Cletus’s success is her appearing on the Ellen Show, or “Elin Degenerous” as she’s called here. They attempt to do material about the recent stories about the toxic work environment on Ellen’s actual show by having her trapdoor the audience for not applauding enough, and her billboard shooting lasers out its eyes, but it all just falls flat. First, why the hell don’t they just make it Ellen? I hate this change-one-letter bullshit when it comes to referencing real people. But beyond that, I remember a decade or so ago in that fucking terrible American Idol episode, they had Ellen on as a guest, because that was the one season she was an Idol judge for some reason, and they made fun of her by having her dance, because that’s the thing she does in real life. And what does “Elin” do when we first see her? She’s dancing in her office. Eleven fucking years and they can still only do the same fucking “joke” about Ellen. A good show would have fucking ripped her apart, not this softball nonsense.
– The unnamed agent is voiced by Albert Brooks, having last appeared six seasons ago as an anger management counselor (I think?) in the brilliantly named “Bull-E.” I remember not being too taken by his character then, and I feel about the same here. It hurts him that he’s showing up thirteen minutes into a story that nobody could possibly care about, but none of his lines are really very funny, which makes it more baffling that they give him two whole minutes at the end to just ad-lib and fill up time. I guess his material is a lot funnier in isolation, and I imagine it was very funny to hear him in the booth just riffing and they laughed so much they decided to keep it all in, but none of any of that humor translated onto the screen.