Original airdate: March 15, 2020

The premise: Facing expulsion after a potentially disastrous prank, Bart is forced into a mentorship with Ned Flanders, only to find it incredibly beneficial. Jealous of his son’s new relationship to his most hated neighbor-eeno, Homer decides to become father figure to a despondent Nelson.

The reaction: I guess this is what happens when you smash together elements from previous episodes: a Simpson takes pity on poor little dirt urchin Nelson (“Slumbering With The Enemy”), Bart forms a connection with Ned Flanders (The Simpsons Movie), and Homer and Bart gain new father/son relationships (“Dad Behavior”). The biggest parallel in my mind is “Brother From The Same Planet,” with the exact same premise of Bart gaining a new father figure out of necessity, and Homer gaining a new surrogate son out of pure spite. Despite ostensibly being a Homer/Bart episode, Homer’s bad parenting doesn’t play a role in Bart’s inciting incident involving releasing a fake live grenade during a school assembly. Ned Flanders steps in to save Bart from getting rightfully expelled, promising he’ll get the boy on the straight and narrow. Or rather, he threatens Chalmers to unleash his “Prayer Chain” after he rightfully balks at using religious teachings to save a public school child. But whatever, there’s no sense complaining about ultra-fanatical religious jokes coloring Ned as unlikable when the show’s been doing this for almost twenty years now. Anyway, we first see Ned having Bart wash dishes, which Bart turns into a prank where he “cuts” his hand and squirts ketchup pretending it’s blood. In a serious tone, Ned threatens, “I can turn that into real blood, you little punk!” At this, I thought they were going to revive “Hurricane Neddy” and have this episode culminate in Ned having another mental breakdown trying to manage a hellion like Bart. But this moment is never recalled again, so I guess it was just a joke that Ned threatened to violently attack a ten-year-old. Anyway, a wilderness fishing trip (remember the movie?) instantly turns Bart into a good student and choir boy, just like that, I guess, so that now nine minutes in, our “plot” begins where Homer realizes Bart doesn’t need him, and eventually comes upon a crying Nelson at the dump and decides to mentor him. Again, I can’t help but recall when almost thirty years ago, Homer was the guardian to another sad, poor boy… what was his name? Pepsi? But here, of course, it’s all tell, not show (“Am I going to do it? Is it wrong to take advantage of one child’s feelings to make another child feel bad?”) Also, unlike “Brother,” where Homer took a genuine shining to little Pepi and tried to be a good surrogate dad, here, he seems to not give much of a shit about actually helping Nelson. Even though we previously saw Mrs. Muntz in the first act as the direct source of Nelson’s misery, showing up drunk at the school and passing out in his locker, she later appears to dress Homer down about getting Nelson’s hopes up about being a father figure who won’t abandon him, as so many have done before. Homer eventually tells Nelson the truth, Nelson swears revenge by getting Bart hurt at a prayer parade Ned has him in, and then Homer gets hurt instead and he and Bart have a bonding ride in the ambulance together, and awww ain’t that sweet who cares. Al Jean bizarrely has a story credit for this episode, which I can only assume was the result of him falling asleep with “Brother From The Same Planet” playing on Disney+ in the background and thinking he had a great idea for a new episode. Great work, Al.

Three items of note:
– I’ve spoken before about the nature of Bart’s pranks in recent years being a lot more cruel than in the classic era, where we’ve gone from Bart being a rambunctious little boy to just being kind of a little asshole. We just saw it two episodes ago where he forced the town to do his bidding out of fear of having a movie spoiled. We’ve seen him abuse Homer in numerous ways over the last five seasons or so. It just seems like there’s a big difference between painting the lines on the faculty parking lot too close together and fiddling with the water nozzles to mess with Homer’s shower, with recent “pranks” like destroying the SPRINGFIELD sign, psychologically torturing Homer, and here, bringing a weapon of war into school as a goof. And yeah, Chalmers was this close from expelling him, but comedy or no, in the year 2020, Bart would immediately be arrested for this shit. Considering this incident and Bart tricking Ned into thinking he cut his hand, the episode could have even been about Bart learning not to take things too far, or on how desensitized he’s become to violence, or something like that. But nothing. Those two scenes feel so off for Bart to me. Even his most notorious “last straw” pranks like him using a huge line of megaphones and unleashing town-wise destruction, or flooding the entire gymnasium, felt like kid-appropriate pranks performed with non-malicious intent.
– The Simpson women take two very different approaches in response to the conflict in this episode. Marge, as always, turns an active blind eye to her husband’s emotionally destructive behavior, running back into the house to tend to Maggie (“Where are you, my little excuse?”) But the bigger reaction comes from Lisa, in maybe one of the saddest moments in series history. Seeing Homer at the bar looking the other way as Nelson steals the coins from the jukebox, Lisa offers her father some cash (“Here’s forty dollars. That’s a lot of money to me. But I want you to get some therapy about what you’re doing.”) Just think about this. This is an eight-year-old girl offering her drunk father sitting at a bar her own money, pleading him to get professional help. This is an absolutely heartbreaking scenario. Fifteen seconds later, we get a joke about Duffman doing Shakespeare. Then we see Homer actually at therapy, the therapist says what he’s doing to those two boys is awful, and then we’re done with that whole concept. Just dreadful.
– When Bart and Ned have their day-to-night camping trip, I couldn’t help wondering where the hell Rod and Todd were. Remember those kids? One of them was incredibly distraught about his dead mother a couple months ago, until he suddenly wasn’t? They do appear mid-way through the episode helping Ned and Bart with the prayer pride parade, and then later in the tag, we see the conclusion where Homer has Ned be Nelson’s new sorta foster dad, and the Flanders and Muntz families come together for a nice family meal. The other bullies balk at Nelson giving up the “way of the bully,” to which he replies, “What can I say? People change.” He then reveals he has Milhouse on ice in the freezer (“Thaw! Thaw!”) Sometimes I feel I can barely comment on this shit. They try to have this completely tone deaf happy ending of Nelson finding a caring family, after spending twenty minutes making jokes about him being poor, then try to dangle some kind of characterization in maybe him reforming his ways, but of course he fucking won’t because this series is in cryostasis. This show just sucks so fucking bad, you guys.

One good line/moment: Can I just retire this section again? I think I’ve threatened to do that a few times, but I may finally do it for real-sies. If there’s something truly of notable quality in an episode, I’ll make a point of mentioning it, but otherwise, there doesn’t feel like any real point in doing this part anymore.

Original airdate: March 8, 2020

The premise: Marge enforces harsher restrictions on screen time for the family, but when she’s outed as being the most addicted of all, the Simpsons decide to go to rehab to get their habit under control.

The reaction: Full disclosure, I was quite tired when I watched this, but this still felt like one of the dullest episodes I’ve seen in a while. A modern family trying to curb their screen time feels like a premise that a lot of family sitcoms must have tackled before, so I guess it’s this show’s turn to give its enlightening social commentary on how addicted we are to our phones and shit. Of course everyone’s lives are more fulfilling without phones: Bart discovers how much he enjoyed playing with real toys, Lisa falls in love with the library’s old card catalog, and Homer get invested in doing the daily jumble. Riveting content. But the struggle is too great for Marge, and the family ends up going to “Messages,” an extremely elaborate and expensive rehab center. I was all set to complain about how the hell they could afford to stay at such a place, but the head doctor explains their services are all paid for, thanks to tech billionaires feeling guilty for the negative ramifications of their products. Therapy introduces possibly intriguing ideas, like Bart replacing wielding weaponry in a video game with using guns in real life at a shooting range, but nothing really interesting comes out of it. The “twist” reveals that the rehab staff are assuming the online identities of their patients in order to spam them with ads and scams. The Simpsons escape, the head doctor is arrested, and the episode is over. The impetus of the episode featured Marge being excited she taught sign language to Maggie, yet none of the family gave a shit, as pictured above. Does that premise get wrapped up in the end? Nah. Honestly, I don’t have much else to say on this one. A show like South Park has done much better episodes regarding phone addiction and screen time, while an entry like this feels like it barely has anything to add that hasn’t been in an editorial cartoon by a 55-year-old artist complaining about those damned young whippersnappers on their phones.

Three items of note:
– Guest star round-up: Dr. Drew Pinsky appears at rehab, which I guess makes sense, until he turns into a Hulk because he’s mad at a phone game. He literally hulks out, and I don’t understand why. Is this a reference to something? Former show writer and current podcaster Dana Gould voices himself as a calming resource for rehab patients, and the head doctor is voiced by acclaimed documentarian Werner Herzog. A recent film of his actually was centered around humanity’s current obsession with technology (Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World), presumably that’s why he was cast in this role. It goes without saying that I am sure that film is more insightful about its subject matter than this episode.
– There’s a scene where Marge and Maggie visit Patty and Selma, but Marge is so off-put by her sisters’ constant texting that she leaves early. Meanwhile, Maggie is so overcome by all the cigarette smoke that she passes out. Marge sits blank-faced as Selma says her joke line, “She always sleeps so good when she’s here!” Outside the bizarre fact that Marge seems to not give a shit her one-year-old just went unconscious due to smoke inhalation, they don’t even try to make any sort of comment about smoking being an addiction too? Why would you include Patty and Selma in an episode about addiction and not even breech that subject?
– Whenever the show makes jokes about video games, it feels like their only joke is that they’re cartoonishly violent. In this show, we get two: we see Bart watching a streamer go through all the different ways he can kill other players, then later Bart regales his rehab group with how he danced upon the digital grave of his opponents. It just feels very played out and limited, since there’s lots of other things you can parody about modern video games.

One good line/moment: Probably nothing.

Bonus review: In case you didn’t know, playing in front of the new Disney-Pixar film Onward is a brand new short starring Maggie, “Playdate with Destiny.” The short opens with the Mickey Mouse ears silhouette revealed to be Homer holding up two donuts above his head, followed by a card reading “DISNEY WELCOMES THE SIMPSONS.” It was maybe the most uncomfortable I’ve felt in a movie theater since I saw Sacha Baron Cohen’s Bruno with my parents. Anyway, the short itself is pretty simple: Maggie meets another baby at the park and falls in love, and then it’s just six minutes of the same joke where it’s like she’s going through the ups and downs of an adult relationship, but she’s a baby.  Using baby powder to freshen up, getting milk drunk in despair after not seeing her date, that sort of stuff. It’s cute, I guess, but pretty unremarkable on the whole. I wasn’t crazy about “The Longest Daycare,” but it’s much more clever and interesting than this saccharine affair. I would have to assume this short was in development before the Disney-Fox deal was in full swing, so I suppose I can’t blame Disney for this. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to The Simpsons being a Disney property now. Seeing billboards of Bart spray-painting on a Disney+ advertisement would always force me to do a double take. But anyway, yeah, the short is pretty dull. But good news, Onward actually exceeded my expectations. It follows the Pixar formula, in some cases a little too much, but the core emotional story is solid, the performances are great, there’s a lot of fun moments and small details, and it’s got the biggest Pixar cry moment since Coco. So big recommend from me. And don’t worry about showing up late. If you miss the Simpsons short, you’re not missing much.

Original airdate: March 1, 2020

The premise: After seeing an advance copy of the latest blockbuster “Vindicators” sequel, Bart abuses his nerd privilege by getting people to do his bidding lest he spoil the movie for them. The other Simpsons worry about Bart taking this too far, while Hollywood takes their own steps to ensure Bart’s silence.

The reaction: Making specific pop culture references basically means you’re dooming your show to be dated within a few years. This isn’t to say that you should never do it, but I consider something like a MAD Magazine-level “parody” like the Vindicators to be very dull and uninspired, rather than something a little broader and more substantial. None of the Vindicators stuff in this episode is really saying anything about blockbuster movies, it’s just about people being emotionally moved by the tragic ending of Avengers: Infinity War, and then being bummed they have to wait a whole year for the conclusion in the sequel. So they’re literally just doing their satirical take on the last two Avengers movies… but then where’s the satire? There’s plenty of criticisms one could make about the films of the MCU, both creatively as movies themselves, and the big business media juggernaut behind them. They approach a bit of the latter with the two movie executives (voiced by the Russo brothers) talking about how imperative the box office of their movie is to the global economy, but by that point, the episode is basically over. So all the Vindicators stuff is mostly just empty referencing and meaningless filler. What are we left with? A story where Bart acts like a dick, only to mend his ways thanks to manipulation. By means I won’t bother explaining here, Bart watches an advance copy of the new Vindicators movie, and uses his spoiler knowledge to get people to do anything he wants, which we see as him taking everything from Comic Book Guy’s store, and ultimately forcing the entire town to build him a giant treehouse. I know the episode is called “Bart the Bad Guy,” but Bart’s not just a little scamp pulling pranks because it’s funny, he’s actively abusing people to do his bidding for no real reason other than he’s just a shit. I guess the episode is about the crisis of Bart’s morality, as clearly spelled out by Marge toward the end (“Bart’s soul is at stake!”) The ending involves the Vindicators executives kidnapping Bart and trapping him in a VR simulation where he discovers his actions have caused his beloved Vindicators to be in danger of being defeated by the sinister villain Chinnos (get it, because Thanos has a big chin? BRILLIANT WRITING YOU GUYS.) Rather than team up with him, Bart chooses to defeat the evil villain, and everything is all good. So he learns the errors of his ways via a massive hallucination and manipulation by a huge corporation? That feels like an ending that shouldn’t be played so straight. We end on the executives, satisfied Bart won’t blab spoilers anymore, disarming the explosive device under Homer and Marge’s bed, in a knee-slapping jab at their new Disney overlords. Any sort of bite-the-hand humor the show used to excel at goes right out the freaking window after this embarrassing mess. After this episode-length Avengers commercial, I can’t wait to see what new synergistic effort Disney’s got cooked up next.

…I guess I didn’t have to wait long.

Three items of note:
– “Vindicators: Crystal War” is a Marble Studios film, but when characters are talking about “Marble movies,” it just sounds like Marvel, which makes me wonder what the fuck is even the point of doing the whole legally distinguishable charade. Disney owns this shit, why not have it actually just be Marvel Studios and the Avengers? Who gives a crap?
– Embracing his spoiler powers, Bart arrives at school acting cool as the other kids are terror stricken, set to the music used in Spider-Man 3 when Venom-infected Peter Parker is strutting his stuff down the New York City streets. My knee jerk reaction is to complain about such a dated reference (we are thirteen years out from Spider-Man 3 at this point, just in case you wanted to feel old today), but considering Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame are more contemporary and those references also suck, it’s basically a no-win scenario. But this is all stuff I’ve talked about numerous times: this is literally as fast as their production cycle can go in terms of contemporary references, and in the age of memes and satire on the Internet, you’re inevitably going to miss the boat bagging on the hot new movie or cultural moment if you wait more than a week. But also, as the show in its prime knew well, a reference doesn’t mean shit unless it’s funny outside of its context, or is adding or subverting something from the source material. What’s the point of using the Spider-Man 3 music? I haven’t a clue, other than please laugh at reference.
– One of Bart’s spoiler victims is Principal Skinner, who gets robbed of his hairpiece. I remember on an early DVD commentary, Matt Groening talking about how he was adamant against the idea of Skinner wearing a toupee, because he felt it was a very cliche trope for a humorless principal character. The only time I recall a mention of this was in one of the very first Simpsons comics, where we see Skinner gluing his hair on his head to ensure the toupee doesn’t budge. But here we are nearly thirty years later, and we finally circled back to this idea, and I guess Groening didn’t give a shit anymore, or was too busy relaxing in his solid gold mansion with his rocket car to notice. Not that I really care either, it’s just an interesting thing I noticed.

One good line/moment: Nothing to be had here. Man, this one was an absolute dud. It was aggressively boring more than anything, maybe second worst of the year after the Todd Flanders episode.

Original airdate: February 23, 2020

The premise: Professor Frink enters the cryptocurrency space with “Frinkcoin,” making him a billionaire overnight. Aghast that he is no longer Springfield’s richest man, Mr. Burns seeks to overtake Frink’s wealth, while Frink tries to determine if his newfound friends aren’t just there to mooch off his fortune.

The reaction: Yet another episode that seemingly acts like they’re shining a light on a secondary character, but reveals absolutely nothing new about them and barely even feels interested in doing so. An entire Frink episode could actually be something worthwhile, if it actually had something to say. But we know what show we’re talking about, right? Frink tells Lisa he’s developing Frinkcoin, then we cut to Kent Brockman reporting on what looks like a press conference of Frink announcing the cryptocurrency, but I guess it’s not that, because Brockman then talks about how Frink’s a billionaire now. I know I’ve talked a lot about the Simpson-becomes-an-instant-success trope, but this is a new one: a character becoming a billionaire out of nowhere by the six minute mark. The main “emotional” thrust of the story is that money does not bring Frink happiness. Lisa urges him to indulge in the creature comforts he’d always dreamed of as a poorer man, but he’s still sad after doing that. Surmising companionship might raise his spirits, Homer is corralled into bringing Frink to Moe’s, leading to the barflies and other schlubs like Kirk and Gil to become Frink’s little posee. But Frink has no connection to these idiots. The point isn’t even that he’s enjoying being social despite the company he’s keeping, it all feels completely meaningless. When Mr. Burns tries to sew discord by telling Frink his new friends only hang out with him for his wealth, Frink replies, “Those guys are my best buddies! Fatso and Drunkie and the evil bartender!” And yeah, the others are quickly revealed to be moochers, but then we’re still supposed to care about Frink being sad and betrayed after the show expressly tells us he doesn’t care enough to remember their names? The ending revolves around a ridiculous conceit of Burns discovering an equation that will render all cryptocurrency worthless, and he leaves the dry erase board of it in the town square to wait for someone to solve it. The equation is finally solved by Frink himself, wanting to rid himself of his fortune, but his reasons for doing so are all explained by Lisa. That’s the whole episode, characters like Lisa, Homer and Mr. Burns maneuver Frink through the plot, pulling information out of him or summarizing the current situation and what he’s feeling on their own. Episodes highlighting Springfield’s less-covered citizens usually get ruined by the Simpson family shoving them out of the way and hogs the spotlight, but here, the episode is all about Frink, yet he barely seems to be in control at all. It’s weird. Like, there’s a way this could have been rewritten that it maybe… maybe could have worked with all the same plot beats, but I dunno. Rewriting season 31 Simpsons scripts? What a thankless job that would be.

Three items of note:
– Now, I’m a big dumb dummy, but I feel like I know the basic gist of what cryptocurrency is and how it works. But a quick info dump feels necessary for a show covering a topic like this. Frink helpfully shows a video hosted by “TV’s most beloved scientist” Jim Parsons, as he explains how the process works, combined with Schoolhouse Rock-esque animation to a parody of Frank Sinatra’s “That’s Life.” It feels like way too much information you don’t need to follow the simple plot, and of course none of it is funny. Parsons attempts to look cool by “jumping” a bike over multiple buses and dancing, holding up a sign reading “NOT A NERD.” Awful.
– Frink shares his office at Springfield University with a humanities professor who can’t stand him (hey, speaking of, this is the first we’ve seen Frink as an actual college professor, isn’t it? Maybe we can introduce that into the plot somehow? His love of education? What his students think about his class? Anything? No?) But his presence annoys the piss out of her, and after Frink strikes it rich, we see he’s cleared out his side of the room and he’s gone, but she can still hear his nasal whistling (“I can still hear it! He’s in Chicago, for God’s sake!”) Later we see Frink has moved into a giant new mansion, which I assumed was in Chicago. Lisa stops by to see that he’s still sad, which I guess is weird, but we’ve seen characters just appear in random places with no explanation, so I didn’t give it much thought. But as the episode goes on, characters still refer to Frink as “the richest man in town,” and now that I look back through the episode, in the establishing shot of Frink’s new mansion, we can see Burns Manor in the background. So what the fuck was that lady on about saying Frink was in Chicago? I don’t understand it.
– The wraparound device of sorts is Lisa writing her report about the man who she admires most: Professor Frink. Over the episode, they seemingly bond over not having friends, which I guess is supposed to set up the emotional payoff of Frink declaring Lisa his best friend. But it never, ever feels like it develops into anything even close to being emotionally resonant. It doesn’t help that the episode also gets slightly meta in Lisa feeling jaded about thirty years worth of stories about her where she faces inevitable crushing disappointment by the end of each twenty minutes (“Every time I get a pony or make a friend, they get the hell out of town.”) Why not write this as simple as possible: Lisa and Frink bond over being social outcasts and lovers of science, Frink gets rich, starts living a lavish, superficial life, shutting Lisa out, until he realizes he’s hurt her, and gives up his life of luxury for the sake of her happiness. Cliche? Of course. But at least it’s actually about two characters and their connection to each other.

One good line/moment: Per usual, if I wait more than a couple hours between watching the episode and writing a post about it, I have to struggle pinpointing anything I can recall liking. And that’s not a good sign. So let’s leave it at that.

Original airdate: February 16, 2020

The premise: A new financial windfall in Springfield’s economy leads to the opening of a brand new STEM Academy. Lisa is initially thrilled to receive an accelerated education in the gifted class, but soon grows suspicious to the true motives behind the school’s operation.

The reaction: It feels like it’s been a while since we’ve had a “big topic” episode this vacuous. For a plot that’s ostensibly supposed to be satirizing STEM education, job automation, the future job market, and so forth, there’s very, very little in the way of actual commentary here. Springfield’s new STEM Academy is a technological wonderland where Bart is thrilled to indulge in VR simulations for the cosmetic rewards and achievements, while Lisa revels in being singled out for the gifted class, where she learns about… stuff. We’re never really shown what exactly her education is, save one mention of her at the dinner table talking about computer science. Things start to unravel when Lisa discovers the rest of the children at the school are being trained to perform menial tasks for side hustles like ride sharing and food delivery. The big reveal is that the school is only gearing these kids up to get ready for a world of minimum wage, low-level jobs? That’s basically all that Springfield Elementary has been doing for over thirty years, so no new satire there. And at this point we’re almost to the end of the episode, and this is all we’ve gained so far. So much of the episode is just repeating the same bullet points and throwing around buzz phrases like “gig economy” rather than actually build a purpose around them. Ultimately, the head of the academy consults the almighty algorithm regarding what viable careers the future holds, and they are shocked to find there’s only one job left that hasn’t been assumed by machines: elder care. And that’s the big punchline, I guess. Funny? The school is quickly destroyed, and the episode ends with Bart and Lisa feeling crestfallen by their hopeless future prospects. Actually, it really ends with future Bart and Lisa being abused by robot drink machines forcing them to pour their own sodas. What an absolutely pointless exercise.

Three items of note:
– The opening features an extended look at the life of Springfield’s resident grizzled old sea captain, Captain McAllister, starting with his past, discovering a Springfield treasure map with his future wife, transitioning forward forty years and his fruitless attempts to unearth the booty. This show has previously seen surprisingly success in highlighting the never-before-seen private life of secondary and tertiary characters in recent past, particularly Mr. Largo on more than one occasion. I wish I could say this was a similar situation, but the glimpses at McAllister as a character we get are either too fleeting (apologizing to his wife for not having children) or too meta (admitting he pretended to be a “flimsy, one-note character” to keep people off the scent of the treasure) to really be satisfying. Also they repeatedly use the Pirates of the Caribbean score, which gets annoying real fast, and distracts from any attempts to humanize this goofy side character. In the end, McAllister’s wife betrays him by tipping off Quimby about their find, and altering the border of the town so that he can claim the treasure. What is she getting out of this? Just a big fuck you to her awful husband? Whatever. Outside the Town Hall meeting to discuss what to do with the town’s new ill-gotten gains, we see McAllister passed out drunk in a ditch. Might as well leave him there to die if this is the best they got for him.
– Marge is the one who proposes a new STEM school (I don’t mean to repeat this point so often, but Julie Kavner’s voice just sounds so, so tired here) and to drive her point home, she’s invited her friend John Legend to sing a not-funny song about it! And his wife Chrissy Teigen is here too, and they talk about her Instagram and stuff! I know it’s pointless to complain about random celebrity appearances at this stage, but it feels like it’s been a while since we’ve seen one this egregious, that Marge just randomly got two mega celebrities to come to Springfield on a whim to help her out. And what great jokes they have for them, talking about the launch party for their couple’s perfume and how Teigen posts pictures of her kids every fucking day. I don’t even follow her on Twitter and I see her posts all the time, how is that possible? Just completely awful and pointless. One of the worst instances of stunt-casting this show has done in a while.
– There’s a kind of B-plot where Homer is terrified that his and everyone else’s jobs at the power plant are going to be taken over by robots. But I seem to remember an episode where that did happen. Season 23’s “Them, Robot” featured the entire staff getting replaced by automatons, leaving Homer the sole human employee left. I know it was eight years ago, but did everyone on staff just forget that this thing that Homer’s paranoid about happening and no one believes him… already happened? Homer’s main target of scorn is the break room’s new automated soda machine, and he tries to one-up it by pouring soda himself, and fuck, it’s so boring and stupid. Even though he passes out in his attempts, he’s quickly revived and announces that everyone’s jobs are safe, and everyone cheers for some reason. Then we pan over and see Burns is unleashing new robot workers into the plant. And that’s the end. What the hell is this? Again, we already did that episode, and it was a piece of shit.

One good line/moment: Nothing to speak of here. Total snooze fest, this one.