Scullyfied Simpsons: “Simpson Safari” (Season 12, Episode 17)

“Don’t worry. Being eaten by a crocodile is just like going to sleep in a giant blender.” – Homer. Hey, look on the bright side! You don’t have to watch any more subpar Simpsons episodes!

Airdate: April 1st, 2001. Foreboding, in retrospect.

Written By: John Swartzwelder

Plot: Homer’s insolence towards the grocery store baggers serves as the straw that breaks the camel’s back, as the union declares a strike. With the rest of the food supply chain supporting the strike, the Simpson clan faces starvation. That is, until Homer tracks down a box of Animal Crackers, which has a golden giraffe – the prize for which is a trip to Africa. One meeting with the executives of a food conglomerate later, The Simpsons are en route to Tanzania. Hilarity ensues.

You know it’s a good sign when the last two words of the preceding paragraph appear.

Review:

Well, the last two episodes of The Simpsons that I covered were… tolerable. Quite a ways from perfect, mind you, but I did feel that “Hungry Hungry Homer” and “Bye Bye Nerdie” were actually fascinating episodes. The former had an intriguing plot that was about a draft away from being elevated to latter-day greatness. The latter, meanwhile, managed to execute a particularly insane plot in a somewhat coherent and technically impressive manner. Hell, even before that, “New Kids on the Bleech” had some amusing takes on the music industry and propaganda, even though it was weighed down by a very subpar plot.

Maybe the show, though far from the glory years, was starting to build something of a hot streak, episodes that were either competent or at least had some brilliant ideas that could be truly explored given another script.

It is so nice to be reminded that hope is always fleeting, and that good can always give way to misery without warning.

This seems to be a theme with the middle of Season 12 – a small streak of decent episodes is followed up with tripe. So it’s not like we were overdue for a major loser. This time, however, we have been rewarded with a TRUE, HONEST-TO-GOD disaster. “Simpson Safari” is such an odious and incoherent half-hour of television, the fact that it was cleared for broadcast by a major television network baffles me. And no, FOX being in its “trash television” phase is not a valid excuse.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “The Great Money Caper” (Season 12, Episode 7)

“Why are you frosting that old throw pillow?” – Marge Simpson. Just cue the hijinks music, because you know things are going to go south from here.

Airdate: December 10th, 2000

Written By: Carolyn Omine

Plot: A bizarre space-related fish incident causes substantial damage to the Simpson sedan. The estimated cost of repair is $6850. Initial plans to have Bart turn magic tricks on the pier fare poorly for Homer. Abandoned by his father at the pier, he manages to get sympathy money from the townsfolk. Noting the buckets of cash that ensued, Homer and Bart decide to become professional scam artists. As the screencap above implies, this does not end well for them. Or does it?

Review:

The abyss is not a pleasant place to be – little light breaks through the surface. This is especially true if you’re using it to compare it to the quality of a cartoon.

Over the course of my reviews of The Simpsons, I’ve covered many an episode that made me baffled as to how it was allowed to go out the way that it did. Some of what I had to cover was absolutely shocking – botched characterization, abysmal plotting, noticeable mistakes that are exposed by the issues surrounding it, lazier animation, and constantly telling the audience to try and do better. (Worth noting, Rebecca Sugar is a Simpsons fan. Make of that what you will.)

I still maintain that my least favorite episode of The Simpsons is “Alone Again, Natura-Diddily”. As I said in that review, it was the perfect storm of almost everything I disliked about the show’s post-golden era, and altered the universe in a way that was soulless and irrevocable. It was crass, callous, made the main character out to be unbelievably odious, soulless… the episode was just an unpleasant viewing experience I have no desire to inflict upon myself ever again.

I will, however, give the episode one unqualified positive. It’s not nearly enough to get its “0” rating revoked – it’s still the nadir – but credit where credit is due. The episode was at least complete. Yeah, it’s still absolute garbage, but the episode at least had some semblance of a plot, odious and obnoxious as it was. There was at least an end to the episode, even if it was pretty damn vapid and didn’t make up for the travesty of the rest of the episode.

Contrast “The Great Money Caper”. Let me just put it this way… does an episode deserve a critique if it’s practically unfinished?

Ah, what the hell, it was aired by the FOX Network. Fair game, in my opinion. (Besides, way back when, I reviewed that Red Dwarf pilot that never aired on USA television. Make of that what you will…)

Scullyfied Simpsons: “Homer vs. Dignity” (Season 12, Episode 5)

“Ow – my eye! I’m not supposed to get pudding in it!” – Lenny. Unfortunately, compared to what else happens in this episode, he gets off relatively easy.

Airdate: November 26th, 2000

Written By: Rob LaZebnik

Plot: The Simpsons are broke again! Their credit cards are no longer accepted at restaurants, the car is being stripped to fund gas, and the family is so in the hole that they face extreme bankruptcy. Homer must humble himself to try and make some extra cash. Unfortunately, Mr. Burns is in a rather jester-ish mood, and his idea of comedy consists of watching Homer humiliate himself for large amounts of cash. Again. And again. And again.

Review:

In “Homer Vs. Dignity”, Homer gets sexually assaulted by a panda while trying to make money based on Mr. Burns’ amusement at his humiliation.

…

Do I have to say anything else at this point?

That one sentence pretty much encapsulates a lot that has gone absolutely wrong with The Simpsons. Just writing that sentence for the purpose of this review makes me wonder what the hell was going on in the writers’ room while this episode was being drafted. The sheer idea of that scene existing in this show alone is enough to put the episode on the cliff of bad Simpsons episodes, even if it was delivered in an absolutely effective way.

As you can probably guess, the execution of said scene, as well as almost everything else about this half-hour of television, sends “Homer vs. Dignity” over the edge into the fiery pit of despair. The Simpsons has been in decline for three seasons now, and in my eyes, it’s been dead since the middle of Season 11. But this episode is special – it might be the moment the writers stopped trying to write for The Simpsons and just used the show as a springboard for their half-assed attempts at satire, all while trying to poorly ape contemporaries such as South Park. 

Let me put it this way – after four episodes ranging from “sorta bad” to “pretty decent”, we finally get a whammy of a trainwreck this season. It is a contender for one of the worst ever – that‘s how bad it is.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Marge” (Season 11, Episode 21)

Well, at least she’s not yielding an entire motorcycle this time…

“I can only see a horrible rainbow!” – Ice Cream Parlor employee. Hey, it was one of the few memorable quotes from this episode.

Airdate: May 14th, 2000.

Written By: Larry Doyle

Plot: The Simpsons host a wedding in their background. This time, it’s meant for Otto and his partner, Becky. However, the marriage collapses due to Otto’s obsession with metal music. With nowhere else to go, Becky moves in with the Simpsons. She manages to endear herself to most of the Simpsons. The odd member out is Marge, who starts to feel jealous… and starts to suspect that Becky is trying to kill her.

Review:

Once again, I am bereft of words.

I mean, I’ve watched this show go down the tubes so fast, you swear it brought a pass to Splish Splash and hit up the Cliff Diver several times. To be blunt, you know that old cliche “hope for the best, prepare for the worst?” Well, in the case of The Simpsons, the latter sentiment holds stronger than the former, to put it mildly. So I wasn’t expecting much from “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Marge” – particularly with my memories of this episode involving a broken ice cream cone being weaponized.

But it still might surprise you to know that what we have here is in the “infamously bad” category.

No, seriously – Season 11 has had some stinkers, and some of those stinkers have been utterly astonishing in how they got put to air in the state they were in. But honestly, this episode is a genuine candidate for the second worst of the season. In fact, that’s where it might wind up when all is said and done.

To put it simply, this might be the single least Simpson-y Simpsons episode I’ve seen so far. And when you manage to outpace the jockey elves in that regard? At least that was surreal. This is, too, but unintentionally this time around.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “Kill the Alligator and Run” (Season 11, Episode 19)

“This family has hit a new low! We’re on the run from the law, totally lost, no car, no money, no clean clothes, and it’s all your fault.” – Marge. Spoiler alert – the word “divorce” is not mentioned once in this episode.

Airdate: April 30th, 2000.

Written By: John Swartzwelder

Plot: After taking a test in a book of self-improvement quizzes, Homer begins to fear that he only has three years left on his lifespan. Emotionally disturbed, he goes off the deep end, to a point where a psychiatrist recommends that he takes a vacation down in Palm Corners, Florida.

OOPS, SPRING BREAK TIME! It sends Homer insane, to the point where he commits a couple of misdemeanors in the process, but gets off easily thanks to the town sheriff. After Spring Break, he is so excited, that in the midst of his party, he runs over the town’s mascot, the alligator Captain Jack. With the whole family facing arrest for something Homer has done, they decide to hide out in plain sight as workers at a diner in the middle of nowhere.

Review:

For the past five and a half years, I have been taking a look at the Mike Scully era of The Simpsons. In many ways, it is the dorkier equivalent to the study of the implosion of the Roman Empire. Everybody has their theories – some rational, others more theoretical, a scant few completely insane and rooted in somewhat odious rationales. What I ultimately am looking at in terms of analyzing the collapse of The Simpsons is what the symptoms reflect.

Right now, what I’m sensing is that the show collapsed due to a fatal combination of arrogance, inexperience, and the limitations of the traditional story engine, sourced from the writers’ room and the FOX Network executives, at war with both increasingly disillusioned fans and worn-down staff (animators and voice actors, respectively.) Sometimes, the writers thought they could go to war with fans. Other times, they thought they could juggle an ability to tell an emotionally moving story with revenge against an errant voice actor and the quest for ratings. As you can probably gather, the writers didn’t do a good job at many of these forays, because even in normal episodes, the show was becoming increasingly outlandish instead of silly, callous instead of merely cynical, and downright incompetent in terms of framing a story, characters, et cetera.

With around 60 Scully-era episodes under my belt, I’ve mulled over quite a few contenders for the show’s event horizon, the moment when the show’s collapse was cemented forever. And I’m not going to restate my arguments here, since it would be a waste of time for all involved.

All I know is that this time, I have watched a Simpsons episode that I sincerely believe would’ve been better off if it was penned and edited by a room full of cocaine users. It is so insane, so incoherent, so mad, and so incompetent that, for the first time in my years of reviewing this show, I have to question the sanity of Mr. Michael Scully.

I don’t know how else to guess the thought process that was behind “Kill the Alligator and Run”.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “Bart to the Future” (Season 11, Episode 17)

While I can’t recall a president choking their brother after a speech, we do currently have a man in office who starred in WrestleMania. That close enough for you?

“I can’t believe ‘smell you later’ replaced good-bye.” – Bart. I get it! The episode explained the joke to me, so I get it! Sharp writing, guys!

Airdate: March 19th, 2000

Written By: Dan Kearney.

Plot: Bart gets caught sneaking into a Native American Casino. As punishment, he is forced to look into the future by the manager. In said future, Bart is a complete loser, drinking copious amounts of beer, writing terrible music with his roommate Ralph, and mooching to make his next payment. In contrast, Lisa has made a meteoric rise to be America’s first straight female President, although her predicament involves trying to fix a massive deficit. Unfortunately for her, Bart decides to move in with her…

Review:

Talk about messing with my mind here. In the thus-far dismal Season 11 of The Simpsons, I would argue that “Pygmoelian” is a contender for the best episode of the season. Even with the limited competition, it stands out in terms of having a coherent plot, interesting character development, and zaniness kept to a relative minimum. Even the faults within didn’t distract from the relative stability and comedy found within. Ultimately, if I had to pick 10 post-Season 10 Simpsons episodes to watch (a sort of “modern classics”), this would likely make the cut.

So, how’s about following up on that with one of the show’s more infamous episodes?

Not because of the apparent moment of precognition (which I’ll get to in the Tidbits), but because even the critics didn’t really like this episode. In 2003, Entertainment Weekly listed this as the worst episode of the entire series (albeit with the “relative” qualifier), with the Toronto Star‘s Ben Rayner and the Winnipeg Free Press‘s Randall King concurring. Most of the critique comes in comparison to “Lisa’s Wedding”, cited as one of the most beautiful and brilliant episodes of the entire series (which, given the brilliance of Seasons 2-8, is something).

And yes, let’s just get this out of the way – “Lisa’s Wedding” is a better episode. That’s more because, yes, “Lisa’s Wedding” is an absolutely brilliant and inventive episode, one that even makes me tear up at times. So even here, this episode had to live up to quite a tall order.

Cut a long story short, they didn’t even try, “Bart to the Future” sucks.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “Saddlesore Galactica” (Season 11, Episode 13)

What are the odds that somebody made that face when reading the script for the first time?

“I’d like to play me latest chart-toppah. It’s called, ‘Me Fans Are Stupid Pigs.'” – Dream Bart, “The Otto Show”. Who knew he would nail a Simpsons writer just eight years later?

Airdate: February 6th, 2000.

Written By: Tim Long

Plot: Springfield Elementary’s Concert Band comes in second place at the county fair, beaten by Ogdenville Elementary, who have recovered well enough from their Lyle Lanley Monorail related debacle to perform “Stars and Stripes Forever” with glow sticks! While Lisa is ornery about the failure, more pressing issues take precedent.

You see, Bart and Homer come across a trick-performing horse that is abandoned at the fair by his deadbeat and abusive owner. Rescuing him from destruction, the two decide to race him to pay the bills. Initial failures lead to the duo trying to remarket the horse, and soon, Bart and Homer become the team to beat. This results in the ire of the other jockeys, who kidnap Homer and reveal themselves to secretly be undergrown-dwelling elves.

Yes.

The jockeys are elves.

There are Jockey Elves in The Simpsons.

Who all live in a fiberglass tree and threaten to eat people’s brains.

…

No, I was not written under the influence of a controlled substance while watching this episode.

Review:

This review has been five years in the making.

The Simpsons has been on the air as a television series for twenty-nine years this December, sending out 639 episodes as of the publication of this post. With such a vast variety of episodes, there are bound to be both high points and low points, no matter what you make of the later seasons. While most of my favorite blogs despair about the current state of the series, the truth is that there are plenty of people who still like the new seasons. Opinions, indeed, have ranged from “this show is permanently dead” to “the show has rebounded” to “the show did decline, but it’s still pretty damn good” to “AL JEAN FOR PRESIDENT!” So unlike what you would expect from The Review Nebula and Dead Homer Society, Simpsons fandom is rather diverse in opinion. And you know what? If you like contemporary Simpsons, that’s cool. I disagree with you, but… that’s cool.

That said, if one speaks broadly, one can ascertain certain trends in episodic opinion. And with that in mind, I think I can safely say that no episode of The Simpsons is loathed more viscerally than “Saddlesore Galactica”.

Yes, “Kidney Trouble” is widely disliked for transforming Homer into an odious figure, but fans have provided arguments trying to excuse his cowardice (even though I personally disagree with said arguments). “Homer Vs. Dignity” gained a lot of hate for the infamous “Panda Scene”, but there’s still debate over what occurred there, as well. “No Good Read Goes Unpunished” does have a lot of people that agree with its message. And while “Lisa Goes Gaga” is universally despised, there is no denying by that point, most of the show’s fans had thrown their hands up and either accepted that an episode like that was bound to happen or quit the show in despair long before it aired.

“Saddlesore Galactica” is often cited as a certain threshold for the series. Many fans often poll it as the show’s event horizon – the moment when they realized that the show’s decline was irreversible. At the very least, it is almost universally described as the show’s most outlandish episode.

So… why do I agree with them? And to what extent?

Red Dwarf Review: “Timewave” (Series XII, Episode 3)

Merry Christmas, and welcome to the climax of our Christmas Spectacular Thing! And it is a climax this year, as we get ready to delve into one of the most critiqued Red Dwarf episodes of the Dave era, “Timewave!”

“Suggest you engage “skedaddle” mode!” – Kryten. Hey, we were warned!

Airdate: 26 October, 2017

Written By: Doug Naylor

Plot: The crew try and come to the rescue of the SS Enconium, a ship that is floating towards the titular timewave. Simple enough, right? Well, on the Enconium, criticism is illegal, punishable by a lengthy jail sentence. Thus, the crew are incompetent, dress like performance artists, and are smug morons.

Review:

I am of the opinion that Red Dwarf’s Dave era has been quite a success so far. Sure, the episodes haven’t really reached the quality peaks of Series III-V (although they have come somewhat close on occasion), but honestly, I don’t expect another “Back to Reality” or “Dimension Jump”. And I’m weirdly cool with that.

Besides, for the most part, the episodes have been funny, our characters have been relatable (in contrast to VIII), the drama and comedy are mixed appropriately (contrast to VII), and the story construction has largely remained good. Nothing mind-blowing, like the aforementioned “Back to Reality” or “The Inquisitor”, but for the most part, the show has produced a consistently enjoyable output since returning from the decade-long hiatus.

Unfortunately, the further you go, the higher your chance of slipping up and misfiring. Which is what brings us to Series XII’s third episode, “Timewave”. In the interest of not burying the lede… it’s a bad episode.

How bad is it? The more I think about it, the less I have to wonder “is it watchable” and the more I have to question “is it a contender for the worst Red Dwarf episode ever?” Oh, yes. As far as I’m concerned, this episode could give “Duct Soup”, “Beyond A Joke”, “Back in the Red”, “Pete”, and even freaking “Krytie TV” a run for their money in the disaster department.

The beautiful irony here, in an episode that I consider a disaster on as many levels as possible? This episode’s big topic is “criticism”.

Scullyfied Simpsons: “Monty Can’t Buy Me Love” (Season 10, Episode 21)

“Don’t worry, folks – he’s not dead! I still hear some faint signs of life.” – Jerry Rude. No, he’s not describing the show, although it really doesn’t matter too much.

Airdate: May 2nd, 1999

Written By: John Swartzwelder

Plot: A new megastore comes to town – Fortune Megastore, to be exact. There for the debut is affable billionaire Arthur Fortune, who tosses his money into the audience and genuinely creates excitement. This is to the frustration of Mr. Burns, who realizes just how disliked he is. For some reason, he goes to Homer to see how to be beloved. Hilarity, apparently, ensues.

Review:

Last time on Scullyfied Simpsons (which, admittedly, was just a couple of weeks ago)…

…do I even have to review this episode? I mean, that .gif pretty much sums up what we are in for here. Mr. Burns? The tyrant who ordered the Rolling Stones killed, who even as a Howard Hughes hypochondriac still came off as menacing (“Hop. In.”), who ruled over Springfield with an iron fist and was only kept out of the Governor’s mansion thanks to his own hubris… reduced to that scene.

And this was written, mind you, by John Swartzwelder. I honestly think he was messing with the writers, and they were just too apathetic to change the script (or wanted to mess around with Swartzwelder by airing the episodes in the first place.)

On one hand, I don’t think I have to go any further. This might be the worst episode of the Scully era – and the previous worst episode was only five episodes ago. And we have two seasons left of this insanity.

…but that would be flat-out giving up. I might as well try and put in more effort to reviewing this than the writers did in, well, writing it.

Scullyfied Simpsons: "Homer Simpson in: "Kidney Trouble"" (Season 10, Episode 8)

Airdate: December 6th, 1998

 

Truly a heartwarming moment… that will be spoiled in two seconds.

 

Synopsis: The whole family (plus Abe, for reasons needed to generate the plot) take a trip up to Bloodbath Gulch, a ghost town turned tourist trap. There, Abe drinks way too many sasparillas, and Homer refuses to stop for a rest stop on the way home. End result? Abe’s kidneys blow out, and Homer is the only available donor. While initially willing to go through with the procedure, fears brought on by his friends cause Homer to bolt from the operating table.

Review (SPOILER): To paraphrase Futurama, Mike Scully, you raised my hopes and dashed them quite expertly, sir! Bravo! Yup, two steps forward with “D’oh-in” and “Lisa Gets an “A””, and one moonwalk back with “Kidney Trouble”, among the most despised episodes in The Simpsons history. So, my expectations heading into this episode were lowered quite a bit.

And I still left, not only disappointed, but downright disgusted.