The Simpsons - "Bart Gets A Z" - Talkback [10/4]

"Oarding is not torture"? I really need to upgrade to an HDTV.

I'm surprised they got away with Homer chasing Santa's Little Helper naked through the yard. I thought they couldn't do nudity on the show anymore.

Marcia Wallace plays a pretty good drunk. In fact, I think this is the most Mrs. K has spoken in years.

"Reveals Size of Principal's Wang". Wow, that's not funny. At least Skinner's magic act jokes kinda made up for it.

Twitter jokes, Skype jokes, Facebook jokes...yeah, this episode will be completely out of date inside two years.

Hank Azaria does a pretty mediocre Rodney Dangerfield.

What the-- that second act break came out of nowhere! I am so sick of this four-act structure...

"When was the last time you washed your hair?"
"Two weeks ago?"
"Well, that's better than me..."

Homer's actually pretty funny here. Him sobbing on Zack's shoulder made me laugh more than it should have.

Parodies of The Secret are always fine by me. "I had to live in a kangaroo's pouch!"

"I'm a Simpson, and a Simpson never gives up until he's tried one easy thing." That made me chuckle.

So we go from Edna's apartment straight to her opening a muffin shop? Either part of the episode is missing or this show's suffering from serious pacing issues.

Wow, this is actually a pretty good Krabappel-Bart story.

Eh, one too many la-la noises.

Better than I thought it'd be. Didn't remind me of "Sweet Seymour Skinner's Baadasssss Song" as much as I thought it would. More laughs than last week, that's for darn sure.
 
That was pretty great, actually. Better than last weeks, definitely, and a lot of good gags. Some pacing problems, though... I think there was a missing chunk here or there, and some parts dragged on to long, but, y'know, still. I enjoyed it.
 
Well that episode was just to point out how stupid curfews are. Whats a 10 year old doing out at 1am on a school night? Our town has a curfew. Children under the age of 17 cannot be out between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. from Sunday to Thursday and between midnight and 6 a.m. on Friday and Saturday. There is an exception if the child is going to or returning from a job without taking a detour and if the child is supervised by a parent or guardian. I dont disagree with the law. I just think its stupid that it needs to be in place. Much like the laws about driving while on the phone... ...people should know better.

However, 17yos, and 18yos, who may be a junior or senior in high school can do whatever because theyre considered adults. Mostly because there are people with summer birthdays like me who graduated at 17. It seems that about 90% of theft and vandalism is cause by adults, not kids.

As far as Homer being a poor role model, I dont see Bart looking up to Homer. He doesnt respect him. There are VERY rare occasions when they have father and son moments, but the only real respect is that hes "family." I think thats the real big reason for the "physical punishment." Children should respect their Elders, especially their parents. However Bart is intelligent enough to know that once must EARN respect. Respect isnt just a given. The people Bart looks up to tend to be media stars (real or made up). Of course, this is also a poor choice as weve seen during the earlier seasons. They may explain his stupid child-like behavior, but not his dennis the menace, bad boy, underachiever and proud of it behavior. Radioactiveman never over ate junkfood. Lance Murdock never drugged someone (that we know of)

I would say that Homer is more of a bad parent than a bad role model. A good example is when Bart will be helping Homer, who should be at work) and Bart will ask "shouldnt I be in school right now?"
 
Well obviously they can't use every family member equally in every ep. Still if they're only going to have her in a scene or two saying like a few lines of dialogue they should really just drop her. This isn't offense to Lisa but remember that the main VA cast of the Simpsons makes 400,000 dollars an episode now. So really Yeardly Smith made almost a million saying... what like 20 or so (if that) lines of dialogue in the last two episodes? That's all kinds of ridicolous if you think about it.



That's because the writing staff has the easiest time writing for Homer due to his stupidity and his oafish behavior. They have claimed he is the "funniest one to see injured" and also the only family member you could see get so man handled in the show anyway. So yeah I don't think there will ever be an episode without Homer at all. It'd be an interesting idea but I don't think it will ever fly.



Peter's a far worse father then Homer is. Yeah Homer's done some generally stupid things, but Peter is a dangerous retard. Besides I don't recall Homer ever shooting Bart intentionally when he walked by, but we've seen Peter has done that to Meg (see "Peter's Daughter").



Don't remember the exact ep (think it was "Brother From Another Planet) but in a commentary on the DVD set of Season 4, the writers did bring up that they have thought about a scene where Lisa is the one choked by Homer but it never "felt right". It's not due to age because they were fine with Homer choking a baby Bart in "Lisa's First Word". It must either be because of her attidue or you know the whole sexist reason of them not liking/not being allowed to have Homer choke his daughter.


Let's focus on what this episode did right first: Actually giving mrs. Krabappel a good amount of screentime that DIDN'T do a dis-service to her character. It's actually been awhile that she's gotten a focus that wasn't about her relaionship with Principal Skinner so it's nice the show still remembers her. To be fair a lot of the early scenes in the beginning about her lonley life feel like a reprint of "Bart The Lover" but I do like the twist of her wanting to motivate the children and she did have a justifable reason to take away their cell phones. I also like her having the spotlight through the entire ep until the end, as well as the idea of Bart helping her out (and the Line "A simpsons never gives up until they try at least one easy solution") and actually just telling Skinner what he did to get her fired. Instead of just trying some lame scheme since admitting the truth actually makes it feel like he's grown some as a character even if that will most likley be the case by next ep. I also liked the bits with Zachary Vaughn, from him doing smile marks on the grades, actually saying Homer's a caring father (even if the crying scene streched out a bit too long) and generally being an overall decent teacher. Well until the end anyway.

What went wrong with this episode? Well a lot unfourantley. The entire idea of Mrs. K acting so off just because she was drunk didn't feel right. Since it's been shown before she's a drinker and would of either noticed the alcholol or not have been affected by it. Also I'm guessing the writers realized they were heading into familar terriotry and decided to spice things up with the whole "secret" thing and then Mrs. K opening up a muffin shop. Which besides a good Flanders scene didn't really lead anywhere at all. It just felt like a random turn in what could of just actually been a more normal end. Also Vaughn's whole acting alcholoic and leaving at the end just felt like a cop out of the highest degree. Yeah like Mrs. K would of been fired for good but it just semeed like a last minute excuse to get him to leave, and the actual ending of Mrs. K passing out the muffins felt really random too. Also besides a few good character jokes and some passing refs (like another Itchy and Scratchy cartoon) nothing about this ep was very funny. Some of it was interesting and had good character moments but it wasn't terribly laugh out loud. Which is sad since you can tell they were trying but it just wasn't succeeding.

So yeah though the season opening was good this was a definite step down. Not bad really but mediocre. I mean it's no "Bart The Lover" but considering the last ep I remember even having any long term focus on Mrs. Krabappel was "My Big Fat Geek Wedding" a big big step up from that crap.
 
I'm surprised so many people on this thread liked this episode. I thought it was a big step down form last week's. I actually thought last week's episode was pretty funny, but I don't think I laughed at all this week.
 
Though not the best season so far, its still a lot better than previous ones. Remember when episodes jumped around with multiple stories? Remember episodes like "See Homer Run" Celebrating Fathers Day -> Lisa hating men and getting in trouble in school -> Homer Becomes Safety Salamander -> Homer runs for Mayor. There was so much going on, that I had to rewind and rewatch because I was honestly asking myself why these things happened since the transiions were so fast. Many episodes went by too fast, and it seemed like the writers didnt have enough ideas for a full episode, so they bundled them up together as one. I would actually compare it to Family Guy, since there seem to be no plot, since every story got derailed and interupted by another one. Its not like "22 Short Films About Springfield" where they were left at short stories, and that was it. That worked, and was better than the movie they were making fun of IMO.

I think this is what future Simpsos episodes will be like. First season focused mostly on Bart, then later branched off to family members. They joked about spin offs and not running out of ideas. The simspons family is done, but rather than write them out and create spinoffs, theyve found a wonderful way of telling other Springfieldites stories. I would much rather they do it this way than cancel the show, and air reruns



Well, heck, he did that to Lois and Mort last Sunday :D

Besides hes already been deemed legally retarded, and unfit to raise children alone.

I dont know about it being a gender thing. Lisa never really ticked Homer off. Any rudeness, disbehaving, and bad behavior was a result of Homers own actions. Homer is apparently capable of understanding cause and effect during the aftermath, and forgives Lisa. The only times I can see Lisa deserving the Bart Choke Hold would be when Lisa makes fun of Homer. But shes so quick witted that Homer does not understand back handed complments and insults.

The reason choking baby bart is acceptable and humourous is because it has already become a running gag. Show someone whos never seen the show before that episode, and they would think Homer was a terrible person for choking a baby. I mean, hes a baby. Babies are innocent. CPS says that physical punishment is alright, so long as it doesnt leave a mark. As weve seen in one clip show episode Dr Hippert questions the physical damage done to Bart as a result of this. In the reason world Bart, and possibly Lisa and Maggie, would be taken away from Homer, if Marge didnt leave him, taking the kids with her. But a similar story has already been done in "Home Sweet Homediddly-Dum-Doodily."
 
I thought this was a small step up from the season premiere last week.

I'm a little stunned The Simpsons is only getting to 'kids rebel after getting their cell phones taken away by their teacher' now. But hey, from what I hear, it's still a major problem in schools these days, so it's not that dated.

I do admit, though, some of the internet gags were funny. For some reason, Nelson telling Martin to text Uncle was hilarious. That, and the new teacher telling the class his first assigned homework was to text for two hours.

Some other fun moments... Krabappel drunkily leading the class down the hall in a 'straight' line, the DVD trailer for 'The Answer.'
 
The first act was pretty good, but after that, the storyline became gradually less interesting. By the end I really wasn't invested in what was happening to Ms. Krabappel at all.

Oh, I also found it kind of odd how they parodied Rodney Dangerfield in whatever college movie he was in, when they already did that with Rodney actually guest starring in "Burns, Baby Burns". It wasn't so much bad, just a little surreal.
 
I disagree. The Bart and Edna this week actually made me somewhat CARE about what was gonig to happen next. Last week just pissed me off and made me glad there's more commercial time than 10 years ago.

Anyway, I actively hate Homer now because Scully made him an ass and Jean took what little brains he had left and three it away. Nowadays, Homer's only two attributes are his negligence and stupidity and he ruins whomever's life he comes across. Yeah, there's the occasional episode where Homer is slightly less intolerable and slightly less annoying, but that still doesn't make the last ten years of Homer any better than an animated POS he's become.

(Please don't list a bunch of episodes where you think he's not either too stupid or too much of a jerk from the past 9 years, because I can probably count on one hand the number of non-irritating Homer Show episodes between Jean and Scully. Okay. Thanks.)
 
As I've posted elsewhere on this forum, I decided to actually check this episode out after hearing so many positive reviews.

It was definitely up there in quality with earlier seasons, I won't lie....but there was something at first that just felt wrong about it. And I know exactly what it is.

I have to say it: the Simpsons just feels dated now. I know they're trying to keep it fresh with modern jokes, but those modern jokes just don't seem to work so well in the series. The whole texting and Twitter and all that..it just....lemme give ya some examples of how out of place and awkward they seemed:

Imagine:

Lucy & Desi watching Blu Ray DVDs

Beaver Cleaver playing a Wii

the WKRP crew posting a company Facebook profile


Sounds strange, doesn't it? Y'know why? Because it's not their "time". It's a totally different era, that's why.

Well, that's why this episode was just so awkward for me....and half these jokes might've been funny.....on another show with current characters who know how to work the jokes properly.

Basically, the Simpsons has two problems now:

1. The writing mostly bites these days.

2. When the writing is actually quite nice, you come to realize just how dated the show really is.

I know I've said this a million times in the past, but I really think it's time for this show to lower the curtain for the final time.

Even when they have the possibility of being funny now, it just seems like dated humor--even with modern amenities.
 
Dated? Compared to what? Yeah in a few years/decade this will be dated, but now it isn't considering that we still do have cell phone texting problems, myspace, facebook etc. It can't really be dated if it's somethign still being expierenced. Besides if you thnk about it, aren't the general premises of a lot of the classics dated? Hell you might as well call I love Lucy dated due to how it deals with the celbrities, the technology, and the standards of the time and how that dosen't apply today. It's all about taking things in context. And you really can't say that's just a problem of newer simpsons either: the biggest example of the Simpsons dating an event is back in TOH VII "Citizen Kang" which is just a send off on the Bob Dole/Bill Clinton presedintal race, which would be dated to anyone who didn't see that episode in 1996.
 
No, the references aren't dated, but the humor it's being used with and the whole setting is.

It'd be like watching a Cosby Show reunion, and Cliff Huxtable makes jokes about texting Theo to come to dinner, or posting a Twitter announcement; it just feels extremely awkward, because the style of the humor is from a different time, and it really just doesn't work with modern amenities. It'd be acceptable in that case, though, cause it'd just be a reunion. This is the Simpsons who are still on the air, long after their humor has for the most part gone stale.

Do remember that the Simpsons humor--which was considered edgy about 20 years ago--is considered much more family friendly these days, and when you mix in the dated "edginess" with modern technological jokes......it just feels weird, and out of place.
 
So what you're saying is that the Simpsons should act like everything's still back in 1989 when they first premiered and not acknowledge the fact that time has move forward?

Yeah I don't buy that. Look it might be thought of as wrong if there were remakes/reunions of The Lucy Show or The Cosby show that tried pulling those stunts, but that's because people associate those shows coming from a specific time frame. Here's the thing about the Simspons: It's moved past the time frame it's started in. It can't pretend it's still the late 80's or early 90's. It has to acknowledge the fact that time's moved on. True there are a lot of jokes that will fly over the heads of someone born 10 years from now whose watching this ep, but you could say the same thing about some of the more timeless episodes as well.

Besides the whole point about this guy wasn't that he texted or facebooked everyone: itw as the fact the kids saw him as cooler and better at Krabappel who didn't know any of that. I'm not saying the material is stronger then it is years ago, because it isn't, but what you seem to be referring to is silly. There's only so much timeless humor you can do nowadays, and due to the restrictions put on the show there's only so much they can get away with anyway. There were jokes about the technology of the time in the earlier eps, and there's ones about the technology in the later eps. That's all.
 
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