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What is the Nadir of the Simpsons?

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So I was discussing this with Sno the other night: it's no secret that The Simpsons has become increasingly played-out and desperate over the years and only continues to exist due to a combination of increasingly hackneyed gimmicks (look forward to the death of a mystery character plus Family Guy and Futurama crossovers this fall!), the complacency of Neilsen families, and sheer momentum akin to that of a corpse being rolled into a ditch. But what is the definitive nadir of the series? The single worst moment; be it the moment most characteristic of the show's faults, the point of no return for the way its characters developed into hollow two-dimensional caricatures of themselves, or simply the most tasteless and conspicuous marketing ploy. I encourage discussion, but open by nominating a few examples:

 

 

Lisa the Simpson

 

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I choose to open with the potentially controversial choice of an episode from the tail end of the Classic Era of the show, but I feel its an exemplary example of the way the show would perform character assassinations and then codify their replacements as the real deal, Invasion of the Body Snatchers style. This episode had potential as a story about Lisa growing as a person, or learning to be more tolerant of her less intellectual family, or overcoming a frustrating rut in her life. Instead, Lisa learns nothing and is told, in very matter-of-fact terms, that she is genetically superior to the rest of her family. Let that sink in a bit. Since this episode aired, every time Lisa -who has traditionally been the writers' liberal soapbox character- has a difference of opinion with anyone in her family, it's presented with the understanding that Lisa is naturally always right and that her family is naturally always wrong. On top of just making her plain preachy and annoying, she's been robbed of the ability to learn or grow from failure or ceasefire the way she did in, say, Lisa's Rival or Lisa the Vegetarian.

 

Treehouse of Horror XXII

 

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Treehouse of Horror has become almost a seperate entity from the show itself, always garnishing significantly higher ratings than the rest of the season since even the most jaded fan will usually tune in out of sheer morbid curiosity (myself included). Naturally, like the main show, TOH has also gone downhill and drifted ever further away from its roots, with this being perhaps the most distant from the core concept of TOH. The episode is divided into three parody shorts based on parodies of the likes of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Dexter, and Avatar; which, as you may notice, are not even remotely Halloween or horror-related AT ALL.  There's also an overly-long intro sequence based on 127 Hours and the first short quickly devolves into a half-baked Spider-Man sketch. The thing about parody is that you have to choose source material that's either extremely timely or has been accepted into cultural canon, and you have to be on the nose. This does neither. The chosen sources for each sequence were well past their sell-by date (127 Hours had come out a year previous, Avatar 2 years, and TDBATB and Dexter about half a decade) but weren't old or memorable enough to be considered classics, and there's a flagrant lack of understanding of the material that makes it irritating for anyone who's seen it and boring for anyone who hasn't. The TDBATB sequence loses steam halfway through and turns into Spider-Man (because we all remember the Turn Off the Dark injuries, right?) once the writers realize they can't squeeze blood from a stone.

 

 

Double Double, Boy in Trouble

 

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"And did someone say 'long lost triplets?'"

I don't even have anything to say about this one. I think that promo art speaks for itself. This isn't the first time that a deliberately bad episode premise was joked about in a previous season and then made reality, either. See also: Moe getting a cell phone, Selma marrying Grandpa Simpson, and robot Marge

 

The Tik Tok Couch Gag

 

 

Apart from the shameless Top Fourty sycophanty and network interference (this originally aired during a special "music week" on FOX where every show would have a musical guest or sequence), here we have a prime example of modern Simpsons' complete and utter lack of understanding of who its characters are and what they stand for. Take a look at which characters they chose to lip-sync for the sequence: Lisa, Groundskeeper Willie, Principal Skinner and Superintendent Chalmers, Mr. Largo, Otto, Nelson, Moe, Marge, Comic Book Guy... None of these characters should have any interest in a vapid pop song about partying. Like, at all. These characters you love are dead, and now you get to see their corpses puppeted around Weekend at Bernie's style to sell iTunes downloads.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In conclusion, The Simpsons is a land of contrast. Thank you.

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...though I'm trying to think of a good episode that really showcases where things went wrong, I find the biggest problem is that I just can't remember a lot of those episodes because they just weren't worth remembering. I promise to come back to this thread when I have a decent answer.

(Also, personally I find that the latest few seasons have seen a noticeable increase in quality, though still nowhere near the height of their quality.)

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I don't know if it was the nadir of the series, or even the worst episode I've seen, but Simpson Tide was when I knew The Simpsons were over. 

 

A series of non sequiturs and self-referential parody where every joke seemed to fall flat, as much due to the timing of the gags as the gags themselves. It seemed like whoever was making it didn't even care. 

 

Also:

 

Required reading for everything about The Simpsons turning to crap

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I wrote a ton of stuff years ago almost season by season up until five or six in the TV/Movie thread, but it might be pretty terrible so I don't know if it's worthwhile to go back. But basically a lot is on the premise that the show was better when it had more heart and was less wacky and Homer was less stupid or a jerk. The animation was very good in many cases, it became very static and stale but it took a while after the release of Klasky Csupo and moving all animation work to Korea. It's a shame that ever had to happen, I heard a hundred animators lost their jobs. The digital junk they have now looks super stale and gross like Family Guy.

 

I have a hard time figuring out when I dropped off though as a kid, but it just became a show that was constantly trying to be wacky and even though a young kid like me back then should have loved that stuff and would have said that was better, I think the emotional hook was still important even though. I own up to Season 9 on DVD and have recently started 8. The reason I think I will not watch any more after is because after Season 9, Brad Bird stopped being involved. He has a great couple of guides out there on good layouts, camera angles, and poses to use for the Simpsons to keep the show fresh and visually dynamic. It seems that was all thrown away for the sake of reuse, since camera angles mean redrawing.

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I dunno about the nadir, but I knew for sure the show had lost it with the season premiere of season 12, when they got the tennis court. Something just wasn't there any more. I've had this impression independently confirmed with another random Simpsons fan, so I know it's true.

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Why are you people trying to ruin one of my favorite TV series? #SimpsonGate

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I also can't come up with a nadir, as I stopped watching around season 10. I think the first episode I felt really disappointed by was The Springfield Files - just a big mess of zeitgeisting and pop-culture references, and homer is fat/stupid jokes. Since the end of season 8, I've been convinced that they could have saved the show by renaming it Springfield and not having to crowbar the Simpsons into every episode.

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I knew exactly what this would be before I even clicked on it.

 

 

I wrote a ton of stuff years ago almost season by season up until five or six in the TV/Movie thread, but it might be pretty terrible so I don't know if it's worthwhile to go back. But basically a lot is on the premise that the show was better when it had more heart and was less wacky and Homer was less stupid or a jerk. The animation was very good in many cases, it became very static and stale but it took a while after the release of Klasky Csupo and moving all animation work to Korea. It's a shame that ever had to happen, I heard a hundred animators lost their jobs. The digital junk they have now looks super stale and gross like Family Guy.

 

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The new intro is just depressing.

 

I really hate the way they do couch gags now. Remember this one here?

 

fWPYOZ6.jpg

 

 

The reason they started using this unusually long couch gag in season 4 was because episodes would sometimes come short of the target time and they'd need to find a way to fill out the time without having to make changes to the episode. Now every single couch gag is a single crummy joke that takes a full minute to tell. Instead of feeling special, it's just a way to make up for increasingly shorter and thinner episodes with what is essentially -as Strong Bad once put it- "a commercial for something you're already watching."

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The answer to the question is season 9, first episode. The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson: the season premier that stinks to high heaven. Don't get me wrong there are some good episodes in season 9 and 10, but this is the point where the characters just degenerate into caricatures of themselves. 

 

Funnily enough, that's the same season as Lisa the Simpson. I don't really understand why it starts to get so bad there, the writers hadn't changed which may be the cause, but those writers had some of the best episodes under their belts. So it's not like they were hacks or just plain bad. 

 

I'd have to disagree that pop culture references made the Simpsons a bad show. The show is entirely based on pop culture references. Pretty much every episode is an adaptation of something, and some of my personal favourites are based on pop culture referential humor. However they're so funny, because they have that Simpsons charm injected in. Like Homer Goes to College which is probably the best episode ever written. The Simpsons Files was great too, and entirely built on references. 

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Like everybody else, I couldn't tell you what the nadir is because I'm pretty sure it kept getting worse after I stopped watching, but I agree with Ben that "The Springfield Files" is a pretty good indicator of the beginning of the end. There were still a lot of good episodes in that season, but cracks were definitely starting to appear in the show's hilarious facade. Season 9 was the first time I was like "why am I even watching this anymore?" The Hank Hill cameo, the first appearance of Gil, the ending of "Lisa the Skeptic," Ralph's leprechaun... there was a lot of stuff in there that rubbed me the wrong way. I think "Trash of the Titans" was where I decided it wasn't worth watching consistently anymore (I still saw some episodes here and there for a season or two after that, but I stopped making an effort to do so).

 

 

I'd have to disagree that pop culture references made the Simpsons a bad show. The show is entirely based on pop culture references. Pretty much every episode is an adaptation of something, and some of my personal favourites are based on pop culture referential humor. However they're so funny, because they have that Simpsons charm injected in. Like Homer Goes to College which is probably the best episode ever written. The Simpsons Files was great too, and entirely built on references. 

 

I think that in the early years, they were a lot better about incorporating pop culture references into jokes, but not making the reference itself the joke. "Homer Goes to College" works even if you've never seen any of the movies it's spoofing, because the episode itself gives you all the context you need, and because it's about parodying the conventions of those movies more than specific scenes. "The Springfield Files" just feels like "we found out we could get Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny, so we threw together an X-Files parody."

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I think that in the early years, they were a lot better about incorporating pop culture references into jokes, but not making the reference itself the joke. "Homer Goes to College" works even if you've never seen any of the movies it's spoofing, because the episode itself gives you all the context you need, and because it's about parodying the conventions of those movies more than specific scenes. "The Springfield Files" just feels like "we found out we could get Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny, so we threw together an X-Files parody."

 

Yeah, this. And actually, I haven't seen it in a while but I don't think I liked HGTC that much either, or many of the other 'parody episodes' (like "Cape Feare") - devoting an entire episode to parodying a single thing often doesn't work that well (it scuppered a few episodes of Spaced as well), whereas something like the Terminator 2 riff with Homer and his golf clubs is fantastic and totally fits into that episode's plot.

 

I think I liked the Futurama college episode ("Robot Houuuuse!") a little better, but perhaps I'm muddling them up a bit.

 

But hey, I really like The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson, so we may just have to agree to disagree on a few things...

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 think that in the early years, they were a lot better about incorporating pop culture references into jokes, but not making the reference itself the joke.

 

I agree with you, I think you just put it into words better than I could. My point was that the show is built on that kind of humour, not that it's inherently good or bad. The Simpsons magic is making the reference funny in its own right, then there's the icing on the cake if you know where it's from. Then again, as I said before, just about every episode is based on a movie or TV show. 

 

One of the difficulties that The Simpsons writers have is how stupid to make Homer. I think the balance shifted from believable (well the suspension of disbelief is possible) to so ridiculous that it's difficult to watch just like Season 9 onwards. 

 

The Futurama "college episode" is so very different to The Simpsons one. They're two different college experiences being expressed and each is funny/insightful in their own right, but The Simpsons episode outshone the Futurama one for me (although Futurama is my favourite TV show ever so that's saying something).

 

Homer-yells-nerd.gif

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One of the difficulties that The Simpsons writers have is how stupid to make Homer. I think the balance shifted from believable (well the suspension of disbelief is possible) to so ridiculous that it's difficult to watch just like Season 9 onwards. 

 

Early Homer was also smart enough to respect other people's feelings, which is something he just doesn't do anymore.

 

 

Also, for what it's worth, I watch the DVD sets religiously. I have seasons 1-9 and never intend to buy anything past that.

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Early Homer was also smart enough to respect other people's feelings, which is something he just doesn't do anymore.

 

 

Also, for what it's worth, I watch the DVD sets religiously. I have seasons 1-9 and never intend to buy anything past that.

 

Pretty much. He became too stupid which made it less funny and more depressing or impossible to believe. 

 

There are a couple of good episodes in season 10: Homer To The Max and Maximum Homerdrive. Mainly because they have some good one-liners or comedic set ups. Nothing amazing in general though.

 

I also watched seasons 3-9 religiously, my old nightly ritual was to put on a simpsons DVD and watch a few episodes in bed (really helped me sleep). Had a bunch of DVDs stolen, including all my Simpsons and Futurama boxed sets. 

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The thing that blows me away about old Simpsons episodes is the sheer density of jokes. They didn't care at all if you got all of them, they just threw in tons of background gags and random innuendo in. Now, whenever they make a joke, they pause to MAKE SURE YOU NOTICED A JOKE HAPPENED. It's pretty terrible.

That same kind of confidence, incidentally, is what I also think is amazing about Arrested Development.

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The thing that blows me away about old Simpsons episodes is the sheer density of jokes. They didn't care at all if you got all of them, they just threw in tons of background gags and random innuendo in. Now, whenever they make a joke, they pause to MAKE SURE YOU NOTICED A JOKE HAPPENED. It's pretty terrible.

 

The best thing about going back to old Simpsons episodes is discovering jokes that you never would have noticed or understood the first time you watched them. I never got the joke behind the Flaming Homer/Flaming Moe until I was like 22.

 

Also, the way they would ruthlessly make fun of their guest stars instead of kissing their ass. I have an immense amount of respect for Harvey Fierstein for refusing to reprise his role as Karl for "Three Gays of the Condor" because he felt the script was so poor and that his character's involvement was just fanservice unnecessary to the plot.

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The joke density made its way to Futurama too. There are so many gags in the first few seasons of both shows that you can't keep up with them. For every one you don't find funny, there are 5 that are fantastic, and they're shot at you so fast, you don't even notice if something falls flat. It just feels like it wasn't even meant to be funny. 

 

I love listening to the commentaries too on the DVDs (although the Futurama ones are way better than those of the Simpsons). Hearing how much time the writers put in to a note on a chalk board, or a street name is insane. The stuff you don't even notice in the background until it's pointed out.

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I haven't watched the Simpson's much since around the late 90s (nothing to do with the Simpson's, but that's about the time that I quit watching non-sports television in general, which I didn't return to until the last 5 years or so and the ability to binge watch great shows through Netflix). 

 

That said, thanks for that link!  I really enjoyed reading through the first half of it as I steadfastly avoided watching my Chiefs blumber through the motions of pretending to be a professional football team. If nothing else, it was an interesting reminder of what role television played in my life in the 80s and 90s, and what it was like then compared to now. 

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The joke density made its way to Futurama too. There are so many gags in the first few seasons of both shows that you can't keep up with them. For every one you don't find funny, there are 5 that are fantastic, and they're shot at you so fast, you don't even notice if something falls flat. It just feels like it wasn't even meant to be funny. 

 

I love listening to the commentaries too on the DVDs (although the Futurama ones are way better than those of the Simpsons). Hearing how much time the writers put in to a note on a chalk board, or a street name is insane. The stuff you don't even notice in the background until it's pointed out.

 

The background math/science jokes are one of my favorite things about Futurama.  The background jokes in the Simpsons are great too, but the math/science ones in Futurama are so much funnier to me because they totally fit in that universe but aren't distracting at all if you don't want to look for them.  The Simpsons has a lot of math jokes too, but they feel much more out of place there because there's usually not a reasonable way to fit them in.

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I'll be the boring predictable guy and cite Homer's Enemy from season 8 as the definitive end of classic Simpsons. The whole thing felt too mean and against the spirit of the rest of the series. RIP Grimey. RIP Simpsons.

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I'll be the boring predictable guy and cite Homer's Enemy from season 8 as the definitive end of classic Simpsons. The whole thing felt too mean and against the spirit of the rest of the series. RIP Grimey. RIP Simpsons.

 

"Homer's Enemy" is notable because Homer is genuinely trying to be a good person undone by his own incompetence right up until the end of the episode, where he shamelessly falls asleep during poor Grimey's funeral.

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