“Everyone is saying Gabbo this and Gabbo that! But no one is saying worship this and Jericho that!” – Reverend Lovejoy
“What’s this about Gabbo?” – Jasper
Yet another clipped Reading Digest this week because there are two idiotic pieces of public relations sucking up the internet’s attention. Firstly, they released a trailer for this week’s much hyped Lego episode. For the record, I quite liked The Lego Movie and it would be a welcome and pleasant surprise if Sunday’s episode was even half as entertaining. But I do not have my hopes up.
Secondly, Jean, a practiced hand at managing PR stunts, compared whatever that upcoming “major character” death is to Game of Thrones, a show that (despite being on premium cable) is watched by far more people than Zombie Simpson. He called it the “Yellow Wedding”, and pageview desperate bloggers and magazines swooned at being able to tap people’s insatiable need to click on anything Game of Thrones related. My money remains on it being a total head fake nothingburger, with the “death” being a reincarnated Dr. Nick or something else that won’t affect the show at all. Remember when they ran that big contest to have people create a character and then killed him five seconds after they introduced him? This looks an awful lot like that.
What we do have though is quite a few very solid links, including cool fan art, an internet retelling of “Cape Feare”, Poochie used to lampoon How I Met Your Mother, a couple of cromulent lists, and a nightmare inducing fan made Mr. Burns mask. Also, there are several factually incorrect links about the low ratings of the show.
Enjoy.
6 Fictional Beers you’d love to drink - Smooth Charlie’s Link of the Week is this list of fake beers (with plenty of YouTube), half of which are from The Simpsons.
48 reasons ‘Cape Feare’ might be the greatest episode of The Simpsons - The whole story of “Cape Feare” told in .gifs and screen grabs. Outstanding.
A Chat with the Cast and Crew of ‘The Simpsons’ - A writeup of a panel discussion Groening, Jean and some of the other big names did:
At one point in the panel they are asked if they’re ever worried about running out of story ideas and Matt admits that they really aren’t. More often, “we find ourselves wondering if we’ve already done a joke.”
That was in 2003. Jebus.
“The Simpsons” Movie Poster Parodies - More fake movie posters. Some I’ve linked before, but “Re-Hominator” is new (I think).
Animated sitcoms punching up arcade’s past – The Simpsons - A writeup of the arcade game, and worth the click for the Japanese promotional flyer at the top. (Also, “World 1-1″ is a great blog name.)
Sweet 17 Syrup and Cinnamon Cake - Cool Simpsons birthday cake:
If a list of TV shows that summed up our early years together were in existence, The Simpsons would be pretty near the top, so I’ve tried to incorporate a resemblance to the classic Simpsons donut. It kinda works.. but the icing is white because I didn’t have pink food colouring and nobody’s perfect.
Bet it was good, though.
DUFF BEER BATH - That is one happy looking wooden Bender.
Complete Collection Of Celebrity ‘Simpsons’ Couch Gags - Lots of YouTube of the only thing on the show anyone talks about.
9 TV Roles From Hank Azaria’s Early Days You Might Have Missed - Azaria had guest spots on such classics as Family Ties and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
Cartoons that made me feel something (Spoilers) - “And Maggie Makes Three” and “Mother Simpson” both make the list here.
‘How I Met Your Mother’ Finale: Poochie Edit - Heh:
Immortalizing Mr. Burns - A creepy looking Mr. Burns ceramic mask and charcoal painting.
Major ‘Simpsons’ death will be a ‘bigger deal’ than Game of Thrones’ Purple Wedding, show producer Al Jean says - There were a lot of these this week. This is one of them. No, there is no actual news. The closest thing to news is Jean saying that whoever dies may still come back in future episodes, but we already knew that.
Is Bart Simpson an Anarchist? – Audio - Say what you will about the impracticalities of anarchism, but at least they don’t get flustered about using copyrighted stuff on their posters.
Best Episodes of The Simpsons - Excellent list, nothing from even close to Zombie Simpsons. Plus there’s a poll.
My 6 Favorite Episodes of The Simpsons - Another explicitly non-Zombie Simpsons list:
But we were hooked from that very first episode, and I have been a lifelong fan of The Simpsons ever since.
Even if I haven’t seen a new episode in years…
Good move.
Best TV Episodes of All Time - “Cape Feare” comes in at #4 here.
5 Timeless Cartoons - The show comes in handily at #1.
I’m All Tapped Out - On deleting a deliberately addictive app:
It was a great move deciding to play Simpsons Tapped Out at the start of the year. I’m not joking here, I played that game every single day from the day I downloaded it, to yesterday evening. It controlled my life. I wouldn’t sleep until certain characters tasks were done and I was constantly tapping away. It’s absolutely for the best that I deleted the app.
Nancy Cartwright Talks ‘Simpsons’ Lego Episode, Charity Poker Tournament & More - The publicity for that music live show they’re doing at the Hollywood Bowl this summer is getting started.
Springfield bar scene offers craft beers to broaden patrons’ palates - Excellent reference from Springfield, IL:
On a tour of Duff Brewery, Homer Simpson discovers that Duff, Duff Light and Duff Dry all come from the same vat. The joke is that the different varieties of beer are indistinguishable by taste. For craft beer lovers, it spoke to what they believe is a larger truth — that the popular beers from domestic mega breweries don’t taste like much at all.
If Homer were to venture outside of Moe’s and visit the real Springfield, he would discover a cornucopia of beers that vary greatly in taste and style.
The Simpsons play Mr Burns is coming to London’s Almeida Theatre - The post apocalypse play is crossing the Atlantic.
The Simpsons Lego Episode Could Be the Show’s Best in Years - Low bar, very low bar. (The trailer they released is there, too, if you haven’t seen it.)
Check Out The Simpsons Lego Episode Poster - Also, there is a poster. Too bad they don’t put this much care into writing the episodes.
The Simpsons ‘ratings crisis’: Matt Groening favourite pulls in all-time low with just 3.4 million viewers - This is from Britain’s Mirror, so the scare quote in the headline (‘ratings crisis’) isn’t anywhere in the article and they get their lead fact wrong:
It looks like the magic of The Simpsons could be over.
The animated adventure following the Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie and the residents of Springfield achieved its lowest ever ratings last night in America.
Just 3.4 million viewers tuned in to watch What To Expect When Bart’s Expecting on Fox in the US, signalling an all-time low for the long-running series which is in its 25th year.
It wasn’t an all-time low, it was second. More importantly, the show is already renewed for another season and its demographic numbers hold up a lot better than the awful topline number would indicate. So there is a lot of slapdash lazy journalism there. And yet . . . I’ve long maintained that the only way they’ll cancel Zombie Simpsons is if the ratings get bad enough that they become embarrassing to the far more important merchandising brand. Replicated enough times in other mainstream publications, headlines and articles like that (missed facts, made up scare quotes and all) could bring enough public embarrassment that the monkeys who run FOX might start thinking that the world doesn’t really need that full 27th season.
‘The Simpsons’ falls to all-time ratings d’oh! - No, Entertainment Weekly, it didn’t, but thanks for furthering the impression.
‘The Simpsons’ Hits All-Time Ratings Low - The same goes for you, Splitsider. Jebus, the entertainment press is wretched.
Last night’s Simpsons episode set an all-time ratings low - Not sure where the A.V. Club is getting its facts:
Given that The Simpsons has been long been on the decline in the eyes of critics and fans, it’s only logical that it will routinely set new records for all-time low ratings as it carries on. Season 22’s “The Great Simpsina” last held the title, but last night’s episode, “What To Expect When Bart’s Expecting,” dropped ratings to a new low, nabbing only 3.4 million viewers in the show’s Sunday night slot.
At 5.00 million viewers, “The Great Simpsina” would be a certified hit by today’s standards. I’ve got it at #31 all time on my list.
Batman: “Pure West” - Excellent shakycam YouTube.
2faced homer - Neat fan made image.
Council clears way for gigabit Internet service - Nice reference:
City Council members have OK’d a contract that helps clear the way for AT&T to begin installing gigabit-speed Internet service in some parts of Durham sometime in 2015.
The 5-0 decision didn’t come without some skepticism, expressed most forcefully by Councilman Don Moffitt.
“All of this is vaporware until we start seeing connections,” he said, adding he was “reminded of ‘The Simpsons’ episode where they came in and sold the town a monorail.”
Cartoons of a Generation - And finally, I get to end with someone who very efficiently agrees with us:
Anyone who, like myself, grew up as a child during this era would be aware that there were some epic cartoon adventures that just aren’t matched these days.
[...]
(the best of) The Simpsons
What could possibly match it?
