“I don’t think we’re talking about love here, we’re talking about s-e-x in front of the c-h-i-l-d-r-e-n.” – Helen Lovejoy

“Sex Cauldron!  I thought they closed that place down!” – Krusty the Klown

In an attempt to fill the summer with love, hate and pointless Simpsons commentary we at the Dead Homer Society are going to spend some time overthinking Season 8.  Why Season 8?  Because Season 8 is when The Simpsons really began to deteriorate into Zombie Simpsons.  That’s why.  Because we’re cutting edge and ultra-modern we’re using a newfangled, information-superhighway fad called a “chatroom” to conduct our conversation.  This text has been edited for clarity and spelling (especially on “ridiculously”).

Today’s episode is 819, “Grade School Confidential” and tomorrow will be 825 “The Secret War of Lisa Simpson“.

Charlie Sweatpants: Shall we start with Grade School Confidential?

Mad Jon: Yes, lets

Charlie Sweatpants: Alright, initial thoughts?

Mad Jon: I kinda like this episode as it has plenty of funny one liners, and the ending wraps up cleaner than most of the episodes we have reviewed as of late

But there are plenty of things they could have done a lot better

Dave: I don’t love or hate this episode

Charlie Sweatpants: I’m kinda down on this one. It’s got not quite enough story to fill the whole episode, feels like it could’ve used a B plot. Homer and Marge have about ten lines total between them.

Mad Jon: that’s one of my problems, Homer has like 3 lines and the only funny one wasn’t that funny because it went on way too long.

Charlie Sweatpants: And while it doesn’t end with a dance party, the plot just goes to pieces right about from the time they make the deal with Bart.

Mad Jon: “Do you know where the remote control is?” That’s it, that’s where that line should have stopped. And even that isn’t A material

Dave: Yeah, that was awful

Mad Jon: Yeah I was watching it earlier and I had to turn it off at the dance scene

Charlie Sweatpants: Honestly, I don’t even think there are that many good gags in here. Sex cauldron is the only thing that always gets me.

Mad Jon: Although Ralph’s explanation of the closet happenings was nice

“the baby looked at you?”

Dave: Making babies is one of his better lines

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, those are okay, but that’s part of the whole, “doesn’t make a lick of sense” thing. I mean, it’s not like it was only the kids who saw them in the closet, Hoover and Willie are there too.

Mad Jon: I know I know.

Charlie Sweatpants: I generally don’t like poking little holes in the plot like that, but this episode has a ton of them.

Dave: Both Hoover and Willie are willfully neglected to further the shallow plot. Yeah, I see what you’re getting at Charlie

Mad Jon: Yeah, like I was saying earlier the one liners were funny, but I usually hate non-Simpson revolving plots on principle. or is it principal?

No, definitely principle

Dave: Principle

Charlie Sweatpants: I don’t see why they feel the need to hide, I don’t think they’d be dumb enough to keep forcing Bart to cover for them and harassing him, why would Chalmers just fire them, there’s just so many things that feel forced.

Dave: There are two little things I enjoy in this episode, out of context. 1) Bart and Chalmers’ exchange in the movie theater and 2) Agnes’ line about the coconut cake

Mad Jon: Well I think the point was that Chalmers fired them for the blown up story of their broom closed make outs, which wouldn’t have happened if they didn’t have to hide it for your well observed unknown reason

Dave: Both are forced, but as I said, out of context they’re funny

Charlie Sweatpants: I like Chalmers line about not being able to use his own judgment, and Martin’s birthday party is kinda amusing.

Mad Jon: I liked skinner’s line about the tea set.

“A lucky boy” but that would have been fine as a non-plot related throw away

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, that’s good.

Mad Jon: That’s why Skinner is so good in small doses.

They tried to do it again with the applesauce line and my penis went soft.

Charlie Sweatpants: But to get back to the story for a second, I think what makes the weak, plot hole filled thing so frustrating is the fact that Skinner and Krabappel are a relatively natural couple, so on a basic level it makes sense, but then it’s just ridiculously poorly executed.

Dave: Even though the plot is insubstantial, I have no beef with Skinner and Krabappel falling in love. It just doesn’t really warrant a full episode

Ha – we basically had the same thought

Mad Jon: The most unfortunate part is that it becomes a running gag for like 8 years

Charlie Sweatpants: Good point Jon, like I can only take so much of Skinner being awkward and Krabappel being lusty.

Bingo.

Dave: They “break up” in a later season

I forget which

Charlie Sweatpants: Feh.

Mad Jon: And get back together and break up and almost get married, then comic book guy shows up…

Dave: It gets tedious

Super tedious

Mad Jon: Now I’m 5 seasons away and I’m still not done

Charlie Sweatpants: But yeah, it’s not the concept that sucks (like Burns Baby Burns or Homer They Fall) it’s the execution.

There’s nothing so critical in here that it had to be a whole episode and you’ve got Homer and Marge basically doing nothing.

Dave: Right

Mad Jon: And god help me I hate the Homer line where he screams like a little girl when he finds out her name is Krabappel and not Krandle

Dave: I might not say it sucks, but it’s not great. This episode is like cheap beer, you’ll drink it and it’ll do the job, but it’s ultimately forgettable

Mad Jon: Good beer analogy.

+1 for Dave

Charlie Sweatpants: I don’t know, I like cheap beer a lot more than I like this episode.

Mad Jon: Dave: is a bit more sophisticated than you and I Pants.

Dave: That’s not true.

Mad Jon: He probably wears socks and ties his shoes and cleans himself regularly.

Charlie Sweatpants: There’s just so many things that feel like filler, the dance scene at the end, all the hoops they make Bart jump through, the agonizing slowness of a story that really only has about four things on its to do list.

Mad Jon: Yep

Dave: But compared to bottom of 8, how do you feel about “Grade School?”

Mad Jon: I would go as far as to say that more than half the episode is definite filler, and even more is debatable

Charlie Sweatpants: It’s not the very bottom, but it’s close.

Mad Jon: Meh, middle lower, I think there are 2 or 3 that are way worse

Well, two at least

Dave: I’m with Jon

Charlie Sweatpants: Think about the two we did last week, the mountain one and the chili pepper one, they’ve got sections that are much funnier than this whole episode even if large parts of them are kind of a wasteland of weird.

This one is just one long flat boring story with a couple of good jokes.

Mad Jon: But if you recall we all rated them at least upper-lower. Like a trailer park in Romulus as opposed to Rawsonville.

Charlie Sweatpants: I’ll take your word for that.

Dave: I stayed in Romulus once. Never again.

Mad Jon: It’s probably best for all involved. At least the cops in Rawsonville look for a reason before beating up minorities.

I mean Romulus. Oh whatever I’ve lost it now

Charlie Sweatpants: It’s not important.

Mad Jon: We’ll just say I’m too uninspired by this episode to continue my poorly executed joke

Dave: Grade School is pretty bland and lacking in the laughs dept. But in spite of that, it’s still watchable

Charlie Sweatpants: When I rewatch these before we do these little chats I usually take some notes, just type a few short reminders, but I took almost no notes on this one because there just isn’t much here. 1:00pm, still just a potato, and all that.

Dave: potatoe

Charlie Sweatpants: You’ve got the Quayle American Heritage Dictionary on your desk, don’t you?

Dave: I might.

Mad Jon: I’m telling you, sophistication unknown to us mere commoners

Except you knew about that…. hmmm..

Charlie Sweatpants: Any final thoughts on this one?

Mad Jon: I like Martin’s jab at Bart before the anticlimactic climax. But like I said, then I turned it off

Dave: Bart misspells “potato” in “Dead Putting Society” right?

Charlie Sweatpants: Yes.

One assumes that was deliberate.

Dave: Phew, I thought I was crazy.

Mad Jon: No, it’s just good science.

Sorry, the beer told me to type that.