This one is another of the true monstrosities of Season 12 and the commentaries bear that out. In addition to spending long stretches more or less completely ignoring what’s happening, two or three times they’ll be talking about how this or that goofy twist came to be when someone will say something like, “That was Act 1, now in Act 2 we did this.” They don’t seem to care that the story didn’t just stop all of a sudden because they went to commercial. Sigh. On the plus side, my respect for the NBA went up a little bit because they were apparently unable to find anyone to do a guest voice for the basketball game at the beginning. All the NBA guys turned them down and while I have no idea why they said no, I’d still like to applaud them for it.
Anyway, in case you don’t remember, this is the one where Homer feels lonely for some reason after hurting his knee. The Homer I know would’ve happily sat on the couch drinking beer, but this is Zombie/Jerkass Homer so he opens a daycare center. Then Bart and Lisa become jealous for some reason. The Bart and Lisa I know would be glad that Homer is taking little to no interest in everything they do, but this is Zombie Bart and Lisa so they feel bad and plot an elaborate, ABC-family-sitcom revenge plot.
Eight guys on this one.
1:45 – Couldn’t get an NBA player to do a voice. Good for the NBA guys.
2:15 – Shitty trivia time: did you know they really did use baskets for basketball!
4:30 – Apparently you can’t show naked cartoon ass any more. I’ll chalk that up as another reason Zombie Simpsons sucks.
5:30 – Total silence as Homer begins freaking out the first time.
5:50 – More about how Hibbert is a terrible doctor now.
6:55 – They noticed that they aren’t talking about what’s going on in the episode. That’s more self awareness than I’ve come to expect.
7:05 – They can’t remember if the bear in the hospital was set up first.
7:45 – Long explanation about how hard it is to get kids into daycare in West LA. I don’t know about you, but I’m riveted.
9:10 – Wow. This needs to be transcribed in full. Flanders, Rod and Todd walk in the back door, then this happens:
“Where did they come from? Since when does Flanders come in the back door?”
“Since the script required it.” (But wait, it gets worse!)
“That was a real, kind of a multi-camera sitcom entrance.”
“Yeah it was”. Chuckles.
That’s right, they just compared themselves to the formulaic sitcoms the show originally mocked. It’s come full circle.
10:00 – Discussing how they put doors and windows everywhere and how nobody cares. Apparently this was an issue for the movie when they had them trying to escape through the window to Flanders house. Someone says, “You gotta give the bloggers something.” I cannot overemphasize this enough: We Do Not Care About Shit Like That.
10:45 – Someone honestly asks “Is Hibbert sort of based on Cosby?” He was serious, and no, I couldn’t believe it either.
11:15 – Still talking about Hibbert/Cosby.
11:50 – Ralph gets his hand scabbed over by Homer’s knee, someone says that this is one everybody hates, “On the internet it’s one of their least favorites.” I’m not someone who believes that everyone has to be super familiar with the various ins and outs of the internet, but these guys sound like Abraham Simpson when they talk about it, “Dear Internet, There is too much pornography and meanness on you. Please improve your editorial standards and create a website where I can see ducks.”
13:00 – Long silence. I think they’re bored.
14:00 – Ralph follows a butterfly off screen for no reason except that they needed to get it down to a two-character shot. It’s just lousy storytelling left and right.
15:30 – Surprise surprise, a lot of the stuff at the end of this episode was crammed in after the table read when things went from bad to worse.
17:30 – Rambling along with their awards show and iMac jokes.
20:00 – Once again discussing stuff that has nothing to do with the episode.
20:30 – It’s time for our usual commentary ending: laughing at how little sense this makes and the lack of jokes.
Dead Homer Society 
6 responses to ““Children of a Lesser Clod” Makes Baby Jesus Cry”
Strangely enough, I caught this very same episode on a re-run last week. I hated that episode when I first saw it years ago, and I hated it when I saw it again last week. Homer was a jerk as per normal for Zombie Simpsons, but I was much more unnerved by the abominable behaviour of Bart and Lisa.
It’s like you were just getting beaten down enough to accept Jerkass Homer and then they make Bart and Lisa act like weirdos too. Jebus, Season 12 is depressing.
I’ve just realised that, in Australia, we don’t get re-runs of any Simpsons episodes older than season 5. We get an insane amount of repeated episodes per week, and chances are they’re from the last 5-10 years. Now, while it doesn’t make a difference to me or anyone who has the DVDs of the classic years, it does make me wonder if there’s a whole generation of viewers who pretty much only familiar with Zombie Simpsons.
[…] I learned while tormenting myself with the Season 12 commentaries was that Zombie Simpsons isn’t allowed to show ass crack. (Of course, The Simpsons was so fond of cartoon nudity that they had enough for an entire […]
Homer’s jerkass qualities really smother this episode, but there’s a few decent bits: Ned thinking he’s going to a Christian rock concert when he’s actually seeing a Chris Rock standup, the Bill Cosby rambling (even if it wasn’t as funny as in Round Springfield), and the Good Guy Awards (“not honoring him would make Santa Claus himself vomit with rage”). I’m part of a minority that thinks that even though their storytelling abilities had gone to Hell by Season 12, they could still turn out more than a few decent jokes. I’d kill for something like that in recent episodes.
You completely disregard the fact that they show Willie’s complete ass (crack and all) as he run’s up the court in his kilt.