“Are you going to need us tonight?” – Kang
“I had ballet tickets! Not that they’ll do much good now.” – Kodos
It’s now clear that Al Jean and David Mirkin (who co-wrote), and David Silverman (who directed), would much rather be working on Futurama than Zombie Simpsons, and I don’t blame them. Like various Star Treks, that show gave its writers and directors a functionally unlimited amount of creative leeway. Need to make fun of something? Make up a new planet or a new species or a new anything and there you go. Zombie Simpsons, on the other hand, is rigidly straight-jacketed by twenty plus seasons of stories and the need to keep the show basically the same as it’s always been lest habitual viewers lose interest. The very existence of Futurama is a testament to the fact that Groening and company were getting bored with The Simpsons after ten seasons; and now, after sixteen more years, Jean and Mirkin seem to feel the same way.
So, what was this thing? Well, it was either a relatively creative episode of Zombie Simpsons or a relatively weak episode of Futurama, depending on how you look at it. To give you an example, near the end, Homer uses the same Dickens quote that Shatner does at the end of Star Trek 2. It’s not even trying to be funny or anything, but as a Star Trek reference, it’s outstanding and a very Futurama thing to do.
None of this story needed the Simpson family to be there, and the whole thing would’ve been less awkward generally with the Planet Express crew than residents of Springfield, but what are you gonna do? That show got cancelled, this one is still on, and it’s not like having Kang and Kodos in a regular episode is going to lower anyone’s respect for the show or defile it’s history. That damage was done long ago. Tacitly acknowledging that by discarding all the rules for an episode about a weird alien planet that’s crammed full of sci-fi references and sign gags is fine by me. I’ll even go so far as to say that this is the best episode of Zombie Simpsons since probably “Trilogy of Error” back in Season 12. It’s weird and chaotic, but for once those things are intentional. Well done, Messrs Jean, Mirkin and Silverman.
– Couch gag is relatively brief, always a plus, and actually works with “Pictures at an Exhibition”.
– I understand that the “Are We There Yet” scene is meant to be a callback, but there’s way too much drawn out Homer aggravation.
– Ethnic Princess section is pretty good, but didn’t need Marge to exposit it. This will be a repeated problem.
– As a counter example to the above, the State of Mickey (or whatever) with a sign advertising $7 pretzels only works because nobody read it out loud.
– The bug scene wasn’t bad, and there is a certain catchiness to “Certain death awaits if you get off the bug”.
– As usual, the pre-explanations of the jokes never help. Yoda saying “Purchased for $4 billion, I was” is just fine on it’s own without first reminding everyone that Disney owns Star Wars now.
– The busty figurehead reading “Our Bodies, Ourselves” and the rest of the politically correct Pirates of the Caribbean ride is the same. Really didn’t need Lisa explaining it when they already had a sign that said “Politically Correct”. One is enough.
– Look, a sign gag that works and didn’t have anyone explaining it:
– This thing with everyone getting melted in the Cool Zone is very Futurama-ish.
– Ditto the screams of terror from the people on the “Let-Go Loop”.
– The sign gags are actually decent:
– “The kind of fun that attractive families have in commercials” isn’t bad.
– And the “Continue Spending” sign being pulled by the plane during the cutaway to the bench line works too.
– And we’re going into space on a flying saucer. When they disconnect the rest of the episode from the opening these days, they really disconnect it.
– And in the first of what will be many, many, many Star Trek references, there’s the bridge noise from the original series.
– “This isn’t Halloween!”, we know.
– Okay, it was a little expository, but I did like “easily reassured fool”.
– Oof, this potato chip scene with the Blue Danube playing goes on way too long for a callback to Season 5.
– Stuff like flying past a game of Asteroids, also very Futurama-y.
– Though I could’ve done without Homer repeatedly chopping off his own hand, and then growing one on Marge’s head.
– I’m going to assume the symbols on those animated billboards (“Have your cups lost their suck?”) is also a Star Trek reference. Klingon, maybe?
– So, that was a little weird. The lights just went out and Kodos turned on a flashlight, then the lights were back on.
– “We have federal rebates for the panels, but few take advantage of them.”
– The multi-birth thing, feh.
– Further cementing my suspicion that this is actually an episode of Futurama, the family is now the attraction at a zoo. Where have I seen that before?
– More good sign gags that (gasp) didn’t have themselves exposited:
– There’s even an alien doctor who doesn’t know basic human anatomy. Why not Zoidberg?
– Seriously, there’s a FORTRAN joke! Jean didn’t have FOX goons kidnap David X. Cohen and Ken Keeler, did he? Have people seen them recently? Are they okay?
– Putting it to a vote seems like a very un-Marge thing to do.
– And the voting scene goes on too long generally. Though it was kinda funny that Homer wrote “The Boy”.
– And there’s our ultra obscure Star Trek 2 reference. Shatner mumbles that line so badly that I didn’t recognize it for a long time and I doubt I’m the only one.
– A lot of the voices don’t sound like themselves anymore, but Shearer’s Vin Scully remains very close to the original.
– “His hobbies include, sitting, lying down, and reaching for things without success.”
– There’s been plenty of the usually “meh” Zombie Simpsons animation here, but this scene with the children’s choir is pretty neat.
– They can’t break all their bad habits, though, “A transporter beam, someone is trying to steal our sacrifice” is about as unnecessary as exposition gets.
– Tell me this doesn’t sound exactly like something Prof. Farnsworth would say, “Space Broccoli has the most advanced feelings of any creature in the universe.”
– This Matrix 2 joke isn’t bad, but didn’t need to be nearly that long.
– There are a lot of freeze frame sign gags here, way more than usual. The only thing that was close recently was the end credits of the Futurama crossover:
That whole thing is on-screen for less than a second and it’s enjoyably sclerotic and absurd.
– “Seriously, are we listening to the same guy?”
– “Why do you care? It’s just your sex mate and spermlings.”
– Here’s some good animation combined with more good freeze frame sign gags:
They pop in quickly enough that while you can see them, there’s no way you could read “The Complete Works of Shakespeare Made of Chocolate” without pausing. Also, that is dead Rod and Todd there, which is way bleaker and darker than you normally see on Zombie Simpsons.
– And while this thing is really unevenly paced overall, it moves well here at the end. Homer going back to save his family obviously isn’t going to work, but they don’t draw it out at all, just hard cutting to “All will be eaten”.
– The glaze thing, on the other hand, takes forever.
– This ending kinda drags, though.
– But on the good side, this “So it will be as if none of this ever happened” callback is the only one. They don’t repeat it ad nauseum like, oh, say, “Everything fits together” yada yada.
– They’ve now dropped any remaining Star Trek subtlety, but it’s kinda fun.
– “Like three bean salad at a barbecue, we will remain untouched.”
– I try not to be a sucker for cheap fan service, but Clausen hits one out of the park with this Star Trek version of the ending theme.
– And posing all their characters in Star Trek scenes was a nice send off.
I mean what I said about “Trilogy of Error” above. Like that one, “The Man Who Came to Be Dinner” is deeply unusual in a way that even their three-part “storytelling” episodes aren’t. Aliens, melted tourists, a panoply of Star Trek stuff, it’s generally more bizarre than it is outright funny, but none of it is any weirder than, say, killer robots, talking bar rags, popped eyeballs, and the host of other assorted shit they’ve done. At least this time they’re acknowledging it instead of asking us to take them seriously.
Helpfully, it is almost completely devoid of the string music of suspense and the weird seriousness that drags down so many Zombie Simpsons episodes. They acknowledge right at the start that wacky and (appropriately enough for Star Trek) non-canon stuff is going to happen, so even when Homer or the family is in danger of getting eaten, it’s played as 100% silly with no pretending there’s any real danger or drama.
None of which is to say that it doesn’t have problems. This is still Zombie Simpsons we’re talking about, so there’s the usual array of them: too much exposition, half-hearted slap stick, general filler, etcetera. But like “Trilogy of Error” and unlike most Zombie Simpsons episodes, this one had a premise and stuck to it. That premise may have been crazy and weird, but a lot more care and thought were put into this than most, and it shows.
Anyway, the numbers are in, and I can just let TV by the Numbers explain:
The Simpsons earned a adults 18-49 rating, up 59 percent from a 2.9 for its most recent original episode. It was the show’s highest rated episode since January 5, 2014, when it also followed a playoff game.
Last night, 10.51 million people wished Futurama had gotten another season. This is why networks like FOX pay such ridiculous amounts of money for football. Sadly for the numbers, however, both of FOX’s remaining Sunday games are early and won’t lead in to primetime. But for once, the numbers are good, and even more unusually, there was something sort of worth watching.
Dead Homer Society 
48 responses to “Behind Us Forever: The Man Who Came to Be Dinner”
If we could make you sort of happy it’s worth it.
I really want to believe that’s not just some guy using the name.
Al Jean follows the blog on Twitter – it could well be he!
Well, I just checked, and he doesn’t actually follow it (he only follows five accounts), but he has certainly conversed with Charlie on there multiple times.
He has left a comment on this blog before.
Aww.
Lisa gave George Lucas advice in one episode to go back to what made Star Wars great, sadly The Simpsons can only do this with it’s original writers and not you AJ.
It’s like a 70-year-old watching some kids play and saying “Ah, how I wish I was young again…” Not gonna happen.
Lol sadly yes.
It’s like watching Stan saying, “Hey, people care about what I have to say!”
It’s not gonna happen.
I’m wondering if this will be the start of ZS going into wackier, increasingly fantastic stories. At this point, it would probably be the only way for the show to try anything new, unless maybe they decided to start focusing on characters outside of the Simpson family. (but I rather doubt that will happen)
We’re well beyond it now, I suppose, but the Spin-Off Showcase episode is coming true in more and more ways as the show continues. We’ve had wedding after wedding after wedding. Is this episode really any weirder than Ozmodiar? Surely soon it’ll be time for “MAGIC POWERS!” It’s amazing, still. how prescient the show was in its glory days. I always think of the college nerds Homer befriends complaining about his plan – “Does it have to be zany?” – The writers knew to stay grounded as much as they could, but now, two-and-a-half decades of show mean it really DOES have to be zany.
Bart did get voodoo conception powers and Sideshow Bob gave himself superpowers last season. The longer your show stays on the air the stupider it becomes. Good writers know when to call it quits.
Sounds like the same ol’ nonsense from Futurama. So, it wouldn’t be fair crediting these numbers to ZS. They just did another crossover. Hardy har. Anyway, besides this pop wave giving them some more push for the next couple of atrocities, I’m still expecting this shit to end by mid-27. Fucking Christmas episode and curtains. Enough’s enough, frankly.
From what I heard, season 27 is going to be a full season, not half of one. It could change due to FOX deciding to cut episodes (like they did when King of the Hill was ending and they picked two episodes out of the six they ordered Mike Judge and co. to make, with the other four airing on Cartoon Network and some local channels that air adult cartoons at 3:00 in the morning) for money reasons or to make room for a new show, but that doesn’t seem likely.
I still wonder who’d watch whatever they’re expecting to air this year… Elon Musk clashing with Springfieldians story, Grandpa story… Then they’re expecting to have some shit-wicked episodes like Homer becoming a 10-year-old retard. It’s just so tedious I can’t stand it even though I stopped watching it like a year ago. I’m actually at the point of putting into question the existence of this very blog, because fuck me, they just won’t stop.
I don’t know and frankly, I don’t care. There’s a million other things to watch on TV (or, more realistically, online) and a billion other things to do in life that’s not TV-related. Life’s too short to waste on a show that stopped being relevant years ago.
How dare you use common sense on I, Stan. I will register my disgust towards you, for I am the greatest.
Reading reviews on this episode online (I haven’t watched it, no planning to do so) I noticed many people use the “jaded fan’s logic” argument to get over its wacky premise.
It works more or less in this way: “…there have been already many wacky episodes with Sci-fi irrealistic stuff, so I’m ok with this episode”, or “Kang & Kodos already appeared in other non THOH episodes, so I’m not bothered for this one”, and, generalizing, “…there have been already many crappy episodes, so this one is ok by now…”. I think this argument is flawed. Even if there have already been a number of shit episodes, this doesn’t make new shit episodes any better: they are still crap.
There are also some points I don’t agree with in Charlie’s post. He seems to have some appreciation for this episode because its more or less a decent, if weak, Futurama episode. Let say I go to a restaurant and order a hamburger and they bring me a hot dog. It may be the most amazing hot dog in history, but still it’s not a hamburger. It is not what I ordered. On Sundays at 8 pm on FOX they air a show called “The Simpsons” and that is what I expect to watch. Last Sunday a Simpsons episode went on, and as a Simpsons episode it should be judged. If they stopped producing Simpsons episode and started producing something else, with a different name and different characters, I would be the happiest person in the world, but this is not gonna happen soon. They still produce Simpsons episodes with Simpsons characters and that is what I expect to whacth and judge.
Another point I don’t agree with is that if they aknowledge weirdness it makes it acceptable. I don’t agree. I’m sure there were instances of the writers acknowledging weird/bad jokes/sequences/episodes during Jean era by having one character making meta-references. But this doesn’t make them any better: they still remains weird/bad jokes/sequences/episodes. If, from now on, at the beginning of every episode we had Homer addressing the public and saying: “Look, guys, this episode is crap, we know.”, this would not make the episodes any more acceptable: they would still be crap.
Agreed on the “jaded fan’s logic” thing. I’ve had people try to convince me that the past few seasons are good because they’re better than the show five years ago. I disagree that the past few seasons are better, but even if I did agree on that, they’re still terrible and not worth my time.
Also DEFINITELY agreed on the last bit. It’s really common in modern comedy and I don’t know why. Acknowledging that your show is bad doesn’t make it any less bad. Jokes like that can be done well (American Dad is surprisingly good with meta humor. They do quite a bit of it but they don’t drag it out or dwell on it. Maybe that’s why it works?) but most of the time it’s just an excuse to suck, the writers going “You can’t complain if we acknowledge it!”. And even outside of books and TV, I hate seeing people say “I’m a bad person but at least I admit it”. That doesn’t really make you a better person.
…wow.
That’s….kinda sad
Maybe this should have been the Futurama crossover episode.
Yep.
Man, you’re right, the “hanging the Flander-eses by a noose” is really bleaker and darker than what’d you normally see on ZS. So dark that it’s just off-putting, even for ZS. In regular Simpsons, I don’t think either Homer or the creators would’ve gone that far as to want Flanders dead (not counting ToH eps). They probably would’ve just gone with a tombstone or something, but “When Flanders Failed” kinda disproves that as well, having Homer only want Flanders to fail, not to die.
Small-ish rambling aside, though, from your notes, I agree that this episode is way a cut about most other Zombie eps., even if it’s a transparent admission that the workers desperately want to work on Futurama instead. But, it’s really sad when you say the last high-point (for Zombie Simpsons) came all the way back in S12 w/ “Trily of Error”!
It’d be really great Charlie if you and the gang could get back together one last time for a Crazy Noises of this episode. I know you haven’t done one since “Behind the Laughter”, but it would be nice here, considering you’ve even said that this is the best ZS since “Trilogy of Error”!
So why was the Flanders family hanging from nooses?
I think Charlie is being very generous with the sign gags. The Downton Abbey “Closed due to Anglophobia” is very lazy and doesn’t make sense.
It was Homer’s fantasy.
Also, “Closed due to Anglophobia” is amusing due to how blunt it is.
For further information, I would like to point out that “Diz-Nee-Land” first appeared in season 2’s Old Money.
What is ‘anglophobia’, anyway? ‘Cromulent’ and ’embiggen’ were much funnier as words.
“Anglophobia” refers to a fear or dislike of England, it’s people, and/or culture.
Just England or anyone speaking the English language?
Well, judging by the prefix “Anglo”, it applies to England and the English language, like how “Franco” applies to France and the French language, “Sino” applies to China and the Chinese language, and “Russo” applies to Russia and the Russian language.
Didn’t they teach you any of this in school or has the American education system truly gone downhill?
I did my elementary in Russia.
Also, in case you’re new here, I’m mostly driving the others off with sarcasm. It’s a clear-skied night in Moscow, time for a smoke.
Yup, anglophobia HAS to be a fake word. Stellar commenting.
It bothers me that ZS has taken Homer’s enviousness of Ned Flanders and turned it into pathological hatred. I mean, killing his kids?
The “Anglophobia” sign doesn’t work for me since Downton Abbey is so popular in the U.S. A better joke would be to parody its fanbase by having Cletus and the Spucklers excitedly going on the ride.
Looking at that picture some thoughts come to my mind, maybe they are not motivated and it’s only my hatred coming out, anyway.
IIRC in the classic years Homer’s favorite food was pork ribs. I don’t see pork ribs in that picture . (am I right on this?)
Looking at the calendar is almost embarrassing to think how hypocrite, preachy and prudish this show has become: I’m married, but if I have to think of a calendar with sexually provocative pictures I would never think of my wife, I would rather think to 20-year-old top models instead, like 99.9% of married men, I guess.
Flanders is not anymore a foil to Homer, they reduced him to a miserable, lonely loser. There’s not really reason for Homer to wish him to die. It doesn’t make anymore sense.
And what the hell is that with Rod and Todd? What the hell have they ever done to Homer? Have they turned Homer into a sadistic, sociopathic bastard?
The fact that they show them hanging on a noose, when Homer in the classic years would never go as far as to want Flanders dead (I think, based on “When Flanders Failed”), is sort-of-proof enough. Answering your last question, of course.
Oh, if only the damage that Season 11 did to Springfield could be reversed…
I think the fact even in his private fantasies he thinks of Marge before any other woman sort of balances the Flanders’ bit. At least to me. You say this show’s gotten preachy and prudish, while also calling it sadistic and sociopathic…
Somehow, it manages to be both. ZS relies much more on shock value and grossout humor than the older episodes did. That’s for individual jokes. But when it comes to storylines and plots, they do get pretty preachy sometimes. A lot of the episodes feel like the writers putting out their political rants. This is most obvious when looking at the character of Lisa; in later years, she seemed to exist just as a mouthpiece for the beliefs of the writers. The show seems really reluctant to criticize certain aspects of society, I dunno.
On that note, I agree that it’s more in-character for Homer to think about Marge before other women. Even in the classic years, it was pretty rare for him to look at other women in that way.
Yeah, it doesn’t make sense to me. I think I am a pretty average man, but I would never think of my wife being on a provocative calendar (even only for me) and at the same time I would never go that far to wish children to die.
The 2 things together, instead of balancing as you said, to me give the impression of a completely scattered personality. The writers are not able to give a cohesive, well-rounded personality to the characters because they are trying to push everything to the extreme to make it funny.
They can’t even risk to give the impression that Homer may think to the remote possibility of cheating on Marge, because they know their viewers are sensible on this subject.
On the other hand they know their viewers are less sensitive about child abuse, and so they push it to the limit. But, as I sad, the 2 things together don’t give me the feeling of a well-balanced show but rather of a show that goes from an extreme to the other without continuity.
I don’t know if I managed to express a comprehensible thought, but it’s late and maybe my rants are only due to the hate for the writers. But thanks for your reply.
…..he thinks Marge is hot. It isn’t her brain on that calendar. I love over-analyzing things, but you don’t even have the right jump-off point.
I just don’t buy this explanation. It’s very simplistic and I think most real men can’t relate with it, not only me.
I still maintain that it’s pretty in-character for Homer. He’s thought about other women, but thinks about Marge far more often. His fantasies usually involve Marge.
Regardless of whether he’d picture Marge or not, it’s absurdly tame for Homer’s subconscious fantasies to feature a calendar rather than an actual woman.
Kudos, Charlie Sweatpants, for being objective enough to acknowledge a reasonably entertaining Zombie Simpsons episode. I do not say this as a Zombie Simpsons apologist; I agree with your assessments of the new episodes at least 90% of the time. But I feel it’s only fair for Simpsons purists to allow themselves the three or four chuckles per season that Zombie Simpsons (if they still watch), instead of dismissing everything out of spite.
This has persuaded me to watch it ;-). On Trilogy of Error: it’s not one I found particularly enjoyable. I think that it’s one of those episodes where they were trying to be clever-clever but forgot that they were supposed to be making people laugh. There were better episodes IMO, even in Season 12, including more “low brow” ones (incidentally I was recently reminded of “Tall Tales” by Selena Gomez’s mishap).
Wow, what the hell was that. It was neither fish nor foul as far as I’m concerned. The ZS element (too many annoying voice performances, explaining way too many jokes) clashed heavily. The Disney segment was certainly the most unpleasant part. They couldn’t get to the alien planet fast enough. Once there, the cartoon reality/ZS/Futurama mix gelled better.
It also seemed like it was written some 20 years ago. Outside of the Star Wars buy-out the “satire” was pretty shopworn stuff. Itchy & Scratchy Land this ain’t, nor does it compare very well with the average Futurama episode.
Although it WAS more entertaining than the average ZS episode and better than the Futurama crossover overall. I agree, some of the nerd humor actually sounded like genuine Futurama lines instead of the typical.
The animation was also above par for ZS, most likely the reason it took so long to make this. Probably decided this one was so unreal in needed more pf a push in “cartoony” animation. Even something like a motion-bur with the shift eyes has been extremely rare since the classic era.
How can I not at least find some minor entertainment in this? ZS has been so bad lately that an episode like this that is essentially an unused Futurama script they had lying around The Mickey Mouse mascot says the debateable “Our cartoons weren’t good, they were just first”. Kinda made me wish I was watching those early cartoons than watching a better-than-average ZS episode.
Another comment said this already, but maybe the reason this was held back was because they were going to make this into the 2nd Simpsons movie and most likely decided to put in some effort in it (rather than completely half-ass it like they did the first. My sister loves The Simpsons Movie, but I just think it’s very average, especially considering all the ideas that were rejected and all the directions they could have taken it).
This was bizarrely boring – I think the uneven pacing might have been what took away the better points, personally. If you’d handed me the script to read, I probably would have been a lot more charitable.
That said, nice premise. If you’re gonna stay on for 26 years, crazy seems like a pretty good way to go. It seems absurd to imagine someone getting upset over the idea of giving Marge telekinetic powers at this point. Might as well have fun with it.