“Sorry, son, but there’s a program about campus life that I really should watch.” – Homer Simpon “We now return to School of Hard Knockers, starring Corey Masterson.” – TV Announcer “Dean Bitterman, I hope nothing unsavory happens during my visit. As you know, I am the President of the United States.” – The President “Oh, don’t worry, I’ve expelled those rowdy members of Chug-A-Lug House.” – Dean Bitterman
Tag: Homer Goes to College
Quote of the Day
“Ah, the college road trip. What better way to spread beer fueled mayhem?” – Homer Simpson “If you’re going for a ride, I’d like you to take Bart and Lisa.” – Homer Simpson “But, Marge, we’re college guys and we’re up to no good.” – Homer Simpson “Mr. Simpson, Gary spilled his ear medicine.” – Fat Nerd
Quote of the Day
“For the love of God, sir! There are two seats!” – Mr. Smithers “I like to put my feet up.” – C.M. Burns
Quote of the Day
“Hey, the pig’s acting kinda funny.” – Fat Nerd “He and Mr. Simpson split a case of malt liquor.” – Skinny Nerd “Guys, he’s really sick!” – Black Nerd “Hello, that sounds like a pig fainting!” – Dean Bobby Peterson
Quote of the Day
“You’re in big trouble, Burns! Homer Simpson’s job requires college training in nuclear physics. Now, you get your man up to speed or we’ll be forced to take legal action.” – Nuclear Inspector “Is that so? Well, I have the feeling you’ll be ‘dropping’ the charges. . . . Oh.” – C.M. Burns “The painters moved your desk, sir.” – Mr. Smithers “Ah, yes.” – C.M. Burns
Quote of the Day
“Homer, we have a perfectly good bookcase.” – Marge Simpson “Yeah, but this is what they’re doing on campus! Besides, it isn’t costing us. I swiped the cinder blocks from a construction site.” – Homer Simpson “Sir, six cinder blocks are missing.” – Foreman “There’ll be no hospital, then. I’ll tell the children.” – Architect
Quote of the Day
“I did always want to go to college. But fate stood in the way.” – Homer Simpson “Homer, sign this application and you’re a shoe in.” – Guidance Counselor “That dog has somebody’s ham! This I gotta see!” – High School Homer
Quote of the Day
“I’m sorry, boys, I’ve never expelled anyone before. But, that pig had some powerful friends.” – Dean Bobby Peterson “Oh, you’ll pay! Don’t think you won’t pay!” – Richard Nixon
Quote of the Day
“Homey, here are the responses from the colleges you applied to.” – Marge Simpson “D’oh! D’oh! D’oh! Woo-hoo, a flyer for a hardware store!” – Homer Simpson
Compare & Contrast: Surprise Nuclear Inspections
“The watchdog of public safety, is there any lower form of life?” – C.M. Burns It would be one thing if Zombie Simpsons merely repeated ideas and stories that had been done on The Simpsons. Given the enormous catalog of episodes, it’s certainly understandable that scenes and concepts would need to get recycled from time to time. Hell, that was understandable way back in the heyday of the show. For example, Season 2’s “Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish” has a great nuclear plant inspection, where we see gum used to seal a crack in the cooling towers, a plutonium paper weight, and ankle deep toxic waste. But all that doesn’t detract in the least from the inspection in Season 5’s “Homer Goes to College”, because instead of showing us the same things again, it gives us a completely different set of horrifying looks into Springfield Nuclear Power Plant. Looks comfy. For starters, the inspectors show up during nap time, where meltdowns are averted by sleepy hound dogs and Smithers is curled up at Burns’ feet. When the surprise inspection team rings the bell, Burns denies them entry and tells a pathetic lie about old fashioned cookies before the inspectors start hacking at the door with an ax. The inspection hasn’t even started yet and already The Simpsons is at full speed, tossing off jokes and ludicrous ideas as fast as possible. Compare that to the – ahem – “inspection” in “My Fare Lady”. Instead of nap time and Homer falling asleep on the “Plant Destruct” button (“Please Do Not Push”), Burns just happens upon Moe, who has been hired as a janitor, mopping the floor. (This whole thing is so inconsequential that we don’t even get an establishing shot and a crow screech.) That immediately leads to a standard Zombie Simpsons joke, wherein the punchline takes forever to arrive, and is patiently explained to the audience: Burns: Hey, swabbie, you missed spots there . . . another one there . . . and there! Every other spot is begrimed! Moe: It’s called a checkerboard floor, you unwrapped mummy. At that, the camera helpfully pulls back to show us the aforementioned checkerboard floor. Hi-larity. No sooner has that happened then Smithers walks up with a bunch of inspectors in tow, “Sir, the NRC is here for a surprise inspection”. Huh? Even by the standards of incompetent Zombie Simpsons Burns, this is head spinning. These guys just waltzed into the plant without Burns (or Smithers, apparently) even knowing they were there? Somewhere, Season 5 Burns is scoffing at his successor’s haplessness. One second they’re not there, the next they are; there’s no lie about cookies, no ax, no nothing. In Season 5, once the inspectors do get in, we see them testing the plant employees while Burns and Smithers gaze down from above. Except, of course, for the three workers who’ve been strategically diverted down to the basement with the important job of keeping a bee in a jar.…
Quote of the Day
“Hello, Simpson. My lawyers and I were in the neighborhood and thought we’d stop by.” – C.M. Burns “Would you like to come in for tea and marshmallow squares?” – Marge Simpson “Yes, he would.” – Blue Haired Lawyer
Behind Us Forever: Clown in the Dumps
“My first day of college. I wish my father was alive to see this.” – Homer Simpson “Hey!” – Abe “Grampa” Simpson “How long have you been back there?” – Homer Simpson “Three days.” – Abe “Grampa” Simpson (Sorry for not getting this up yesterday. The day got away from me.) Season 26 picked up right where season 25 left off: a time eating guest couch gag, many needlessly self voiced celebrities, characters explaining how they feel and what they’re doing, and plenty of other boring nonsense. The A-plot was about Krusty being sad and involved the much hyped character death, which turned out to be the nothingburger we all expected. (The fact that the media is so easily and repeatedly trolled by Zombie Simpsons may be the funniest thing about the show these days.) The B-plot was about Lisa being worried about Homer’s health all of a sudden. We know this because she basically narrates the whole thing for us, including how she’s feeling and the ending that was already nonsensical before the school bus crashes into the Simpson back yard. – Count me among those who generally like the guest couch gags. It’s nice to get something new and interesting, and since the writing staff doesn’t have to do any plot or dialogue, they’re often very decent. But this one was pretty bad. It was a decent concept and had a neat look to it, but it took way too long given how little actually happened and how repetitive the images were. – This popcorn thing is really dumb. It was also done much, much better in “Realty Bites”. – “Cheap to Produce” was at least quick. – Ugh, this Wiggum crime photo thing. I thought the Family Guy stuff was going to be during their episode. – Hey, look: crappy jokes, self voiced celebrities, and canned laughter. – “Nobody warned me this roast would treat me the same way as every roast I’ve seen and laughed at.” – Unnecessary exposition rolled up with a cheap excuse for the idiot nonsense they just made us sit through. Stuff like this really demonstrates how much the show has deteriorated. Krusty knows what a roast is. It’d be fine to have the roast get to him, bum him out, etc. Instead, he acts depressed and surprised from the get go because Heaven forefend characters and the story might move along in reaction to what happens rather than just because. – That swapper joke could’ve been funny if it had made sense. – Hey, look, Bart just showed up out of nowhere to tell Krusty what to do. Seamless. – This is certainly a pointless death scene. – And now it’s time for a funeral that improbably includes the Simpson family. – Hey, the B-plot showed up. I’ll let Lisa explain, “Dad, I’m worried about your health. I don’t want to lose you.” – Remember when they only included Sideshow Bob when they had something really great and fun to do? Long time…
Quote of the Day
“Oh, Dean, this is what your new hip is going to look like . . . you’re going to have to go easy on it.” – Dr. Hibbert
Quote of the Day
“Don’t worry, Mr. Simpson, we can take care of ourselves.” – Black Nerd “Uh, wallet inspector.” – Snake “Oh, here you go. I believe that’s all in order.” – Fat Nerd “Whoa, I can’t believe that worked!” – Snake “Hey, that’s not the wallet inspector.” – Homer Simpson
Quote of the Day
“Marge, someone squeezed all the life out of these kids. And unless movies and teevee have lied to me, it’s a crusty, bitter old dean.” – Homer Simpson “Hi there, hello, I’m Dean Peterson, but you can call me Bobby. I just want you to know, if you ever feel stressed out from studying or whatever, I’m always up for some hacky sack. Or hey, if you just want to come by and jam, I used to be the bass player for the Pretenders.” – Dean Peterson “Boy, I can’t wait to take some of the starch out of that stuffed shirt.” – Homer Simpson Happy 20th Anniversary to “Homer Goes to College”! Original airdate 14 October 1993.
Quote of the Day
“We played Dungeons & Dragons for three hours, then I was slain by en elf.” – Homer Simpson “Listen to yourself, man, you’re hanging with nerds.” – Bart Simpson “You take that back!” – Homer Simpson “Homer, please, these boys sound very nice, but they’re clearly nerds.” – Marge Simpson Happy birthday Conan O’Brien!
Compare & Contrast: Homer Parties Like It’s Freshman Year
“Now, the only antidote to a zany scheme, is an even zanier scheme!” – Homer Simpson “Why does it have to be zany?” – Fat Nerd Since the show had all but run out of ideas by Season 11, it’s no surprise that they had to start revisiting topics and concepts that they’d already done with increasing frequency. And while most of “Kill the Alligator and Run” is a bizarre slideshow of the family leaping from one goofy, vaguely Southern situation to another, it gets there by transporting Homer to a raucous college party and having him run around with the drunken kids. As it happens, Homer had tried to party with college students once before, in Season 5’s infinitely better “Homer Goes to College”. As with so many comparisons between The Simpsons and Zombie Simpsons, to really get to the heart of the matter you have to put aside most of Zombie Simpsons usual problems. So, no, the trip to Florida doesn’t have anything to do with spring break, nor does it have much to do with Homer’s odd freakout at the beginning of the episode or the subsequent multi-act run from the law. And, no, Homer getting down with the college kids doesn’t make any sense on its own either, from his getting to the beach with a bed tied to him to his bizarre antics at the Kid Rock concert to the sheriff happily looking the other way for Homer. All of those typical Zombie Simpsons shortcuts distract from just how empty the comedy here really is, so while they exist and are a big part of what makes this episode so very unwatchable, they aren’t what makes their take on “spring break” so utterly empty, boring and unfunny. On the surface, both “Homer Goes to College” and “Kill the Alligator and Run” have Homer acting like a jerk around college kids. But if you look just a bit deeper, you can see that Zombie Simpsons wasn’t doing anything else while The Simpsons was using Homer for far more than just him running around and yelling. Homer yelling and running, there’s a lot of this. The premise of “Homer Goes to College” was that Homer, in his infinite stupidity, thought that all those Animal House style movies about college are what life on campus is really like. When he actually got there, he figured that the jocks would be constantly beating the nerds, that the dean was naturally out to get everyone, and that the rest of the students would feel the same way he did. Homer being Homer, he couldn’t see that none of that was true, and instead tried to do things like take the nerds on a beer fueled road trip and prank a nearby school that no one else on campus even cared about. The jokes come fast and heavy, but the main idea on which everything else rests is that Homer is wildly out of place and spectacularly wrong about what college…
Quote of the Day
“It was the most I ever threw up, and it changed my life forever.” – Homer Simpson
Quote of the Day
“Oh, very well, it’s time for your bribe. Now, you can either have the washer and dryer where the lovely Smithers is standing, or you can trade it all in for what’s in this box.” – C.M. Burns “The box, the box!” – Nuclear Inspector
Reading Digest: The Perils of Syndication Edition
“Wow! They’ll never let us show that again, not in a million years!” – Krusty the Klown Assuming that pure joy expands in a circle at the speed of light, the echo of my unbounded glee at learning that reruns of The Simpsons would be on five days a week should be somewhere between Altair and Sigma Draconis by now. In those dark days before DVDs, DVD rips, and bottomless hard drive platters, watching old episodes wasn’t easy to do, and the news that it would be on every weeknight (and sometimes on Saturday) was literally life changing. All those episodes that I had only seen once or twice were suddenly going to be broadcast again and again, and that meant that I could watch them again and again. These days I never watch the syndication runs, both because they’re hopelessly polluted with Zombie Simpsons and because having episodes on my computer is vastly more convenient. But I recognize that I’m in the minority on how I watch, and this week we have two links to demonstrate that. One to a television station that’s broadcasting good episodes in May, and another to someone who’s still shackled to the whims of the program directors. We’ve also got pictures of that beaded Springfield, an awesome love song, plenty of excellent usage, and a Hans Moleman video. Enjoy. Perfectly Cromulent Analysis: Mr. Plow – Smooth Charlie’s Click of the Week is a post on “Mr. Plow” by our old friend Andreas. He extensively and rightly praises that excellent “Do you come with the car?” joke that still rings true nearly twenty years later. Well worth reading in full. The Unofficial Smithers Love Song – Fan made song and video that contains 100% of your daily recommended amount of fuck yeah (via @springfieldx2). Electronic Arts Cancels ‘Dead Space 2’ Wii, ‘The Simpsons Game 2’ – A Simpsons related game I didn’t know was being developed has been cancelled. 10 Best Female Voice Actors | Actors & Directors | Screen Junkies – Nancy Cartwright snags #1 here, but no one else from the show makes the cut. The Simpsons Makes a Skit About Precious – Thanks go to Maggie C for sending in a link to this Tumblr site that noted Zombie Simpsons’ pathetic “Precious” dream sequence in “Love Is a Many Strangled Thing”. My favorite comment got right to the point: holy shit fuck you, simpsons Simpsons town revealed in Forest Hills artist’s home – Pictures from the revealing of Forty Square Feet of Awesome. The Disco Stu door prize is pretty cool. Financial Lessons from the Final Four, Yoga, Homer Simpson, and Other Odd Sources – Prosaic advise courtesy of a copy and paste job at Time magazine. They get the quotes right so it’s excellent usage even if it is banal to the point that Henry Luce’s corpse would blush if it still could. Everything I Know About Money, I Learned from Homer Simpson – And linked from the above is this,…