By Connor Dunphy Yo, it’s Dead Homer Society. You know how it is, you ain’t here if you don’t. Let’s get straight to it, because I got something to rant about. Charlie and his accomplices have done a real fine job of utterly deconstructing Zombie Simpsons. And it deserves every single bit of it, because watching it is like seeing your beloved Grandma contract dementia and then proceed to start being really mean and horrible for no reason. Everything they’ve mentioned: the dialogue, the storylines, the characterization, lack thereof of all three, it’s all grade A, 100%, farmer’s dream bullshit. Today, though, I’m here to properly shed some light on something else. I’m gonna scoop some of that bullshit from a corner of the bottom of the barrel which I don’t think has been properly examined: the animation of Zombie Simpsons. Ever since I started thinking about how this show has declined other than “eh it’s not as good, I guess”, since I read the very first word of this site’s manifesto, what’s pissed me off the most, got me to pause whatever platform I’m watching the show from, made me draw characters on my toilet paper to properly represent where their shenanigans can go, was the way the animation has gone. Think back to all the classic Simpsons episodes that you know. You got your “You are Lisa Simpson”s, your “Do it for her”s, just all the amazing seasons you see people on Tumblr, Twitter, anything quote. They had amazing animation. Everything felt human. If I could refer to a specific example, it would be the scene where you can pinpoint the exact moment Ralph’s heart breaks in half. You can sense, just from how this specific frame is drawn, what the characters are feeling. Lisa feels regret, sorrow, sadness of some kind, and Bart, in his amused indifference, is rubbing it in. You don’t need to watch the entire episode to sense that. You don’t need overwhelming [SOMBER TRUMPET NOISES] to know that they’re feeling that, because you know who the characters are, what their personalities are. If someone came up to me and said “hey dude, I never seen the Simpsons can you show me a quick sum up of the characters”, then I’d take pity on them for being denied a right as entitled to him/her as freedom of speech, and show them this picture. Everyone knows the barest thing about the Simpsons. Hell, I used to listen to this square-ass radio station where middle-aged people would get asked “who is the mischievous person in the Simpsons” and they’d just instantly say Bart. You look at this picture, and you have the 0.003333333% of Simpsons knowledge that everyone who’s never watched it does, you know what’s going on. This is the beauty of old Simpsons animation, it fit the characters and the storyline. A truly great producer has their music fit the vocalist, whether it’s a rapper or a folk singer, they use the right…
Tag: The Yellow Badge of Cowardge
Compare & Contrast: Homer and 4th of July Fireworks Disasters
“This baby’s sure to kill something!” – Homer Simpson There is little doubt that a man who famously likes his beer cold, his teevee loud, and his homosexuals flaming, is a big fan of the thundering light show that is Fourth of July fireworks. Of course, Homer is also the exact opposite person who should ever actually be involved with them. He is thoughtless, careless and impulsive, and those are not traits that mix well with gunpowder. In “The Yellow Badge of Cowardage”, Zombie Simpsons played with that combustible mixture and blew itself up. In “Summer of 4 Ft. 2”, The Simpsons used the same ingredients to put on a masterful display. To see the difference between that crowd pleasing spectacle and the kind of disaster that makes people run away screaming, there’s only really two things we need to consider: 1) getting the fireworks and 2) using them. For the first, Zombie Simpsons makes things easy because they barely bother to show us anything. Homer and Not Don Vittorio initially go to Cletus’s farm (why? who cares?) where they fail to buy anything. The very next scene with the two of them is this: Homer: Okay, let’s make some fireworks. Uh, I guess they found some? There’s no explanation of where it came from or how they got it, and certainly not because of time constraints. After this we get the interminable and mechanically narrated “drive around with gunpowder” scene, which is nothing but the two of them telling us what they’re about to do and then doing it: cobblestone streets, a rickety bridge, gaslights . . . it just keeps going. So not only did they skip over something important, but they did so with forty-five seconds of filler. Compare that to Homer’s immortal attempt to act casual like he buys illegal fireworks all the time. Text is a weak excuse for Castellaneta’s exquisite delivery, and can never hope to reproduce that blithely misplaced confidence that he’s being smooth, but here it is anyway: Homer: Hi, um, let me have one of those porno magazines, large box of condoms, bottle of Old Harper, couple of those panty shields, and some illegal fireworks . . . and one of those disposable enemas. Nah, make it two. This is lunatic insanity of the absolute best kind. Homer is precisely himself: clueless and utterly incompetent. The items he thinks are innocuous are the kind of thing that might get a real convenience store owner to tip the police off to this weirdo in his store. Better yet, the Apu stand-in doesn’t even flinch, calmly explaining that he has no fireworks right up until the coast is clear, whereupon he instantly takes Homer back to his storeroom/arsenal: Hey, look, multiple sign gags in just one shot. I’m particularly fond of “Tang Tse Doodle”. Once there we get to the M-320 (“Celebrate the independence of your nation by blowing up a small part of it.”) and Homer’s quick and happy response: “Alright”. Coincidentally, the entire scene, from…
Behind Us Forever: The Yellow Badge of Cowardge
“Gratzi, gratzi, you have brought great joy to this old Italian stereotype.” – Don Vittorio DiMaggio “No, no, Don Vittorio, you’re not-” – Legs “Yes, I am. I know it, I am.” – Don Vittorio DiMaggio If nothing else, “The Yellow Badge of Cowardge” capped off Season 25 with the same brand of forgettable and lackluster nonsense that we’ve come to expect. (Points for consistency, if literally nothing else.) Jokes and childishly simple plot points are explained ad nauseam while the overall story staggers around in a world of dull nonsense. So, for example, near the middle of the episode Homer and the guy who looks and sounds like Don Vittorio DiMaggio but isn’t Don Vittorio DiMaggio drive around with barrels of gunpowder strapped to their car. Despite the fact that we know nothing of consequence is going to happen, the show insists on driving them through a bunch of neighborhoods where everything might explode. It goes on for the better part of a minute and they explain every place they go before they get there. It’s Season 25 (and really all of Zombie Simpsons) in a nutshell: a bad joke that’s explained ahead of time and then run into the ground. – At least the couch gag was short. Didn’t have a couch, but it was short. – Why is Lisa narrating when the first time we see her she’s asleep? – Bart banging pots and pans . . . feels like I’ve seen that before. Also, he explained what he was doing while he was doing it. – “That’s a prison road crew” – Marge, telling us what we’re looking at. – Having had a couple of jokes explained while they were happening, here’s Marge to pre-explain the fire department delivering pizza in a pointless, Family Guy aside. – Narration Lisa is now also pre-explaining the jokes “and run with your leg tied to someone who wouldn’t talk to you all year”. – Cletus, doing the same. – Skinner is getting pelted with eggs. He used to be good at his job. – As is sometimes the case, the sign gags are at least okay. Lewis’s out of office text message was kinda funny. It couldn’t save that extended bit with Chalmers just yelling and mumbling, but it wasn’t terrible. – This whole field day is an excuse for them to jump from one bad idea to another. – Okay, Edwin Moses contemptuously saying that all hurdles are the same size was funny. – The cheese grater abs on Milhouse are kinda gross. – I think Chalmers reciting all the kids names is supposed to be fan service. Getting hard to tell. – Aaaaand, proving once again that they will overuse anything decent, they have Moses jump off a cliff (literally). – Nelson’s here to punch Milhouse. Supposedly he’s there because the bullies don’t want to pay off a bet to Martin (which they would do why, exactly?), but maybe he just wanted Milhouse to stop expositing while he ran.…
Sunday Preview: The Yellow Badge Of Cowardge
Bart is plagued with guilt when he wins the annual “last day of school” race around Springfield Elementary, with an assist from Nelson, who beats up frontrunner Milhouse. Meanwhile, Homer tries to bring back the annual 4th of July fireworks display after it’s canceled for budget reasons. This is the season finale, so we got that going for us. However, based on the description, there will most likely be lost of guilt horns, so that sucks. I also read that Glenn Close will be voicing Mona Simpson tonight. I am almost certain she is dead, unless they brought her back in one of the many ZS episodes I neglected to watch, so maybe its in a dream sequence. Whateves, I am less interested in solving that mystery than I am in figuring out why Bart gives a crap about winning a race around the school in the first place.