Homer's onto something here... pic.twitter.com/uEmRSLYoc1
— The Simpsons (@TheSimpsons) December 6, 2023
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As if it wasn't already clear that The Simpsons has been a mockery of itself for at least a decade, they've managed to reach an even lower level, reaching a new plateau of unamusement while simultaneously torturing all viewers with absolutely terrible voice acting performances. The clip presented here is a good example of this. What is the point of this shit anyway and who is watching it? Zoomers may not know it (or maybe they do, since zoomers are often portrayed as a group to be hated, even though half of all internet users are zoomers), but The Simpsons was by far the best animated series of all time, and in the highest tier of all shows - namely the S Tier along with the Twilight Zone, Twin Peaks and Euphoria. Just let it end already. It's not even fun to hatewatch any longer.
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Writers gotta be trolling giving poor Julie Kavner a speech.
I'm out of the loop here and apologize if this has been covered but Marge sounds awful. I haven't watched the show in years and decided to tune in tonight and all I could think was Marge sounds truly awful. It legitimately ruined my watching experience and had to switch it off. Are they just allowing the show to die with the original cast? I can't imagine Disney keeping this going for much longer.
Disney is desperate right now and The Simpsons is one of their big Disney+ hits. Rumors say they're pushing the Simpsons producers for a new movie after their disastrous box office year. Recasting seems more likely than cancelling at this point, should it be needed.
I think this is the first time Skinners voice has sounded off
and they want to bring harry back for another spinal tap movie?
Honestly at this point, they should maybe consider using the literal weeks of audio voice recordings to make an ai voice program for the voice actors. Have the voice actors still record lines to get the cadence and emotion right and use the ai to fix the voices. Everyone still gets paid and gets to keep their voices from degrading further
I was willing to give it a shot. I'm a lifelong B&S fanatic, so I had to tune in to see if they were gonna do an end credits song and I was delighted to see they did, even if they didn't write it themselves.
Of course, I had to skip to the end. I just can't handle the shitty, limp, lifeless "writing" the show has devolved to, and obviously the VOICES.
Even Skinner sounds like he has about three weeks to live. And as soon as Marge comes on, I instinctively turn the sound off and turn on the subtitles. They need to stage an intervention for Julie Kavner. This can't keep going on. Just use AI based on her voice from 40 years ago and keep paying her, if that's what it takes.
A+ for Belle & Sebastian, D- for the rest of this horseslop.
PS....the song playing in the montage is called "If You Find Yourself Caught In Love" from the album "Dear Catastrophe Waitress" if you were curious.
Discussion
Post your favourite Simpsons episode here!
Mine is Last Exit to Springfield.
I know it is a bit generic but this is an absolute behemoth of an episode. True sovl.
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The worst was when they decided every episode needed a celebrity guest. The writing went way downhill to shoehorn them in.
Just compare how the plot of Tennis the Menace develops compared to Bart of Darkness.
Bart of Darkness: There's a heat wave. A mobile pool arrives and the neighborhood kids spend all day enjoying a good swim. Once the pool leaves, Bart and Lisa annoy their parents into buying their own pool. It's a believable and natural way to end with a pool in their backyard.
Tennis the Menace: Grampa is in a talent competition when he suffers a heart attack. He survives but the family prices out burial plots. When informed the mausoleum would cost as much as a tennis court, Homer decides to buy a tennis court.
It's such a clumsy way to develop the story. It could've just as easily been a basketball court, a set of Go-Karts, another pool, or a gigantic bounce house. This episode could've progressed to Homer spending all month in a giant bouncehouse just by changing two words in the first act. It could've been a Speed Racer parody with the kids gokarting. Heck, it could've become an Air Bud parody when they discover Santa's Little Helper can shoot basketballs.
But instead he said "Tennis court" because somebody promised Venus and Serena a guest appearance.
The talent show, heart attack, and burial plans? Not addressed in the slightest after the first commercial break. Not even a lazy handwave of "grampa clutches his chest at the end of the episode". The heat wave in Bart of Darkness continued because it was part of the plot -- it's the reason so many kids are coming over daily.
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One of the last βnewβ episodes I remember watching featured Lisa trying to undo her unpopularity by making a school blog anonymously that writes positive things about her self and then Bart exposes Lisa's doing it, so everyone thinks she's a try hard loser again and then...... Lady Gaga has psychic visions that Lisa needs help. So Gaga shows up to Springfield to teach her to love herself or something, and they perform a song.
It's was very bizarre, overwrought, and why is a magic Lady Gaga needed to help Lisa? I remember an old 90s episode where Lisa gets a substitute teacher who is the first person to encourage her intelligence and creativity, and then when he leaves she runs out the class crying asking him to stay and he gives her a note saying, "You are Lisa Simpson" to always help her believe in herself when she feels she's got no support. One of them actually feels rooted in something a gifted child from a family that doesn't know how to support her and is stuck in an underfunded school might actually go through. The other is just feels like a celeb vehicle.
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I noticed a very specific episode around season 20 where the animation and writing changed dramatically. Not just "switched to digital animation" but the pacing changed. It was a specific scene in the 4th grade classroom and included Nelson harming MiltonMartin in an unusually harsh way.
Then there's dogshit animation like this. It's cartoonish even by cartoon standards with babbys first fluid container. I've seen better animation on Newgrounds
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For me Kill the Alligator and Run was the show's 'shooting pain in the left arm', I felt bad after I watched it for the first time because I saw the future of the show in that one 20 minute turd. It was around that point that Homer transformed from basically a decent average father and husband into an actually bipolar lunatic.
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I've heard quite a bit about that episode but think I only watched it once, and even then barely paid attention.
Southern bayou themes don't do it for me.
I'm honestly surprised to see it's a Season 11 episode. I've seen the episodes surrounding it (tapdance, phone book cover contest) several times and remember them clearly, as well as several in 12. I would've guessed it be closer to 16 given I stopped watching around 13.
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It's kind of dumb since it's just a cartoon and whatnot, but every now and then I catch a rerun from the second or third season quite randomly, and I get genuinely angry with what the show has become... there's just so much heart and brain in each of those episodes, the characters are written with care and respect, the jokes mostly hit, and don't revolve around whatever manic high Homer happens to be riding in the first 10 minutes of the episode, or their celebrity guest, the performances are solid, and it's all generally good in spite of its fuzzy, wonky animation and its crude backgrounds and weird aspect ratio.
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it happens with any show. i think before they "settle" on what the characters are going to be (or run out of ideas if you want to be pessimistic) the characters are a lot more dynamic and real. but there are only so many stories you can tell without making the characters more extreme. even shows that people say didn't go downhill totally did this. king of the hill is a good example, where everyone is flanderized and not nearly as warm as they were in the first three or four seasons (even though people act like it was perfect up until the end). but i will agree the simpsons is the most cynical example of the show's characters becoming complete husks of their former selves, and that's saying something when family man exists
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They always did this tho?
Each episode starts out seeming to be about a certain premise but then it pivots into a completely different story.
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The first act used to still be somewhat related to the rest of the episode. A heatwave, school budget crisis, company softball game, etc. After season 11 it became more and more disconnected to the point that it was seemingly written so they could drop the entire first act for the sake of more adtime.
Season 7: Homer gets too drunk and leaves his car with Barney, who abandons it in New York. The rest of the episode is a trip to NY to get the car back. It's all related.
Season 12, Homer finds a decades-old box of crackers in the attic with a winning ticket to Africa. The Simpsons go to Africa.
Or he loses all their money in stocks and becomes a human guinea pig. Turns out a crayon made him dumb, but the bankruptcy is forgotten.
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It
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