I watched the season premier tonight just out of respect for the fact that, for many years, it was the funniest show on television and every episode was brilliant. I knew in the back of my mind that the last few seasons have been steadily worse, often resorting to self-parody in an attempt to appear humorful. Throwing away continuity at some points and going for desperate "shocks" like outing Selma or giving comic book guy a name didn't make any difference.

Anyway, I can safely say it is now painful to watch. I don't know why I even finished the whole episode. How many episodes have they done now where Homer does something and Marge gets mad and leaves him? How can they suddenly invent a cousin for Homer? At no point have they ever stated that Abe had any siblings. I think I have completely given up hope at this point.



Follow-up discussion: re: The War At Home.

This is a new live-action show that's taking the place of Malcolm In The Middle, as MITM is moving to Thursdays. This show is pure Fox. In the bad way. They managed to be racist, homophobic, sexist, make three penis jokes, make a joke about porn, show the parents smoking and drinking, and have the son crossdress all in the span of twenty minutes. The gist of the plot was that the parents think their son is gay and the daughter's dating a black guy.

Then they showed a viewer discretion warning before Family Guy. Please.

I missed tonight's Simpsons, but it has been hit or miss since, oh, 1997 or so. Although the recent "good" episodes can't come close to the quality of the mid-90s episodes, they're still better than just about anything CBS, NBC, or ABC has to offer.

Explained that they were the owners of Santa's Little Helper's brother. They've been on for 18 years... Still better than most of the crap on Adult Swim.

I guess I see your point to a degree and it's your perogative to not like the show, but I just don't understand how anyone can complain about 'continuity' in a cartoon show like this. Over the years Homer has gone from been a fan of Drederick Tatum (when he's stealing cable) and later had no idea who he was when Moe sets him up to fight him. Who cares if they start throwing in cousins? Wasn't there a whole platoon of them in the episode where Lisa thought she getting getting dumb because of the Simpson gene. After 17 years I don't know what else they can do, except try writing some snappier episodes. I still thought it was pretty funny.

i look at tonight as a bad episode, but i bet they have at least 4 really good episodes this season so i'll watch.

and the random invention of homer's long lost brother made for one of the best episodes ever made. it's the execution that counts.

for the last five years i've had no expectations for the simpsons whatsoever. and so it continues.

i don't even have syndication to fall back on any more, because they only show the recent ones around me. dvd it is, then.

I find that some recent episodes are pretty funny the second or third time around. They still manage to disappoint by the end, but it's not as bad as upon original viewing.

Well, it's been true for two or three episodes.

I agree. Tonight's episode was so poorly executed that all that was left was to notice that they did another Homer and Marge fight episode. I think they still could have used the manatee situation but centered it around something else. I do, however, think the ending was great but it was the only thing I really liked about it. Also, jokes where Homer gets hurt such as tonight with the hammers really need to go or at least be extremely short.

to go with your post.

What? Animated avatars that slow the fucking board down?


Haha. Your picture is from www.historyforkids.org. Did you get the CD-ROM on sale at the mall?

They should bring back Albert Brooks. He was gold in "The Heartbroke Kid" from last season.

I actually thought this episode was pretty funny. No big laughs but plenty of little ones. It was at least better than a lot of episodes from recent years.

the episode was overall lame - but it did have 3 high points:

1) "We don't have an outhouse.....? MY RECORDING STUDIO!" - a repeat of an old gag, yes, but for some reason it still made me laugh. (speaking of continuity... the original outhouse gag involved homer's "Sudden toolshed" in the front yard! 'Member that?)

2) After homer defused the situation with the guys on jetskis and he quietly chuckled and called them "rubes". The reaction was great.

2b) "No court order is gonna tell US what to do!"
"Waitaminute! it's notarized! let's get outta here!"

3) the manatee scrubbing scene with Burns and Smithers at the end.

I had a hard time following anything going on in the episode.

My main quibble:

There were so many great things that could have come out of the original "making adult films in the simpson household" storyline...and they blew it.

Would you save two manitee's by killing one... but before you answer that, this manitee is pregnant.

For someone not having seen the episode, this comes across as really bizarre.

Missed the episode, but caught this... I laughed pretty hard. I can't fault any comedy involving the Sea Cow...

King Of The Hill > Simpsons

Been that way for years.

IMO. YMMV. PDQ.

This is very true. Whereas I used to sit down at 7 on Sundays, turn to fox, and watch it straight through to 10, it looks like it'll now be more or less me catching KOTH at 7:30 and maybe Family Guy at 9.

Mondays look to be the new Fox comedy powerhouse, albeit there's no animation involved.

i cant stand king of the hill. i have a total lack of empathy for all the characters. every time i watch it i end up wanting to punch peggy right in the face, shes always so dumb and needy.

I can understand that. She can be a VERY annoying character. But at the same time I find her hilarious, because she's so completely unaware of her annoying qualities. Definitely a situation where yer laughing AT a character, not WITH.


alongdrive - enjoy the few new "KOTH" episodes we get this season. They're probably the last.

Peggy is one of the most unlikable characters on television, her ego and self-absorbtion is boundless, so laughing at her is much the richer. Like the episode where Randy Travis steals her song and backstory.

And yeah, I did read that this season of KOTH is the last one, which sucks because I think it's been getting better as years go by. Sort of a reverse trend.

A King of the Hill discussion is almost a thread in itself, there are so many good characters and great episodes.

tonight's episode was better, still incredibly mediocre, but it was better than last week.

Agreed.

It's funnier if you've grown with with people who are just like the KOTH characters.

Seinfeld is urban-funny. KOTH is rural-funny. Both funny.