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Banksy designed the opening credits and awesome couch gag for tonight's episode.

Dear Simpsons:

Please go away.

Love,
Everyone, 10+ years ago.

Jeff wrote:Banksy designed the opening credits and awesome couch gag for tonight's episode.

God Bless America, where winking self-incrimination sets you free! And where street artist hacks can rake in as much cash, pussy and power as the overlords they help place into power! AMERICA, BITCHES!

Jeff wrote:Banksy designed the opening credits and awesome couch gag for tonight's episode.

Whoa, thanks for that.
Though they do seem to be conflating South Korea with China's evil capitalist genius.
The timing for the latter is quite good and Nobel.

I keep forgetting this show is still on.

Jeff wrote:Banksy designed the opening credits and awesome couch gag for tonight's episode.

Using the decapitated dolphin head to seal boxes was a nice touch.

Murdoch wrote:I keep forgetting this show is still on.

Exactly.

You gotta admit though, that beginning is excellent.

Lemmy Caution wrote:

Jeff wrote:Banksy designed the opening credits and awesome couch gag for tonight's episode.

Whoa, thanks for that.
Though they do seem to be conflating South Korea with China's evil capitalist genius.
The timing for the latter is quite good and Nobel.

Wait, so you're saying that South Korea isn't an American influenced state being used as a source of cheap labour and goods?

It's not The Simpsons, though; gimmicks like this have become the only way it can get any attention for the last decade. It used to be funny, and that's all it had to do. The most unusual thing they did was a The Critic crossover back in the day, and Matt Groening took his name off the episode. The show is now a sponge for poorly directed celebrity guest appearances, corny slapstick, and stale attempts at topical political humor. In Season 12 it was just disappointing, but it quickly devolved into being an absolutely humorless shell of a television show, and every Banksy opening and Zuckerberg guest voice in the world isn't going to save it.

colinr0380 wrote: Wait, so you're saying that South Korea isn't an American influenced state being used as a source of cheap labour and goods?

and labor drones?
and utter disregard of human norms?
Even without haggard worker-pandas, it's pretty obvious they have China on their mind. Also, I'd be pretty surprised if any Simpson merchandise is made in Korea.
I guess the dolphin head (Japan's shame) is the give-away that it's some composite Asian worker hellhole. The satire provides an interesting glimpse of American fears.

Banksy isn't an American.

mfunk9786 wrote:Dear Simpsons:

Please go away.

Love,
Everyone, 10+ years ago.

Don't watch. Problem solved.

mfunk is pretty much right in diagnosing the reason for the show's decline, but I feel like the past few seasons have been a vast improvement. Its a hit or miss show for me -- the show can be very good at times. Case in point, did you actually watch the Banksy episode? It was genuinely funny and had a lot of winking old-school charm. Just avoid the episodes with gimmicky guest appearances and you'll catch a real gem every now and then.

Anyway, beats any of that terrible Seth Macfarlane garbage.

That's an exhausting conceit, and I've tried that to absolutely zero success. The vocal performances lack any chemistry (presumably since they're now literally phoned in) and the show's desperation to be relevant not only assures that it won't be, but it also destroys the first 10 seasons' strongest characteristic: timelessness. There have now been more terrible episodes of the show than good ones, and that's a really sad thought for someone who watched it throughout the first 10 years. It has tarnished the show's legacy. I can no longer make the mistake of saying "I enjoy The Simpsons" without a litany of asterisks and season numbers prepared in my mind, for fear that anyone will think that I actually tune in for this dreck.

mfunk9786 wrote:There have now been more terrible episodes of the show than good ones, and that's a really sad thought for someone who watched it throughout the first 10 years. It has tarnished the show's legacy. I can no longer make the mistake of saying "I enjoy The Simpsons" without a litany of asterisks and season numbers prepared in my mind, for fear that anyone will think that I actually tune in for this dreck.

Completely agree. I watched the Cape Feare episode last night for the first time in years and marveled at it's ingenuity and wit. There are more laughs in that episode than in what I've seen in the entirety of the last ten years. It's depressing to see the glory days get buried deeper and deeper under the embarrassingly awful new seasons.

Also, the Simpsons already made more or less the same joke as the Banksy couch gag (with much more subtlety) in the old "Itchy and Scratchy: The Movie" episode.

Titus wrote: There are more laughs in that episode than in what I've seen in the entirety of the last ten years.

That statement belongs in the "rediculous" thread.

It really, really doesn't.

There was that one episode with Al Brooks as a fat counselor that had four or five laughs in it. It can't be the only one like that in the last decade. That said I did accidentally bump into an old episode some months back and it managed more laughs than any set of the new episodes I can think of.

An interesting interview with a Simpsons executive producer about the Banksy intro.
Unfortunately, in all the stories I've read about this intro, no one seems much interested in talking about the actual basis for the satire. By presenting a caricature of a sweatshop, it allows viewers to ponder this for a moment and then laugh it off, as we're reassured that the reality is nothing like that. So collectively we indulge in a little shallow liberal guilt and then go on consuming products from sweatshops. And the Simpsons empire gets to look hip and edgy for running the Banksy intro and doesn't need to change any of its practices. Ultimately it strikes me as pretty cynical. How would we feel about a satirical portrayal of slavery in the antebellum South that exaggerated the atrocious conditions of slave life to the point of being patently ridiculous, allowing us to say "Oh, that was just a farfetched satire; the real conditions were nowhere near that bad"?

Hadn't noticed this before:

The Stiffsons

Has anyone else had a Simpsons episode that isn't Lisa's Substitute (come on, that episode is waterworks waiting to happen) make you cry? Because of my father's history of heartattacks, Homer's Triple Bypass hits close to home for me, and Marge Be Not Proud can get me going sometimes. Anyone have any additions to this most shameful list?

While the episode itself wasn't great, the death of Bleeding Gums Murphy brought a tear to my eye because of the sax song. And of course the one when Maggie says "dada" after Homer walks out the door.

I don't know, that Steve Allen pog was pretty fantastic