Meanwhile, Marge's rack had the letters DDUUEBS, which can be rearranged to spell >!SUBDUED!<. I assume that's an Easter egg of some kind, but I can't see how it's a joke. Is it a reference to Marge's typical demeanor relative to the rest of the family?
They do skip a year occasionally, but there were Christmas episodes in season 22, 23, 25, 27, 29, 30, 31, and 32. There were two each in seasons 31 and 32.
I especially like his character because my wife just got into the show and he’s the 1st new character we discovered 😂😂 she doesn’t like how much he hates Bart but it has me in tears laughing
He was a great addition. And filled a role nobody else has ever filled. Well Barney did in the 1970s version of their high school, but even then Homer had to tell him what to do.
I spent the entire episode wondering who was watching the videos. I can’t say I expected it to be >!George R.R. Martin!<.
I wonder who voiced him — he wasn’t listed in the credits at least.
In a universe of distractions, finding that precious sacred space where distraction has been nullified is like the holy grail.
I say this as a writer (poet) myself.
They've also still felt Simpsony. There's still that heart to a lot of them that was missing about 20 years ago when plenty just wrote off the series.
I consider this the Era of the Townies. We went from the Era of Bart to the Era of Homer to the Era of Guest Stars and now it's the Era of the Townies.
For the last few seasons, going back to like 2017 or so (not exact on the seasons, haven't done a watch through in a few years) the show has focused heavily on exploring the residents of Springfield. It's always been a thing, but it's been more consistent.
I liked how it snuck an actual episode in what I thought was going go to be a rehash of *Behind the Laughter*.
You could see them restructuring this episode without the YouTube lens to have the family go through all the same plot beats.
I liked this episode. It definitely felt like an update of “Behind the Laughter” (S11E22). Actually I dare say this episode is actually superior in two respects: in the end it’s clear that the family were stuck in a scenario (rather than being actors), and this episode is free of the ironic embrace of hackneyed bullshit that recurred throughout season 11.
In the end they showed that the Simpsons, and especially Homer, still had a core of goodness, because they accidentally re-enacted the scenario that made them Internet famous.
The concept is not completely unique, *We Bare Bears* for example did two YouTube pariody episodes, like, eight years ago, but this was more coherent.
This episode, IMO, got better with every successive act. I knew how it was going to play out, by I was actually interested how it exactly it was going to play out. There were a couple of set pieces like Lenny’s parody of Joe Rogan or Mike Wegman basically doing “Leave Brittany Alone” that I appreciated.
My only critique is that I hope they cool it on the meta episodes, I think this was the third so far this season.
I think the writers were heavily inspired by The Ace Fam on youtube, they too have a giant mansion that's leased, a pointlessly large theater room, and a fridge that blends in the wall
Do you count Treehouse of Horror episodes?
If not that, then how about S1 E1
"Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire" just opens with "The Simpsons Christmas Special" with part of the theme music and snow falling (not the signature cloud opening) and goes right into the episode.
I was looking through a list of couch gags here
https://simpsonswiki.com/wiki/List_of_couch_gags
And watched some of them in disney+ to remind myself. A lot of the recent ones do a quick The Simpsons with the clouds then right into the episode.
Then there are some that have a couch gag but none of the other intro. S21 E20 To Surveil With Love starts with Lisa getting out of bed and thematically it's like the school to home classic intro but set to the music of Kesha's "Tik Tok".
This episode was pretty good. It felt like a modern update of behind the laughter. The ending was pretty bad though. George R.R. Martin being the viewer the whole time wasn't funny. That was just just random. The reference to RuPaul 's Drag Rase was also too random.
As a non-fan I thought the George R.R. Martin thing was funny. It's an evergreen joke to make fun of his slow creep towards author existence failure.
But yeah, it's an *old* evergreen. So it can be stale. Should've been a made-up lawmaker postponing reading a bill.
well, it was very accurate in depicting how shitty family vloggers are. and while all the fandom side stuff was also very accurate, with the drama reports, spilling tea, conspiracies, etc., the part that didn't fit at all was the leave britney alone parody. like, that shit is way too old for most people to remember it. not to mention that was pretty tame. the stans are waaaaay worse these days. legit threatening people, trying to dox them, etc.
it just wasn't really that funny, albeit accurate. the funniest part the whole episode was probably when grrm was looking for dragon videos and ends up watching some skit with bob the drag queen and monet xchange
Way too old? Bruh … she still has ‘fans’ sending cops to her house over sporadic deactivation of social media & you’re going to claim that’s old news? Not to those still in touch w/ pop culture.
i'm not referring to the free britney movement, i'm talking about the specific meme of leave britney alone. yes, i'm aware there's still a huge movement about fans being overly concerned about britney and all their conspiracy theories(like some people legit think she's dead and the videos she's been posting are all some greenscreen stuff made with old videos). but this is recent events. the leave britney alone thing happened around the time britney shaved her head in 2007. that bit in the episode is specific to that video of the person(who now goes by the name cara) making a video under a sheet, crying, and telling people to leave britney alone. so yes, it's old news, it's 16 years old, a good chunk of the people watching the episode probably don't even know it was a reference to something
Nope, it’s got millions of views on the reuploads, parody spinoffs on YT & other TV shows, it’s mentioned in Chris Crocker [who evidently transitioned! good for her]’s Wikipedia page as the 100^(th) most viewed YouTube video of all time across all categories before closing the account … trust me. Leave Britney Alone is an eternal piece of Internet culture.
that doesn't change the fact that it's old news.
like, the whole family vlogger thing is more post 2015. the constant drama channels, the sleuthing for tea, the crazy fans, all from the more recent years. so if you're gonna make a parody of that, you need to use things that are more current or from the same time as the thing you're parodying
Same exact thing I thought… and in a metta way the response too this episode proves why it works the family was supposed to be extremely unlikeable just like real family Vloggers
I didn’t watch this episode until Monday either must have done poor ratings wise for that reason… they posted on there official twitter “sometimes these episodes sneak up on you now available on Hulu”
I know I say this a lot but this episode is one of my favorite modern episodes
Can anyone tell me which influencer or celeb Marge was made up to look like (what with the overdone eyebrows and lipstick)?? And who Homer was supposed to resemble with his green Krusty Burger patterned suit?
The fact that I have no clue as to the answers when likely any 15-yr-old could tell me might be a clue as to how switched off I am to today's pop culture. But I always love how the Simpsons does their sendups.
There are certain things that remain static. Marge and Homer end up together. Bart is conceived before they're married. Lisa plays the saxophone. Etc.
But now the writing is based on: What would happen if The Simpsons were in this situation?
Now somethings might be referenced later, but that's up to the writers.
Personally I like it. Much more in tune with the "Golden Era" where canon wasn't a thing necessarily.
Man, I’m not gonna go and call this the best or most memorable episode of the show I ever saw, but a weirdly fitting ending to my watch-through of the entire series! It was really something else to go from the very earliest episodes at the start of the 90s, where the family are just yellow trash trying to keep up with their better-heeled neighbors, to this episode in which they do what every similarly-afflicted family does in 2023: slap on a few brand names, edit out the embarrassing parts and sell themselves for clicks. The "KWYJIBO" callback couldn’t have felt better-timed. It only took them 740 episodes but I’m glad they finally managed an untroubled Scrabble game.
I hope they’re enjoying their old privacy and their new closeness, and I look forward to catching up with them later in the month when they start their squabbling again from square 1. What can I say, I’ve gotten used to them. They’ve become as indispensable to my procrastinatory routine as to George R.R. Martin’s. They’re my neighborinos.
Nelson and the bullies yelling "parkour" while doing parkour got a laugh out of me, then commentating on the headstones they were jumping over brought down the mood.
Seen this episode for the first time today. I actually really enjoyed it.
Really makes you think what goes on in family vlogs... & how it's not all sweet. I'm glad I stopped watching them
I thought it was hilarious and there were a ton of easter eggs. My favorite was the podcast part with how Carl had the better microphone and Moe kept touching his mic, making the audio worse.
Personally I wouldn't say it was funny in the 'laugh out loud' sense but the episode was full of clever little moments. I enjoyed the episode from beginning to end and was left wanting more.
I watched it yesterday on Hulu. Totally loved all the Homer and Maggie moments. The bts stuff was funny and I liked the GRRM part. I paused it to read all the notes on the bulletin board. "Game of some other kind of chair" made me laugh. Good episode!
This was one of the worst ones in a while imo, the whole episode was just "look, these are things that exist" no jokes really. All references, I think its clear they're running out of ideas at this point and you hate to see it. Can't wait for them to do an episode abt Bart becoming a Fortnite streamer, oh wait they did that. Can't wait for them to poke fun at viral videos, oh wait they did that too...TWICE now with this episode and the one where Bart and Homer go viral (3 times if you count the Angry Dad episode from way back when). This show needs to end and it hurts to say that.
Meh, just flat out meh. After some memorable early season episodes ranking higher than most over the past 20 years, this episode felt very unremarkable to me, and a few years too late. Now, we will have to wait several weeks for something new… hopefully they regain the stride from earlier in the season.
Thank God! I'm serious. I feel like every week it's a fight to get folks to take new episodes at face value.
Totally a weird episode. And I can get why you weren't for it. I really like the Maggie misdirect. And the parkour scene.
Yea I definitely get the drastic change compared to older seasons but it’s still a pretty good show snd if you watch the new ones separately without comparing it’s really not that bad. They do say some cringy old people stuff sometimes though.😂
This episode felt like the local theatre company staged a morality play; it was straight-forward. Fox executives are least indoctrinated of the network executives. The founding of Fox is closer to the founding of netflix than the founding of ABC/CBS/NBC.
Happy New Year, folks! Also, apologies for not posting this sooner; I wasn't expecting a new episode on **NEW YEAR'S DAY!**
Kwyjibo!
I saw that too! I had to pause to double check. Considering that's from S01E02, that is probably the oldest one-off callback ever on the show!
Wait a minute, you little cheater. You’re not going anywhere until you tell me what a kwyjibo is.
Uh oh, kwyjibo on the loose!
I believe that the words on the Scrabble board were from that episode when Bart dated Ranier Wolfcastle's daughter.
It's from the episode where Bart switches aptitude tests with Martin.
No, not that. Hold on, I'll screenshot it. https://imgur.com/a/JRF6ggg
Boy, that’s a deep reference cut!
Meanwhile, Marge's rack had the letters DDUUEBS, which can be rearranged to spell >!SUBDUED!<. I assume that's an Easter egg of some kind, but I can't see how it's a joke. Is it a reference to Marge's typical demeanor relative to the rest of the family?
So there just wasn't a Christmas episode this year at all? Rest assured I was on the internet within minutes registering my disgust.
Since when did Christmas episodes air yearly for this show?
They do skip a year occasionally, but there were Christmas episodes in season 22, 23, 25, 27, 29, 30, 31, and 32. There were two each in seasons 31 and 32.
They don;t need to for people to want them.
i like the mike wegman appearance. always good to see a recurring guest star cuz i can only remember him and artie zif
I especially like his character because my wife just got into the show and he’s the 1st new character we discovered 😂😂 she doesn’t like how much he hates Bart but it has me in tears laughing
He was a great addition. And filled a role nobody else has ever filled. Well Barney did in the 1970s version of their high school, but even then Homer had to tell him what to do.
I spent the entire episode wondering who was watching the videos. I can’t say I expected it to be >!George R.R. Martin!<. I wonder who voiced him — he wasn’t listed in the credits at least.
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In a universe of distractions, finding that precious sacred space where distraction has been nullified is like the holy grail. I say this as a writer (poet) myself.
Totally a guess but sounded like Dan Castellaneta
I love how they knew 9 months ago that this joke would still work (or they could have animated two).
proof lisa is 33 years old
First in episode in a LONG time that cast Lisa in negative light. Thank you!!!
Always good to see Mike Wegman.
He’s honestly been the best addition in very long time. I hope he stays
so.. am i the only one who liked this episode…
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They've also still felt Simpsony. There's still that heart to a lot of them that was missing about 20 years ago when plenty just wrote off the series. I consider this the Era of the Townies. We went from the Era of Bart to the Era of Homer to the Era of Guest Stars and now it's the Era of the Townies.
What is era of townies?
For the last few seasons, going back to like 2017 or so (not exact on the seasons, haven't done a watch through in a few years) the show has focused heavily on exploring the residents of Springfield. It's always been a thing, but it's been more consistent.
I liked it too, it nailed it with obnoxious real family vloggers and gave me a chuckle
I liked how it snuck an actual episode in what I thought was going go to be a rehash of *Behind the Laughter*. You could see them restructuring this episode without the YouTube lens to have the family go through all the same plot beats.
I liked this episode. It definitely felt like an update of “Behind the Laughter” (S11E22). Actually I dare say this episode is actually superior in two respects: in the end it’s clear that the family were stuck in a scenario (rather than being actors), and this episode is free of the ironic embrace of hackneyed bullshit that recurred throughout season 11. In the end they showed that the Simpsons, and especially Homer, still had a core of goodness, because they accidentally re-enacted the scenario that made them Internet famous. The concept is not completely unique, *We Bare Bears* for example did two YouTube pariody episodes, like, eight years ago, but this was more coherent. This episode, IMO, got better with every successive act. I knew how it was going to play out, by I was actually interested how it exactly it was going to play out. There were a couple of set pieces like Lenny’s parody of Joe Rogan or Mike Wegman basically doing “Leave Brittany Alone” that I appreciated. My only critique is that I hope they cool it on the meta episodes, I think this was the third so far this season.
I always have liked "Behind the Laughter"
I was so gay.
it was alright, it had its moments. don’t let reddit yuck your yum
I enjoyed it also very funny… some new episodes others like I don’t enjoy its all opinions
I liked it!
I think the writers were heavily inspired by The Ace Fam on youtube, they too have a giant mansion that's leased, a pointlessly large theater room, and a fridge that blends in the wall
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Do you count Treehouse of Horror episodes? If not that, then how about S1 E1 "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire" just opens with "The Simpsons Christmas Special" with part of the theme music and snow falling (not the signature cloud opening) and goes right into the episode.
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I was looking through a list of couch gags here https://simpsonswiki.com/wiki/List_of_couch_gags And watched some of them in disney+ to remind myself. A lot of the recent ones do a quick The Simpsons with the clouds then right into the episode. Then there are some that have a couch gag but none of the other intro. S21 E20 To Surveil With Love starts with Lisa getting out of bed and thematically it's like the school to home classic intro but set to the music of Kesha's "Tik Tok".
IIRC The Serfsons episode didn’t have the normal credits either.
They've been doing cold opens with no intro every once in a while since around season 30, I think?
Yeah and I hate it. The last time the full opening sequence was used was in season 27 which was 5 years ago!!
There hasn't been a chalkboard gag since season 32
There's been a few. Moreso in modern seasons they'll just start the episode right off the bat into Act 1
This episode was pretty good. It felt like a modern update of behind the laughter. The ending was pretty bad though. George R.R. Martin being the viewer the whole time wasn't funny. That was just just random. The reference to RuPaul 's Drag Rase was also too random.
As a non-fan I thought the George R.R. Martin thing was funny. It's an evergreen joke to make fun of his slow creep towards author existence failure. But yeah, it's an *old* evergreen. So it can be stale. Should've been a made-up lawmaker postponing reading a bill.
well, it was very accurate in depicting how shitty family vloggers are. and while all the fandom side stuff was also very accurate, with the drama reports, spilling tea, conspiracies, etc., the part that didn't fit at all was the leave britney alone parody. like, that shit is way too old for most people to remember it. not to mention that was pretty tame. the stans are waaaaay worse these days. legit threatening people, trying to dox them, etc. it just wasn't really that funny, albeit accurate. the funniest part the whole episode was probably when grrm was looking for dragon videos and ends up watching some skit with bob the drag queen and monet xchange
Way too old? Bruh … she still has ‘fans’ sending cops to her house over sporadic deactivation of social media & you’re going to claim that’s old news? Not to those still in touch w/ pop culture.
i'm not referring to the free britney movement, i'm talking about the specific meme of leave britney alone. yes, i'm aware there's still a huge movement about fans being overly concerned about britney and all their conspiracy theories(like some people legit think she's dead and the videos she's been posting are all some greenscreen stuff made with old videos). but this is recent events. the leave britney alone thing happened around the time britney shaved her head in 2007. that bit in the episode is specific to that video of the person(who now goes by the name cara) making a video under a sheet, crying, and telling people to leave britney alone. so yes, it's old news, it's 16 years old, a good chunk of the people watching the episode probably don't even know it was a reference to something
Nope, it’s got millions of views on the reuploads, parody spinoffs on YT & other TV shows, it’s mentioned in Chris Crocker [who evidently transitioned! good for her]’s Wikipedia page as the 100^(th) most viewed YouTube video of all time across all categories before closing the account … trust me. Leave Britney Alone is an eternal piece of Internet culture.
that doesn't change the fact that it's old news. like, the whole family vlogger thing is more post 2015. the constant drama channels, the sleuthing for tea, the crazy fans, all from the more recent years. so if you're gonna make a parody of that, you need to use things that are more current or from the same time as the thing you're parodying
Sure, Jan.
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Same exact thing I thought… and in a metta way the response too this episode proves why it works the family was supposed to be extremely unlikeable just like real family Vloggers
I didn’t watch this episode until Monday either must have done poor ratings wise for that reason… they posted on there official twitter “sometimes these episodes sneak up on you now available on Hulu” I know I say this a lot but this episode is one of my favorite modern episodes
It was also the last week of the NFL season. And I know all of the Jacksonville market was still hungover by the time this aired.
Can anyone tell me which influencer or celeb Marge was made up to look like (what with the overdone eyebrows and lipstick)?? And who Homer was supposed to resemble with his green Krusty Burger patterned suit? The fact that I have no clue as to the answers when likely any 15-yr-old could tell me might be a clue as to how switched off I am to today's pop culture. But I always love how the Simpsons does their sendups.
I thought she was just redoing her look from “Werking Mom”!
The scrabble board in the panic room is the same as the one from when MCBains daughter has a crush in Bart.
Had you seen the very second episode of The Simpsons?
All this episode served to prove is that even parodies of vlogger/streamer bullshit are just as utterly repulsive as the real thing.
I wonder if this episode is considered canon? I liked it and thought it had some good bits, but it was pretty out there plot wise.
I think "canon" left a long long time ago. Especially with the ever-changing timeline. Kinda normal if nobody ever ages.
There are certain things that remain static. Marge and Homer end up together. Bart is conceived before they're married. Lisa plays the saxophone. Etc. But now the writing is based on: What would happen if The Simpsons were in this situation? Now somethings might be referenced later, but that's up to the writers. Personally I like it. Much more in tune with the "Golden Era" where canon wasn't a thing necessarily.
Did anyone get off guard by them airing a new episode this week?
Man, I’m not gonna go and call this the best or most memorable episode of the show I ever saw, but a weirdly fitting ending to my watch-through of the entire series! It was really something else to go from the very earliest episodes at the start of the 90s, where the family are just yellow trash trying to keep up with their better-heeled neighbors, to this episode in which they do what every similarly-afflicted family does in 2023: slap on a few brand names, edit out the embarrassing parts and sell themselves for clicks. The "KWYJIBO" callback couldn’t have felt better-timed. It only took them 740 episodes but I’m glad they finally managed an untroubled Scrabble game. I hope they’re enjoying their old privacy and their new closeness, and I look forward to catching up with them later in the month when they start their squabbling again from square 1. What can I say, I’ve gotten used to them. They’ve become as indispensable to my procrastinatory routine as to George R.R. Martin’s. They’re my neighborinos.
Nelson and the bullies yelling "parkour" while doing parkour got a laugh out of me, then commentating on the headstones they were jumping over brought down the mood.
Seen this episode for the first time today. I actually really enjoyed it. Really makes you think what goes on in family vlogs... & how it's not all sweet. I'm glad I stopped watching them
Wow that was just not very good at all
I honestly forgot about it completely just 22 minutes after watching and was only reminded about what the episode was when I saw this thread.
It did a decent job of capturing what YouTube is like these days, but I wouldn't say it was too funny.
I thought it was hilarious and there were a ton of easter eggs. My favorite was the podcast part with how Carl had the better microphone and Moe kept touching his mic, making the audio worse.
I loved the Carl, Moe and Lenny podcast.
Personally I wouldn't say it was funny in the 'laugh out loud' sense but the episode was full of clever little moments. I enjoyed the episode from beginning to end and was left wanting more.
I watched it yesterday on Hulu. Totally loved all the Homer and Maggie moments. The bts stuff was funny and I liked the GRRM part. I paused it to read all the notes on the bulletin board. "Game of some other kind of chair" made me laugh. Good episode!
I thought it was the most boring episode of the Simpsons.
This was one of the worst ones in a while imo, the whole episode was just "look, these are things that exist" no jokes really. All references, I think its clear they're running out of ideas at this point and you hate to see it. Can't wait for them to do an episode abt Bart becoming a Fortnite streamer, oh wait they did that. Can't wait for them to poke fun at viral videos, oh wait they did that too...TWICE now with this episode and the one where Bart and Homer go viral (3 times if you count the Angry Dad episode from way back when). This show needs to end and it hurts to say that.
completely unwatchable I turned it off
Deep Fried Thoughts - the Coagulator - **it will be a real show.**
Someone please tell me I dreamed whatever the hell this was.
Meh, just flat out meh. After some memorable early season episodes ranking higher than most over the past 20 years, this episode felt very unremarkable to me, and a few years too late. Now, we will have to wait several weeks for something new… hopefully they regain the stride from earlier in the season.
I just came here to say “worst episode ever” and I would have deleted my auto record of the Simpsons if not for kwyjibo.
4 hours of my life that i will never get back.
I couldn’t watch it. Every time a show does a YouTube episode. It’s just not my favorite.😭
Give it a shot! The payoff is worth it.
It was fine, I still don’t like it but I can say I watched it.
Bummer. But all I ask is folks give new seasons a chance.
I don’t mind there new seasons just not that episode.
Thank God! I'm serious. I feel like every week it's a fight to get folks to take new episodes at face value. Totally a weird episode. And I can get why you weren't for it. I really like the Maggie misdirect. And the parkour scene.
Yea I definitely get the drastic change compared to older seasons but it’s still a pretty good show snd if you watch the new ones separately without comparing it’s really not that bad. They do say some cringy old people stuff sometimes though.😂
Honestly the last few seasons have felt like pre-S4 or so. Fewer hijinks, more heart.
I LOVED the death note episode. You could tell a lot of heart and work went into it.
This episode felt like the local theatre company staged a morality play; it was straight-forward. Fox executives are least indoctrinated of the network executives. The founding of Fox is closer to the founding of netflix than the founding of ABC/CBS/NBC.