I don’t deny that there’s been a drop in quality, originality, and freshness since the early seasons. How could there not be after what, 27 seasons? And I do respect a show (actor, sports star, politician, artist, writer, etc. etc.) that retires at the top of their game. But at what point should the Simpsons have gone out on? There will be a lot of different opinions on that.
But! I believe that there’s a lot of satirical comedy goodness to be mined from the show even to the present day. As a case in point, I submit for your consideration an episode from just a few seasons ago, “A Totally Fun Thing That Bart Will Never Do Again”: in which the Simpsons get a super-duper cabin upgrade on a cruise ship, and everyone is enjoying themselves so much that Bart fakes a global pandemic on land to try to extend the fun. It has a bit of everything: great Homer quotes (“Boy, thanks to you, we’re having fun…before you were born fun”). A nice musical number, apocalyptic scenarios played for laughs…good stuff. I think that episode holds up very well against “classic” era episodes.
And I know many will disagree, but I’ve actually found fascinating the evolution of the Homer character from a satirized version of an ordanary, dysfunctional, grumpy, Walter Matthau sound-alike dad to a literally cartoonish, almost metaphorical depiction of pure, raging Id.
So let me have it- anybody agree? Violently disagree? Let me go ahead and pre-emptively get this out of the way “Worst. Post. Ever.” Beat ya to it! HA-ha!
I was in high school when the Simpsons started. Growing up in the 80s, when cable was a wasteland compared to what it is today, I hated nearly everything that was on TV. My happiest TV memories growing up are of Monty Python’s Flying Circus on PBS. So to find something as clever and subversive (not to mention consistently hilarious) as The Simpsons in prime time was almost miraculous. It made everything else on the dial look dumbed-down and formulaic. Consequently, as the show became dumber, coarser, more repetitive, more shrill — in other words, more like the stuff it was originally making fun of — I and a lot of others of my cohort took it hard. We don’t want to sit around endlessly comparing the later episodes to the early ones, but it’s a hard instinct to shut off.
I don’t deny that they can still pull out a near-classic episode or two every season. And seeing the repeats on FXX reveals that some of the latter-day Simpsons episodes seem better on re-watch — not many, but some. But the show just isn’t consistently very funny anymore, the characters are flatter and not as endearing (which makes the poorer-written episodes harder to sit through), and the satiric style the show pioneered has been taken up and elaborated on by innumerable other programs, and at the end of the day, I’d usually rather watch one of them. Saying “What do you expect after nearly 30 years?” or “It’s better than a lot of other stuff on TV!” is just excuse-making.
“Better than anything else on” is a poor excuse in this age anyway. For one thing, there probably is something better on. For another, I have access to a bajillion shows spanning the history of television these days. Hell, I can watch old Simpsons if I want “something else better” on.
The series doesn’t have to end just because it’s not as good as it once was. If that was going to be done then it should have been done a long time ago. It still gets ratings, it still makes money, let it be.
At least part of the problem on my part is that I have dropped in and out of TV watching periodically throughout my life. I remember when the Simpsons first showed up, I thought it was cute, but not really worth the trouble. Later on, though, as it found its feet, it got to be rather good, and continued to improve.
…and then I quit watching TV for a while. I came back, the Simpsons had kind of crystallized. It didn’t seem as good as it had when I’d first started. It was still cute, though, and the Halloween episodes were consistently wonderful.
…and then I quit watching TV for a while. When I came back, the Simpsons really seemed to be running on automatic. It wasn’t funny. It was going through the motions. It was comedy as assembled on a line by a committee. They weren’t The Simpsons any more, they were simply pumping out episodes for paychecks and future syndication packages.
This isn’t to say there are never good episodes any more; sometimes, they surprise me. But I don’t watch the show much any more, and never if anything better is on. The show’s been going for going on thirty years, and I’m not the same guy I was back then, or twenty years ago, or even ten years ago. Tastes change, just like times do. And the Simpsons just ain’t there with me any more.
Yeah, I’ve been trying to keep this in mind when judging recent (and by “recent” I mean in the last ten years) Simpsons episodes, but they just don’t seem to have the same sort of humor and writing anymore. Another series, South Park, which has been around for a good long time, still makes me laugh as much (or nearly so) as when it first came on in the late 90s. To me, it doesn’t seem much has changed in the character of the writing and the humor in the show, whereas for the Simpsons, it really does seem to have. I’d say somewhere around Season 9 is where it started being more hit-and-miss to me, although I did enjoy it up until Season 12 or so. Now, I don’t bother even DVRing it, while South Park, I’ll still look forward to and catch when I can.
The show has had ups and downs since the beginning. There was indeed a period where there were more downs than ups for a few seasons but I think they righted that ship. What I do appreciate is they seem more willing to try weird things the last few years.
I agree, South Park has aged well. Maybe it’s been more consistently better over the years than the Simpsons because so many writers have come and gone on the Simpsons, while Parker and Stone have (I think) maintained close creative control the entire time,
I was 28 years old when The Simpsons began (a perfect age to enjoy all the things they spoof, IMO) and had been a fan of Groening’s “Life In Hell” for years.I continue to watch the show every week. Yes, it’s best days may be behind it, but there always seems to be something new and funny in every show.
Perfect example, in 2011, their 22nd season they aired the episode “Angry Dad”. In it ran some HILARIOUS spoofs of PIXAR (a Toy Story like feature called “Condiments”, Wallace & Gromit, Triplets of Belleville and Persepolis. It was brilliant!
I believe there are those who stopped watching it over a decade ago and don’t like where it’s gone. Fine, I can understand that. And there are a vocal bunch on the internet who profess that they NEVER watch the show anymore (but yet if they never watch the show, how can they say it’s so bad?)
IMO there are three things that populate most if not all of the internet.
• Cat videos
• Porn
• People who emphatically state that the Simpsons have sucked for years.
It is clear that some modern episodes are simply not funny and cringeworthy. But there still are some good ones. People who insist that it “hasn’t been good since season 10” probably don’t even watch the old ones anymore and don’t know what they’re talking about. I stopped watching new episodes because I can’t get Fox, but some of my favorite quotes are post-S10.
On the other hand, some episodes in particularly the first two seasons have not aged well. I think they really hit their stride in season 8 or so. That’s after I’ve seen some people claim “it started to suck.”
IMHO South Park has always had its ups and downs and there are still good and bad episodes.
“Scott Tenorman Must Die” was in 2001!? Wow, that ages me.
Nitpick: “Angry Dad: The Movie.” The Angry Dad character was first introduced in S13/2002.
The problem for me, though, is that I only tune in to two or three episodes each season, so perhaps there’s some really good stuff in the last ten years, but the couple of episodes I’ve caught each season have stopped me from wanting to watch more. So I admit that I don’t have the fairest opinion in the sense that I’ve actually watched every episode in every season.
Because taste aside, season 10 was a long time ago and I think they mean something more recent anyway. For example, Season 11 has tons of classic episodes (IMHO) and inspired a major meme.
Well, I’m not necessarily going to disagree there. For me, as I said above, there’s stuff I like up to about season 12 or perhaps even 13. That said, I’m somewhat embarrassed to say that I’m unfamiliar with that meme, but that was a decent episode.
If a show is garbage then no, people aren’t going to be watching it, why on earth would they?
The idea that somebody needs to have watched every new episode before they can offer an opinion on the Simpsons doesn’t hold water, its like saying you can’t think the X Factor is manufactured crud unless you have seen every episode, or you can’t call porn videos cheap unless you have seen every porno ever made.
The Simpsons got crap and so people stopped watching it, thats what happens when shows get crap.
