[QUOTE=mobo85]
Sherri and Terri? They weren’t even in this episode- the kids at the laser tag hall were just generic children, and most of this episode took place at a college. And Roger is from American Dad.
[/QUOTE]
You’re right, I said Family Guy by accident and I got my Simpsons episodes all mixed up, there were two on tonight.
So, Never mind.
Homer to his dad: “That’s none of your business! Now, will you hire me for your business?”
I liked it. Not the best ever, but I liked it.
Lots of moments that made me smile. Cutie-pus and Professor Moose made me laugh a little. “It was insulin” made me laugh loudly. So not a bad episode.
Didn’t one of Homer’s flashbacks years ago start something like “It was the 80s, or the 90s, or maybe the 70s…”? They’ve played fast and loose with chronology for a long time.
I thought “Margerine” was pretty funny.
[QUOTE=Marley23]
I wanted them to reveal at the end that the gas man was actually Professor August.
[/QUOTE]
I actually thought they were going to do that, too. I don’t know what it would have accomplished, but I just thought it would have made sense for it to happen, for some reason.
[QUOTE=pepperlandgirl]
A hearty fuck-you to the fans? I think somebody is taking The Simpsons a little too personally.
I liked the episode a lot. But what do I know? I’m only 25, and I’m foolish and young enough to enjoy the 90s references.
[/QUOTE]
Maybe you’re right- its just that I’ve gotten some of my biggest TV laughs ever from the show, and they owe me to continue doing so 
And I didn’t mean anything negative about you youngun’s- if the show had always been this type humor It’d be one thing- I just don’t like how a show can at some point change its basic humor- like if one season Fraiser turned into Three Stooges type slapstick- still could be funny, just an entirely type show. I think they should have created a different show if they wanted to change the basic type of humor.
Marley23, we obviously don’t see eye to eye on the show, and that’s ok, so I won’t rebut your post except to say Homer graduating in 73/74, while off from day one, hasn’t been changed until now. I do wonder what classic early season writers think of this type thing though.
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn]
…I do wonder what classic early season writers think of this type thing though.
[/QUOTE]
They probably angrily shake their walkers and canes at the TV screen in the rec room of the Old TV Cartoonists’ Rest Home and Sanitarium.
Two things:
One of the few memorable jokes in this episode was Homer’s “Futurama” reference
“And cartoonist Matt Groening started a little show called Futurama”
the Weird Al part was nice, but overall a rather craptacular episode, that does nothing to embiggen the show, cromulent it sure wasn’t
it’s not the Worst…Episode…Ever… but it’s certainly a low rater, c’mon, a Kurt Cobain/Nirvana/Grundge Rock episode, what is this, Family Guy (and I LIKE Family Guy…)
this episode rates a solid “MEH!” from me
I liked this episode. And with characters that have been around for as long as the Simpsons, you can’t really give a crap about continuity.
That would be like a “Smallville” fan being enraged that Clark Kent is a teenager in the first decade of the 21st century. If you held that strictly to continuity, that show should be taking place in 1928. 
[QUOTE=MacTech]
“And cartoonist Matt Groening started a little show called Futurama”
[/QUOTE]
Struggling cartoonist Matt Groening. Which made the joke even nore pathetic. Har har, let’s put in a reference to our own creator like we exist separately from him, won’t that be funny. Well no, actually, it won’t be funny.
I actually thought it was fantastic, anomalously so among these later episodes (not that they’re bad; they’re just generally not that impressive either). Do I have to forfeit my Simpsons cred or something?
[QUOTE=Otto]
Struggling cartoonist Matt Groening. Which made the joke even nore pathetic. Har har, let’s put in a reference to our own creator like we exist separately from him, won’t that be funny. Well no, actually, it won’t be funny.
[/QUOTE]
They’ve actually joked about that before: Groening appeared in one episode as the creator of Futurama at a comic book convention. The real Groening commented, “If I were to appear as the creator of The Simpsons, the universe would explode.”
Wasn’t the greatest episode ever, but plenty of entertaining moments. I don’t understand why so many people got so worked up.
“Lenny”
“Karl”
“Lou-the-Cop”
I haven’t been following the Simpsons very closely since the late 90s, but I did get a bit of a chuckle from this episode. It seemed a lot better than anything I saw in the early-mid-2000s, as in, I actually found myself laughing several times. Honestly, it’s the best episode I’ve seen in a long, long time.
I’ll pile on as another long-time fan that loved this episode. I had lots of laugh-out-loud (or"LOL" as those crazy kids these days call it) moments, and I’m an old fart in my mid-50s. I didn’t delete it from the DVR, and that’s rare for a Simpsons.
Funny trend here.
I actually still like the show a lot, but I thought that was a terrible episode.
I liked the gas man. “just fix the gas, monkey”.
Simpsons time/age continuity was off from the start. Homer has always been in his late 30s, and Bart is 10, so he should have been born during Homer’s late 20s. But Homer knocked Marge up right out of high school. (Jon Stewart tried to press Matt Groening on this on TDS, but he wouldn’t take the bait.)
As a Simpsons fan from the start and a grunge survivor, I thought this was the best episode in a long time.
I liked it, I think it helped that I got married in the early 90’s and it reminded me of my wife and I.
[QUOTE=cochrane]
And with characters that have been around for as long as the Simpsons, you can’t really give a crap about continuity.
That would be like a “Smallville” fan being enraged that Clark Kent is a teenager in the first decade of the 21st century.
[/QUOTE]
I was thinking about this last night. “The Simpsons” could adopt the DC/Marvel approach of pretending that all previous episodes took place in alternate universes, creating multiple conflicting continuities, then have some sort of huge, cataclysmic event, let’s call it a “crisis,” that establishes a single continuity at the cost of destroying most of these other worlds, wiping out our favorite episodes and erasing some longtime established characters from existence. I’m sure that would make the fans happy.