I must agree with Exapno Mapcase.
I rarely walk out of an episode, I made an exception tonight. This is the third time I saw the beginning, have yet to see it through. Probably has to rate as one of the all-time worst.
If the entire Saddlesore Galactica episode was as craptacular as the 3rd act, it would win, but I actually chuckled a few times during the first two acts. (“Excuse me, but I believe this family already had a horse, the expense of which forced Homer to work at the Kwik-E-Mart, with hilarious consequences.”)
Take the Alligator and Run has the singular honor of not making me laugh one single time. It wins. (For me).
Excuse me, but I believe it was called Stop the Planet of Apes, I Want to Get Off. Thank you.
The last great episode they had was the one with Hank Scorpio.
This past season was an improvement, if only because of the episode where Krusty gets elected to Congress and the hilarious FOXNews-parody-bottomline-scrawl appears.
Season 11 is the deepest pit in TV hell.
The Mel Gibson episode sucked so hard it enraged me.
People keep saying: “It might not be as good as it was in it’s prime, but it’s still better than anything else on TV!”
Most people I know would strongly disagree with that. I can always catch something better on TV than what the Simpsons have become.
For those who say: “Well, if you hate it so much, why not turn the channel.”
I have, but I suspect there are a lot of people out there that want to catch a good episode. It’s hard to let go of something that was so funny to us in the past. I watched an episode a while ago where Lisa was mistaken for an older student in college, and I laughed a lot, but I don’t even watch for the occasional “decent” episodes anymore.
I don’t think the problem is that they are running out of story ideas. Hell, the only thing I watch almost religiously on TV these days are old Simpsons reruns. I laugh just as hard as I did the first time. If anything, I miss the old humor (and style, including the episodes that have heart). I want it to be more of the same. The writers could have stuck with some of the same ideas as they have been the last few years, and produce something FUNNY from them, but they didn’t. In fact, most of their idea’s don’t really even get fleshed out, because at the end, they cut to FOX looking for donations (like PBS), or the whole town going surfing, or horse jockey’s start singing.
Now granted, those aren’t GREAT examples of story idea’s that could be funny, if written better. I DO think the idea of Homer teaching religion could be a funny idea. I think the Simpsons being on a reality TV prank show could be funny. I even think that Bart getting another horse and racing it could be funny if done right.
Ian Maxtone-Graham is an evil King Midas. Everything he touches turns to crap. Okay, he did some good episodes (which is an achievement for a man who didn’t even watch the show before he was hired to write for it). Larry Burns, Trillion-Dollar Bill, New York, Lisa Cheats. But the rest…ew. Sanitation Engineer Race. Tomacco. Death of Maude. Tennis the Menace. Homer Remembers Finding Corpse of Man Who Turns Out To Be Smithers’ Father. Marge’s Breast Implants. And his latest craptacular, Dude, Where’s My Ranch?, featuring Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Sean Astin in what may be the worst guest appearance since Dr. Joyce Brothers*, saying a line he’s already said many times before. The only good thing about that one was the “Everybody Hates Ned Flanders” song that was nominated for an Emmy…and lost.
[sub]Brothers: Total of five words. “I brought my own mike!”
Astin: Two words. “My Precious…”
I should point out the plot of Dude, Where’s My Ranch? doesn’t even sound like a Simpsons plot.
Synopsis: Fed up with hearing a song he wrote over and over, Homer moves with the family to a dude ranch. While there, Lisa falls in love with one of the regulars. Meanwhile, Homer and Bart help a friendly Indian tribe with their beaver problem.
Shouldn’t this thread really be called “Worst. Episode. Ever.”?
I do have to give props to my favorite ep ever the Mr. Sparkle/Listen Lady.
Some of the greatest lines ever and the single best video for japanese soap I’ve ever seen.
see my signature…
I have a Mr Sparkle T-shirt!
I think that any episode where the show’s dynamic is greatly changed (death of Maude, Principal Skinner is a fraud) is an automatic crap episode. Bleeding Gums doesn’t count, as he wasn’t a regular (although I admit it’s been a while since I saw that episode).
Definitely the one where Moe goes to college and gets a new bar. It made no sense and had like 5 different plots and was just…bad.
I also really hate the Treehouse of Horror episode with the Simpsons in fairy tale land. The whole episode was unnecessarily cruel and sadistic, it’s painful to watch.
I really hate the NSYNC episode. Mainly because I hate NSYNC, and I thought the matrix joke wasn’t funny, mainly because that joke had been overused in other places. I’m probably going to get hell for this, but I kinda like the first season.
But did the dynamic change at all in that latter episode? Didn’t the judge threaten a death sentence to anyone who ever brought it up again, as a parody of TV character changes that are quickly forgotten? And I don’t watch the show regularly, but I thought that particular plot point was, true to its word, never mentioned again…
The thing that ALWAYS bothered me about the Tomacco episode is that in the episode where Homer and Grandpa go into business selling their liquid viagra THEY BURN DOWN THE VERY HOUSE SEEN, USED AND DESTROYED AGAIN IN THE TOMACCO EPISODE.
The ONLY episode I ever turn off is the one with…Kim Bassinger, I think that was her name, and I think a Baldwin. I’ve only seen it once, and I will never watch it again.
Any episode where some big-shot hollywood star plays him/herself is almost guarenteed to suck. The Mel Gibson episode and the Basinger/Baldwin episode come to mind.
The N-suck episode was pretty lame too, mostly because it had N-suck in it. Instead of giving Boy bands the lambasting they richly deserve, they had a bizarre plot about the navy that was more wierd than funny.
CaptainQwark I’m actually with you on the first season. lost in the forest and Bart the Daredevil are two of my favorites and the first Sideshow Bob is pretty funny too
Yes! Yes! Yes! And for the exact reasons you gave. I lost some respect for the show just for having NSync make an appearance. And the “Join the Navy” bit was stupid.
As an aside: When Mr. Bunny and I were watching a rerun of that episode not too long ago (he liked it), there’s the point in the show where Lisa realizes the song is just an ad for the Navy. As soon as she says it, they go to commercial. First commercial we saw? An ad for the Navy! I think we laughed all the way through the commercials when we saw that. It made the episode more palatable anyway.
I also agree with Saddlesore Gallactica, but I hated the one where Lisa became a buddist. :insert puke smiley here:
I’m going with N*Synch and Kim & Alec.
I love the Bleeding Gums episodes. They had to kill him off cause Ron Taylor was dying of cancer.
The tomaco episode won the best subtle sign award.
Hijack: On Tuesday the episode shown had “Springfield Squares” on it, with Charley Weaver, Barry White, and Troy McLure. Then the real “Hollywood Squares” came on, with John Ritter (taped right before his death, with a nice lead-in by Henry Winkler). It was spooky.