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What Episode made you stop watcing the Simpsons

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IISANDERII said:
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Was sort of gradual but this was the beginning of the end. Actually not that bad an episode but the magic was definitely gone by this time.
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You've got to be joking me. I...just....seriously? Come on now, this is even worse than the guy that said The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie show.
 
Gradually stopped watching as well when more stuff began airing on Sundays. I tried to get back into it after they went "HD" but the first episode I saw was an "apple" products parody. I made it 5 mins into it before changing the channel.

All these direct to real world parody's or guest stars killed it. It was funny when they were insinuating or being subtle but meh, to much attempt to be timely with the episodes killed my interest completely.
 
Valkerionseven said:
All these direct to real world parody's or guest stars killed it. It was funny when they were insinuating or being subtle but meh, to much attempt to be timely with the episodes killed my interest completely.
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That was it. Not only were the real world parodies a shameless lack of creativity, they were usually a couple of years late to the subject. Like parents who learn about memes long after their kids are bored of them.

Old Simpsons would craft actual stories, and weave references into them in a way that you didn't even have to "get" the reference for it to work.
 
The last two I remember clearly were:

- Sideshow Bob comes back somehow and now has a shitty evil family, and then the show has no real ending like many of the newer episodes.
- A bunch of Olympic athletes just go through the whole episode doing weird/stupid shit while saying pointless lines at each other.

There's an earlier episode in the Simpsons where they make fun of shitty TV and then Homer starts thumping the TV going "stupid TV. Be more funny!" When I realized the Simpsons itself has BECOME exactly the type of show they were making fun of in that episode, I knew it was time to stop.
 
I'm going to keep watching until the day it dies because fuck it.

But the episode that made me realize that the show was transforming into a different beast was:

Behind_the_Laughter_(043).jpg
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Every ounce of humor, writing, and style for what the Simpsons was about to become is present in this episode. It's sickening. It opened up the "cynical years" of about 5 to 6 seasons of the worst aspects of every character. I'd say recent seasons have plateaued into a tolerable middle ground, but no where near the glory days.

Runner ups include:

When You Dish Upon a star.
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Helter Shelter
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How I spent my Strummer vacation
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Saddlesore Galactica
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I know these range from all over seasons 10-14, but hey I was 12 at the time. These are the general sore thumb episodes that stuck out to me without necessarily knowing the episode orders.
 
KenzinFive said:
The City of New York vs Homer Simpson gave us crab juice, khalkhalash, and "Mom, are those rabbits dead?!" "No, no honey! They're just sleeping....upside down...and inside out." It's also weirdly poignant since the plot largely involves the World Trade Center. I saw it before 9/11 and it's weird knowing that lines I remember are now cut out in syndication.
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Never thought about that. I guess the "they stick all the jerks in Tower One" line would be a little weird now.
 
there's an old Simpsons clip I cannot, for the life of me, find at this moment... it was Bart and Homer sitting in front of the TV watching an old show (? can't remember) still on the air and saying it would be sad to remain so long on TV still doing the same thing.

I found that video oddly prescient. Anyone knows which video I'm talking about? I don't think it was part of an episode, it must've been a commercial or something like that.
 
Altazor said:
Curiously on-topic, here is The Verge's take on the moment The Simpsons "jumped the shark" spoiler alert
it's about Homer's Enemy but paints it in a very good light nevertheless

I somewhat agree with the point but as I said on my previous post here, I don't like that episode that much.
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Great article.

Before Frank Grimes, Homer is a hapless father with a good heart. After Frank Grimes, he's a caricature of a moron. Before the episode, Springfield treats Homer like another working-class schmuck, surprised by his good fortune. Afterward, he fluctuates between deranged villain, accidental hero and most often walking punchline.
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That expresses pretty much exactly how I've always felt about that show and that episode.
 
Sullichin said:
Do we know if this episode is cut/modified for this marathon?
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Pretty sure it's the syndicated versions, which would be cut. I always thought this shot in that episode was a little eerie as well.

EDIT: Actually just read that it's the full versions for this marathon and it will be syndicated from now on. No idea if they kept the censorship on this one, though.

lisa2.jpg
 
Septimus Prime said:
Episode 300, with Tony Hawk.

"I just don't know how many times your father has done this?"
"It's 300, mom."

Such a piece of shit joke.
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Lol! That's literally where I stopped watching regularly as well. But I've seen a few newer episodes randomly, and some of them are pretty good. It's definitely hit or miss these days, but it's not pure trash as many say.

Salmonax said:
Pretty sure it's the syndicated versions, which would be cut. I always thought this shot in that episode was a little eerie as well.

EDIT: Actually just read that it's the full versions for this marathon and it will be syndicated from now on. No idea if they kept the censorship on this one, though.

lisa2.jpg
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Illuminati confirmed. Isn't Matt Groening a Freemason? :readjusts tinfoil hat:
 
Kano on the Phone said:
Great article.



That expresses pretty much exactly how I've always felt about that show and that episode.
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yes, of course, that's the main thing I take from that article and it mirrors my own thoughts. I don't think it was a conscious decision from the writers, but after that point (or, let's say, after the 8th season) Homer slowly transitioned from a guy that was stuck on a terrible job with a terrible boss and nondescript coworkers, to a guy that began getting crazy jobs every other week, a minor celebrity in its own right and the cause of Springfield's many woes.

Homer stopped being a spoof about average joes and deadbeat dads and started being "hehe, he's funny 'cause he's doing dumb stuff".
 
The episode that changed me from "eh, it's not as good, but it's still ok" to "I'm done" was the Equalia episode.

I'd really say though that as soon as family guy became popular, Simpsons started going. And I say this as someone who really doesn't like family guy.

I remember a scene with the monopoly guy. I don't remember what episode, but it was completely pointless. I see that stupid joke as the point when the Simpsons went from a funny show about a dysfunctional family to just a show about wackiness.

Edit: Google tells me it was the episode in season 10 when they go to japan.
 
Like a lot of people it's hard for me to pinpoint when as it sorta petered out pretty rapidly at one point. One of my last memories though was watching that episode where they went to Africa and being both annoyed and even confused with how insanely bad everything about it was.
 
Altazor said:
there's an old Simpsons clip I cannot, for the life of me, find at this moment... it was Bart and Homer sitting in front of the TV watching an old show (? can't remember) still on the air and saying it would be sad to remain so long on TV still doing the same thing.

I found that video oddly prescient. Anyone knows which video I'm talking about? I don't think it was part of an episode, it must've been a commercial or something like that.
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replying myself:

Finally "found" the video. It's not on youtube anymore - and it was about Bart and Homer discussing the end of THE COSBY SHOW.

In a special clip aired on the occasion of The Cosby Show leaving the air, Bart says "Dad, why are they taking the Cosby Show off the air", to which Homer replies "because Mr. Cosby wanted to stop before the quality suffered". Bart responds "quality, shmality, if I had a TV show I'd run that sucker into the ground", and Homer says "amen boy, amen".

The Simpsons, at their peak, were so fucking good... they actually predicted their own downfall.
 
It's weird, thinking about The Simpsons.

It's like, in my mind, the show ended well over a decade ago. It doesn't exist anymore. But then I see promos for it on TV.

It's a sort of cognitive dissonance.
 
Somewhere in season 13, no specific episode, but all the Celebrity Guest Stars for the sake of having Celebrity Guest Stars just killed it for me.
 
I dont think a single episode is what pushed most fans away, it was more a range of episodes and the general tone that in time outright showed you this is no longer the show you once loved.

Really episodes stick out in our minds, tennis episode, horse racing, Tamzarian episode etc, but its really the combination of them and more that did it
 
Classic Simpsons has so many laughs, that one day I intend to sit and create some kind of "laughs per minute" measurement to find out which episodes are truly the funniest. When the episodes fell to maybe one or two good laughs per episode, it was time to quit.

I'm not a musical fan, so the first Simpsons episode I remember not liking was the Mary Poppins episode. Looking back now, it's a good episode but at the time it rubbed me the wrong way. It was really the first episode of the Simpsons I hadn't enjoyed,

I realised it wasn't coming back with the Saddlesore Galactica episode. Thoroughly insulting, random retread with a stupid plot that takes a stupid twist. This is the first episode of the Simpsons to register 0 laughs with me.

I went in to the movie expecting to hate it, but I thought it was really good and laughed most of the way through. But I never went back to watching the show regularly. Thinking about it now, there are probably more episodes of the Simpsons I haven't seen, than I have. When it's finished I'll buy the full run on whatever medium we're using in the year 2108.
 
I think I stopped watching when I realized that Homer hurting himself badly became the go to joke. They used to have so many quotable moments. It may also be that I'm getting old.
that's not it
 
Around season 11 or 12 was when I stopped watching it regularly as a kid. The last one I remember watching at that time was the one where Krusty meets his daughter, and after that I just lost track of the series.

I saw newer ones later on but the good moments were few and far between.

edit: Someone mentioned the Carmen Electra one, yeah I remember seeing that later on and it was bad, and I say this as someone who didn't think the Real Skinner episode was that bad.
 
I think the rot set in during Season 9. Watched until Season 11 or 12... watched an episode around Season 17 or so and it was rock bottom.

jstripes said:
It's weird, thinking about The Simpsons.

It's like, in my mind, the show ended well over a decade ago. It doesn't exist anymore. But then I see promos for it on TV.

It's a sort of cognitive dissonance.
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I can get behind this. The Simpsons has become the kind of thing it used to make fun of during its peak.
 
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Don't you love it when a character dies and yet somehow due to cheap writing, it is almost like he never died in the first place?

edit: oh yeah in case you are wondering, Fat Tony did die.
 
I distinctly remember sitting down to watch a new episode, seeing that the opening was a lip-synching of Ke$ha, and immediately turning off the TV.

Haven't watched a new episode since.

I don't even dislike Ke$ha.
 
Altazor said:
Fat Tony died? Like "Bleeding Gums" Murphy died?
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yep. his cousin called Fit Tony over here comes over to lead the mob. due to stress of leading the mafia, he gains weight and eventually becomes Fit-Fat Tony before he is just called Fat Tony. Fit-fat Tony happens to look, sound, and act exactly like Fat tony.

This basically makes Fat Tony's death completely pointless.

http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Donnie_Fatso

it would be like Maude Flanders dying and then Ned hooking up with a chick who sounds, looks, and acts exactly like Maude and then marries her.
 
I guess the closest to a specific episode is when Tony Hawk guest-starred. Everything after that has been a blur despite catching like three episodes within five years of each other.

And while I admit I've seen very few episodes over the last years, watching the marathon which is on season three now I think, it's just nice to see narrative and sentiment on the show instead of smothering guest stars and rapid gags.
 
Kart94 said:
yep. his cousin called Fit Tony over here comes over to lead the mob. due to stress of leading the mafia, he gains weight and eventually becomes Fit-Fat Tony before he is just called Fat Tony. Fit-fat Tony happens to look, sound, and act exactly like Fat tony.

This basically makes Fat Tony's death completely pointless.

http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/Donnie_Fatso

it would be like Maude Flanders dying and then Ned hooking up with a chick who sounds, looks, and acts exactly like Maude and then marries her.
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WTF, that's worse than when they said Dr. Marvin Monroe wasn't dead, just "very ill" or when they revealed Frank Grimes had a son that looked and sounded just like him.
 
Oh yeah. After Phil Hartman died, they started to replace his characters with unbearably unfunny Gil. I don't know what episode, exactly, where that happened, but damn did that drop the show's quality fast.

To be fair, though, Family Guy and Futurama also suffered equally bad drop-offs in terms of quality. They ended up being terrible around last year, with The Simpsons ended up being the funniest of the three, somehow.
 
Vampirolol said:
The movie.
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I liked the movie the first time I watched it. I thought it had a healthy dose of drama that was apparently missing from the "zanier" Simpsons even though it was the typical "Homer drives Marge away by being an idiot" plot... the videotape scene was great, I think - because you cared about these characters, or at least, the memory and legacy of these characters and what they used to represent.

When I watched it a second time, I was boooooored. Too many ridiculous parts, Albert Brooks was wasted at the villain (should've been Hank Scorpio, dammit), jokes weren't funny and so on.

I'd say it's a mixed bag at best.
 
Of course, I despise The Principal and The Pauper, but it was Saddlesore Galactica that made me stop watching for a while. The episodes before that were so boring, I kept falling asleep while watching them. I also hated that every episode now had an unnecessary and unfunny musical number in them. After watching Saddlesore Galactica, I was so enraged that I stopped watching.

I am watching The Simpsons again. The episodes aren't as great as the classic episodes, but they are still enjoyable. One of my favorite current episodes is the Cheech and Chong episode with the Fritz The Cat homage.
 
mattiewheels said:
To be really honest with myself, I remember a weird sensation after watching both episodes of Who Shot Mr Burns, as they aired, that the show was really starting to change. Obviously those episodes were good compared to what it became, but I also realize that I stopped watching regularly after that, so I guess I subconsciously checked out at that point.
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IISANDERII said:
gallery_Napoleon_Dynamite_1.jpg


Was sort of gradual but this was the beginning of the end. Actually not that bad an episode but the magic was definitely gone by this time.
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While I still think seasons five to eight are classic, the show's tone did change fairly dramatically when compared to the early seasons. 1-3, maybe 4 are more like story driven and grounded - you could call them dramedies - while after 4 the plots get more outlandish and episodes more out and out joke driven. It worked as long as the jokes were good, but it all fell apart around season 9. I enjoyed the show up until about season 12 or 13 when I was younger, but now I just cringe. I've caught a few season 20 something re runs on TV and a few of them have been surprisingly okay. They haven't been particularly funny, but their plots have been at least a little bit grounded and coherent. I hate the fucking montage plus popular song thing they seem to do in every single episode though.
 
I quit watching when they retconned how Homer and Marge met in the 90's during the grunge phase vs the 70's. Really fucking stupid.
 
none because The show did have a lein in quality but it's always had quality episodes during each season and the newer seasons have fairly consistent quality.
 
ok, so because i am just too curious for my own good, i saw Kill the Alligator and Run.

I do not get it at all. How does it morph to "Homer is afraid he will be dead in 3 years and they are visiting Florida to calm him down" to "SPRING BREAK! YAYY FOR KID ROCK" and whoever that kid is, to them hitting the alligator and running from the cops. It is just a jumbled mess.

*ok, who is that kid with Kid Rock anyway?*
 
acrid said:
I quit watching when they retconned how Homer and Marge met in the 90's during the grunge phase vs the 70's. Really fucking stupid.
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....What?

Tell me this is a fucking joke.

It basically erases Homer's entire childhood and flashback episodes of his mom younger and him as a happy go lucky hippy child running around naked in the fields. That episode was so fucking sad and brilliant.

BRILLIANT. ARGH!
 
It was the 2nd episode that's set in the future where Lisa is the president. Just an incredibly unfunny episode with only 1 joke that worked.

Either that or sometime around Season 14 or 15. I can't pinpoint it.
 
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