The Simpsons season finale- 400th episode!
August 10th 2007 03:03
The Simpsons, Season 18 finale Episode 400 ‘You Kent Always Get What You Want’
The Simpsons has always been at its very best when it takes popular scapegoats under the knife. In the past, it has taken on charlatan religious cults; celebrity psychologists whose actual qualifications are questionable; and giant, faceless corporations (let’s come up with a new national holiday. We had great results last year with Christmas II!), all to excellent comic effect.
This milestone event, marking The Simpsons 400th production for television, just happens to also be their most politically-charged satire in years. Kent Brockman (voiced by Spinal Tap cult legend Harry Shearer) loses his news anchor job because of a faux pas in which he utters an obscene (and unintelligible, due to the PG rating) curse word on air. It turns out that nobody was actually watching the offending broadcast, so Brockman assumes his journalistic career is safe. Well, you know what assumption is the mother of. He didn’t count on radical Christian media watchdog groups scrutinising the airwaves 24/7 to find things to complain about, did he? Ned Flanders, one of the ringleaders of these groups, has two piles of videocassettes in his living room. The naughty pile is gargantuan, the nice counterpart consists of only two tapes! Chancing upon Brockman’s televised egregious error, an appalled Flanders (also voiced by Harry Shearer) is registering his disgust on an Internet chat forum within moments.
Brockman subsequently joins a long and distinguished list of down-and-out Springfield residents who’ve crashed at the Simpson’s abode (they astutely reference this proud tradition of theirs, with a Wall of Fame displaying photos of their previous jobless house guests, including Krusty the Klown, Otto the heavy metal obsessed schoolbus driver, and Apu, who Homer is quick to point out ‘sang a song for them’)
During the course of this most subversive half hour of animation, the writers fire at, and score direct hits upon multiple marks. Rednecks, Republican politicians (with, of course, the very Ah-nuld-like Rainer Wolfcastle attending their top-secret Republican meeting), the above-mentioned Christian alarmist groups, reality TV, conservative news media, and notably the Fox network are the quarry, and no quarter is given to any of them. All are delicately skewered and par-boiled to crisp perfection. In a delightful end-of-episode exchange, Homer goes to tell Lisa the biggest, most salacious secret Brockman revealed to him, apropos the Fox corporation. Their voices are deleted, and instead we hear a robotic male tone articulate that Fox is responsible for producing many hours of quality, intellectually-stimulating programming, such as American Idol, and the American Idol results show. It is fitting that in its 400th instalment, The Simpsons is still maintaining its reputation as one of America’s prime exponents of social commentary. The real-life dramas and human emotions of the golden years may not ever return, but as long as the show casts a critical eye over relevant topical issues, we’ll be OK. Guest-stars popular hip hop artist Ludacris.
The Simpsons has always been at its very best when it takes popular scapegoats under the knife. In the past, it has taken on charlatan religious cults; celebrity psychologists whose actual qualifications are questionable; and giant, faceless corporations (let’s come up with a new national holiday. We had great results last year with Christmas II!), all to excellent comic effect.
This milestone event, marking The Simpsons 400th production for television, just happens to also be their most politically-charged satire in years. Kent Brockman (voiced by Spinal Tap cult legend Harry Shearer) loses his news anchor job because of a faux pas in which he utters an obscene (and unintelligible, due to the PG rating) curse word on air. It turns out that nobody was actually watching the offending broadcast, so Brockman assumes his journalistic career is safe. Well, you know what assumption is the mother of. He didn’t count on radical Christian media watchdog groups scrutinising the airwaves 24/7 to find things to complain about, did he? Ned Flanders, one of the ringleaders of these groups, has two piles of videocassettes in his living room. The naughty pile is gargantuan, the nice counterpart consists of only two tapes! Chancing upon Brockman’s televised egregious error, an appalled Flanders (also voiced by Harry Shearer) is registering his disgust on an Internet chat forum within moments.
Brockman subsequently joins a long and distinguished list of down-and-out Springfield residents who’ve crashed at the Simpson’s abode (they astutely reference this proud tradition of theirs, with a Wall of Fame displaying photos of their previous jobless house guests, including Krusty the Klown, Otto the heavy metal obsessed schoolbus driver, and Apu, who Homer is quick to point out ‘sang a song for them’)
During the course of this most subversive half hour of animation, the writers fire at, and score direct hits upon multiple marks. Rednecks, Republican politicians (with, of course, the very Ah-nuld-like Rainer Wolfcastle attending their top-secret Republican meeting), the above-mentioned Christian alarmist groups, reality TV, conservative news media, and notably the Fox network are the quarry, and no quarter is given to any of them. All are delicately skewered and par-boiled to crisp perfection. In a delightful end-of-episode exchange, Homer goes to tell Lisa the biggest, most salacious secret Brockman revealed to him, apropos the Fox corporation. Their voices are deleted, and instead we hear a robotic male tone articulate that Fox is responsible for producing many hours of quality, intellectually-stimulating programming, such as American Idol, and the American Idol results show. It is fitting that in its 400th instalment, The Simpsons is still maintaining its reputation as one of America’s prime exponents of social commentary. The real-life dramas and human emotions of the golden years may not ever return, but as long as the show casts a critical eye over relevant topical issues, we’ll be OK. Guest-stars popular hip hop artist Ludacris.
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