The-Simpsons

“Anyone from a species that has mastered intergalactic travel, raise your hand.” – Kodos.

Written by: John Swartzwelder, Jay Kogen, Wallace Wolodarsky and Sam Simon.

It’s a measure of the confidence that The Simpsons writers had in the universe they were building that they could completely subvert those rules this early on for the “Simpsons Halloween Special,” which like the album The Beatles is the actual proper name for this episode.

Held together by a framing device – Bart & Lisa telling scary stories in the treehouse – that led the subsequent series its name, this first Halloween special was a masterpiece, chock full of spot-on references (“Kodos” and “Kang”), hilarious lines (“Quit throwing your garbage into our dimension”), and new takes on classic horror tropes (“Quoth the Raven, ‘Eat my shorts’”).

No wonder this obvious experiment became an beloved institution. Once the writers realized they could do this every year, they went full bore, and in subsequent years, it only got weirder, and for awhile, because of FOX’s domination (and near ruination) of post-season MLB, they often started the whole season with the “Treehouse of Horror,” knowing it was a natural hook for a new season.

I’ll betcha that people who have long given up tuning into The Simpsons every week still check out the yearly Treehouses of Horror, if for no other reason than to see how they’re going to shoehorn in Kang and Kodos that year.

“Wait, who is that young go-getter?” – Mr. Burns.

Written by: Jon Vitti.

After committing insurance fraud to get a miracle hair tonic, Homer gets a brand-new hair, a promotion and an assistant who mentors him.

Thematically, this is another instance of one of the Simpsons being mentored by a person who is more worldly-wise than they are. It’s already happened with Marge & Jacques, and will reach its apotheosis later in the season with “Lisa’s Substitute.”

In this case, Karl the assistant – voiced by then-icon, now “who in the hell has that voice” Harvey Fierstein – teaches Homer the valuable lesson that confidence comes from within, not from a gorgeous hairpiece.

(One of my favorite unacknowledged – and hitherfore unnoticed – running gags in this excellent episode is that Homer’s hair is different in every scene.)

Which is just as well, because not only does Smithers – jealous because Homer is coming in between him and his one true love – dig up the dirt on Homer’s insurance fraud, Bart spills the hair tonic, causing Homer to lose his assistant, his promotion and his hair all at the same time.

As Karl leaves – having taken the fall for the insurance fraud – he gives Homer a big smooch, which I guess felt a little controversial, unless you grew up watching Bugs Bunny kissing Elmer Fudd every Saturday morning.

“As God is my witness, I can pass the 4th grade!” – Bart.

Written by: David M. Stern.

A few changes in the first episode of the second season of The Simpsons: the bus stop gag in the opening has been banished forever to a vague memory, replaced by Bart skateboarding through various secondary & tertiary characters, the animation is less shaky and Homer finally sounds like Homer.

The plot, however, centers around a familiar theme: everybody – including the boy himself – thinks that Bart is an idiot, until he demonstrates that that he isn’t, and raises his grade from an F to a D-.

In between, we get funny stuff as Bart and Martin teach each other how to be each other, with – of course – Martin enjoying being bad more than Bart enjoying being good.

But, Bart does get good enough to actually – eventually – study a snow day that he prayed for despite being the greatest snow day in the history of the world.

In October 1990, it made sense for The Simpsons to start the second season with a small story in the and concentrate on their breakout character – the ratings were surprisingly good in the first season, and I’m sure that FOX was nervous about the deep satire that was waiting in the wings.

“Garcon, another bottle of your second-least-expensive champagne!” – Homer.

Written by: Matt Groening, Sam Simon.

I don’t remember if I thought that “Some Enchanted Evening” was a step back from the glories of the previous two episodes back in 1990, but upon any subsequent rewatch, it’s completely obvious. Good reason though: it was the first one produced for the series, but was pushed to the season finale due to production problems.

And while it has a rare Matt Groening writing credit and a lot of funny lines, “Some Enchanted Evening” doesn’t really add anything to the universe of The Simpsons.

That said, it might have been a better first episode than “Simpsons Roasting Over an Open Fire,” but I guess we’ll never know.

I do remember this: at the time, I was really glad that I had taped all of the episodes of The Simpsons, and was definitely looking forward to more. That said, it didn’t yet feel like an all-time world changer: in May 1990, Twin Peaks – halfway through a first season that I made every person I came into contact with watch – was the first TV show that felt like it was coming from a future where television would routinely produce greater art than any other medium.

But, of course,  I had no way of knowing is that Twin Peaks had already peaked and The Simpsons hadn’t even really started.

“Don’t blame me, I didn’t do it! – Krusty.

Written by: Jay Kogen & Wallace Wolodarsky

Occasionally, an episode has a joke so brilliantly specific to that episode, I almost wonder if the entire episode wasn’t constructed around that joke. I’m still convinced that Newsradio did the entire  ”in space" episode  just to make the “space heater” joke.

In the case of “Krusty Gets Busted,” it’s the moment where Homer – who has witnessed Krusty The Clown rob a convenience store – is down at police HQ to ID Krusty in a lineup. And Wiggum says: “Send in the clowns.”

That just kills me.  And the reason that it’s funnier than Bart yelling “Say it ain’t so, Krusty!” or Sideshow Bob observing that he would have “gotten away with it if it wasn’t for those meddling kids” is that “send in the clowns” is a joke that advances the actual plot, as opposed to a crammed-in pop culture reference.

Those other references are funny, of course, but they aren’t beautiful.

Of course, it wasn’t Krusty what robbed the Kwik-E-Mart, but rather Sideshow Bob, his long-suffering sidekick, voiced by Kelsey Grammer. Grammer, of course, was the perfect choice for the role, and totally knocks it out of the park, especially in the “Sideshow Bob’s Cavalcade of Whimsy” sequence.

Still, at the time, nobody knew that they’d come up with a lifelong nemesis (I mean our lives, cos we’re the ones who age) for Bart – and that’s proven by the fact that Sideshow Bob doesn’t come back until near the end of the third season

For the second straight episode, the climax comes when Bart has a revelation just when all seems lost, which has inspired me to have my own revelation: Bart is secretly smart, he just hides it within a wall of of disinterest, slackerdom and cool.

Whether or not that is “true,” I’m going to be watching future episodes for more evidence of this theory.

“What can I say? I got a weakness for the classics!” – Bart

Written by: George Meyer, Sam Simon, John Swartzwelder & Jon Vitti.

As do I, Bart. And I say this is one of those, packed with tons and tons of great jokes, right down to the (freeze frame gag) “French Birth Control Device” as part of the souvenirs Bart brings back from France.

Bart’s in France, of course, because he flushed a cherry bomb down the toilet, and Skinner proposes that he participate in a Foreign Exchange program that sends Bart to France and brings to Springfield a sweet-tempered Albanian boy, Adil.

Who is also a nuclear spy, no doubt an inspiration for the character of Ahnyong (Ahnyong!)  many years later in Arrested Development.

Meanwhile, Bart is fostered by a pair of ill-tempered winemakers who mistreat him and (even worse!) are putting anti-freeze into their wine. The climax, where Bart suddenly discovers he’s learned French and rats them out, is one of the more satisfying plot resolutions in Simpsons history, and pretty damn funny, to boot.

“Mom, Bart is taking pictures of his butt!!” – Lisa

Written by: Jon Vitti.

When video of of Homer dancing with a belly dancer at a bachelor party goes viral after Bart uploads it to YouTube, Marge reacts with fury and tosses him out.

Or at least that’s how this standard sitcom plot would play today. In 1990, it’s a picture of Homer dancing with “Princess Jasmine” that Bart snaps with his brand-new spy camera. It gets passed along via photocopy and becomes an underground sensation.

Despite a funny sequence where Homer and Bart go to various adult-themed establishments trying to find “Princess Jasmine” so that Homer can apologize to her for doing her job, this is all incredibly silly. And not the good kind of silly, either.

“It’s not quite breakfast, not quite lunch, but it comes with a slice of cantaloupe at the end. ” – Jacques.

Written by: John Swartzwelder.

See the full moon? The classic symbol of romance? It’s a bowling ball.

That’s you all you need to know about the level of detail that went into this hilarious and beautiful temptation episode, and the first to concentrate on what it must be like to be Marge Simpson. 

In the future, of course, we’ll get to the backstory of Homer & Marge’s marriage, but for now, all we need to know is that while Homer can be an uncaring, insensitive lout, she still loves him. And vice versa.

So while she’s tempted – so very tempted – by the smooth-talking, brunch-loving bowling instructor voiced by the incomparable Albert Brooks, of course she’s going to back out of actually having an affair.

That that Marge didn’t have an affair, and was reminded by the entire universe how much she treasured her family, her marriage, and yes, even Homer, went a long way towards telling us what kind of show The Simpsons was going to be when it was running on all cylinders. 

And in brilliant fashion, the episode distracted us from its otherwise rote-seeming happy ending by making it a parody of another well-known happy ending, topped by Homer’s triumphant “Tell him I’m going to the backseat of my car with the woman I love … and I won’t be back for 10 minutes!!”