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  1. #1
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    Simpson's 500th Episode Sunday (2/19)

    Time Magazine ran this article recently: The Simpsons at 500

    Is there anything left to say about The Simpsons? Is there anything left to be said by The Simpsons? Maybe not on either count, but the show has, despite some recent contract-negotiation drama, kept chugging along past landmark after landmark. Sunday night, it sails past its latest marker with episode 500, “At Long Last Leave.”

    I was recently asked my favorite Simpsons episodes,* an impossible task considering the show has had more couch gags than Ikea has couches. I figured the most honest way to decide, rather than go back and look over a complete list, was to come up with them off the top of my head. It probably won’t surprise you that every single episode I came up with was from the show’s first decade. I would love to write the contrarian article saying that 2000s Simpsons is better than 1990s Simpsons, but come on.

    *(Since you’re wondering: no, I won’t list them all, because there are too many that I love. But the best is “Homer’s Enemy.” Period. I shall not hear it gainsaid!)

    That said, the whole question of whether The Simpsons should go off the air doesn’t excite me, because it’s moot. The Simpsons, which is to say the classic, worldview-defining show that provided me a memorable quote for pretty much every occasion in life, already went off the air. It had a great run–eight or ten years, depending who’s counting, which is far, far longer than even most great TV shows maintain their greatness.

    It was replaced by a second Simpsons,** which began around the late ’90s, give or take. This was not as great a show, it was less focused on the Simpsons as a family unit, and in some ways wasn’t even really a sitcom, so much as an institution, like Saturday Night Live, which became known for its famous guest cameos and its parodies and takes on topical issues. It was a lesser show, but that was fine; the world also needs comedies that are just often pretty funny, and to me its existence took nothing away from the preceding seasons.

    **[This is a very crude and broad division, I admit. Within the first Golden Age of The Simpsons, you could also define separate periods: the first couple seasons, for instance, were much more based on realistic family comedy, while later years moved into more fanciful, if no less hilarious and meaningful, stories about space trips and monorails. And the latter Silver--or Bronze--Era of The Simpsons had its variations too. In the past couple of years it's become more family-focused again, and is still capable of world-class episodes like the recent "Holidays of Future Passed." The Simpsons movie too, if you count that, stands up with most of the show's first-decade greatness.]

    The Simpsons takes its half-millennium bow Sunday with “At Long Last Leave,” an episode that spoofs… The Simpsons. Like the Seinfeld finale, the episode looks back on the series’ history by asking: how could the rest of the world tolerate being disturbed by this family for so long? The answer is that it can’t; the townspeople of Springfield finally respond to decades of shenanigans and property damage by ostracizing the Simpsons, who relocate to an outcast’s camp in the country. The episode, true to form, makes room for guest voices–notably Wikileaks’ Julian Assange–but the real stars are the central characters, and their history, with gags referencing how Homer’s voice has changed since the first episodes and how disturbing it is that Maggie is a baby, yet never cries.

    Is it a great episode? It’s… all right! It recalls some of the show’s earlier better work, some of the gags feel forced by the writers’ room, and yet a few moments made me bark out loud and realize why I loved the show in the first place. Pretty much exactly, in other words, what this iteration of The Simpsons is meant to do.
    Lots of people hate The Simpsons these days and think it should've gone off the air 10 years ago, but when I watch it these days I usually find myself enjoying it. It really has become an institution.

    So what's everyone's favorite episode of the series? Be absolute, no list of great ones. I'm going with You Only Move Twice, the Hank Scorpio episode.

  2. #2
    True skill only comes from macro switching all your e-peen gear thru 10 pages
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    You Only Move Twice is such a great episode. I don't have a fav but the first two that came to mind were

    Brother from the Same Planet

    Marge vs the Monorail

  3. #3
    Death by snoo snoo
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    DENTAL PLAN

  4. #4

    I liked the episode when Marge turned MMA fighter.

  5. #5
    BG's most likeable Québécois
    Pens win! Pens Win!!! PENS WIN!!!!!

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    Not my favorite but one of the favorite

    Lisa on Ice

    and with this :D


  6. #6
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    Separate_Vocations has always been my favorite. Although the first 3 you guys posted were all excellent lol.

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ratatapa View Post
    Not my favorite but one of the favorite

    Lisa on Ice

    and with this :D

    Holy fuck lol. This show used to be so amazing lol

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by Skirkle View Post

    So what's everyone's favorite episode of the series? Be absolute, no list of great ones. I'm going with You Only Move Twice, the Hank Scorpio episode.
    "The Denver Broncos?!"

  9. #9
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    "Bart the Daredevil" is and always will be my favorite episode.

  10. #10
    The 69th Donor
    Pens win! Pens Win!!! PENS WIN!!!!!

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    My favorite episode ever was the X-Files crossover episode. I can't remember the title of it, but coupled with the fact that I was a huge fan of the X-Files when it came out, it was absolutely hilarious.

  11. #11
    Ridill
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    The last two or three seasons have been markedly better than the ones that proceeded them. While not as funny as the show's hey-day, still quite amusing and much better than the crap that is Family Guy or the Cleavland Show. (Although American Dad is the single best thing on Fox.)

  12. #12
    True skill only comes from macro switching all your e-peen gear thru 10 pages
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    Quote Originally Posted by Aksannyi View Post
    My favorite episode ever was the X-Files crossover episode. I can't remember the title of it, but coupled with the fact that I was a huge fan of the X-Files when it came out, it was absolutely hilarious.
    Spoiler: show

    XD


  13. #13
    The God Damn Kuno
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    Is this the last episode?

  14. #14
    Formerly BGTemp // TERA Fan
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    "You only move twice" is a definate favorite. I also like the insanity pepper one too.

    "Find your soulmate Homer!"
    "Wait! Dogs can't talk!"
    "bark!"
    "Damn straight!"

  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by Not Kuno View Post
    Is this the last episode?
    Unless something's changed, I think they still have one more season to go before it ends.

  16. #16



    I always loved this little clip

  17. #17
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    im about as open minded as they come, and im telling you. the 1st 10 seasons of the simpsons are the ABSOLUTE best moments in television history right over Seinfeld, imo.
    there are only so many times i can laugh at Peter beating up a giant chicken, or cartmen and kenny doing some crazy things, but the humor in these seasons will remain funny to the day i die.


    http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/119...0260092167.jpg

    "hey i dont remember saying that"

  18. #18
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    for you skirk:




    this joke, will never.. ever EVER get old. if you love the show, the charactes, and know the story behind this episode, you'd most likely feel the same way:


    me and uryuu talk about this all day on vent back when we used to kill our AVs and Odins lol. if anyone can find that clip of them in that batman parody with the scouts, i will love you

  19. #19
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  20. #20
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    only episode i really remember the title of is 22 short films about springfield

    Professor Frink, Professor Frink, he'll make you laugh, he'll make you think, then he'll do thing, with the thing and the... person...

    Boy, that monkey is going to pay