Dead Homer Society

“Where is Homer, anyway?” – Selma Bouvier
“It’s so typical of the big doofus to spoil it all.” – Patty Bouvier
“What, Aunt Patty?” – Lisa Simpson
“Oh, nothing, dear, I’m just trashing your father.” – Patty Bouvier
“Well, I wish you wouldn’t.  Because, aside from the fact that he has the same frailties as all human beings, he’s the only father I have.  Therefore he is my model of manhood, and my estimation of him will govern the prospects of my adult relationships.  So I hope you bear in mind that any knock at him is a knock at me, and I am far too young to defend myself against such onslaughts.” – Lisa Simpson
“Mmmhmm, go watch your cartoon show, dear.” – Patty Bouvier 

After I finished watching this episode, I went to the end and began rewinding.  Lucas, the kid who Lisa briefly sorta liked and whose dialogue appeared to be stuff that was rejected from Zach Galifianakis’ part in a draft for Hangover 4, appears in the very last scene.  It had been so long since we saw him that I wasn’t even sure when he’d gone missing.  Reversing, it turns out that he had been gone since literally the halfway mark of the episode.  The show didn’t completely forget him, there was that final, tacked on scene, but he was so pointless and shallow that they literally didn’t need him for most of the second act and all of the third.  Jebus.  The dropouts at Hollywood Upstairs Screenwriting College think that’s sloppy.

Besides a forgettably shallow guest voice, what else did “Luca$” have?  Exposition.  Lots and lots and lots of exposition.  In the B-plot, Snake kept stealing stuff for Bart, which we didn’t see, then he got arrested, which we didn’t see, and then Bart went to get him out of jail, which we did see but which was practically narrated for us, including such sparkling dialogue as:

“But, Chief, we got guns!  He’s got a little wrench.”

“You won’t need to save me a third time.”

“If I get caught, it’s suicide by cop.”

“It means I get you to shoot me.”

The A-plot, meanwhile, suffered from the same repetitive problem, but managed a big swing and a miss on the ending, where they wrapped up the wrong plot thread.  Marge was supposed to be worried about Lisa seeing Homer as a bad example for future romantic partners, but that quickly devolved into Homer being upset with her about it, which meant that the ending was about Homer forgiving Marge, making Lisa’s whole presence something of an afterthought.  That the big gag was that Marge wore a dress from when they drew her into Project Runway didn’t help, nor Jimbo at the bar or the overall weird and creepiness of Homer and Lisa going on a “date”.  The quote above from Season 1 contains basically every idea the A-plot fumbled, and it didn’t forget any characters in the middle either.

– Slapping “Parodies Are Easy” on the couch gag is maybe a bit more revealing than they think.

– Why did Nelson run up the playground in a baseball uniform?

– Repeating the word “Senator” should kill some time.

– Skinner chasing Bart in his car is, uh, somewhat dumber than “The Boy Who Knew Too Much”.

– Milhouse gets an aside to complain about the “fat kid with a dream”.  They really have no idea how to write dialogue anymore.  Even inside the cafeteria what passes for jokes has to come from asides and random breaks in what’s actually happening.

– Nice that this kid just happens to have tupperware full of hot dogs in the cafeteria.

– “Liberated, you mean stolen?” Thanks, exposition Milhouse.

– “Then that makes me the Jackie Robinson of the sport, and you are the racist Philadelphia manager.”/”Quit comparing me to Ben Chapman” – Jokes work so much better when explained beforehand.  It’s comedy 101, everyone knows that.

– “Women marry their fathers, Marge” – In case anyone was unclear what was going on, it has now been explained to us.

– The montage of stolen things ate up some time.

– Is all of Galifianakis’ dialogue going to be him telling us what he’s eating?  (Amusing side note: my spell checker’s only suggestion for his name was “Egalitarianism”.)

– “Careful it’s uncut syrup”, hmmm, haven’t I seen Bart and Milhouse mainline Squishee syrup before?  Nah, this feels too original and believable.

– “You ratted him out!” – And for approximately the fortieth time in just  thirteen minutes of video, things have been explained to the audience yet again.

– Professional freelance writer as an advice authority is kinda funny.  Of course, it’s also one of the few jokes that happen within the dialogue and aren’t about explaining what’s happening, but I’m sure that’s a coincidence.

– “Homer you can’t just do the things you want to do” comes right after Homer tells us what he might do.

– “She might marry someone like me”/”you think that might be bad?” – These just keep coming.  It’s one thing to explain what’s happening, it’s quite another to do is three times in the same scene.

– Nice of Cletus to just be there at the bar without saying anything until now.

– Good Jebus, now Homer is describing what he’s gonna do at the dinner.

– “Hey, I can’t screw this up or Lisa will get stuck with someone like me” – Did you get it yet?  People who fell asleep watching American Dad and just left the TV on could follow this plot by now.

– “We need to have a conversation in loud whispers”, once again, the action you’re about to see before you see it: comedy!

– How about some characters describing their feelings out loud and in public?  “I felt terrible when you said I felt stuck with you, but then I realized I am stuck with you”.  Ugh.

– “Remember that sewing machine you say I never use, well I sold it and bought this dress” – It’s never going to stop.

– Why is Jimbo at the bar?

– Hey, Lucas is back for the last scene in the episode.  I guess he didn’t choke to death or anything.

– “You’re not competitive eating anymore?”/’No, I realized that was unrealistic”, but his lines are still terrible.

– The whistle version of the theme over the credits was kinda nice, but, then again, I’m a sucker for that song.

Anyway, the ratings are in and while they are up slightly from last week, they remain deep in the toilet.  Last night, just 4.30 million people wondered why they named the episode after a character who wasn’t in the last half of it.  That’s good enough to not be one of the ten least watched episodes ever, the first time that’s happened since January, but is still #14 on the all time least watched list.  Season 25 remains well on pace to be the least watched season ever.