The Simpsons: season 5

Most fans will put the turning point a fair bit later, but in my opinion Season 5 was the beginning of the end for The Simpsons. Decades later, of course it had far further to fall, but in my opinion, this was where things started to get lazy, repetitive and far less adventurous. The characters are by now very well-established, with only the likes of one-note Cletus and the mute monobrow baby introduced into the cast at this stage.

The series begins strongly, but that seems to me largely because of holdovers and creative continuances from Season 4. ‘Cape Feare’ in particular is a favourite episode, and while it begins the annoying trend of ‘Don’t you remember this time that ought to have made Homer incredibly famous?’, there are great moments in ‘Homer’s Barbershop Quartet.’ ‘Rosebud’ also reminds the viewer that by this stage, Mr. Burns is actually one of the most developed of the show’s characters, ‘Homer and Apu’ fleshes out a character who could so easily have been an embarrassment for the writers and this is in fact probably a golden era for Bart, what with insisting on an elephant, getting briefly famous, becoming a billionaire’s heir and getting Skinner fired and having a dilemma over testifying in court or keeping his truancy secret.

Some set-ups seem repetitive. There’s been enough wooing of Marge and her sisters, so it’s time for her mother to get an episode. Homer’s gossiping estranges Marge yet again in a rushed and very superficial season finale – oh, and is also tempted by another woman once again, only to remember that his marriage is much more important.

I’m not saying this isn’t a strong season. It has a lot of classic episodes and was a show really hitting its stride. But for me, the signs of the well-known later decline are in place. This is also the stage where it feels extremely hard to continue to look at The Simpsons as the average American dysfunctional family, which was after all the show’s hook – honest pessimism with a heart of gold underneath it, as opposed to idealisation. They are in many ways average, sure, but at this stage, both father and son have been household names, even if only briefly, Lisa has released a toy line and Homer has gone to space. Yes, at every stage the idea is that it’s the loveable everyday family getting into these strange situations, but at a certain point, they’re just no longer going to be credible as loveable and everyday.

There’s still a long way to go before The Simpsons stops being fun to watch, and there are plenty of great episodes still to come. But the show has lost its fresh feeling. Luckily, by this stage it is very well-established as a true classic and an American institution. But in some ways I wish they’d taken the Fawlty Towers route rather than pushing it until inevitably the shark is jumped. 

The Simpsons season 4

By the fourth season, The Simpsons had really hit its stride. It was regularly honoured in awards shows, so much so that when the showrunners entered episodes for the Emmys in categories that until that year were only open to live-action shows, yet got no nominations for them, it was considered a snub.

Guest stars were by this point a fixture, for better or worse. Elizabeth Taylor came in to deliver Maggie’s first real word, Leonard Nimoy’s appearance cemented his general comedic persona from then on, and the final episode is a parade of famous faced and Groening-ised voices. There are some great, classic episodes, most of them keeping things simple and not being too ambitious – Mr. Plow, Marge Get a Job, A Streetcar named Marge.

On the other hand, there are some signs of laziness creeping in. There was a clip show, though not the most egregious of its kind, and the plotlines were sometimes not so well-constructed, as when Krusty’s rival ventriloquist in Krusty Gets Cancelled never has his story properly concluded – he’s last seen annoyed by the bigger line Krusty’s show gets.

There are some moments that push a little too far into the surreal, many of them in Marge vs the Monorail, and Homer occasionally goes a bit far into the persona that later ruins many a later season, where he’s less loveable oaf and more outright psychopath – including when he decides to start caring for a little neglected kid called Pepi just to spite Bart.

Marge is probably the star of this season, with her well-meaning ideas on home parenting, frustration with her marriage needing an outlet and even her reaction to being caught accidentally shoplifting being highlights.

The cast is largely established by this point, though the season introduces the one-note Sea Captain and classic authority figure stooge Superintendent (Super Nintendo) Chalmers. Oh, and Jub Jub in yet another episode that surprised me with how much development Patty and Selma get with their relatively limited screen time. I always considered them the butt of ugly women jokes, but in fact there’s a lot of depth to them, and sadness to their stories.

I don’t consider the fourth season as strong as the third or fifth, but it was still a show in very good standing. 

干物妹!うまるちゃん / Himouto! Umaru-chan

There’s a simple way of appealing to late-night anime fans – get a pretty girl to act in ways that are just like a male otaku. “Look – she’s so cute! And she’s doing all the things I do!” Well, it worked for Lucky Star.

Umaru-chan neatly filled my ‘brainless fun with a bit too much fanservice’ void. There’s very little substance here, but there’s not really mean to be.

A young salaryman called Taihei lives in his small Tokyo apartment with his schoolgirl sister. Outwardly, she is the perfect student – model-pretty, academically top of the class, and highly skilled at any sport she turns her hand to. At home, however, she is a terrible slob who loves anime, games and surfing the net – while eating sugary snacks and chugging cola. She seems callous to her brother sometimes, but is actually devoted to him, and of course has a variety of pretty friends with extreme character quirks that always involve blushing, who all also become very interested in Taihei.

The usual boxes get ticked – beach trips, Valentine’s chocolate dilemmas, sweet Christmas eve fuzziness. Umaru-chan also takes part in video game tournaments, goes to nostalgic old stores and pontificates on the best way to snack.

It’s brainless, formulaic and lazy, but that’s not to say it isn’t fun and likeable. I just miss the times when anime comedies could make me actually laugh out loud multiple times an episode, like Azumanga Daioh. I suppose Nichijou was the closest thing recently…

The key is not to follow the formula too closely, or like Umaru-san, you get a show that’s pleasant and enjoyable but leaves very little lasting impression.  

The Simpsons: Season 3

By season 3, The Simpsons had gotten over the wobbles of establishing a new show with a broad cast – which, it should be noted, were remarkably minor wobbles – and settled into the best period of its production history, which it will sustain for long enough to become the critically-lauded definer of a generation’s pop culture that it still is. No matter how far it has fallen.

Season three doesn’t need to establish characters or setting any more, but the ideas it puts forward are still fresh and interesting. It is also still possible for the celebrity cameos to be a surprise. Season opener ‘Stark Raving Dad’, with an inspired bit of meta humour in its casting of Michael Jackson as an asylum internee who only believes he is Michael Jackson, perfectly encapsulates this.

There are plenty more celebrity cameos, including a long list of baseball stars all at once, as well as great little appearances by Aerosmith and Spinal Tap, but it is of course the deepening of the characters’ personalities and relationships that make this season work well. Flanders already begins to really get fleshed out with his venture into left-handed entrepreneurship – also giving Homer some much-needed humanity in the days before he’s simply put forward as some kind of psychopath. Moe has his defining episode in the highlight episode ‘Flaming Moe’s’. Krusty and Sideshow Bob both get episodes that build upon what we’ve already seen of their personalities beyond the surface, and flashback episodes of Homer and Marge show that no matter how dysfunctional they can be and how nightmarish they were at that work party way back at the beginning of season 1, they have a lot in their lives that is in fact enviable and adorable.

There are some episodes that stretch the characters. Bart sometimes goes too far in torturing others, to the extent that he becomes hard to forgive, like when he toys with Mrs. Krabappel. Homer being tempted into another affair in Colonel Homer both seems over-familiar from earlier episodes and shows him being a little too oblivious and insensitive, even if he ends up making the right decisions. 

But this season more than any other makes the Simpson family seem relatable and likeable even to watchers who in all honesty are very little like these people. And that, I guess, is the most impressive thing that The Simpsons manages to pull off. 

進撃！巨人中学校 / Shingeki! Kyojin Chuugakkou / Attack On Titan: Junior High

Enjoying Shingeki no Kyojin doesn’t mean you have to adore its various spin-offs. I watched the live-action movies recently, and can’t say I enjoyed them very much despite impressive visuals. The manga version of this gag spin-off also hasn’t been received too well, though I haven’t actually read it myself. But fully accepting it’s just a silly bit of comedy fanservice, I thoroughly enjoyed Chiugakkou.

I tuned in for the first episode and the new premise amused me quite a bit – exaggerated, silly versions of our main characters are attending a school split between humans and titans. Eren’s grudge comes not from personal loss but because his lunch was stolen and eaten. In fact, that’s what the nefarious titans do here – invade the school grounds of the poor defenceless humans and steal their bento. It’s silly and fun and I really like the characters rendered in such cutesy styles, especially Eren and Armin.

Character traits are amplified in the ways fandoms enjoy. Levi is an authoritarian upperclassman obsessed with cleaning and rules. Mikasa’s skills are superhuman and her devotion to an oblivious Eren boundless. Armin for some reason is extremely susceptible to the cold and needs to go everywhere wrapped in his futon.

The 12-episode season treads the usual ground for school comedies. The kids take part in sports days and go to a matsuri, where romance is in the air. There are mix-ups with love letters and fierce competition to be student president. It’s silly, innocuous stuff and much of the humour comes from seeing these characters who are usually in such a serious and grim setting transposed to one that’s so light and fluffy. I’d say it works better than it ever did for Full Metal Panic!

I’m not saying this is a superb anime or one to recommend highly. It’s cheaply-done, unoriginal and the laughs aren’t on a par with the likes of Azumanga Daioh or Nichijou. It’s very much a by-the-numbers comedy spin-off that plays it safe and follows a formula. But that’s all I wanted from it, and it certainly succeeded. 

Minions

I must say, though I liked Despicable Me a lot, I’ve been very surprised by the enduring popularity of the minions. They were slightly irritating in the films, though occasionally funny or cute or both. But through popular adulation or the power of forced marketing, they’re ubiquitous, especially in East Asia. In both Japan and Taiwan, there’s a profusion of soft toys of the things, even though I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything else relating to Despicable Me.

So perhaps it made sense to give the minions their own vehicle, which box office numbers show certainly did draw more of an international audience than a new Despicable Me film would have. On the other hand, it’s extremely hard to shift focus fully onto comic relief without making a film with a strong smell of direct-to-video sequel. Minions does not manage to avoid this, at all.

On the other hand, that doesn’t mean this isn’t an enjoyable and silly film, and it being set in London with a lot of familiar locations gave it bonus points for me.

After a prologue showing minions attempting to serve evil figures throughout history, we find out that in the 60s, they were left bereft of a master or mistress. Thus, intrepid minions Kevin, Stuart and Bob set off to find the most despicable being on earth to serve.

At a convention, they discover and win the affections of the wonderfully-named Scarlet Overkill, an American femme fatale with designs on the Crown of England.

The plot as it unfolds is very silly and anything-goes, but that works just fine. But this film can’t hold a candle to Despicable Me or its satisfying sequel. The thing is, those films have a lot of heart, and the minions are just cute comic relief on the edge of that. This film, while fun and silly, is almost bereft of anything you could call heart. There’s no real emotional stakes here, and for that reason, everything stays superficial. That makes this a functional kids’ film that will keep the littlest ones entertained but nothing more.

The Simpsons: Season 2

The second season of The Simpsons moves it into more golden-era territory, though there’s still plenty of experimenting, plenty of odd choices in character design, writing and animation that wouldn’t fit in the show later on. Yet looking back, those elements seem refreshing, fun and inventive. The show has obviously already exploded in popularity as well, with some of the biggest celebrity guests you can get making an appearance – Danny DeVito, Ringo Starr and Dustin Hoffman. Hoffman used a pseudonym, like Michael Jackson in the next season, but for a show only just finding its feet, those are pretty huge names.

There are more episodes in this season, and things have been polished. The bus stop sequence in the opening has already been scrapped, and characters like Barney, Chief Wiggum, Smithers and Ralph have more firmly-established characters. Without any kind of fanfare, the show also introduces the likes of Groundskeeper Willie and Dr. Hibbert and has fun with the first of many ‘Treehouse of Horror’ episodes – James Earl Jones also lends his distinctive voice to the episode, and it’s interesting that as originally conceived, Kang and Kodos weren’t evil at all. One of the show’s funniest gags was the part with blowing dust off the cookbook.

Bart is made a little more likeable in this season, having to grapple with his own shortcomings, apologising when his selfishness genuinely upsets others and even toiling away for some pocket money – even though he very quickly regrets that. Meanwhile, Lisa’s vulnerabilities are also explored, as well as her often absurd stubbornness, and Marge – as well as stealing many scenes with her funny little vocal reactions – provides some of the show’s biggest moments of defiance when she decides to deal with things in her surprisingly dramatic way. Her appearance in Itchy & Scratchy as a squirrel is also something very special.

A whole lot of the season, though, revolves around the pattern of Homer getting the chance to hit it rich – whether as a successful dancing mascot, as the recipient of money for suing Mr. Burns or as the brother of a very rich man – and messing it up, or realising other things are more important. This pattern isn’t actually often very inventive, but sometimes it does lead to some real insight into the family dynamic and how ultimately, their bonds will prevail despite how often they screw up or act selfishly. It’s interesting that the idea of infidelity in the marriage, which informed a lot of the first season, is now mostly replaced by the fear of things simply falling apart without outside influence, through the characters’ innate flaws.

There’s actually a lot of sentimentality in this season, but it never really oversteps the line into schmaltz. When Grandpa loses Bea, when Lisa has to say goodbye to Mr. Bergstrom, the story of Marge’s unlikely decision to date Homer and especially when Homer thinks he doesn’t have long to live all tug at the heartstrings, of course balanced with the bathos that The Simpsons does so well, and overall it makes the viewer far more invested in these characters.

And, I suppose, keep them invested for many, many years yet.