The Simpsons: 3rd Season
August 31, 2003
I was only eleven years old in 1991, but I remember the ads and the episode vividly. Fox was touting the season premier of “The Simpsons”, to air September 19th, rather heavily, as their breakout animated hit was heading into its third season with quite a coup. The producers had lined up Michael Jackson to guest voice the first episode, “Stark Raving Dad”, in which Homer wears a pink shirt to work, is assumed insane, and gets tossed into a mental hospital where he’s roomed with a 300 pound White guy from Jersey, who sounds like, and claims to be Jacko himself. A watershed moment in pop culture history that not only kicked off the shows long running gift at landing big time voice-over guest stars (though due to contractual obligations Jackson’s name couldn’t be credited, thus the fake John Jay Smith at the shows end), but continued the series’ streak (started somewhere mid season 1) of dynamite comedy that would last, perfectly through season 7, and somewhat imperfectly still today. No, I don’t remember much about 1991 and being eleven, but it was apparent my love for “The Simpsons”; Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, Maggie and a huge cast of Springfieldian personalities, was already in full bloom.
The Jackson episode, along with the season’s other, brilliant 23 episodes has recently been released on DVD, and it’s quite obvious, in revisiting these classics for roughly the 50th time (thanks to syndication saturation) that the writers and animators were on a roll. Take the opener for example, in addition to coaxing a hilarious performance out of Jackson, often mocking his own weird lifestyle, they got him to sing a catchy song (“Lisa it’s your birthday, happy birthday Lisa”-try getting that out of your head) inside the body of a fat, balding bricklayer named Leon Kompowsky. The song was great, the moment was perfect, and the resounding effect (Bart’s buried affection for his younger sister) has the shows trademark sweetness; as Leon walked into the sunrise, and Homer, with his hand still stamped “Not Insane” picks up the paper proclaiming the towns hatred for Bart over his faux-king of pop prank, the season was off to a shining start.
And it never let up; the next 8 months spooled out episode after episode of satirical gold, zany yet grounded classics that fans, casual and obsessive, today know nearly line for line. Bare in mind as you read on, that this review is being written by a Simpsons nut (anyone familiar with my writings knows my tendency to quote the show as often as I can), and will contain synopsis and lines that, while knee-slappingly funny to similar Simpsons fanatics, may seem, well, odd to anyone not familiar in the least with these yellow skinned, four fingered animated icons.
Season three was a fruitful season, like any show still fresh and imaginative, they were able to pepper the episodes with character development and reintroductions. Bart’s nemesis, Sideshow Bob, makes a welcome return in “Black Widower”, two years after Bart nabbed him on framing Krusty, Bob returns, seemingly reformed, to marry Bart’s chain smoking, MacGyver loving Aunt Selma. Only Bart realizes Bob’s ulterior motives (Bob on seeing Selma naked for the first time: “Even murder has its ugly side”) and has to give Homer a crash course in basic physics to get him to understand how Bob plans on blowing Selma sky high on their honeymoon. It’s always like Homer to miss the point, and after Bob is caught, he and even dumber Chief Wiggum celebrate a job well done by smoking cigars, in the vicinity of the toxic hotel room. After the explosion things end in vintage Simpsons surrealist humor, Bart, goofy from the gas: “Lets get out of this gas filled hallway before we all suffocate.
The voice-over work of Kelsey Grammer as Bob is always great (to Selma: “Kissing you would be like kissing some divine ashtray”) and is just one of the memorable guest spots throughout the season. Along with Jackson, other music related guests included the whole of Aerosmith in the hilarious classic, “Flaming Moe’s”, while Sting helped dig Bart out of a well in “Radio Bart”, crooning along with Krusty and friends on the benefit song, “We’re Sending Our Love Down the Well”, which would drop to 99 on the charts a week after it’s revealed another hoax perpetuated by Bart, being replaced by new number one tune, “I Do Believe We’re Naked” by Funky C Funky Do.
Spinal Tap (including ‘Simpsons regular Harry Shearer) performs a messy, problematic set to a rowdy Springfield (“goodnight Springton, there will be no encore”) crowd in “The Otto Show” while Beverly D’Angelo sings a few catchy country ditties as Lurleen Lumpkin in “Colonel Homer”, one of a few eps that would test Homer’s devotion to Marge. The musical influence throughout the shows years has been so strong that earlier this year Rolling Stone magazine featured a cover story on how important they figure into rock history. Certainly a show that can deify a Spinal Tap performance, which includes a bogus Satan doll (“we salute you, our half inflated dark lord”) is worthy of such lofty rock icon status.
Other than music nods, the show has always been smart in its movie references, and they are aplenty in season three. When Mr. Burns adopts Santa’s Little Helper as a guard dog, in “Dog of Death”, he trains him by brainwashing him with horrific images, ala Alex in “A Clockwork Orange”. Kubrick is referenced five episodes later in the season finale, “Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes?” when Homer, in the market for a new chair, sits in the vibrating Spine Melter 2000 and hallucinates (“please excuse me while I kiss the sky”) similarly to the grand trip sequence in “2001”, which is also referenced in “Lisa’s Pony”, as Homer dreams he’s an ape, sleeping against the black monolith, while all of the other apes forge survival tools. And in one of the best episodes of all time, “Homer at the Bat”, written by legendary ‘Simpsons scribe John Swartzwelder, Homer carves a “Wonder Bat” out of a fallen tree, much like Robert Redford in “The Natural”. Spot on and brimming with homage, the show is always intricate and appropriate in its movie references.
Rating these 24 singular masterpieces is arbitrary, but everybody likes lists, especially me, so here is my choice for the ten best of season three, in descending order:
“Treehouse of Horror II”, in which Homer buys a magical monkeys paw, ruins the families lives with it, gives it to Flanders who wishes world peace as Homer regrets, “I wish I had a monkeys paw”.
“Burns Ver Kraufen der Kraftwerk”, where Germans overtake the nuclear power plant and Homer dreams of a land of chocolate.
“The Otto Show”, where Otto moves in with the family and has a monologue about a piece of food that was hanging on Homer’s face for three days, “and it wasn’t little either, it was a chicken wing!”
“Colonel Homer”, an episode that features Homer as sexy Lurleen Lumpkin’s manager, a rip-roaring send-up of “Hee Haw”, and another touching ending with Homer and Marge making up.
“Like Father, Like Clown”: A masterwork exploring Krusty the clown’s life as a Jew, estranged from his Rabbi father, voiced by Jackie Mason.
“Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes?” with Danny DeVito reprising his role as Herb, Homer’s long lost brother, with whom he bankrupted in season 2’s “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?”
“Bart the Murderer”, which introduces Joe Mantegna as mafia boss Fat Tony and where Bart learns the ropes as a mafia underling. Wearing a blue pinstripe suit, he stuffs a hundred dollar bill into Marge’s dress and deadpans, “Give me three fingers of milk, Ma.”
“Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington”: the second episode of the season is a sharp satire of politics as Lisa discovers the greed beneath the smiles and handshakes in the nations capital.
“Homer Defined”, in which Homer-as-icon is solidified in a purely brilliant comedy about cowardice, as Homer blindly saves Springfield from nuclear holocaust with “Eenie, meenie, miney, mo” and is falsely acclaimed employee of the month with a congratulatory phone call from Magic Johnson.
“Homer at the Bat”, a landmark episode where Mr. Burns fields his company softball team with current Major League ringers (only because Honus Wagner and Capp Anson are long dead) such as Darryl Strawberry and Roger Clemens, until separate mishaps befall all 9, except Strawberry, playing Homer’s position. In my opinion, possibly the best 23 minutes in the shows 14 season history.
I could go on for days about every little detail of season three; of how Bart scams his teacher into falling in love with a picture of Gordie Howe, or of Homer’s land of chocolate fantasy during a crucial evaluation that gets him fired, for the umpteenth time, but you get the point. I don’t think it’s only my opinion that “The Simpsons” is the best television series, animated or not, of all time. Just watch the countless episodes in syndication each week, or better yet, get the DVD’s of seasons 1-3, they’re groundbreaking and hilarious, but I’ll let the show speak for itself in a classic bit of dialogue from “Flaming Moe’s”:
Marge: “Homer, you can take some consolation in the fact that something you created is making so many people happy.”
Homer (sarcastically): “Oh, look at me! I’m making people happy: I’m the magical man, from Happyland, in a gumdrop house on Lollipop Lane!!”
Sarcastic or not, Homer and his Springfield neighbors make us happy on an obsessive daily basis.
“The Simpsons: The Complete Third Season” DVD features drop dead funny commentaries by show writers, directors, and creator/genius Matt Groening, as well as numerous bits of curio-nostalgia.
by Adam Suraf