Transitioning... transitioning... while the domain nameservers are switching over I have no email, and through strange coincidence my phone is not taking incoming calls either. Unexpectedly hermited, I am enjoying some peace and quiet. I wonder if the blog will even work in this new, strange server. Well I guess we'll find out momentarily.

Now don't get creeped out, but: I have large windows looking north on a series of apartment buildings, and so rather naturally I gaze out over the vista while, say, talking on the phone and/or ruminating upon things. Now I noticed, just randomly, that on Valentine's Day, one of the individuals in an apartment opposite mine was watching pornography on his very, very, very large television. The television faces the window, and is very, very, very large, and as such (from my vantage point) it essentially is the window, for all intents and purposes. And that window is porn. It was so on Valentine's Day, and now inevitably every time I gaze out on my vista, my eyes are drawn back there to see what's the what now, and it's porn. Lots, and lots, and lots of porn. It's amazing to me that with only the naked (heh) human eye, one can discern porn indisputably from over 1000 feet away. I wonder, had I a much larger television and more than a passing interest in porn, if I would also have my television face the window so that I would be beaming my porn out into the cosmos like my apartment-facing neighbour. I'm not so sure. I've never quite removed myself from the 12-year-old boy gut-feel that porn is something to be secreted, hoarded, and absolutely never admitted to in any tangible sense. Porn is for dark corners, not 60-inch plasmas.

That newfangled HDTV Simpsons opening credits, though, that sure as fuck is for 60-inch plasmas. It was very exciting right up till I realized that this is, demonstrably, the moment that The Simpsons has inextricably jumped the shark. They must now demonstrably be within seconds of being cancelled. Like that year of The X Files with Anabeth Gish and the T-1000. Sweet, merciful cancellation. Can you believe The Simpsons went twenty years? And only about three of them sucked?

Hey - if you saw Medicine for Melancholy at the festival (or elsewhere) (and if you didn't/haven't, you really should), check out the interview with Barry Jenkins on this week's installment of The Treatment with Elvis Mitchell. (The Soderbergh one from a few weeks back, too, is fairly kickass.) Additionally, there's a new Mamo that doesn't seem to be syndicating correctly, so check that out too.

This week was long and complex and performance-reviewy, and I am tired and have yet to get into my whiskey as was promised to me by me, about six hours ago. I'm sure we have much to discuss, like why Dollhouse sucked so bad, but we will have to talk about it later.

Posted by tederick at 8:49 PM in 1701 & movies & podcastery & sex (theoretical) & simps & tederickdotcomdotcom
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A tiny, vicious-looking miniature helicopter would go nicely with my trebuchet, don't you think? I could send out sorties into the rest of the office, lure enemies back to my desk with the promise of RC helicopterin' fun, and then hit them with a fusillade of trebuchet-flung hellfire. But I don't trust ThinkGeek any more, not since the Venus Flytrap incident of 2006, which was admittedly my own fault for thinking that the climate in Toronto was somehow equivalent to that of Buenos Aires, but I blame ThinkGeek nevertheless. Because I'm a dork.

• Plush zombie with mix-and-match zombie parts ooooh!
• No reason not to have the headpiece to the Staff of Ra on one's keychain.

Sarafina and I took a lap around the Spaced block last night, with delicious foods to go along with, and she's also working her way through the first season of Lost rather ravenously, which has made me want to go back and watch the whole thing all over again, or at least get to December quickly so I can watch Season 4 when it comes out on the DVD. The dino-natives are restless.

Television programs I apparently no longer watch:

• House
• The Simpsons
• Pushing Daisies

Television programs I continue to watch in spite of myself:

• Sookie Stackhouse or whatever the fuck it's called

Thus returning us to my long-held, little-believed assertion that I don't watch TV any more.

Posted by tederick at 9:46 AM in 4-8-15-16-23-42 & dr. house & dr. jones & miscellaneous crap & simps & tv & zombies
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On its first ten minutes alone I'm about ready to call that Best Episode Ever. Recap:

• Born-Again Robin ("Holy Trinity, Batman!")
• Ya Ya Sophia
• The Passion of the Comic Book Guy
• Jack Black
• Japanese hard candy and Korean Tom Jones covers
• Jabba
• The proper resting place of Asterix and Tintin comics
• Comics for reading, not for hoarding
• Evidence of Homer's psionic connection to Bart
• The Mulk kicked a tidal wave into the sun
• Jimbo wailing on Kearney for no reason
• That's a Lost Girls poster, with Simpsonized Lost Girlsized Wendy, Alice and Dorothy
• "I really wanna draw Batman!"
• Alan Moore's Radioactive Man
• Watchmen Babies in V for Vacation
• Strawberry, who is almost too accurate to be awesome (almost)
• League of Extraordinary Freelancers
• Too bad about all that Marge stuff
• First tangible proof that Dr. Nick did in fact die in The Simpsons Movie (Dr. Nick's off-market Azaria-voiced replacement)
• The post-credits gutter-swipe at the studios who think they don't need writers.

I actually watched it a second time start to finish before the last credit had even dropped.

Whoa... two Strawberry titles in one day. Cosmic.

Posted by tederick at 6:00 PM in simps
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Posted by tederick at 7:42 AM in simps & vagina fridays
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The only nominal element curiously missing is a musical number; and the only true concession to the Friday night morality of the multiplex is a gag shot of Bart's dick. Otherwise, it's Simpsons through and through. Big glorious frame (and computer-enhanced animation and colouring) notwithstanding, it's amazing how cleanly the 88-minute movie effort fits within the emotional rhythms of the 400-strong flotilla of 22-minute episodes.

Click here to read my review.

Posted by tederick at 3:46 PM in reviews & simps
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Double that grin and give me another. The universe has a hell of an awesome sense of humour. (And dramatic timing! Wooooo.)

I can't sleep.

Hey, I heard about this a while ago but it's sort of driving me nuts: apparently the original intention in Pirates 3 was that if Elizabeth remained faithful to Will for the 10 years he captained the Dutchman, he'd be freed when he came back. Which is very specifically not what is said in the film (I've checked... four times); in the film, Will's fate is that he will have to captain the Dutchman for eternity and only return to Elizabeth (and Will Jr.) once every ten years. But apparently the deleted scene that contains the original intended concept will appear on the DVD, thus providing irritating non-canonical referencing for the folks who want to believe that it all turned out all right in the end. Isn't it so much better if Will is out there on the Dutchman for the rest of time? Like, he's there right now even? He watched Elizabeth grow old and die and his son grow up and his son's son grow up and so on and so forth, and all that time served as the guide for those souls lost at sea, because he had finally become a whole, individuated, selfless person? Isn't that what his story is about? That is a freakin' terrific end to that tale, not "she was faithful to him for ten years so he got out of jail free." Elizabeth got the Empress, Will got the Dutchman, and they pulled a Kyle Reese and Sarah Connor: "in one night, we loved a lifetime's worth."

Sorry. That's been kicking the back of my head for 2 months. I needed to vent.

Did you know there's a Simpsons MOVIE??? I know! Insanicrap. Well it's a pretty goddamn terrific movie, too, and that is heartwarming. It took 'em 18 damn years but they didn't screw it up. I mean there's no Jasper in the thing to speak of and it doesn't exactly rip America in half with incisive critical commentary, but it makes you remember just how much we love the Fab Five, and it has the Spider-Pig song, and Boob Lady and Alaska and Bart's penis and a truly definitive hero moment for Homer J. Simpson. That's pretty tight, Simpsons folks. Pretty damn tight.

Hmmm. Still can't sleep. (Obviously.) Maybe I should listen to the thrumming of Sebulba's engine... that always does me.

You know what? I've got a pretty good crew. Between the roommates and Teen Girl Squad and the Box and the e.team and the soccer team and the Yorkies and the FORPies and the fam and whatnot, I'd say we're fairly well unstoppable right now. We've pretty much got this fucking thing covered.

Posted by tederick at 1:27 AM in pirates & poetical & simps
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Turns out it's a lot more fun to do me as a kid. You know, like how Muppet Babies are inherently cuter than Muppets.

Posted by tederick at 4:18 PM in simps
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It's not a patch on the South Park one, but you can't deny the appeal of designing your Simpsonsverse self.

No tattoo options though. simpsonsmovie.com

Incidentally, thanks for being polite about it but you're right, I am an idiot. The Simpsons Movie comes out next week, not this week.

Posted by tederick at 9:22 AM in simps
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As it turns out, doing yoga with a scab the size of a baked potato on your left arm is a study in compromise. Yeah.

I am very nearly done Order of the Phoenix. That means I'm a day behind, but Teen Girl Squad had my Half-Blood Prince until just now so there's not much I could have done about it. Stupid girls and their poisonous reading habits! Marrr. But anyways, I just read page 698, which serves as the basis for the story I use whenever asked how obsessed I am with Harry Potter. Goes like this:

Cast your mind back to the summer of 2003, when Phoenix came out. After a marathon weekend reading session that had got me into the climax at the Department of Mysteries, and in no fit state to deal with whatever "main character death" Rowling had been advertising for months, I happened upon the following passage on page 698:

"But the Death Eater Hermione had just struck dumb made a sudden slashing movement with his wand; a streak of what looked like purple flame passed right across Hermione's chest. She gave a tiny 'Oh!' as though of surprise and crumpled on to the floor, where she lay motionless."

I turned to page 699 to continue... and page 699 was blank.

It's not actually blank. I'm looking at it right now; there are words on it. But on that day, after reading that paragraph, my brain turned page 699 white, just in case page 699 contained the confirmation that Hermione Jane Granger was, in fact, dead.

So that's how obsessed with Harry Potter I am.

All in all I'd say seeing the Phoenix flick this week was a mistake because it totally torpedoed the last act of the book for me. As a cautionary measure I'm going to leave off seeing The Simpsons until well after I'm done Book Seven. Just don't have enough room in the brain right now. It's a shame, though, because there will be Batman.

Posted by tederick at 12:30 PM in h-pot & miss hermione granger & movies & simps
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"Not only do I enjoy Michael Bay movies, but I also really enjoy when cars turn into robots and then do karate." - Transformers reviews pouring in at AICN, and that sentence sums it up: nine lead words that completely invalidate this individual as not just a film critic but as a human fucking being, and then a closer joke so in line with exactly why I'm going to go see that motherfucking movie anyway that I can't say shit.

Same site different page, Vern remains the Die Hard fan to rally behind, as demonstrated by his indomitable use of non-motherfucker motherfucker quips. Rory Kennedy's smiling up there somewhere.

Over here, Abe Sapien + Maddy Gaiman = possibly the cutest thing ever.

Who's a good pig???

Done Goblet; onto Phoenix. Goal is to get Phoenix done the day the movie comes out and then spend the last 9 days doing Prince. I'm right on schedule, and yes, I needed to have a schedule to read Harry Potter books. Or as I said to a woman at yoga today, "I'm a project manager. If it doesn't have a workback schedule, it doesn't exist."

Posted by tederick at 12:41 PM in h-pot & movies & simps
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Ah, water. I was already all into water, but now I drink water pretty much exclusively. Well, water and coffee, but never together. Ewww! Yeah anyways this is something I should have done a long time ago but dropping pop and juice out of my diet has already had fairly spectacular results. I actually went down (up?) a belt notch - whichever the thinner one is, that's where I live now.

Last night I was flipping channels after Heroes (ick!) and I came upon an episode of the third season of Slings & Arrows. I fuckin' love that show and it's a mark at just how spectacularly bad the Canadian television industry is at promoting itself that I had no idea there even was a third season. Shitheads. It's the Sarah Polley season! (All Canadian television programs are required, by law, to have a Sarah Polley season. Just like all indie Canadian films are required to cast Callum Keith Rennie.) Anyways the season's coming out on DVD in July so I'll finally get to get caught up on my Lear. Actually I might have a Lear summer - see it at Stratford, burn through my Ran DVD, and watch Slings & Arrows. Daughters, man. Useless!

I've been meaning to comment on the collapse of Premiere magazine, if only because the mag had a small space in my pre-film school education (the Iron Jim article back in '94, about Cameron on the set of True Lies, was near-biblical for me, though that led to problems later on). God knows their writing went into the ground in the tail end of the '90s, but for a few years there, Premiere was a terrific little oversize magazine. As with all things, I worry about what happens to the art form when responsible criticism on even this relative scale (Premiere ain't Les Cahiers du Cinema, folks) can't cut it. One of these days Ebert's gonna up and die on us, and then what are we gonna do?

Meanwhile, we finally have the answer to what the Simpsons movie is going to bring to the table that you couldn't get on the TV show: Bart Simpson's penis. My money's on circumcised. How about you?

I've been knocking this script idea called Glow around in my head for some time now; I think I've mentioned it before. It's based on a first draft of a ghost story I wrote about a girl who appears in an old black and white photo at my cottage, who no one can put a name to. I've tried launching the script a few times before with no success; something just ain't there yet. But I feel like all the pieces have been revolving around in my head lately and sooner or later they'll click into place. I want to be writing again. (Er, something that isn't a comic book.)

It's my parents anniversary today - thirty-five [expletive deleted] years! Man, that snuck up on me. Which is my way of saying "no gift."

Posted by tederick at 8:24 AM in ebert & foodin' & movies & simps & the process & tv
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Let me see if I've got this right: on The Simpsons, Lisa pretended to be an Indian and Bart married a pregnant chick, and then on Family Guy, Peter did crack while Stewie begged Lois to step on his cubes. Oh and the pregnant chick was played by Natalie Portman and yes, the fact that the animated character's hair was blonde made it fundamentally impossible for me to guess whose voice it was. ("Britney Murphy...? ...Drew Barrymore?")

Well anyways. Here's the rundown:

• Debt: under a grand.
• Terra: under a grand.
• Steven Spielberg: under a grand.

I am determined to run this laptop clean off the road. The indicator is telling me I have 7 minutes of power left. I will watch this pansy bitch go dark, my friends. I will be here when it happens. Incidentally this pisses me off - not the Linux joke but the ad campaign generally. It took me a few passes to figure out whether the ads were supposed to be pro-Mac or anti-Mac because the Mac guy is so clearly an example of what you get when you hire a marketing company to come up with the exact white male who represents Macdom, i.e., a shithead.

Here's Miniature Fuckin' Hermione by the way, for those keeping score.

Well whatever. Today was a good day. I updated the Tederick Films section of the site for the first time in forever, and my bio, too, which seemed to predate my I'm-over-Bearshark period in some ways. I finished sending Standoff to both On the Lot and the Worldwide Short Film Festival. My project at work sailed through its brand review, Chad and I got the second issue laid out, and my work for '07 is crystallizing both at actual work and at home (work). So... yes. Aside from the fact that I am hungry and tired and have had little besides cheese to eat today, things are on the up and up.

"I don't know what to do! It's like Hamlet only inconsequential!!" - Matt Brown

Posted by tederick at 9:08 PM in i hate mac & miss hermione granger & simps & tederick films & tederickdotcomdotcom & toys!
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Did an episode of The Simpsons just present the most positive depiction of human sexuality in the history of American television? And then define "faggot" as dictionary text on screen?

Posted by tederick at 9:02 PM in simps
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It is so hot that I was wearing my soccer shorts earlier to go do the Mamo and I swear my balls were actually hanging below the hem of the shorts. That's the fun thing about being a male in this heat - you get to see the lengths your body is willing to go to in order to preserve the testicle's sperm-making facility. And each and every time, I'm surprised. Each and every time, "Wow, I've never felt balls swinging around down there before." It is so fucking hot in my bedroom that you actually can't do anything but sit and sweat. I went downstairs and watched my favourite episode of The Simpsons, "Bart vs. Australia." It is my favourite episode in a very arbitrary way. It is my favourite episode because I needed something to say when asked, and it seemed like a good candidate. I think it's actually quite excellent. I think it has everything I'd want from a Simpsons episode (except Jasper). But as with all arbitrary pick-ums in one's life, there's an air of dissatisfaction about the proceedings, like a shotgun wedding or a gift with purchase. Yeah, it's shiny, but it's also just so much more clutter. Of course, being as that they're nearing 400 episodes, I don't get asked what my favourite is very often any more, because I think the critical masses are aware that in such a wide and varied field, such laser-like focus becomes meaningless. You know, someday, humans will be able to look back on what was wrought in 18, 19, whateverhowmany seasons of The Simpsons, and only then will they be able to grasp what the vastity means (or doesn't mean). Until then, it's beyond the human mind. Even efforts in enormous selectivity like Jasper Online - which was founded in order to restrict my Simpsons gaze on as narrow a part of that universe as possible - is so fucking big now that I can barely keep up with it. We are reaching infinite space. Folded time. Multiverses of yellow skin, overbites, and big, googly eyes, where all is meaningful and meaningless at the same time. The profundity of endlessness.

I may already be having tonight's fever dream. I swear my testicles are lying on my feet right now.

Posted by tederick at 11:06 PM in simps
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It turns out that the television season is over. Boy, that one rocketed by. It seems only yesterday I was power-loading episodes of Season One of Lost at 6 or 7 a day to get over a bad breakup (hmmm... it was Deep Space Nine last time), and now the whole second year has come and gone in what seems like the blink of an eye. Traditionally at this point I'd do my top five shows for the year. But you know what? I only have two.

House won last year over Lost, but this year I'd call it a tie. I don't think either show was quite as good on the whole this year as they were last year, but they both also had better single episodes this year than they had last year, so call it a draw. I really can't pick between them; I can only say that they're the only two shows I genuinely give a fuck about on a weekly basis. As I've said many times before, and contrary to popular opinion, I don't watch much TV.

The Simpsons could hardly be put on any "top" list; overall it was a pretty crappy season, although there were three or four episodes that I'd rate absolutely outstanding. I also fell off the Amazing Race wagon this year; neither of the last two installments captured my imagination, and I'm beginning to get that icky, post-Survivor hangover feeling again, so this might be it for me. Family Guy was solid overall, but in its reincarnated state feels less like broadcast television and more like preexisting internet content. So for some reason it doesn't count.

The only new show I picked up was How I Met Your Mother, which is utter trash in every conceivable sense... yet I can't look away. It gives me dirty feelings inside, because like the Jedi once said, I know I'm better than this. And yet. Not with the looking away.

The PVR is empty, the DVD shelf is full, and life would be perfect if they'd just figured a way to put the second season of Lost on DVD in June, instead of October.

Posted by tederick at 9:34 AM in 4-8-15-16-23-42 & dr. house & simps & tv
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All right, I'll admit it: I put absolutely no time into developing an April Fool's gag for the site this year. So... April Fool's? The joke's on you? Whatever. Overall I'd say the web-based gags this year have been frightfully tame, although I do rather like Sideshow's limited edition six-inch "defeated" Darth Maul.

And this might be a gag but more likely isn't: an actual honest-to-god Simpsons movie, and it's only a year away. Of course, having not seen Ice Age 2 (because that would never happen), I can't verify whether this trailer actually played or not... but I guess we'll find out soon enough.

Posted by tederick at 10:15 AM in simps
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Tonight was pretty much the first time in my life that I just did not want to watch The Simpsons at all. Didn't want to watch it now, didn't want to watch it later... didn't want to watch it ever again. And yet, forced myself to do it, and.... well... best ... episode .... ever.

Sure, I have a particular fondness for flashback play and for the use of rings within rings to really fuck with the expectations of conventional narrative, not to mention berserker humour that is servant to absolutely no master but its own whimsy, so maybe I was particularly prone in this case... or as prone as I've been since the Linguo episode or the time Homer got raped by the panda. But man howdy, regardless of how they did it, that show did a number on me but good. I feel like I just got laid by God.

Posted by tederick at 8:39 PM in simps
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Fuck me sideways, this is trippy.

Third linkspam in ten minutes, I really oughta shut the fuck up and get to work.

[sing-songy] Procraaaaaaaasturbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaationnnnnnnnnn.....

Posted by tederick at 5:06 PM in simps
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Jasper Beardly.

Did everybody get that?

Posted by tederick at 8:56 PM in simps
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Things that Springfield has that a like-sized small town might not otherwise have:

A gorge.
A movie studio.
An international airport.
A river, a lake, and an ocean.
A mountain range.
A sea port.
A military base.
A single bridge out of town which, if destroyed, traps all citizens within the city limits.

Posted by tederick at 10:30 AM in simps
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Cletus and Brandine: husband and wife, mother and son.

How loud was your living room at around 8:07 last night?

Posted by tederick at 10:12 AM in simps
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Well there's good news and there's bad news: the good news is that last night's 6/49 jackpot ended up being a whopping fifty-four million dollars, a Canadian record. The bad news is that the winner's in Alberta (and I am not). So I guess that train ride's gonna have to wait a little longer. Fortunately, King Kong's three hours long. (Think that doesn't connect? You're wrong.)

Oh, and to continue a discussion we were having earlier: there are now Kong Arms to go with the Hulk Hands and Thing Feet. The new superhero to be composed of these items grows weirder all the time, yes? What's next, Wonder Woman Kneecaps?

The other day, just to see, I decided to find out if I was any good at drawing Homer:

So it turns out I'm no good at drawing Homer. I am somewhat comforted, however, by the fact that I draw Homer the way Homer draws Homer.

There is a small shard of glass sticking out of my left leg. It keeps changing shape; sometimes it has square edges, and sometimes it is rounded, and sometimes it is a triangle and sometimes it is a rod. Charisma Carpenter put it there. I've been awake two hours now and it still won't go away.

Posted by tederick at 10:41 AM in dreams & pj's playground & simps
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Every single season, rafts of Simpsons fans bitch to me endlessly about how the show just isn't as good as it used to be. It's season seventeen now, and this has been going on (in my memory anyway) since at least season ten, and probably a few years before that. Hell, even I bitched about season nine. (Ugh... season nine.) This year's no different from any other; after each and every episode I encounter at least one person who wants to tell me that the show's no good any more.

This has to stop.

I'm not one to make definitive aesthetic judgements about anything, but in this case you're all just Wrongy Wrongersons. I might even, next time I hear from any of you, be forced to call you Wrongface McGee. You are wrong with a capital Wrong. Here's why, and it's the grand secret to The Simpsons over at least the past decade of its existence (and possibly the whole thing): The Simpsons is the television equivalent of chili con carne. Cook it up and eat it straight off the stove, and it's pretty good. Leave it overnight, though, and it's the best fucking thing you've ever tasted.

I've been watching reruns from season sixteen over the past couple of weeks, and episodes that didn't make me laugh once during their original airings last year now have me rolling on the ground with tears leaking out of my eyes. The Simpsons is the quintessential example of a show that ages well - that's why we're all chock-full of Simpsons verbiage which we whip out in conversation at any appropriate (or inappropriate) moment. That's why we really could organize a fundraiser evening where everyone is required to speak only in Simpsons quotes, and could probably pull it off for hours on end. And the stuff that you instantly pass over on Sunday night at 8:00 because it just doesn't seem to be as sharp as the old episodes is the stuff you'll be quoting ad nauseum a year from now. Dollars to doughnuts, when that shiny Moe Szylak-headed DVD set of season fourteen comes rolling around, you'll buy it without a second thought because half of the episodes on it are "your favourite." Like the song said: They'll never stop The Simpsons. Have no fears, we have stories for years. Like, how about a crazy wedding? Where something happens, and doo doo doo doo doo?

This rant was brought to you by Jasper Online, still kicking ass in season seventeen.

Posted by tederick at 12:54 PM in simps
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