Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - Goo Goo Gai Pan

Episode Date: July 22, 2026

"Jub-Jub can't take care of me when I'm old and sick. All he can do is eat me when I'm dead" - Selma Bouvier The perpetually unlucky in love Selma suddenly experiences menopause symptoms, making her mothering urge rise to previously unseen levels. Thankfully, she finds China's baby girl surplus will solve all of her problems—as long as she's willing to play Homer's wife. Support this podcast and get over 200 ad-free bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow the official Twitter, @TalkSimpsonsPod, not to mention Bluesky and Instagram!

This podcast is brought to you by patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. Head there to check out exclusive podcasts like Talking Futurama, Talk King of the Hill, The What a Cartoon movie podcast, and tons more. Ho's this event or product. Ahoy, hoy, everybody, and welcome to Talking Simpsons, where we give menopause a round of menopause. I'm one of your host, the Year of the Porcupine Celebrator Bob Mackie, and this is our chronological exploration of the Simpsons, who is here with me today as always. Waiting till the Dramboean sleeping pills kick in, it's Henry Gilbert.

In this week's episode is Gugu Guy Pan. March, when are we going to tell Homer? He has to pretend to be my husband. Wait till the Drambooy and Sleeping Pills kick in. Hey, look a dragon. Hello, Homer. Give me your peanuts and you can fly on my back. This episode originally aired on March 13, 2005, and as always, Henry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history.

The Blue Sky and Fox animated film Robots Tops the box office. Wonder shows in debuts on MTV2. And Donkey Kong Jungle Beat is released for the GameCube. So, Robots, have we seen this film, Henry? I have watched it when a co-worker put it on at a video store that I worked at, if that counts. But if that doesn't count, then, no, I have not seen this movie.

one of the many roles for Robin Williams in this kind of sour period of his life and it also felt like the blue sky guys were just saying can we do DreamWorks but cheaper with even more celebrities I did write down at least well these are just four of the celebrities I think there might be even more

but Ewan McGregor Hallie Berry Greg Kinneer and Robin Williams in all the roles there this is not notable in any way I don't think we'll ever cover it on what a cartoon movie I can't think of anything to say about this film what if they're a robots what if celebrities voice them

I think you can understand what would happen from there. The only thing else I remember about robots, and this is the number one movie in theaters. And maybe if you're a Gen Z to young millennial crossover, maybe it was a big deal to you. But I remember it has easy achievements. Like the robots game would be on the easy video game achievements list, I think. Or man, maybe I'm getting confused with another one, though,

because this would have been 05. Like the 360 is now until the summer. So, you know what? I think I'm wrong on that, actually. I'm even getting that confused with another piece, of like shovelware cartoon movie stuff. Are we still doing these easy achievement games? Does anyone care anymore as Microsoft is burying the Xbox brand alive?

Well, I care to the extent that I want to get to 100,000, and I'm about 7,000 away right now. And then what happens? I mean, nothing, nothing happens. Well, trophies don't matter either. All these things are stupid, but the achievements were murdered by Xbox, like how they murdered everything with the Xbox 1, that's when they started doing like free achievement points or zero point.

achievement point. They just muddied the water so much. Hey, but speaking of video games, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat, a game that ended up mattering a lot to the future of Mario games, though. We didn't care much for it back then. And for all those interested, this is not Donkey Kong. This is not the game where you played Happy Birthday on the Bongoes while Donkey Kong danced around on the screen. This is a platform where you control with Bongoes. And the team that made this would go on to make games like Super Mario Odyssey. So it's all starting here in the very good Donkey Kong platformer that I've never played, but I don't know if I want to play a bongo-based platformer. It's probably the best you can do with this peripheral. It's so funny, they just built and sold that bongo thing for its own game or two games, and they realize, like, we have these giant bongos taking up space in people's living rooms

of the Nintendo crazies. And so why don't we make an experimental game? The way it plays is basically like one mini-game in a level of Mario Galaxy or Mario Odyssey of like move the Wii remotes up and down to make Mario walk, that kind of thing. And Wonder Shosen, a big favorite of you and minds, also one that, you know what, is 21 years old and has some things. Like all comedy, it comes with a giant asterisk attached because Wonder Shosen is one of the cruelest and most shocking television shows to ever air. That's what it dabbled in. And 21 years later, the kind of ironic.

racism that, hey, is in the Simpsons episode too. Yep. Does not age super well. So I believe you have to be at least over 40 to kind of understand what was going on with Wonder Shosen and why the creators were so furious about the state of the world. I think we need another Wonder Shosen for our modern era because the creators were mad about George W. Bush being reelected a second time. That is what fueled the hatred that powered Wonder Showson. Now we're on Trump, too. Where is the next Wonder Shosen, I ask you? And from the demographic point of things, like, it is worth noting, and this was in

an oral history of it, I remember from a few years back for an anniversary, is it Chapman and Lee, the two creators and main performers in the show. I believe they are both, you know, they're biracial, like have a Chinese, Jewish and African-American background. So it's not like these are just two white guys doing funny accent jokes the entire time. It's worth noting that they were speaking about their own backgrounds and ethnicities. But yeah, they're still, but they were, they were attacking the garbage of that era with a sledgehammer while everybody else was trying to be nice. Like, it wasn't a time for subtlety. Yeah.

It's a very mean show. I'd love to highlight it. We have to be careful, though, as to which episode we select. Because trying to show that to people over the past 10 years, you kind of have to go in saying, okay, it was 2005, it was 2006. Here's what was happening. Here's the kind of jokes that were allowed on television. And they're going beyond that.

Another thing I loved about wonder shows and was, it does these things that are shocking. in it. But if you've grown up on YouTube videos that can do anything your entire life, it's not that shocking, I think, but the important thing was that they did have a sensor that they were battling with. They weren't just, well, actually YouTube

sensors a lot of stuff. But what I am saying is like MTV2 was a cable channel that had lines. And another fun thing in winter shows was watching them dance along the line and you're like, how do they get away with this on MTV2? This is not HBO. Yes. And I will say there are other shows

are just as alienating and crazy. Like Xavier Renegate Angel, we did cover that. On what a cartoon and also The Heart She Holler, a very demented live-action, twin-pexy, southern gothic kind of show. Very twisted, very disgusting. I've only seen the first season. I want to watch it all.

But I kind of love everything these guys do. I like their vibe. I really enjoy their stuff too. I haven't kept up with them as much. I think one of the last things Chadman worked on was the Louis C.K. film that'll ever be released. So there's also that asses. to it too. But I like remembering the good times of watching wonder shows and how every season

they ran out of budget and time. And both season finalies were joke episodes that wasted your time and had very little content. I think the patience episode might be one of the greatest things to ever air on television for as much as it wasted your time. Yes, it's so great. It was also their dumping ground for like, ah, these sketches didn't work. Let's cut them down to five seconds and make the joke of just showing it as fast as we can. And if you don't know the show, you probably know memes such as one of the many children they have asking questions in the Sesame Street parody style of it is one of my favorites is the kid dressed as little Hitler talking to a guy with a cowboy head on. It's like, which of our outfits represents genocide more? That was a great

joke. That segment is called Beat Kids, because that is the kind of humor they're laying down on Wondershosen. Kids on the street. Kids on the beat. Beek kids. And so yes, the era of Wander Shosen had begun. As we were also watching this episode, of The Simpsons. Yes, and our special guest this week is no one. Henry and I are trying to work ahead this summer. We have a life outside this house, you know. Yes.

We only spend 23 hours a day here. There is no grand conspiracy when we don't have a guest, by the way. Sometimes you want to turn around an episode quickly and work ahead in our backlog. No one said, I'm not touching Goo Guy Pan with a 10-foot column pole. We're just doing this on our own. Yeah, it helps to get ahead. And these episodes, we have a ton to say in them. Believe me, I did more research on.

Chinese history than anyone had expected us to on this. Yes. I think our new motto here is, I'm not learning ancient Hebrew. There's only so much we can be expected to educate ourselves when it comes to recording a weekly podcast. So we're doing the best we can, but neither Henry nor myself are Chinese experts, let's say. Yes, yes. Obviously, though, we do represent the Chinese government on this and apologize for any things they've done, like, for sure. We support them and the century of American humiliation. We're living in it, and it rules. I mean, President Z. If you want us get more on board, we have just, if a $50,000 a month patron shows up on our Patreon, we're not going to tell the government who it is. Look for us to sneak in subliminal

messages about the Chinese government and every future podcast. This episode, though, I have been waiting for us to get to this a little bit just in that almost a decade ago, we've talked in person to the writer of this episode and he was talking about it then. This is his personal favorite episode he wrote for sentimental reasons. Yes, and it's a new. writer. Let's talk about Lawrence Talbot. Actually, let's not talk about Lawrence Talbot because that is his pseudonym. This episode is written by Dana Gould, and the pseudonym is there because he did

not want to piss off the Chinese government when he was going to adopt a third child from China. And Lawrence Talbot, of course, is a reference to The Wolfman. He is the titular Wolfman in 1941's The Wolfman, which is a perfect Dana Gould choice for a pseudonym. That should have tipped off his

Chinese handlers. I mean, it's a knock on his Chinese handler's ability to observe him, but they're not like, wait a minute, It's Simpsons writer that's a reference who has the same name as an old movie monster that Dana Gould wrote this. Dana Gould at the time and he was still on the commentary, him and his then-wife, Sue Nagel. They have been very open about adopting kids.

They have three kids and they adopted them via the Chinese government. And this was because Al Jean had heard these stories or had seen Dana Gould have to leave the country for weeks to pick up his children that I think it was Al Jean finally suggested, hey, what if we just did an episode about that, except it's the childless Selma Bouvier who is going to be doing the adoption? Yeah, and these kind of international adoptions are becoming a hot button issue in the early aughts, if you remember correctly, Angelina Jolie also adopted three children from different countries.

None of them were China, by the way. But still, it was becoming a thing people were talking about. Like, oh, did you know that other countries have children that need adoptions? And you could do that yourself. I'm sure it helps to be a celebrity because I'm not going to say I know a lot about the topic. But adopting internationally feels a lot more expensive than the already expensive adoption process within your own country. Yeah, Dina Gould, if you've been a longtime fan of his like we have, you've heard him talk about this and in his stand up so much. He has great.

He has a great joke about being approached by people with his children and when they can observe that the parents are not Chinese. that they ask, you know, oh, why else you adopted? Why? And he goes, I'm not going to tell you, stranger I just met. He's very private. But I think other times he joked of like he is not a fan of his genetic stock he's coming from and we'd rather not continue it on, I think. He said the Gould's in here, damn it. And the three children are now adults. He posts about them quite a lot, a lot of fun, proud dad stuff. He wishes him happy birthday like every birthday and even adds their accounts. I think they're all adults now.

Definitely one is nearly done with college, and I think the first is done with college. I believe Lulu, who Ling is based on the first child they adopted, she is probably 24 or 25 right now. And I even seen Dana Gould post about how his new wife and he's happily remarried that he calls her bonus mom to his kids. They seem to all really love each other.

Though I had not, when we've talked about Dana Gould's married life before, and it's relation to the character of Sue Nagel's character, Lindsay Nagel, in the show. Did this come up before? I did not realize that Sue Nagel is married to a woman now, apparently. Yes, I think we have covered that. She remarried. I guess that is when she came out of the closet. I don't think she was publicly out before that, although I'm no Sue Nagel expert.

Yes. Okay, then it did come up before. I memory hold it then, and it was like a surprise all over again. Like, wait, she's married to the screenwriter of multiple things she produced. Knowing Data Gould, he might have a few jokes about this situation. See, I wonder, yes, we heard him do some divorce jokes. And I wonder, I haven't watched his recent comedy. Like, he could easily get some good material out of my wife left me for a woman.

Were that to be the jokes he would say if that were the situation he were joking about. Yes, it's the kind of joke a guy from his generation would definitely make. I wonder if he does have a little bit of like, well, you know, I don't want to be too mean. She's the mom of my kids. And also, I mean, now that these kids are adults, I want to. wonder what, you know, Lulu Alice and third unnamed one I couldn't find the name of. Stitchface. What did Lulu Alice and Stitchface think of being the subject of not just a stand-up, but also

this episode, like as adults? What is like to grow up like that? Well, if you rewind to our Dana Gould interview live podcast from about nine years ago, Dana Gould said they don't care. They'd rather watch Bob's burgers. Although that was before The Simpsons was widely available on streaming. So maybe they are all Simpsons addicts now. I mean, if The Simpsons is more popular by the time they're,

get to college. I think if I'm Lulu or Alice, I'm playing that card all over the place with friends who like, if somebody sends, you know, Homer walking backwards into the Bush's meme, then I'm saying, hey, you know, I'm actually in the show The Simpsons. What? And then boom, you're the coolest person in the room. I was probably in Tapped Out, although you can't check anymore. Right. The Ling Ling, Ling, Wikipedia page, or Ling. Ling, yeah. Homer calls her that, but it's just late. That Wikipedia page for her has very few entries, so the tap-down one takes up a lot of space in it. You might be thinking of a joke where Homer wants Kentucky Fried Panda and he says it's finger Ling Ling Good?

Right, yes, that is true. I probably, yes, I think I'm just hearing it in my head when he said that. But I apologize to the character of Ling. She's only Ling and I won't. Even if I wrote it down in my notes incorrectly is Lingling, I will not read it back that way. Well, I have some important China updates I discovered through some light research on the gigantic country full of people. named China. So China, they banned all inter-country adoptions in 2024. So this is not happening anymore. And China's one-child policy, which was in place for a very long time, it expanded in 2015 to a two-child policy. And now it is currently at a three-child policy since 2021. So I think there is less of a need for these sorts of adoptions now that people are allowed by the government to have more babies without fines or penalties and so on.

Yeah, Bob, I saw a little of that, too, of just I had not kept up with the one-child policy thing, which was so controversial and talked about, like, a lot in the U.S. when discussion of the Chinese government happened as we were young. It was a fact of life our entire lives that I didn't even know that they had ended it or that apparently, like, demographically, China is going through its own, you know, depopulation or just like a slower birth rate even in China these days, apparently. as Lisa will say in the episode that this was because there were a lot of unwanted daughters there because usually thanks to other societal things or legal matters if you have a boy they have more legal

power in the structure than a girl so you don't want to keep a daughter if she's the firstborn. That is how you end up with mainly daughters to be adopted in the Chinese adoption system. And this is a Simpsons Travelog episode and we always expect them to make fun of the country they're visiting. Although here I

will say it feels a little more pointed, and I feel like I don't want to speak for the man, but I don't think Dana Gould has any affinity for China or its people, because if you listen to his stories, if you listen to his take on the commentary, the idea from him is, this country is crazy, and we rescued children from it, the end. I don't like China. My time there is full of wacky stories. And the 2005 depiction of China is very quaint in this episode, because the idea is, look at these silly backwards people. Their horrible, oppressive government only hurts them, look at the crazy things they do and the way the society is built.

Now we're in 2026, and the idea in the mainstream is China will destroy us. We must fight them at every turn. Even Democrats bring up China frequently as we have to beat them. We have to destroy them. They're kicking our ass. Obviously, the president of the United States on the Republican side made an entire plank of his campaigning. It was just saying Changna over and over again. But yeah, Democrats like Senator Slotkin, I remember seeing her going like,

We can't get Chinese, do we really want to have Chinese apps or Chinese electric cars here? Because those are going to like be watching you for the Chinese government. Like, oh, no, the government's spying on me through a thing I bought. I would never want that. No. Yes, exactly. I don't know. I mean, I feel like with two Trump terms behind us now, I mean, we're in the middle of Trump too, by the way.

We don't really have a leg to stand on when it comes to talking about corrupt governments. And it is always funny that you'll see this comparison. when Trump does something crazy or when civil rights are curtailed in America, the common sentiment is, is this North Korea? Are we in China? What's hidden behind? Like, are we Asian people? No.

We shouldn't stand for this. Yes, I forget who originally invented this, but this is like one of those Twitter and social media things you see. But like the most American thing happens ever. And then people who observe it, what are we? An Asian person? Like, yes. And I mean, not to go on too long about this,

but the stories you would hear about Kim, Kim Jong-il in the early 2000s. The funny stories, they'd be traded around on the internet. We'd all be making jokes about them online. They're in like Team America World Police. The exact same things are happening with the U.S. President right now. Like his big UFC birthday party,

that would have been a Kim Jong-il story 25 years ago. We'd all laugh at it. Like, oh, that crazy country. And the same five billionaires who are all his friends are buying all the media and making the TV shows and movies and sports events that he says he wants. Like, yes, it's oligarchical,

while technically they're not the government, it's just the billionaires own it. And what same deal of like, oh, the human rights abuses. Like, oh, yeah, I would hate for the agent of the government to just storm into my house and shoot me in the face. That would never happen in America. Like, I know this could be called what aboutism

or just as an excuse of like, oh, you're just making excuses for China. It's like I think you and I are both in agreement of, let's sort our shit out first here before we ever complain about human rights. And I don't remember the last time China actually invaded another country. country and did a genocide in this century. I can't think of that at the very least in this century. Yes, it's fun, in quotes, to look back at the previous kind of patronizing look at China compared to the state they're in today, which is the boogeyman. They're at fault for everything that's going wrong here, according to a lot of politicians. Not us. Look at them. I think from Gould's viewpoint, if I were to guess at it to, like, he's not a guy who would have ever traveled to Beijing for his own, like, vacation. I don't think he had a personal.

interested in one way or the other. From the stories he tells, it sounds a little like, you know, a hostage negotiation to get a potential daughter from somebody. So why would he like the people who he's trying to negotiate a life from in a way? Like, I can understand that. It's an entirely, he can view it as a very combative situation

that he's in and just views all of the rules. And hoops he has to jump through to adopt a child that he wants to give a rich child's life and give it the best life possible. he's like just hand me the kid why must it be all this work like I can understand how that you know gives you frustration and you want to joke about it like I understand but then we get jokes about the bureaucracy and frankly I'd love a bureaucracy where if I follow the rules something would happen it would lead to B there'd be like a direct system in place instead of like where do I go

what do I do how long are you sitting on this and again to hear things about you know like social capital or their oppressive internet and all that it's like we bought TikTok from them so you can't talk about Israel's genocide in something. Or every social media or television channel is being bought by people to silence dissent of the president. So I don't. It's really hard to take shots of China for right now from America. If anything, they're America's role model when it comes to human rights abuses. They're like, man, if only we could get away with that.

Yes. Yeah. It's just like how the Nazis looked at America's laws and Jim Crow South and like, boy, we got to start working hard to get to where these guys are at. Yeah, and also like the slaughter of indigenous people. They're like, what if we tried something like that? You guys are on to something. Yeah. Another thing that is funny about our timing of covering this is that we just did the King

of the Hill episode, Won't You Pee My Neighbor, which that one, it is not about China. It is about the Laotian New Year's Festival, but the Buddhist monk jokes in it. They could have made easy jokes like this one in that episode, but the point of the episode is, Much more about like, hey, respect this religion like you would other ones. Like, it's not all a joke to us. We're not all clowns. Yeah. In typical King of the Hill fashion, the joke is that the monks are basically humorless.

Yes, yes. They're not like secret karate masters or whatever, a kung fu masters. I think this episode goes to too many obvious places in general. Yeah. That's a problem with it. I will say it's very odd that we get a Patty episode and then two episodes later we get a Selma episode. Both Patty and some episodes change their characters forever.

It's weird that it happens in one. season and so close together. Yes. Yeah. If Patty and or Selma got one episode in a season, that was a good season for them. Like there are often seasons where Patty and Selma get like two minutes of screen time total. So to have separated by one episode, both in production order and air order, Patty episode and a Selma episode is very impressive. And they wouldn't even do that now in the show. I did notice, well, there's two things about this with regards to Disney Plus. I did to see when I pulled up the Disney Plus version of it, Lawrence Talbot name gone. It is written by Dana Gould as the credit on there.

Maybe that was like the syndicated version of the credits or something or like a later airings version of the credits because the DVD version, which I watched definitely has Lawrence Talbot on there. Oh yeah. There's a credited name. I don't know why it would have been updated, but yes, I paused it. I was like, oh wait, they did update it for the Disney Plus version. And also in Disney Plus, like this episode is got a lot of headlines in 20. Because to read the New York Times headline, A Simpsons episode Lampoon Chinese Censorship in Hong Kong, it vanished.

Hmm. Makes sense? When Disney Plus launched for Hong Kong viewers for that region, which often gets separate levels of freedom of internet access than mainland China gets, thanks to the history of Hong Kong, which I'll go into now for two hours. But they did get Disney Plus, and people notice that without any, reference or any explanation from Disney or the Chinese government, this episode is not on the Disney Plus app.

This is their Starkraving Dad. Yes. What if they did get Stark Raven Dad because in China they love Michael Jackson still? That's not a problem. You were talking about this off Mike earlier like a week or so ago, but this is something that Disney would not do today. So I guess we can applaud Fox for their gutsiness even though they're being very patronizing towards China.

But to have statements about Tibet in this episode, I feel like Disney would not like that because they want their slop to appeal to as much as possible, as big of an audience as possible, that includes international. Maybe that's a joke that can be cut, like they often do for different markets. But I feel like they would no, no, this approve of it immediately, and it would not make the final cut. Yeah, or it would be, as a University of Hong Kong professor said about this episode being gone, it could have just been preemptive censorship, which these companies engage in, which they are so cowed by the governments they depend on for making their billions that they don't even wait for the government to tell them not to do something,

which is certainly helpful to governments. And by that, I mean China or America or United Kingdom. The governments don't even have to say, I censor you because that is a brazen act. They just scare the company of like, hey, you know, you're supposed to censor that. Like, oh, yes, sir, yep. And I just censored it already. In reminder listeners, like Disney, or at least through Miramax, released the Martin Scorsese film Kundun, which is about Tibet and their oppression. And after they released it, Michael Eisner himself personally wrote an apology letter to the Chinese government that it was a stupid mistake to have released that film.

Didn't in recent years John Sina have to apologize to China for something to... Yes. I actually came across that in my notes for this too, that it was that John Sina, who has learned some level of fluency in Mandarin because he wants to be a big star in China. like he actually speaks Mandarin in interviews. He did an appearance in Taiwan for some Fast in the Furious movie. And the wording he said was, Taiwan is going to be the first country to get this fast in the furious movie,

meaning it's releasing there first. He, though, used the term country. If you ask the Chinese government, Taiwan is not a country. And he deeply, deeply apologized in Mandarin for calling it a country. And he said he was very, very sorry. Well, if our Patreon suddenly hits $50,000, you'll know why we no longer reference Taiwan anymore. Yes, yes. So, yeah, there is that spirit of self-censorship, which is like scary.

I don't like it. That's not good. I don't want these things to happen. But, again, it's like America should be proving how important that is by also not arresting student protesters of genocide, maybe, or then expelling them from the country. How would you prove it that way? Oh, and also that, like, The Simpsons in general was banned from. Chinese television in 2006 because this was the BBC reporting at Simpsons

and most other foreign cartoons this included Japanese animation anime too got banned from regular Chinese television in favor of China's own animation. It was not seen as much of a cultural thing as well it sort of was but it was about supporting internal industries versus outsider ones too. So there's multiple stories of Simpsons Band in China

though there is some question to have like How popular is The Simpsons in China, in general, both mainland and Hong Kong. There's a few Redditors out there who, you know, I saw on Reddit post say, like, I grew up in China and I loved watching it. Now they say, like, I've never heard this show. But it's so ubiquitous, you've seen it. But I also think it's a very self-selecting sample of if you are fluent in English to comment on Reddit and you are from Hong Kong or Beijing, per se, you are likely to know English and be interested in The Simpsons on a level of a non-English-speaking Chinese. resident is. Yeah, I think some countries don't really jive with the Simpsons. I mean, I know it's a different country, different culture, Japan, you go there, you don't see any Simpsons stuff. I saw one

Simpsons thing in a 7-Ele and I bought it and that's basically just a habit. It's like a little barred hand towel and that was the one piece of merch I saw. And you'll see like old merch in like thrift stores, whatever trickled over, but it's very, very rare to see the Simpsons in Japan. I think at like Mondarakee at one of those, or not even that, even like a smaller Japanese chain of nerd toys. They will have imports of the things we had here in the 90s. They will have imported them there. So you'll see like the Burger King toys or whatever there. But Japan has their own Simpsons like Cranch and Chan and things like that. Things that have been running for almost as long with a new movie every year and a series that has not stopped running episodes for 30 years. So

they've got that covered, like the kind of animated sitcom stuff covered. This episode, though, begins with first we watch Homer Die in the introduction to the episode or in the couch gag, which was pretty crazy couch gag. Yes, it was very brief, but we see a surprise party for Homer or the Simpsons, which kills him with shock. Then we start the episode with, I feel like they are re-learning that Mr. Burns being old is funny. And they're realizing that could make a Selma scene even funnier of just a bunch of old things. Like Mr. Burns is saying every old thing he can. This feels like season three, Mr. Burns.

I love Burns in this scene. And I'm not sure what this says about his age, but his license expired in 1909. So I think they're making him even older than he was previously. This would put him into like 120 in 2005, right? Something like that. I'm not doing the math right now. I noted on it that his hair is still is marked gray then, too. The implication he was actually kind of old then, even, 100 years ago.

Why don't we hear a bunch of funny Burnsisms as Selma gives him a test? I don't see why I need a new driving license. My old one's just fine. I have serious doubts about your skill behind the wheel. You drove them with three people on your grill. At least I'm out doing things. Do you know this baby once outraced the Flying Finn, Pavonurmi? Turn the heater off. It's boiling in here.

What are you talking about? This car is cooler than Guy Lombardo. What's wrong with me? Good heavens, she's some sort of female madman. Hot. So hot. Stop that, you wantwit. I might get stung by a bubbled bee. Yes, lots of great bernsisms, like wantwit and bumbleed bee in references to long dead celebrities like Paavo Nirmie and Guy Lombardo.

Yeah, Paavo Nirmie, the Flying Finn, a real guy who's at 20, two world records back in the 1920s for long distance running. Guy Lombardo, Canadian band leader, back when band leaders were a hot item. It sounds like he was the one who made Old Lang Zine famous as like the New Year's. He was the Dick Clark of his day, if I can sound like also a Mr. Burns of referencing somebody who's long dead. We all remember Dick Clark, right? Come on.

See, the man who couldn't age until he did suddenly and then died. Bumbled to B like credit to Shearer, the enunciation of it makes it even funnier. B that has been bumbled. But yes, Soma is going through the change. Something that has not really been confronted on The Simpsons up until now. It was only in the last year's episode that parahormonal activity episode with a flash forward where Marge enters perimenopause at the age of 43. I think up until this point in season 16, the word menopause has not even been spoken on the show. Yeah, yeah. A much cartoonier look at it than Marge's episode, which seems to be. seemed a little more grounded and perhaps written by women about this change.

I knew jokes about hot flashes in things. I think the first menopause comedy I remember seeing was either like Murphy Brown or the for better or worse comics as a kid. Because the Lynn and the mother in that comic was getting hot flashes and going through perimenopause, I think, as the series was reaching its end. And this might not surprise anybody, but it feels like they really need to do a lot more work when it comes to researching menopause and researching ways to alleviate some of the symptoms of menopause.

We put a lot more focus on men's health, it turns out. That Simpson's episode that came much later does deal with that idea. Like, we care more about men's health than women's health, and we're kind of grossed out by the idea of menopause in general. Yes, I had not heard of the term perimenopause until that episode either, which is, you know, you're on the verge of it, or it's the transitional point between menopause and adulthood, or whatever you call the stage before menopause.

I've heard of it because I listen to women. I'm clapping between every syllable. I did love it that episode, the parahomonal one, that Hibbert has nothing for Marge. But when Homer has one problem getting an erection, he instantly is handed every pill you possibly can get as a man to get his owner back. Selma, meanwhile, this feels like a sequel to Selma's choice

in that she has like a ticking grandfather clock in that episode, and time is a wasting for her. and now the sword of Damocles has fallen on her. This is it. Zero hour has been reached. Although, like with a lot of these sequel episodes, they should have watched the original because I believe in this one,

March says, I didn't know you wanted a baby. And that's the entire point of Selma's choice that they have a discussion about in the episode. She takes the kids on a test run to Duff Gardens. I think her line, like she says four times the episodes, I want to have a baby. I want to have a baby.

It's over and over again. This is a problem in this era that they make sequels without watching the episode. It seems like it's just Al Jean half from members like, hey, we did a thing with like Selma Watt and a baby before. Didn't we? She could like adopt now. And so they crashed the car, almost hitting Millhouse and Bart as they're playing hockey. Millhouse has gotten to be a better hockey player than Bart, I'd say now,

or at least is equal since we saw an ice. Yeah, just for this first act, it's winter. You're right. Yeah, this isn't a winter episode, except for the joke is. that Selma crashes into a pile of snow and melts it with her hot flashes. Holy crap. That's it. Also, they were doing more jokes then of Millhouse being a pedant.

Yes, because Bart yells car and Millhouse needs him to finish the sentence before he knows what exactly is about to happen. He needs a verb. Just like in the Patty episode, I think Millhouse is, that's where he says, like, meat isn't sweet. It's savory when Bart says, oh, this will be the sweetest meat. And we just had him saying seedless watermelon. So after this, Selma wakes up. up in the hospital and they are telling her that, well, it wasn't anything too serious, just menopause. She's going through hot flashes and a womanly change here, which is confusing

Bart and Homer, I think, too. Yes, Homer explains to Bart as menopause is when drunken hunters shoot the stork that delivers babies. That's a great one. I also like way Homer delivers, and it's something to be feared, right, doctor? And we get another instructional video, although this one, it's funny. I like the choice of celebrity, but it can't really hold a candle to the Gary Busey video we talked about previously in on a clear day. I can't see my sister. For two episodes in a row, they discover, like we said in that one, they've discovered a way to do a Troy McClure instructional video without Troy McClure, which is you hire a guy who basically is the person you're mocking with Troy McClure. But Gary Busey is insane. Robert Wagner is just an old. bachelor or just like a smooth ladies man of the 60s. That's who he is. He feels more like Troy McClure than Gary Busey because I assume he was supposed to be in the same era as Troy's like 60s, 70s heyday. But I feel like Wagner had more success than that fictional character ever did.

Yeah, Robert Wagner did much better than the people Troy is named after. I mean, when I looked at Wagner's list of successes, though, they mainly were like TV shows I never watched and even one. Honestly, now Switch. Maybe that's so SWIF. which is a good show. I want to see him in Edward Albert's doing a detective adventures. Yes, Wagner and the guy from Green Acres solving mysteries, but I guess heart to heart was his

biggest TV show. I think another detective show. I think so, yeah. He was a detective. Now, me and you, we knew him as number two from the Austin Powers films. Yes, yeah, he's really good in that, and I should say, still alive at 96, this podcast goes live in three weeks, so

we were not on the scene if it happened. Yes. to let you know what a ladies man he was, his personal life section on his Wikipedia page has just like paragraph after paragraph of like famous, beautiful women he is either said he had affairs with or was married to or dated for a long time like Joan Crawford, Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Collins, Barbara Stanwick, who was 20 years older than him. He was getting with Barbara Stanwick and Jill St. John. And then there's a whole other section about him and his wife, Natalie Wood.

We already have all this time for China. We haven't had time for this. And yeah, they also asked him on the commentary, well, he's not on the commentary, but on the commentary, they mentioned how they asked him about Marilyn Monroe and he was kind of like sheepish about it, so something happened there. And I guess he also refused to say a line that was in the script where he refers to himself as a former actor. I like that. You know, Adam West would have said that line. Dana Gill has a cute story about the meeting of Adam West and Robert Wagner, who probably competed over the same ladies back in the 60s. I love the story of that. They were walking him around the Fox lot where he, you know, was a contract. player when the last contract players at Fox. He knew the Fox lot very well. And I think how Marilyn Monroe came up, as they pointed out, like, oh, did you know, like that's the Marilyn Monroe's bungalow?

And he knew about where Marilyn and Rose slept on the Fox lot. Yes. Now it's full of smelly comedy writers, I bet. Well, you know what? She liked Arthur Miller, so she could have gone for one of them, perhaps. Fox Sunday, the Simpsons hit China. Danger, you! Luzzi Lou.

guest stars, then heartwarming reunions, unexpected drop-ins, and shocking discoveries. Stop licking my hand. And all new arrest of development, followed by a bonus simps and the premiere of Kelsey Grammer presents the sketch show, the most jam-packed comedy on TV. Can I have a quickie? It's pronounced keesh. It all starts at 7-6 Central Fox Sunday. Why don't we hear a little bit from old Robert Wagner as he explains menopause to

us. Welcome to the break, everybody. It's your favorite belly fruit. Henry Gilbert here saying thanks for listening to this week's podcast of us chatting about Gougu Guy Pan, an impactful episode of season 16 of The Simpsons. And me and Bob love doing this as our full-time jobs, giving you all this awesome podcast history of The Simpsons. And we know that you must enjoy it too. But maybe you don't like hearing ads like this one. Did you know that you can both support this being me and Bob's full-time jobs, while also avoiding any ads like these and the others you'll hear in the episode? That can all be years if you sign up for five bucks a month at patreon.com slash talking Simpsons. At Patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons, you get access to early and ad-free episodes of

Talking Simpsons and the What a Cartoon podcast. We put out multiple times a month, not to mention tons of bonus episodes. Each month we cover Futurama and King the Hill just as in depth as we do an episode of The Simpsons. And we're hundreds of episodes in on those. And before that we did every episode of The Critic, every episode of Mission Hill, and many of our favorite episodes of Batman, the animated series. You can find it all at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons sign up today to see all of the awesome bonus ad free stuff you're missing. You can even get a 10% off discount if you sign up for a whole year in advance. But if you want to listen to a podcast is magical as the combo of drambuian sleeping pills.

You need to sign up at the premium level at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons because that gets all of the ad-free extra stuff that you heard about at the $5 level, but you also get a ton of bonuses, but you also get our premium triple-length podcast, What a Cartoon Movie each month, where we cover an animated feature film as in depth as we do an episode of The Simpsons. Both June and July's What a Cartoon movies are very important to Simpsons fans, because we talk about Reckett Ralph and Zootopia,

two films that were heavily involved with Simpsons Legends, including Rich, Boar, and Jim Reardon. We dig into a ton of history of both those directors and those films. There were both big hits for Disney and pretty interesting as part of our summer of Disney 2010s. Previously, we also covered Winnie DePoo from 2011, a very good film. And we're going to be wrapping up in August this summer with Big Hero 6. And that's just the most recent of over eight years of what a cartoon movie. Hundreds of hours of us covering Disney Renaissance, Pixar, Warner Brothers, anime, toy cartoons, even live action stuff like

Who framed Roger Rabbit and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Sign up today at the $10 level to see all of the awesome stuff you're missing out on. And don't forget at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. You can also get 10% off if you sign up for a full year in advance. One more time, that is patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. Check out it today. Sure. You may experience mood swings, loss of desire, and private dryness.

But don't worry, you can still do everything that you did before. Everything? including having children? Ma'am, we're trying to make a video here. Menopause means you can't have any more children, but it also marks a wonderful new plateau in a woman's life. So let's all give menopause a round of menopause. Menopause? I'm not saying that.

So, that's it. The end of the line. I'm never going to have children. Selma, I never realized you wanted a child so badly. I didn't want to get pregnant and live. lose my looks. But now I'm afraid I'll grow old alone. What about your pet iguana?

Jep Jub. Jub-Jub can't take care of me when I'm old and sick. All he can do is eat me when I'm dead. Well, at least they got him to say private dryness. That was a good line. I liked how they used the equivalent of, well, this hand isn't laying eggs anymore, and this 60s sex symbol talking about the new plateau in a woman's life.

And weirdly enough, I mean, Jubjub is the original child of Selma, and I think Jubb appears as much or possibly more than Ling in the future. I think so. I think Jug Job, like in the last two seasons, Jub job had jokes that Ling did not get. I would save that for the end, but I was like, boy, Ling has really vanished in the show. But Jubjub actually had a joke in the most recent season, I think. Well, also, I love the May Wagner thing,

that somebody who is seemingly an actress shows up to say, like, but I can still have kids right, but his reaction to her is that she is not part of the, the production and she's interrupting him to ask this question. This poor, desperate woman is hearing hope. Does not know that there's an active filming situation going on. The Jub-Jub photo that Lisa holds up to that almost feels like Lisa is representing the nerds at home. Like it's a near comic book high question of like, um, excuse me, we've been through this before.

You adopted Jub-Jub. That was your replacement for a child, remember? And in that photo with Jub Jub-Jub, Selma's doing the Henry Classic of the two fingers up behind his head. Oh, behind? Okay, like the bunny ears. You're never giving anyone bunny ears actively. No, no, no. Yes, at first, I wanted to believe Selma was thrown up the peace sign,

which I just do instinctively in photos. I've seen it. It's like a lizard brain reaction. It's like, oh, you're telling me to stand still? I just don't know what to do with my hands, to be honest. Like, okay, hand up to see you. Do a sassy pose on the hips. Okay, I like try to have more.

Or perhaps around a loved one. You, yuck. No, no. The hover hand. You're allowed to touch your husband. It's okay. You won't get canceled. Well, not in China.

Not in China. That's true. I'll say, I've always wanted to visit Hong Kong. Well, I look forward to it, but I am such a weeb that every time I think of like, oh, I fly in Japan, it wouldn't be too far to go to Hong Kong or Beijing from Tokyo as a second leg of a trip. But I just want to stay in Japan and just go to another place in Japan right there. Well, it's very different than Mortal Kombat makes it look. I'll tell you that much.

If you could just go on a red arrow in the air, it would be so much easier. Now, here's another, like, comedy nerd complacent. I have. I don't like, and this was in two episodes ago too, I think they have forgotten what made Homer with the twins a special joke thing, and they're just writing them like plain sitcom jokes, and I'm not a fan. I'm not a fan. Yeah, these zingers they're trading. It feels very broad and not as inspired as previous Homer or Paddy Selma jabs. Yeah. These would be jokes you'd write for, you know, all in the family of like Archie Bunker versus Maude, and they're both getting these witty things where Homer is not supposed to be witty.

He is just supposed to hate them or pretend to be nice to them because Marge forces him. But him having like, I was covering you up for everybody else's sake. It's like, no, that's just a sitcom joke. Yeah. I don't know where this joke came from, but I don't like Homer saying, oh, my thingies when he has punched in the balls. Yeah, a ball punched joke. And when Selma says, I didn't want to lose my looks.

That is a statement itself. Like that works as a joke. Homer giggling at it makes it worse. I agree, I agree. That sits alone and you can trust the audience to think that's funny if you find some distasteful. And Homer giggling at it like that also brings up Homer's IQ too much. Homer knowing that it's funny that a person he finds unattractive saying that she's going to lose her looks, Homer shouldn't be smart enough for that.

Yeah, I think they've just kind of forgotten what made those jokes good together. So Homer walks away. We then cut to spinster arms apartments again. I think it's Spinster City, the reference to the classic sitcom, which I think I'd just gone off the air at this point or was about to. That's right, that's right, yes. The first of Michael J. Fox and then a Charlie Sheen sitcom. And it's in an extremely Dana Gould joke

that the thing that pushes her over the edge is seeing old horror movies on TV made her think of her childlessness. Yes, Bubarella is hosting an intro to the film, Son of Satan. And by the way, they point this out on the commentary, but a Bubarella, not a Dana-Gould invention. Kevin Curran invented Bubarella. I really appreciated this clarity.

I feel like I have said, oh, this has to be Dana-Gould about this, as I say too much on our episodes. I love that he clarified this, that it's his friend, Kevin Curran, who did it, and it leads them to talk about Vampira and Gould's friendship with Vampira. And you know what?

Al Jean did a slip-up. I've done, too, of saying Vampirella when you mean Vampirea as well. Vampira, Elvira, Vampire, Vampirea, Vampirea, Vampirella, Bubarella, all distinct. I like, do they bring up that Kevin Curran is always pitching Booborella jokes because he would get the $200 character payment contractually obligated to him for when his character gets a line.

Not bad. That's why Matt Sleman calls the Octoplets the Eight Monies. It was very smart of him. Try to make up eight characters at once, who are children to somebody. Kevin Curran, too, to bring up again, he is buried in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery right next to Vampire's Grave. So he's there with Bubarella's namesake for all time. Dana Gould's plot better be resting nearby waiting for him. He better get the slot in between them. And I don't care what his new wife says. He should be like, I'd love to be buried next to you, but I made a promise to Vampire and I ain't breaking it. Yeah, like, I want to know more about Kevin Curran and Vampira. Mila Nirmie, I think her name was

because Dana Gould was essentially her caretaker for many years. But how did Kevin Curran warm his way in there and become like a plot mate? Yes. We got to ask Dana Gould about all of his dead friends. I'm sure you'd love to talk. I love to. He tells a great story of basically the punchline is Vampira had sex with Orson Wells and he gave her the clap in quotes. Here's credit to the writing of this episode. Wait, why was the clap in quotes? Oh, I've just, in case that

is like, I'm not using the medical term. I'm using a term I would not use for an STD, but just to use the term, Gould used for it. Okay. By the way, the clap is gonorrhea. I'll credit to Dana Gould or whoever came up with it. Swegman's a good grocery store name. I like that name.

But Patty, sorry, Selma is not encouraged by the thought of eating damaged food. But this is when she realizes she could also adopt a kid. In the adoption process, that'll end the heartbreak, as Somas sets up wonderfully, and she seemingly very quickly ends up

with a kid. Oh, he's perfect. For this little guy, I'm going to give up smoking. From now on, we're a skull family. Um, is this a baby pound where I give up my kid cause I needs to get him back.

Oh no, the birth father. I shouldn't give them away. Seems I misheard my wife. What she said was she's tired of having rabies. If you want, I'll call you after Brandein's next letter. Yeah. Pass! Don't give up, Aunt Selma. China has thousands of baby girls who need adoption. Great. Another job lost to a foreign. Get some idiocacy-style comedy there with all these dumb, poor people. They can't stop having kids.

I know. Selma's even offered the next litter of kids, and she turns it down because they're disgustingly inbred Hicks. Like, there is an eugenicist-type argument happening here, too, I think. It's a part of idiocracy that's not so fun, and don't comment on that, anyone, please. We talked enough about idiocracy. I feel bad for bringing it up. Seeing Lindsay Nagel there is fun, because this Sue Nagel is also part of Dana Gould's

journey in this. It's her kids too. She went through it all the same too. It's funny that Lindsay Nagel is now involved in the adoption agencies. She's like a Hollywood executive. She's like a bank manager, a financial planner. She's everywhere you want to be or you don't want to be. As we learned, she's a sexual predator. So she's constantly getting new jobs. Also, you know, now that you mention her, she in this time is usually coupled or a wing woman is Cookie Kwan. But this is a Cookie Kwan free episode despite having to do with like she's a Chinese American character. Oh, well, Trace McNeil is having enough fun with the accents, as is Dan Costaneta, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer. It's an accent party on Google Guy Pan. Welcome to it.

Yes. It's the next clip I got is the start of accents, the accent parade. You know, I did also see a movie that Sue Nagel produced that was surprised seeing her name. It was like, oh, hey, look at that. It was the Amy Adams movie, Night Bitch. I watched because I did the Amy Adams podcast, which used to be called chasing Amy Adams, but they've finished their Amy Adam's season and now it's just going to be called supporting actresses and they're basically going to do a different actresses filmographies as seasons of the show. But that night bitch, I wanted to see just Amy Adams most recent thing and she's good in it. But I don't know, it's about how it sucks to be a mom. It was not like the monster body horror film. I expected it to

be. It has, I don't know, there's some corny stuff in it. I expect it a little deeper. But then again, maybe I'm just a dumb guy who doesn't know what being a mom is like and didn't get it. Maybe so. Well, Sue Nagel's fingerprints are over a lot of things. If you watch HBO for about 15 years, she was producing all of their hit programming, like, let's say, Game of Thrones. Right, yes. She's now, like, relaxing. Deep. Oh, yes.

Atepe. Entourage. I saw multiple picks of her on the red carpet for entourage season premieres. And I think the Entourage movie, too. Now, like, her retirement is just that she picks and chooses occasional films she is interested personally in producing and just does them instead of macro overseeing an entire slate. of pictures. And yes, her wife is screenwriter Sarah Gubbins, G-U-B-B-I-N-S. Now, she related to Cletus

with a name like that. That's true, man. She's with a Gubbins type. Maybe she likes Cletus more than Dana Gould did. From gold to Gubbins. The Sue Nagle story. Also, they have a joke that she's done with smoking, that she's a schoolgirl. I've said before my dad,

like he did quit smoking around when I was a baby and transition to chewing to tobacco and that light brown pouch that she pulls out is like the exact brand my dad had and just looking at it, I can hear the sound of its crinkling and smell. It's just, ugh, so gross. I like the phrase around the time I was a baby, so he was just holding out until it could do the most damage to your developing body. I believe my father didn't speak to an aunt of mine for a long time because she dared to say, you probably shouldn't smoke around your baby.

In my lifetime, every adult around me smoked like a chimney. And I, I never started smoking, so I've inhaled all kinds of things. Chewing tobacco is so disgusting, though. It's like, ugh, it's so funny. Apparently, it's making a comeback right now. Like, people walking around with their cans in their back pocket is the new thing. They're tapping their skull. They are.

They're doing it. Is this like the powder stuff? Is that what your dad was into, or what? His was more of the, well, it's the thing that Big League chew is imitating. That's more of, like, the crinkly little strings. Kids now have those, like, little nicotine pouches that are very, very, very addictive and I guess are a big deal when it comes to a certain market. Do you know what I'm talking about these little like nicotine pouches you put in your mouth? Oh, okay. That's different

than the pinch of school thing. Now, I haven't seen a ton of these. I believe you. Nicotine finds a way. We legislated out smoking quite a lot. The smoking's fairly unpopular now comparatively, but the nicotine finds a way. Yes, we legislated vapes for the most part. I don't see people vaping as much anymore, but now we have Zinn, which are nicotine pouches. Your dad never had them because they didn't exist until recently. But flavored nicotine pouches, you just stick in your lip, and it generates all kinds of cancers and a tasteful mint smell at the same time. My dad still is a cigar guy, though.

He picked back up cigars about 20 years ago, and no one into his late 70s. Still is enjoying them. But all right, so she lost her baby to a rabies lady, who will soon be dead, as we know about the facts about rabies. Yeah, check out our King of the Hill episode about what, to kill a ladybird? Is that it?

Yes, where Dale asked a great question, like, can you live with rabies or like, can you live comfortably with rabies? And just no shug. There's a lot of scrolling first. I think there was a headline. This is one of those like, oh, a headline on Reddit. I don't click on it to read more. The headline was a young person actually survived rabies recently, like got the injections,

past the point of no return for most people, though it does seem like she's going to be in a wheelchair, perhaps for the rest of her life. But technically, it looks like she survived. So maybe you can live with rabies now. Yeah, confront those rabid dogs. Say, I'm not afraid of you anymore and hold up the headline as they're gnawing on you. So, yes, Lisa points her in the direction of the news, and we were all hearing about that. I did, yes, when I looked into the ending of that policy, I did check a couple of, like, websites that were for adoption agencies saying that one had a really sad story of, like, these people who were very close to had made a commitment to, like, a five-year-old.

girl, we are adopting you. Here's your new bedroom. You're going to come here. And then it happened just overnight the change in that program and they could not adopt the child. And the girl stayed there. There's a lot of sad stories in there. Yeah. And Dana Gould talked about on the commentary how one of the people he went to China with was an slash is a lesbian who had to pretend to be married in order to adopt. Yeah, I noted that was coming up back then to the only times I hear about adoption or would. I'd also hear about it with regards to, you know, same-sex parents who want to adopt in the United States. And their challenges with that both at home and abroad and that it's a challenge, even in liberal areas, to convince, like, them to trust you with a child,

as there can be a lot of judgments on same-sex couples from the people who run the adoption agencies. But then when you go to a country like China, they also have their own reasonings that their own conservative views on, two men or two women cannot raise a child feeling. So, yes, it involves lying to a government that doesn't like when you lie to them to get a child out of them. To hear that, that they had a lesbian with them who was there with like some guy. I'm glad Gould didn't give more information than that because he could have really caused some problems. He said more. Also, that adoption agency, one of them said that like, okay, you know what?

Now with these new changes, try Thailand. Apparently Thailand is what China used to be for adopting kids. if you're looking for that, apparently. This, though, is 21 years ago, and Selma is talking to our first Asian character in the episode, voiced by the Master of Accents, Hank is there yet. Madam, your adoption application is in perfect order, except for one thing.

You forgot to fill out the name of your husband. Husband. Of course. The Chinese government only allows wholesome married couples to adopt. No hen without cock. Apologize if that is a double entendre in your language. It is not an Oz. Don't worry.

I'll just write my husband's name on this form. Have you ever heard of MacGyver? Oh, yes, big star. Big star. We know he's not married to you. Right, right, right. And don't forget, your husband must go with you to China to pick up the baby. All right, here I go.

Writing the name. Excellent. He is your soulmate and lover. Yes, Homer Simpson is my whole world. I love him. Oh, I just felt a chill go through my very soul. Yeah, no sloppy Joe's will do that. Salma, still thinking of McGiver 13 years after the show went off the air.

I assume she's watching the DVDs in 2005. They must have been watching at least the first couple seasons on DVDs. Or you know what? They normally wouldn't be the type to go on Kazan. download episodes of things. But I bet for McGiver, they instantly were getting the backups of that off-line.

Unclear why Selma writes Homer's name. She could have relied on any of her former husbands, perhaps, for help. But this is a very ancient sitcom trope. I think I've seen at least a dozen episodes of something where the premise is, you have to pretend to be my wife or husband, and we don't get along.

They actually did it in the two Mrs. Nihasa Pima Pedalons a while ago, while identifying the idea that this is a very old trope. They're not essentially doing that here. They're just kind of running with it. Yeah, I'm glad you brought up that episode because I already was in the mindset of like we're also covering season six, which is pure and perfect and has no problematic elements. But definitely, in old hoary sitcom trope like this, they would have said, that's lame. We need to have another spin on this or at least make fun of it or have a moment where you think we're going to go there.

And then David Merkin would say, like, no, we're not going to do such an obvious sitcom thing. but in Apu at least says, oh, that tired old idea we can think of something better than that, and then they can't. They don't even do that here. Yeah, I don't think this is a necessary element of the plot, and they don't really dwell on it that much.

So to be fair, they don't really make a lot out of it, but I don't know, I feel like we could have went in a better direction with this whole idea without including this very, very tired plot, which Selma and Homer could have been at each other's throats without having to pretend to be married to each other. That would have been fine, too. Yeah, it'd be. feels like Al Jean or the pitching process didn't challenge this is like, we can do better than this.

There should be more a feeling of like, no, we're the Simpsons. We're better than this. There's just a lot of settling here, but mainly it is with Homer and Selma. I think they just in general forgot what the dynamic was and why it's funny. Now, obviously, every character, other than the guest star, every character is being voiced by a white person. So it's be redundant to say this every time. I'll compliment as far as lines go. I apologize if that's a double entendre in your language.

It is not an ours. I laughed at that. I like that. They could have hired maybe one person of Asian descent or Chinese descent to voice a other character, one other character here, outside of Lucy Liu. Yes, I mean, again, to talk about how they like tried harder in other times, in the Mr. Sparkle scenes, they didn't ask their white actors to play Japanese people in the Mr. Sparkle video. that they did get Japanese or Japanese American actors to do the scenes. They hired like four of them or maybe five even just to do just very, very small lines. Yeah, they counted on that kind.

There are lots of Chinese actors and Chinese American actors in Hollywood. They could easily find them if they wanted to. Let's just say Chinese because what about the Chinese Canadians, Henry? There's a lot of them. Apologies, yes. And they want to act too, you know. Now that I don't approve. Canadians coming to America taking acting jobs.

Thanks. Nobody in a movie is American anymore. Don't worry about it. That is true, yes. They don't want us. There's so many people they could have hired and that this is a general thing with The Simpsons for decades, but to know that they tried harder like eight years earlier for a similar

episode of Asian characters, it's unfortunate in this one. Yeah, I agree. If it wasn't for the extreme fame of the one Asian actor they got it this time, it probably would have just been Tress McNeil for this character too. Yes. If there wasn't one notable actress, Lucy Lou is Chinese American, I guess. Yes. Both her parents are Chinese birth, moved to Taiwan, and then moved to New York City, immigrated to New York City, and she was born in New York City. So yes, she is a Chinese American

actress. So what we're hearing is if she wasn't available, it would have been Mingnaa, and if Mingnaa wasn't available, it would have been Trace McNeil. Yes. After Mingna, they're like, well, that's it. We don't know any other. Margaret Cho, we've been too mean to her. We can't ask her. We're not asking her. I think he's Korean, right? Yes, what do they know? They wouldn't care. I also like that he says, like, yeah, we all know who McGiver is.

We know he's not married to you. Another good line. I like them. This is where I noted the Taiwan thing that made me look up like the John Cena apology was very distractingly to me, behind him in this official Chinese governmental office. There's a map where Taiwan is represented as a separate country from China, which would definitely not be on a Chinese map of their. country. Yeah, you're not going to air in China based on that alone. 30 seconds into the first scene that

has to do anything with China, they're already like, okay, this is banned now, culturally gone. And so Selma makes this deal and is off-screen happens the scene of the Simpsons are going to China. We don't get to actually see that. We just, they're on the airplane when the next act start. We don't see them packing. But Homer explains very tidily about like, well, it's again, one of those like second X-sees. It was so nice of our Aunt Selma offered to fly to all to China for no reason at all. And Homer brings up how he actually had to get an excuse to leave work. At least they care in this episode about his job and how he can be gone from it for weeks.

So now on the plane, that's where we get the opening clip that I also said. But any reference to Drambouy is a good one for me. I learned what Drambouy was from The Simpsons and Miss Hoover. He should not be drinking it straight up, though. It's like a liqueur that you add to cocktails and perhaps coffee, right? Yeah, actually. Yes, Homer is one of the rare people who takes Dr. Bambuie straight, I guess.

Pretty low ABV, though. He's going to have to guzzle that, which I'm sure Homer did. Though, I mean, this is dangerous stuff. This trambouy and sleeping pills were only a few years away from losing Heath Ledger to stuff like this. I think it was more than that, but it was part of the tremendous cocktail that felt the Joker. But Homer has to get crazy, wacky-sossed here to see, at least Al Jean can admit on

the commentary. These are the dragons from spirited away, not like, which I do think, that dragon is meant to look like a Chinese-style dragon, I'll say, maybe. But still, they're pulling from Japanese cultural stuff, not China so much. Yeah, at least they're admitting it. Like, we know it's not China. This is the one Japanese thing that we've seen in the past five years. I do think they're very complimentary, Lance Kramer and his animation team on this.

I think they were asked to do crazy, wacky things when they went to China, but they animated it well, the wacky things, including multiple dragons flying around. Yeah, and coming up like a ton of monks, moving in sync and fall fighting Homer? Yeah, moments like that or the Dragons feels like, it lets animators like Lance Kramer and his team express the kind of action or fantasy things they don't normally get to do working in the sitcom realm of US TV. So yes, Homer gets told he's drunk enough now after making a couple of dragons cry.

And they really like that dragon joke. They spent extra money to have a callback later in the episode. And I didn't know the dragon was singing words in English until I was, went to Frinkiac. It just sounded like faux Chinese to me, but Presbycdiel is saying words in English. Yeah, it's very extreme, to say the least, the accents they're doing

here, especially the singing. It feels very pointed of like, oh, this is what Peking Opera or other Chinese singing sounds like to us just screeching. Like, I don't know, it's a little judgy, I'd say. They are playing the Duesianchin. I looked up how to say that. That's the very long, one

string and instrument that sounds very high-pitched sort of like a zither kind of, kind of Thanks for looking that up. I did not know what that was called. I consulted many sources to find out how to pronounce it. But yes, it's Dusanchen. Also when he tells her, or when he learns it, the cut to the outside of the plane with his, no, I don't know, that's also a little obvious. Yeah, I was expecting like another gag to follow, but it is just a stock gag of the big reaction that is, we cut outside, we don't see the big reaction. The dragons are crying rainbows as well.

And so Homer is pretty pissed off about what the plan is. but Marge is able to convince him. Homer, I'm going to need you to do something for me when we get to China. You name it, oh, wise mountain ape. You have to pretend to be my husband. No! That's him, the man who broke a dragon's heart. Homer, if you do this one small favor, it could transform Selma's life.

But, Marge, I don't want her to be happy. Okay, don't do it for her. Deal. Do it for me. Oh, okay, I'll do it Because your sweet love is the one thing That saved my life from being an unmitigated disaster Ha ha, now we're even

But there will be sex for Homer if he follows through We'll learn that later It speaks to the way they write marriage in this era Of just like, well, yeah, everything's a transactional marriage And that Homer has done horrible things to march For her entire life And now they're even Because of this one favor he got tricked into doing

Do you know what, Al Jean also having to deal with watching these on a commentary, he admits the memorial to a Chinese food box that is General Gow's. He says that's not very subtle, he admits. No, no. I'm surprised they won't with General Gow because this is mostly known as, I want to say the pronunciation is General Sowe, but there's a dispute whether it should be So or Sao, but this is the famous Chinese dish, which is fried chicken covered in sugar slime. Yes, yeah, which Americans love that shit. You go to any Chinese buffet through the South, and it's different types of fried chicken covered in different colors of goo, of sugary goo. And when they land, everything is being made in China is being shipped off,

which is like, no, I mean, that's like it times eight billion now, I'd say. Yes. And hey, those tariffs work, damn it. That's why manufacturing has returned. Yep. Yeah. And it didn't cost us a dime. They all paid for it.

Also to hear about how when that happened, when the tariffs were, introduced, I was not aware of things such as that Nintendo, among other companies, had taken some of their offshore manufacturing from China already thinking tariffs like this were coming and moving it to Vietnam, which also as cheap labor, but is not as a hot button issue to America, so it wouldn't be outlawed? I had no clue that they'd already been preparing for this companies like Nintendo. Yeah, we got over our fear of Vietnam. Those people are dead now. And now, no matter where it's being produced, though, everything costs more if it is produced there. Because every video game console is $50 to $100 more than it used to be.

And there's no way there will be new consoles next year. If they have to cost what they cost, they cannot come out next year. I think there shouldn't be new consoles because no one can afford to make a game for current ones, at the level of fidelity that they can max out at. So we don't need them. It's over. At the very least, five. Where can we go?

Sorry, go ahead. No, like five more years. at least on these things. Yeah. Well, also, Sony and Microsoft make three games a year exclusively for their systems anyway. There aren't enough games as it is.

How much better can Noddy Dog make a rope look? We've hit the peak of video games. That's it. How much better will the debris falling at you as you run towards the camera look on a PlayStation 6? I mean, really. As you push the control stick in one direction

and you can't lose. After chopping off like 800 heads and saying like, huh, I feel feelings. This sounds like an allegory. for something. So now it's time for the Simpsons to get to where Futurama was years earlier by having Lucy Lou as a guest star. Bender's girlfriend Lucy Lou playing this, let's call her like a dragon lady style caricature. Madame Wu. It is funny how, I mean, they're putting chopsticks in her hair to kind of just go way over the top. But this is not something that you do in those countries. I mean, it was at the time, I think it was fading out around the time, a trendy American thing to do. Like my white, girlfriend in high school stuck chopsticks through her bun.

But that's like you and I sticking a fork in a knife in our hair. It's gross. You don't want to stick eating utensils in your gross oily hair. I think it's one of the more dated things in the first Spider-Man movie. That's like an outfit that Pristons Mary Jane wears in the movie. Her Chinese woman cosplay. Yes. They're pulling from a thing that is also, was in like Hong Kong films in the 90s.

The biggest example is the third police story film called Supercop here, the Jackie Chan film. Michelle Yo's character is a mainland China. who is working with Jackie, and it is about a culture clash between the British colonial ruled Hong Kong police officer and the Communist China police officer. And she is played of like, oh, I'm a woman in charge, which Jackie Chan is not used to. And her thing is that she is very dressed down and not interesting to look at all. She's an all-business-type woman who then lets down her hair a little bit when working with good old Jackie Chan, the super cop himself. And then at one point, Jackie Chan becomes Chun Lee, from what I understand. Yes.

Is this a different film or is this police story three? No, no, that is a different film. That's City Hunter. That's City Hunter. Okay. There's a scene where he, like, fights a street fighter cabinet or something, and there's many unlicensed cosplays? Yeah, the City Hunter movie is so funny.

Like, he knew that his films were big in Japan. And so he was like, he wanted to make a film directly for the Japanese market or adapt to a popular Japanese comic and animated series, City Hunter, and make it about him. So he's playing a Japanese character in it. And then to make it an extra credit to Japan, he then, I think it is with Capcom's permission. He has

an entire fight sequence where he gets zapped by a street fighter machine and he sees himself as the characters of street fighter. His opponent is Ken and he starts off. I think he starts his Ryu, turns into E. Honda, and eventually he's Chun Li and defeats Ken

as Chun Lee. Yes, the image of him as Chun Lee is very popular. based on this image search I'm doing here. I remember it as a fun scene. It tricks you into thinking City Hunter the movie is a particularly great one, but there's a reason it's the only scene that's shown from it. It's fine. It's of 90s Jackie Chan.

I love 90s Jackie Chan in late 80s, but it is a lesser film of his other than that scene. Watch both of the Armor of God films. Those are better. The Operation Condor and Armor of God, if you want a fun, wacky one. But it's hard to go wrong with old Jackie Chan movies. Pre coming to America, I'd say.

But Lucy Lou, meanwhile, yes, She was a big star, then she still is like in stuff. She's made movies now. They're joking about her being in the Sherlock Holmes series Elementary that was just getting started when the DVDs came out and ran for seven seasons. So that's, yeah. Very successful show. A very, very nice transition to television, Lucy Lou.

And Dana Gould, of course, he doesn't say the name. I know the name. It's Greg Nicotero. He says that when Dana Gould met Lucy Lou, he's like, hey, you know, I know the guy who made the fake head of yours that gets chopped off and kill Bill. And I'm certain it is Greg Nicotero. His good friend.

We hear Lucy Lou will deliver you a cupcake basket if she voice acts on your show, at least in this era. And show up to see that it arrived. Like, that's a nice lady. That's a nice Hollywood star. I just saw that the whole bloody affair movie last year. And the additions to it for her character are the best parts of it. They add in like 10 new minutes of animation in her origin story,

in the anime flashback. That is the Kill Bill. and two slam together with a Fortnite short at the end that you don't have to watch. You can skip the Fortnite short, but yeah, it's called the whole bloody fair, but there's still, I'd say it's only 10% different, if that, as a movie. But the new editions are fun. I saw Kill Bill 1 and 2 back to back at a double feature, and in between movies, I was getting another beer, and I heard someone say, Tarantino's old sizzle no steak.

And I can't believe we're saying that in 2026. I hate the man. I haven't even seen all of his movies, but I'm like, you can't say this. This is the most cliched thing to say about him. I know. It's like, oh boy, he's... That's why I said it in that snooty voice, by the way. No, Tarantino's almost cliched is that complaint about his cliches.

And you know what? Unlike in this episode, his casting in the movie might have been more sensitive because Lucy Lou's character in that, he cast Lucy Lou to be the boss of the yakuza. And he actually had to add a scene to the movie to explain why a Japanese, Chinese, Chinese, American character like Oranishi somehow got to be in charge of the yakuza, which would never happen in real life. Well, you know, I really feel like he's sabotaging his own career

so he won't have to make a 10th movie. At this point, everyone is just so tired of him. Yes, he gives interviews saying that he thinks good actors or bad actors. He loves to pose for photos with genociders. A lot of mistakes out. He's mean to Paul Dano. Yeah, and Matthew Lillard, who fucking rules,

like, Tarantino should be so lucky to have fucking Matthew Lillard act in one of his movies. It makes me sad that I saw one movie at his new Beverly Cinema, but now he acts like such a jackass that I don't want to watch. I'm like, ugh, God, I'm patronizing this jackass's movie theater. But yes, why don't we hear a little bit from old Madam Wu in our next clip? When do I get my baby? In a few days.

This will give you a chance to explore our nation's ancient culture. And it will give me a chance to closely observe the intimate details of your married life. Oh! Madam Wu, these are our children, Bart and Lisa. Yes. And this is Marge, our surprisingly hot nanny. Thank you, Mr. Simpson.

Don't mention it, Miss October. But don't look at her passport. It's different. These are the famous Shaolin Temple monks. They pursue spiritual peace through mastery of The barefisted murder. I've heard of these guys. You can wave your arms at him and make funny faces,

and they just have to stand there and take it. Homer, no, stop. You're thinking of Buckingham Palace. What? And, of course, Homer is referencing Playboy magazine in which you were allowed to see one woman naked a month, and you would refer to her by the month in which that issue arrived at your door. Right, right. In this case, Miss October for March,

which I like that he at least says, don't look at her passport. It's different because this entire plot would fall apart instantly if this Chinese official asked to look at her passport, which you could easily do. And if you enjoy the work of Zach Craigor, like Barbarian and Weapons, you'll love him in Miss March, a movie that came

out around this time, I think, in history. That's right. Don't see the movie, the RIP Trevor Moore. So they start hitting all of the spots you hit on a tour of Beijing, starting with a Shaolin Temple where Homer mistakes the Shaolin monks who are training for the Queen's guards in England, who

are not allowed to respond. Instead, these Shaolin monks beat the shit out of Homer in a very well animated action sequence. Yeah, very well done. One of these guys, Kano's Homer, and rips out his heart and puts it back. Just puts it back in. Also, the punch freeze frame to me feels

like a generic kung fu movie trope, though if it is from a specific kung fu film, it's lost on me, though. I'm open to listeners to suggest that. It's whatever Mortal Kombat ripped off with Kano. I'd like to, that Homer has a good, crazy face. on the moment he does not have a heart inside of his body

before it is placed back. Though this is also insane. This isn't even... Well, actually, this is the most extreme thing that happened to Homer, injury-wise, though close to it is snapping his back in half. Like Batman. It's true. Bain will break him, and so will his lies to the Chinese government.

And we visit Chairman Mao embalmed in this nice little memorial. You can visit him. Say hi. You can't physically touch him with your hands, though. That's a joke there. Yes. Now, this 50 million number, I will say, this is, again, our challenge to not learn ancient Hebrew. But this 50 million number I did look up just a little bit, which is, did you look into it any Bob? How much can be attributed to Chairman Mao or not? No.

I know capitalism's hands are clean. Yes. That's the general what-aboutism. But the way Homer frames it is, now, of course, Chairman Mao and its government had definitely killed some political enemies and opponents, say, landlords, for instance, but when this 50 million number makes one think of say Hitler or in

that kind of death toll and you think death camps, but the majority of the 50 million number, which is on the high end of some historians and disputed by historians who some put it more at 15 to 30 million, that is attributed to the Great

Leap Forward program, as Mal called it, which was about industrialization of the country and changing how the farms worked. And it is attributed to causing a mass famine in those years. And then that famine is attributed to 50 million deaths in the high end for some historians. I see. Well, I apologize for taking part in what aboutism.

Yes. And I will burn myself with three cigarettes when this podcast is over. Again, like most things when you blame China's human rights abuses, it does feel like we're coming at it. It feels weird from an American angle. But especially in this one, it's like, well, this famine. It's his planning and it was his. So he did kill the people himself and it should be attributed. And to that, I do say it's like, so every American president's death toll should count

every person who didn't have health insurance because of their rules as a president. And I say, yes, then they have millions of people dead on their hands. But that's not how the people who say Mao killed 50 million people count it when it is a white guy who did it for instance. So it's like, Do people blame, people try to dispute Winston Churchill starving the people of India during their colonial occupation? They don't give that number to him either. So when you hear the 50 million thing, one, it's disputed by people who put it more at 15 to 30. But even if it were true, if you attribute famine to it, then blame other people to. That is the what aboutism I am steeped in right now.

That's what I was saying at the beginning of this podcast. They make fun of every country, but here it feels a little more pointed. Well, also it's a joke that you're just supposed to, agree with Homer and that Homer knows history well. Like it also just breaks the concept of Homer a bit that he has like a CIA talking point about Chairman Mao at the ready. Who wrote this, John Krasinski? So as they're exploring, enough about the politics, as they're exploring, we head to the Great Wall. And so instead of a joke about communism, we get an F-Troop-style joke about barbarians of the Great Wall.

Yes. And hey, about let me think, how many years, before this was, okay, this is like 14 years earlier, Bart skateboarded down the Great Wall and Bart versus the world where he later fought Foo Manchu Burns. Right. Slightly more sensitive portrayal, perhaps. And like Drew Carey actually ran down that same Great Wall of China. Hey, Berlin Wall's garbage compared to the Great Wall. Oh, yeah. That Great Wall is pretty great.

Sorry, the Berlin Wall could barely support David Hasselhoff. It would take a thousand David Hasselhoff to even try to destroy one part of that Great Wall. And so I do like that the barbarians, as they're called, they all have a writer's room style approach to it of. All right, everyone take a break and come back Monday with five fresh ideas. Can't make it Monday. My kid has a thing. Pogo sticks didn't work this time. And this next joke about Death of a Salesman, this is according to the commentary. I guess this is a popular play in China, but it is performed with Chinese theater techniques.

And if you are an American watching this, it seems very wacky. Yes, it seems incredibly left field to have Death of a Salesman performed here. And I think the root of it comes from. In 1983, it made headlines that Arthur Miller traveled to Beijing to direct a performance of his play in Mandarin, you know, through translators. And so his accounting of it, I think, got it a lot of Western headlines that certainly a Simpsons, well-read Simpsons writers like Al Jean, would have heard Arthur Miller even direct. directed Chinese performers of a Beijing performance. And Arthur Miller also published his journal on his travels there called Salesman in Beijing. Hmm.

Okay. Yeah, I didn't know that historical context. I guess to me it's a little myopic to be fascinated with like, oh, the Chinese love this American thing. When everybody, America has dominated the world in terms of giving them all of our pop culture. It's like, to me, it's very pedestrian. It's like, yes, of course, other people love American culture. And here's an example. That's like saying, oh, they perform Shakespearean plays in other places, but in their native language.

It's just localization. But, yes, I am thinking that this being a checklist of things that they know about China in the writer's room, then they heard about when in 1983, when it was a bigger news, especially with comparatively closed off China and Beijing, were then to hear reports from Arthur Miller, a respected playwright about going there. I can see how that's stuck in their minds. Though I don't know, I'd have to read his book on it. I don't think a New Year's dragon walks through the sea during that. You could be surprised. And then after that, this is where Homer realizes he can lie, too. So, Mr. Simpson, what do you do for a living?

I'm a nuclear... Wait a minute. These guys don't know me? I can be whatever I want. I'm a Chinese acrobat. You shall be back in the land you love soon. Tomorrow we will give you your baby. Oh my god. Really? My life begins at last.

That is quite an insult to your other children. We understand, ma'am. We're pretty lousy kids. Lisa, soon you will have a Chinese baby sister who will surpass you academically. I don't know about that. I'm considered pretty smart. Well, Tibet was considered... That was considered pretty independent. How'd that work out? How dare you make light of that brutal?

Mind your manners, Lisa. Such loving discipline. Maybe someday. Someone will love you too, childless servant. Lisa doesn't even get a comeback to that. It's just outrage. How dare you? They don't even write a funny thing for a...

I think this justifies the jingle. Let's give it a listen. Mm-hmm. Take that. Lisa's beliefs. We cover the Tibet thing. Yes, yeah. This is just another...

That whole deal, the Tibet deal. And they were, as Homer said, about the environment, you know, a bunch of people got together and that worked itself out and we don't have to talk about it anymore, right? Yeah. But getting the line in the episode is pretty funny that Lisa also just that they get to, say, you know, the competitiveness of, I mean, this is certainly stuff that the Al Jean's generation reads about in the news of like,

America falling behind Chinese education standards and putting Lisa in competition with a smarter, a quotation marks Chinese baby. And this is where one of the two deleted scenes are here. When Bart says that they are disappointing children as part of cover, he had some more descriptions. That is quite an insult to your other children. We understand, ma'am. We're pretty lousy kids. I call my father Homer and Fat Wad.

also lard butt wide load popping fresh Minnesota farts I have been to your Minnesota friendly folks Not bad I think her saying that she's been to Minnesota And reaction to that makes it funny I think Fat Wada is a new one for Bart though He's reacting to days like you know what I do call him Homer all the time We are pretty disrespectful

Also I was thinking that oh in the deleted scene Maybe they comment on It's just kind of in the background they're like oh Kentucky Fried Chicken Or Krusty has a business there That's crusty fried chicken. That is their comment for back then going to Beijing and seeing, you know, American businesses in red China. Right. And also seeing celebrity endorsements that would not make it over to America.

Like, you would see them eventually when YouTube came around. Like, oh, look, Arnold Schwarzenegger did this ad and Tommy Lee Jones does these ads in Japan. And so we then head to a Chinese acrobatic performance. Another, you know, one of the many cultural things. I would bet Dana Gould was taken to or got to see during his visit to Beijing with his wife. And then we had some very dark jokes about state-sponsored murder in here, too. I'd hate to live in a place where agents of the government could just kill me. That'd be pretty bad.

We're safe, as far as I know. I haven't looked at the news in 44 years, but it's going to take it for granted. And certainly a government that didn't like the day we're recording this, arrest people on trumped-up anti-fah terrorism charges. put them in jail for being at a protest. They would not make a protest so illegal in America. No, no. Not going to happen.

Well, in this case, the star acrobat died of a bullet-related death from being too outspoken. They then are instantly losing faith in their government immediately. Like, they start questioning how it works. They wonder why Pearl Jam never shows up because Pearl Jam fronted a lot of Free Tibet concerts previously. And, too, I could not find proof that they have gone back on performing. in China, so Pearl Jam is stayed true to that. And Homer's poking holes in this so-called communism by pointing out the rudimentary free markets that exist? He's got a point. I mean, China had the good, you know, once they opened

up, they had the good sense of, oh, if we just make your business easy, you won't care that we're communist. And eventually, you'll kind of not be able to do anything without us, I think. We really do count on that everything being cheap from them. And we see how good tariffs work when you try to not do something with that. All of this political talk, though, about it having rudimentary free markets then just leads to, like, another corny sitcom plot. Yes, it just is like now Homer has to pose as a different kind of person, an acrobat. Yeah, that the little joke, it's not a bad joke when Homer comes up with a terrible

lie about what his job is just because he sees a Chinese acrobat. This is an I Love Lucy thing, like, oh, well, of course, since you said you're an acrobat, you can fill in unless you're lying. And the animation is very cool, like the Shalind Monk scene, but it is a needless complication that fills up a lot of time when we should be focused on Selma and her emotional story. I like how long it takes, and Homer has no reaction to it.

Everything is happening without him, understanding what this is about, why he is clearly standing on a seesaw that is going to launch him into the air, and it works. He actually does stay high up until his jingoism gets the best of him, his patriotism as he starts chanting USA, and that knocks him off, and he snaps his spine in two, but he gets better immediately. Don't worry.

Yeah, there was no acupuncture, but a porcupine came in and covered him in needles while he was sleeping. They love puns, corny F-Troop level, Asian puns in this. The name of the stunt is Chairman Wow. Yeah. I prefer Chairman Mo. magic walk. Though this does work on multiple levels, Homer is a man on chairs, and you say, wow, it's about a chairman and tribute to chairman now. But it's true. It's a lot richer than you think, because,

yeah, it's a chairman. This is also where it really hit me that, like, not a single word of Mandarin, I think, is spoken once in this entire episode, kind of, they could have at least, like, I get it, they're not going to have a sign gag actually written in Mandarin. It's, even though it makes no sense, it'll be written in English so you can get the joke. But could Madam Wu, instead of just having a very pronounced accent, as many other characters do, could she at least speak Mandarin to another person in Beijing who is native there once? It'd be fun to hear it once, I say. It might seem like you care about the culture a little more if they spoke the language accurately

instead of just a bunch of white people speaking in accents. So Homer wakes up, they tease an acupuncture joke, but yes, it's a porcupine. We learn that there will never be a year of the porcupine. They haven't changed the Chinese zodiac yet. Maybe someday. I know. I feel like we're not going to get any new additions. This is not like McDonald's Land where a new character could show up.

They need to refresh that zodiac. Get a little tired of here. Snake again. We're a proud year of the dog guys, I think, both of us. I believe so, yes. You know, you're close to the Chinese measurement in the calendar to cut off to be into the previous one. I think we're both in the lunar new year of the dog.

Yeah. After we get Homer, they don't speak once again about how Homer should clearly have horrible spine issues. We then get the sweetness of Selma having the most important emotional moment of the episode happen entirely off screen and she instead comes into the room with it.

Oh yeah, by the way, I was given this. Here she is. I feel like an episode that really cared about Selma's emotions here would show you her first meeting instead of making it about the first time Homer meets her. And also, I think they wouldn't do it off screen while Homer's unconscious.

Yeah, and again, this is Ling based on Lulu Gould. And like I said earlier, not seen very much after this. Nope. They stopped really caring about her, despite all of their opportunities. But let's hear our first meeting with Ling. I like you all to meet someone introducing Ling Bouvier. Selma, she's beautiful. This is Homer, your daddy. Without him, I wouldn't have you. Oh, she likes you. She likes it.

My eyes. How? Homer, I do appreciate what you did. How'd you like a little time with Miss October? I would, but Marge would kill me. I mean, oh, right. Oh, ow, oh. Homer, of all the sneaky dishonest things you've ever done,

playing Selma's husband was by far the sweetest. It wasn't easy, Marge. I missed you so much. Oh, okay. One quick snuggle. Snuggle. Is there any other kind? If I can poke holes in this again for another reason,

Homer says he missed her so much. At what time was he ever not around March the entire time they've been in Beijing? You know what? I didn't even think of that because it just feels like placeholder dialogue. But yeah, like I guess emotionally he is free from Selma. And they also missed an opportunity then do a scene of Homer and Selma have to sleep in the same bed in the same hotel room as part of the, like do that. Like there's a joke.

Yeah, there's more to explore in this tired sitcom premise. But yes, this is odd. It's also odd that Marge is like, let's have sex in a, not a hotel room, rather, a hospital room that any doctor could walk into. Yes. And I have to think, okay, let's just say Homer's back isn't broken. This is a horrible injury. If he can even, like, he's, sex is going to be very difficult in this exact moment right here, I would say for Homer. Yes, he could be snuggled upon, but not, there could be no co-snuggling, let's say.

Yes, yeah. Homer one and how, I mean, how giving of a lover do you think Homer is in this situation? I'm going to say there's some hand snuggling and that's it. Sure, sure, sure. Look, Marge is getting her dessert here, I'll say, but I don't think Homer is if you even can. And then it is revealed they do the eyes in the picture thing with Chairman Mao, except it's his nostrils, which I guess is at least a little good of a little joke change up there. And then Madam Wu's mortal catchphrase.

Yes, fool me once. Shame on you. fool me twice shame on woo and that's why she's called woo there's no other reason it's just for a corny joke about her name i would like to hear lucy lu had to do a lot of jokes about her ethnicity written by white actors back in her time she's reflected on that a little bit i wonder how she felt at the time like was she given directions of you know no her accent make it a little more uh and how did that work exactly i feel like these are just the rules that you're used to play in this time period as an actor of her race, and she's willing to, like, humor it because when they bring her in

and they tell her, you're going to be an evil Chinese bureaucrat. I think she kind of knows what they want. Yeah, you're right. She's a professional actor. It's not a particularly nuanced character she's being asked to play, and I think she understood it pretty easily. Yeah, yeah. And so then we do get a nice, we finally get a joke at America's expense saying that, like, you know, you'll go to America where no one is happy. She's bragging about with Ling about to go there. But this is where they lose their Ling.

Ling, you're going to be very happy in America, unlike everyone else there. Selma Bouvier, this man is not your husband. And for that, no adoption. They took my babies. The fortune cookies here really are more accurate. If you were waiting for the fortune cookie joke, well, you had to wait until the end of Act 2.

Yes. But of course they were going to do a fortune cookie joke. We will take Selma's baby is what it said. It's a cute enough spin on, oh, you know, the food is fresher or the Chinese food. It tastes better when you're actually in Beijing than opposed to when you eat it from an American restaurant. But here it's that the fortune cookies are more accurate, which instead is just a threat of a fortune cookie ended a Homer. But yes, a joke that could easily have been written in a Jerry Lewis comedy in 1955 here. I think we covered this before, but fortune cookies are not Chinese.

Nobody knows where they came from. It's somewhere in California. We can't determine the origin point. I don't know if they made it back over to China or what. Because, like, obviously our version of Chinese food is very different than actual Chinese food. Oh, yes. You had a great history on that in the episode where the Simpsons go to Chinatown and Homer gets that fortune cookie. I think that was.

Yeah. So we go to commercial break with Selma sobbing. She's been crying all the way to the airport. I mean, it has destroyed her to have. have her baby and Ling calls her mama. The bonding has happened and Selma has been destroyed by this. I'd love this Chinese spy to meet Hans Molman in his Bart get up. So many people have played Barts over the years.

And then they could meet Estonian Dwarf too. No, he's more Millhouse. Millhouse Estonian Dwarf can hang out with these two barts. I love that. Gould did relate that this waiting at the airport is nerve-wracking, that once you've been handed your baby, You don't really feel like you have it until, at least for him, he didn't feel like they had Lulu or his other children until they landed, it sounded like.

I could see that being a very stressful situation. I guess there's the threat that they can decide, no, we have a lot of power and we can take it back from you. But yet I mean the baby. And this is where Lisa decides that it's time for an even zanier scheme. Listen, I've got a plan to get Ling back, but we must be discreet. You never know where there might be a spy. Yes, tell me your plan in detail, American sister. Don't have a cattle, dude.

Let's talk about this outside. Hold still, homie. Yeah, Dad. If you don't look perfect, you'll never be able to sneak in and steal Ling back. You look just like a Buddha statue. Now all you need is an expression of utter serenity. Just think about the day you found that junior mint in your belly. your mint in your belly button.

So I guess this is Lisa's plan. Yeah. She is a Buddhist and you can't see it, of course, but Homer has been spray painted to look like a classic smiling Buddhist statue. It's really selling out her religion that she's like, you know what, we're going to have, perhaps there's no grave and idol rule in Buddhism. I don't know. I suppose.

I'm maybe just thinking like a Christian, but it's shocking that, yes, this is her crazy scheme. Man, again, this King of the Hill episode we just did, it's really making me miss it. It felt a little more respectful to Buddhism and the culture. Yeah, nobody is spray painting Bobby Hill gold and then dragging him around by a hook. And nor would it successfully fool the Buddhists who see it and think it is a real statue and not a man painted gold. I mean, this is just, it's very silly. Al Jean mentions that kid robots sold a Homer Buddha, gold Buddha toy around this same time.

And on the DVD, if you press the enter button at the end of this scene, it actually will pop up just an image of the gold Buddha Homer just popping up on the DVD screen for just a second. Yeah, I guess that wasn't a blind box figure. That was just sold independently. They come in, because it's one of these kind of figures, they come in many different colors of different rarity. There's a silver one, there's a jade one.

Oh, jade's cool. I only looked up the gold one. I didn't see the other ones. The gold one I did see at least a week ago when I last checked it. You can get a gold version of it for 20 bucks on eBay, right now. Though I don't know if it comes with the Chinese food box included, if it's mintin box with its Chinese food box that he comes in.

If it doesn't report that seller immediately. This is, again, this is so corny. At least if they're going this ridiculous, then they will go truly insane of put a hook inside of the statue's nose to drag him. Like, that is truly insane. Like, his family guy would be like, I guess that's not too crazy for us. Yeah, the guards are not hearing Homer's screen.

when the hook goes in. I guess his nose cartilage is rather resilient if they're able to drag him this far. And then eventually they want to chop him up into chunks and quote unquote, worship the chunks. Also, we learned that at least one of the two guards thinks that feng shui is fake and sold to trick Americans. So Homer then is left alone for a moment

and that's when he is able to sneak further into the orphanage and find the room full of babies. The Dana Gould says that apparently this is similar to how he first saw at least one of his daughters, that it was a huge room full of baby girls, very similar to this. Yeah, I don't know if he had to find the baby who grabbed his eyes like Homer does. Wasn't that, I mean, he was telling the story, but I'm thinking, well, yes, when babies are born,

like in hospitals, they're putting a nursery like this. So it's not that different. But I guess this is like an orphanage. So, yeah, I just, I'm thinking, well, yeah, that's kind of what you do with little babies, right? It's a maternity ward. It seems a little dismissive of just. a thing that's normal in American hospitals, too, I think. Yes.

I last saw it in Marty Supreme. That's right. As a man tears up and we hear an 80s song that is totally out of time with it. He's leaving that kid five minutes later. You've seen that movie. I don't buy it for a second. No, I know. He's crying. Yeah, it's made ambiguous in, but the character we have seen throughout the entire movie, is he the type who he's crying because he's thinking, I would die for this child? Or is he thinking, time to go on a new ping pong tour and never come back? He's caught up in the moment, but then he's like, oh, enough of that. Yes, yeah.

This isn't as fun as sleeping with an older Gwyneth Paltrow. Yes, yeah. That's probably true. That's probably true. After the eyes are grabbed, Homer runs out with the baby. Seemingly nobody catches him running out of a building with guards with a baby while dressed as a golden Buddha. He pulls that off pretty easily. Because we haven't been there yet, we have to go to the famous square where nothing ever happens.

Yes. This is where the family, well, actually, right before it, This is the next and final and only deleted scene, whereas they are heading toward Tiananmen Square, they are trying to stay inconspicuous. Now listen, this country's crawling with cops. So try to remain inconspicuous. And then the camera pans up to show a giant, like, jumbo vision screen,

showing Selma saying this and having it subtitled with what she's saying. Right. Okay. That's interesting. We're going back to the approach. perspective on China from 20 years ago. It's like, oh, this country's covered with cops, unlike America. Dot, dot, dot, dot. I know it's an authoritarian state.

I know it's very different. But also, like, there's too many cops here. But here I mean America. Possibly true about Canada. Just alone. I feel like it leaks every other day. The government under Trump or Biden or Trump. Turns out they were actually watching you the entire time or they logged all of the things

you said on social media about Trump or Israel or Antifa. and they've been building it the entire time they've been watching you in the TSA or ICE or wherever. Yeah, we'll just turn you away at the border if you made a joke once on Twitter, basically. So I feel like we were just catching up to where China was 20 years ago. Like I said earlier, they're kind of our role model for how to crack down on civilians.

As always, we're behind China. That comes, as well as maintaining our authoritarian state of murder and watching over people. Tiananmen Square thing again, look, yeah, I have a whole history out of it. No, I don't. It was a thing that happened. I will say one thing that gets lost in it, the thing that happened on June 5, 1989, which was in response to a giant student protest where a lot of people were killed, the tank man in the photo is not run over.

He actually does the tank stops and does not run him over, and then he gets away. And that is an important fact about it. That's not a man who dies in that photo. I did not look into this, again, ancient Hebrew, but I'm glad you did. And also I had read that nobody knows who that guy is, and he may have been arrested. He may have never been caught by the Chinese government. the Chinese government doesn't like talking about this. Though also I did read a fun conspiracy theory

that a Japanese reporter who was there that day for it, he alleges that it was all staged in response to the day before that they actually did kill protesters, that it was staged by the Chinese government for the press who were there to witness it, that's why it was photographed in film for it, to show them not killing a protester

as a way to, that was one reporter who was theirs, like, conspiracy theory, let's say. Could be true. I see. Mainly this is the reason most people say this episode is probably not on Disney Plus, is this scene being set in Tiananmen Square, restaging this shot of the tank running up to Selma here. I feel like even if you cut that out, there'd be three more jokes that would not make it play in China.

Yes, yeah. Also, isn't this a boogie joke that how to any, okay, maybe Selma, but how do any of the rest of the Simpsons have, Delta Gold Medallion access, right? You have to fly so much to get anything from any airports. So it does feel like writers reflecting on their own travels. A lot of the writers like Mike Reese were flying out to L.A. once a week from New York.

Oh, yeah. And Dana Gould is a road warrior and a very successful comedian of stand-up. Like, I would bet he has gold medallion status at some airline for all the traveling he no doubt did when he isn't a Simpsons writer doing stand-up all around America. But the Simpsons would not have these miles. They don't travel that frequently. But I guess maybe with all of their, the Simpsons are going to blank. They have accumulated enough miles to make it to the Delta Lounge.

And so they have been cornered by Lucy Lou once more in our next clip. If we can just get to the Delta Airlines Gold Medallion Lounge, they can't get in without spending frequent flyer miles. Plus, we get free apple, orange, and grapefruit juice. I'm afraid that juice is not on your tongue just yet. Give the baby back. I cannot allow her to be raised by an unmarried woman. Madam Wu, I too work for a cruel and faceless empire,

the Department of Motor Vehicles. May I talk to you, bureaucrat to bureaucrat. Yes, but you first must sign this form. An initial here and here. Now we must find a notary. This is a wang-a-pawls time to sign. Proceed. Sheed. Madam Wu, we both love the enforcement of pointless rules. But there's a greater joy in bending the rules to help someone who thinks all hope is gone.

So Futurama has been off the air for a bit. And this is now our space for bureaucrat jokes. And I'll take them. Yes. Maybe one of the former Futurama writers like Bill Odenkirk even suggested it. Like, well, that's why we do a joke with Hermes about bureaucrats. This is one of the few jokes about like the cultural differences and similarities that I did like in his story. is that, well, yeah, we're both bureaucrats. America has annoying bureaucrats too at the DMV who have to have so many rules. Yeah, I did like this. It's a clever enough resolution to this problem. They can see eye to eye about one subject.

Instead of just, you know, a boring way to write, it would just say, from woman to woman or whatever, that that breaks through. Or certainly in a dramatic version of this story, it would be saying to like, look, you're a woman too. Can't you understand what this means? Like, that's what would happen in a regular drama. We do hear Madam Wu's insane.

backstory that speaking of Marty Supreme, her mother, excuse me, father was a ping pong champion who died when the ball got lodged in his throat and the Heimlich maneuver invented the next day. So she was raised by a single mother and she knows it can't be done. And so this is when she allows

the family to escape. I was this woman's husband for a few days. Name only. And beer will soon obliterate that memory. But I don't think this baby could find any greater love on your planet or ours.

You may not believe this, but I once was a baby myself. My father was a ping pong champion. He died when the ball got stuck in his throat. The Heimlich maneuver was invented the very next day. My mother raised me alone, so I know it can be done. You may keep your baby. But you, drop the panda.

But he loved me. Ow! What are you little... All in danger. You. And then the parrot panda shows up and starts strangling Homer back, and it's very silly, very, very silly. Yeah. Hey, you know what?

I'm glad they brought up Homer versus dignity on the commentary because I was thinking at Homer has had very intimate relationships with a panda. So you think this would be traumatic for him? Yes, like Dana Gold says, why would he want a panda after being sexually assaulted by one? And then Matt Selman starts to go like, well, you know, is it rape? Like I'm quoting Matt Selman on the thing. Yeah, there's a conversation about Homer versus Dignity that should have happened on that commentary.

It at least shows that it was something that became a joke within the group. Like, they know they went too far with it, or at least that's what I get from the writers having the conversation. And I'm sure MacGaraining hates that, that whole scene. He better hate that more than every time somebody cried too many tears combined. He better. Yes. He was too busy writing Bender jokes to keep his eyes on whatever was happening on the Simpsons

when they were doing weird stuff with pandas. Man, just to hear them talk about it on there I was like, oh boy, you're bringing it. It's so bad. I wish, if I can erase one thing, I don't know if it would be that or Mod's death because I really do think like Mod's death was such a mistake and it fucks up Ned's character in a way you can never really come back from.

But that low point is so low of the panda love. When we covered that episode, though, we found it to be very funny, except for the third act. Yes. So there's things you can salvage from it. No, we actually, we did end up liking it more. than I expected to until that bit. And then the third act is just them completely lost of what to do with Homer after he is surviving his encounter with the Panda.

Hey, that's a great episode with Nick Weiger as our guest. If you haven't heard that one in the archive, it's give that a listen. Actually, around the same time as they're making this joke about Homer's Panda history, Dana Gold then gets very earnest for a moment in a way that seems to make all the other guys uncomfortable in the room that he's like actually. I mean, even I was a little like, wow, Dana Gould can be earnest about his love for his children. he loves his kids. That's obvious. If he follows Instagram, he's always talking and posting about his kids. And like we said earlier, they're all

adults now. Yes. It does grant this episode for its problems. A level of sweetness that I can't deny. That like, Dana Gould wrote this out of a love for his children and he is, by all account, seems to be a pretty great dad. And one who loves his kids and

really supports them. And it is very sweet as an expression of that. And so they're about to leave on a junk for some reason. instead of just, you know, a taxi to the airport. Yeah. I guess it's like, what haven't we done yet with China? They looked at their board of stereotypes, and they're like, wait, haven't done a junk.

Let's get them on one of those boats. And as they leave, we get two endings because they decided they needed to topper and added it late in animation. Goodbye, Simpsons. You'll be back someday, Ling. As a spoiled American teenager. Ah! Something's wrong with Bart.

He's acting weird. Feast on my shorts, stupid father man. Wait, you're not, Bart. Close enough. Homer did not try kissing this Chinese spy. It might have been similar to a peanut. You should try it with this other Bart. They're mainly just having fun with

what if you mistranslated or what have you translated and then translated back? Bart's catchphrases, or at least what they imagined that would be like, not to say that they actually found out what it would be in Mandarin and then translated it back in English. It's more just the feel of that. And these three dragons were basically the spider pig of 2005. We couldn't get enough of them.

I know that they say that it came in at the end, like late. And it's just like, I don't love this song. I don't love the voices that are being done in it. It's not that funny, I got to say. Yeah, I guess they needed something to get to. go out on. It couldn't have been sentimentality, so it had to be the return of the dragons. Not to be confused with a classic Bruce Lee film. True, true, true.

And with this joke here, I wonder if I would love to hear from his now adult children, their experiences if they, you know, have traveled back as American teenagers or older and visited Beijing or any other parts of where they were born. I'd be interested to hear their thoughts on traveling back there as being raised American their entire lives. I would ask them if Dana Gould does Gek's lines throughout the house. Does he like walk into the room and say, it's tail time? They would probably say they don't even hear it anymore.

It's the similar thing to every joke your parents make, it just becomes noise eventually. Hey, we're dealing with the return of gex. It's either happening now or soon, I forget what. That's right. With Dana Gould's involvement, of course. You couldn't do it without it. Yes. I mean, how dare you even insinuate that this could happen without him?

You mentioned Lings. appearances over time. They really are light on her. From my quick research on Ling, she gets one dedicated episode in season 24, and that episode is about how she's being raised, but it comes into this problem that is she has to age faster than Maggie.

She's Maggie's equal in age seemingly in this, but for that episode in season four, they have to age her up to be verbal. Like she's a toddler in that episode, just for to make the story work better. This happens with a million characters, but it is really distracting to me that she is older than Maggie somehow

after appearing much later than her. Yeah, I'm seeing this is The Changing of the Guardian for her only other featured episode. And then I was looking up like, the wiki says she appears on screen in season 34 as My Life is a vlog. I pulled up that episode. That's the one where the high concept is

it's only told through watching YouTube videos and other videos online about how the Simpsons became viral. And there is a clip of, like, Maggie performing in a, like, child's recital. And a baby is there who probably is Ling. But Selma doesn't talk to her and does not react to it. I see. I see. So unclear.

And I'd also point out that in season 36 and season 37, there are two episodes that are dedicated to Selma and Patty, including in season 37, the one where they start. stop living together and Patty gets a new haircut. Guess who isn't in that episode at all? And I rescind it to be sure. I like that episode. And you know what?

I completely forgot about Ling. Maybe the show just says, we don't have to acknowledge this anymore. It's too complicated. It's crazy. That episode has a Jub, job joke in it too. Like, they remember they had Jubjub,

but not the baby they gave her, which actually should be a big problem. Patty should be like, I have to live with a fucking baby who cries all night. Like, I didn't sign on for this when I split an apartment, with my twin. Yeah.

When they wrote this episode, they'd know the movie was coming. They didn't know they'd be living with these characters for 21 more years and then beyond.

So maybe they thought like, well, how many more stories can we make? We don't really need to worry about Ling and now we're kind of living in the forever show. Yeah. Things that change Selma forever

like Ling might have to be toned down all the way to the point where they barely exist. It reminds me of this happens on countless soap operas, daytime soaps on TV in the U.S., but also on TV shows like family matters.

young kid characters appear and then someday they just don't show up anymore because they write the kids out of the show even though it's the family of the show because the writers don't want to do anything with these kids anymore. Yeah, I know. I didn't watch friends, but I know there was a baby at some point and you barely see it after it's born.

Yes, I know what you're talking about. It's Ross's baby is born as a major moment in season one, but the baby lives with his mother and her wife. And so Ross is basically only a dad in a handful of episodes. I recall late in the series when Rachel gives birth to a second child of Ross's that Ross's dad played by Elliot Gould says, wow, I'm a grandfather. And then Ross says, wait, no, you have my baby Ben.

And then Elliot Gould goes like, yes, I'm kidding. And he turns away from his son and kind of does a big dramatic like, whew, uh-oh. It's like you kind of forget that Frazier has a kid, and that is the premise of the reboot that didn't really go anywhere. It's like, oh, I have to live with my son and he's rude and obnoxious and he's 30.

I never watched a full episode of that I think you saw some of it, Bob, but I feel like there's jokes to be made there of, you're my father who never visited me and left me to live with my frigid, horrid mother. My wife, she might have watched some of it on a plane. I've heard it is good, but it's also not

Frazier because there's nobody else except for Kelsey Grammer. And then a few people might pop in for like a cameo. But clearly that was a terrible time for everybody involved, including Kelsey Grammer, mostly because of Kelsey Grammer, so they didn't want to come back. The last tide of the episode, though, that seemingly confuses even David Silverman himself on the commentary, for no reason that they explain on the commentary, they have over the credits David Silverman identify himself as the supervising director on the show and gives a little lesson on how to draw Bart.

Yeah, he even makes a joke like, well, this is not actually how I do it. Yes. It was just for the cameras. But yeah, you could see a youngish David Silverman in this. It is weird. You're right. Like, why now? Why not earlier in the show?

It feels like it should be something that happens closer to the movie because he is a director on the film, like the core director. So it's nice to see, but I'm also confused. I wish if there was a reason for it, I wish they explained it on the commentary. My best guess if I had to make one is Fox is slowly, starting to pressure them into having a fourth act. Or they were told, no, you have to put something over the credits. And so they filmed something in David Silverman's office really quick to put something over the credits.

Like maybe that was the demand. But it's very strange. It is very strange. In any case, it's nice to see David Silverman on the screen. Within the context of an episode, it's forever part of the episode. So he will always be part of it. Viewers should know more about the animators. So I approve of it that way, too.

It's just a strange, strange end to the episode. but a weird and important continuity-wise one and important one for Dana Gould and his family and his lovely family, but a weird one that is also full of, at best, you could say, dated stereotypes about the country and people of China. Yeah, it is a very 2005 perspective on the country, and I feel like nothing we said should offend you, but we are still for sale, China. So we're waiting for that big donation to the Patreon, mysterious benefactor. Who could it be? We'll know. We'll know.

But we know how to keep it a secret, President G. We won't mention ghosts, time travel, or Winnie the Pooh. Don't worry. That's not going to be happening on our future podcasts. If you want us to delist our movie episode about Winnie the Pooh 2011, it's gone. It's gone tomorrow. I'm going to get rid of my 4Ks back to the future. It's not going to happen.

Thanks so much for listening, everybody. I did also want to note that there was like a five-day break between the first half and the second half of this podcast because I had a power outage and then we had to record a ton of stuff in between. So we might have repeated ourselves. and if so, we're sorry, but that's never really happened before. Yes, if you didn't even notice where the change in time happens there, then I guess we did a good job or at least our great editor did a good job. Oh, wait a minute.

Was it China who down that power line in my neighborhood? Oh, man, the conspiracy widens here. Yeah, where was my MacBook made? Oh, I'll dig into this. I'll dig into this in the future. But everybody out there, thanks for listening. If you want to support the show, get these episodes ad-free, go to patreon.com slash Talking Simpson sign up there.

you will get the ad-free episodes that you crave. You will also get access to our vast paywall of episodes. Beyond that, lurks nine years worth of Patreon content. They are all very long episodes about shows you like, like Futurama, King of the Hill, Mission Hill, Batman, the Animated Series, and The Critic. And on that level, if you sign up for five bucks, patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons,

you also get a new episode of both Talking Futurama and Talk King of the Hill every month. And often, a little surprise. Recently, within the past month or so, we honey and I saw Toy Story independently and then the next day we sat down and made a little reaction podcast we put it on Patreon everyone loved it so yeah

look for little surprises like that happening at patreon.com slash talking Simpsons and there is a $10 level too when he signed up for that you can access the $5 stuff naturally but you can also access one mega immense podcast once a month for patrons of that level what is going on there Henry

Bob is referring to the what a cartoon movie our premium podcast that we do each month that's really like three extra podcasts that you get for your subscription in addition to all of the ad-free and bonus podcast Bob was talking about. We're in the middle of our summer of Disney 2010s, and we're talking about this month,

Zootopia, a very popular film in the region that this episode was set. And before that, last month you heard us talk about Rekin Ralph, the 2012 film. Both of those were directed by Simpsons veterans, and we have a ton of fun stories about the connections to the Simpsons in there, plus tons of other great,

history and trivia that you can learn by listening to those episodes where we go crazy in depth. That's just the two most recent ones. We have a giant back catalog where we have covered tons of Disney films, Warner Films, DreamWorks films, live-action films, anime, junk too. We love having fun talking about crappy things like Cool World. Sign up today to get access to the entire gigantic back catalog, hundreds of hours, at patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. When you head there, you can just check on the collections page to see all of the cool stuff you're missing.

in our many different series of extra content on Patreon. Once more, that is patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. And I've been one of your host, Bob Mackey. You can find me on, let's say, Blue Sky, there we go, and Letterbox as Bob Servo of my other podcast. It's called Retronauts. That is a classic gaming podcast, all about old video games. You can find that where you find your normal podcast,

or, hey, go to patreon.com slash Retronauts and sign up there for a ton of paywall bonus stuff too. And, Henry, how about you? You could find me on Blue Sky. And Instagram as Talking, Henry, I'm always posting fun stuff there. And if you want to stay up to date whenever we do new stuff, or if we have any bonuses that come as a surprise, like our Toy Story 5, spoiler cast, you should be following at Talk Simpsons Pod on Blue Sky and Instagram,

because at Talk Simpsons pod keeps you in the loop about all of those things. And if you would just like an easy-to-follow list of all of the free podcast we've ever released for Talking Simpsons and for our What a Cartoon podcast, head over to talking simpsons.com. Thank you so much for listening, folks. We'll see you again next time for season sixes, and Maggie makes three, and we'll see you then. Sir, thank God the airbags activated.

Those are my lungs. Aw.