Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - Last Exit to Springfield With Eva Anderson

Episode Date: May 15, 2024

First-time guest, the brilliant TV writer Eva Anderson, is here to help us deconstruct one of the most celebrated eps in Simpsons history! Often ranked high on "best Simpsons ever" lists, we deconstruct how it got that reputation and if the highly quotable scenes hold up. Plus Eva helps us with the show's WGA strike history (which was the style at the time), we explain the multiple guest stars cut from the early scripts, and debunk British smiles. Listen now for the best of times and the blurst of times in this exciting podcast! Support this podcast, experience it ad-free, and get over 150 bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow the official Twitter, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

This podcast is brought to you by patreon.com slash talking Simpsons head there to check out exclusive podcasts like talking Futurama talking of the hill the what a cartoon movie podcast and tons more I hardly endorse this event or product Our product. Ahoy, hoy, everybody, and welcome to Talking Simpsons, where we podcast without flungers, cap dabblers, and smendlers. I'm one of your hosts, the hired goon, Bob Mackey, and this is our chronological exploration of The Simpsons. Who is here with me today, as always? That's a nice donut. It's Henry Gilbert.

And who is our special guest on the line? I'm Eva Anderson, and I can't think of a quote right now. And this week's episode is Last Exit to Springfield. My friends, tonight we unveil my most diabolical creation. This episode originally aired on March 11th, 1993. And as always, Henry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history. Oh my God! Oh boy, Bobby.

The Great Blizzard of 93 strikes most of the eastern United States. Roger Rabbit's final short appears in theaters with the forgotten film A Far Off Place and Harrison Ford makes a cameo on the young Indiana Jones Chronicles that's what all of the young Indiana Jones watchers were waiting for to yeah for him to show up as old Indiana Jones but now he's aged beyond that oh yeah that point in the story he's much older than the non-canonical old indiana jones in the show like i've since learned that in official lucasfilm canon that is no longer canon but there's a one-eyed current day indiana jones in like 1993 that's in the show but then yeah if they have an episode that takes place like at a jazz club in the 50s and harrison ford like basically says one

line and sits in a chair and then he's like yes I remember being in South America and then it flashes to younger characters adventure it dared to ask what if Indiana Jones was 57 years old what would happen that's why I was thinking while watching the most recent Indiana Jones movie I was like when's he gonna lose his eye so that he's a one-eyed guy like he is in the future they're not respecting that canon although that was a very hard series to actually watch because no network wanted to run it these kind of dull historical dramas starring indy jones but not the guy you know i think they're all on disney plus now i believe so yes but that's why it's not canonical because i've heard that the old man scenes have been cut out of the version that's on disney. Okay, wow. I guess they didn't want any connection to any possible canon then.

And yes, that Roger Rabbit short, it's the final one that aired. We did a whole podcast on. We were big Roger Rabbit fans. We did a whole podcast on. But yes, the trail mix-up is the short where it was the last one that got okayed before the deal ended with Steven Spielberg and Michael Eisner, before they became too great of enemies to make the movie together. And if you wanted to see this short,

you had to go watch a depressing movie about elephant poachers starring Reese Witherspoon. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Eva, did that get you to go to the theater to see that one, the Roger Rabbit film? No, I saw the one where he was chasing baby Herman around the kitchen. What was the first?

It was the hospital, the short before Honey, I Shrunk the hospital. Uh, the short before honey, I shrunk the kids. Yeah, of course I saw that. Yeah, that was, that was peak.

But yeah, you guys are talking about Sean Patrick Flannery. Like he's not famous. Like young Indiana Jones. Isn't a tiger beat superstar. Wasn't it him? He wasn't on my radar. I think,

I think that was it. You weren't a tween girl, man. Like everyone had like fold outs of Sean. He was in powder. Oh my God. I think that was. You weren't a tween girl, man. Everyone had fold-outs of Sean. He was in powder. Guilty as charged. Oh, wow. I remember powder for only one thing these days.

It's not fun to talk about. I know. Fun fact about me, Harrison Ford crashed his plane outside my house. That was pretty rude. Whoa. Yeah. I live above the municipal golf course that he crashed onto with his little Indiana Jones plane. Walked away.

Which crash was this? It's multiple crashes, isn't it? I mean, the golf course one was like eight years ago, something like that. I think it was a pretty big one. And he was fine. Oh, hey, just like Indiana Jones would be. He is the real life Indiana Jones. He did Indiana Jones straight out of the plane.

It was great. Oh, and this blizzard, I looked it up. It was like record snowfall from Cuba to Quebec. And it's a storm that killed apparently 318 people. But I don't recall experiencing it in Florida. I'm sure it was colder than usual in Florida then. But yeah, I was a blizzard of 93 survivor. Both of you. I have a feeling Eva was in California. Something tells me she was in California. Henry in Florida. Oh, I'm getting a no have a feeling Eva was in California. Something tells me she was in California.

Henry in Florida. Oh, I'm getting a no. No, I was in Seattle. Oh, Seattle. Okay, well, I assume you were safe. Yes, West Coast. Okay, record amount of snowfall, record amount of me playing SimCity and not going to school.

That's what was going on, Blizzard of 93. How many days? I think it was almost two weeks. Jeez. Almost two complete weeks of missing school. It was the best time of my life in grade school. Yeah. Grade school, too.

It didn't matter. No, no. I already knew how to count and shapes and everything. Yeah. That's amazing. Also, CB4 and Fire in the Sky were in the box office as well, but I was more interested in the Roger Rabbit short that debuted. Yeah.

More relevant to us. And joining us today first time guest eva anderson a fantastic comedy writer welcome to the show eva thanks guys thank you for having me i'm so happy to be here you've appeared on many of our favorite podcasts including doughboys and podcasts arrived we've been wanting to have on for such a long time so it's great to have you oh thanks so much i really appreciate it happy to talk simpsons and i was saying this to you when i emailed you but yeah you also wrote one of like the sketches that makes me like cry every time i watch it from the comedy bang bang tv show in the first christmas episode the one with scott with

the father played by dave thomas and the mother played by lynn marie stewart it gets me every time oh thank you i was saying I was in the group of Kiss from Daddy with Neil Campbell and Paul Rust and a bunch of pals. And we did that on stage originally. So that was one of my few stage sketches I was able to get televised very happily. And also, I grew up kind of knowing Lynn Stewart as a family friend. So also, it was very exciting to get to do something with her because I never got to do that before or since. She is so funny as this perfect mom archetype of the fun mom who has the funny T-shirts and just she's just such a funny actress. Like we grew up with her as, you know, the most beautiful woman in puppet land.

Oh, absolutely. Miss Yvonne. Yeah. I think, Henry, we might need to establish context by saying what the sketch is about. Oh, yes. Sorry. So it's a flashback to Scott's imaginary childhood, not based on his real childhood, but of his mother is a fun lady who has silly T-shirts and sayings. And then she remembers it as this happy memory.

And then she realizes it was all a dream. And it's very heartbreaking. She has a shirt that says hand over the chocolate and no one gets hurt and then her family is laughing because they think it's funny and then she realizes that it was just a dream she had that they thought she was funny yeah henry do you call your mom every time you watch that sketch well no i like it so much because it's not at all like my life or reminds me of my childhood at all. So she pops up all over the place. And it's great. The last season, she has a crazy sketch that Neil wrote where she's shopping with Scott at like a department store for clothes. And it's just, it's astonishing. But anyway. Did you know that Lynn Marie Stewart, she has a tangential relationship to The Simpsons or the

first season of it? One episode of Pee Wee's Playhouse was co-written by her and her friend Mimi Pond. And it was how cartoonist Mimi Pond first wrote for television. And she then used that credential to then move on to write the first aired episode of The Simpsons. Simpsons roasting on an open fire. So she also just side note has two lines in the movie American Graffiti. She told me once that every single teen actor in the valley got cast in American Graffiti. So she flips off Richard Dreyfuss.

It's very satisfying. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. Well, Eva, you know, as a professional comedy writer, I was curious, what is your personal attachment you have to the series The Simpsons? Yeah, it's I think it's a lot of people in my age group, like became aware of it when it was on television for the first time, though my parents actually, we did live in LA till I was eight years old. And my parents were a fan of the Matt Groening Life in Hell comic strip. And we had books of it around the house. They loved Akbar and Jeff.

So I was kind of aware of this guy, even as the show was starting to air. And then interestingly, like we moved to Seattle, we actually moved very far outside Seattle. Actually the town where they filmed Twin Peaks was the closest town, the Snoqualmie Valley. We had just had an antenna suddenly for television that barely got anything. But the one thing we could get was The Simpsons. So we would watch The Simpsons when I was like in middle school, basically that was like the one show we would watch as a family and then by the time I was in high school it was this very crazy time where I don't know if this was like universal but at least in the Seattle Fox channel the Simpsons aired every night at 6 and 7 30 and so if you were just like not going anywhere it was very easy for you to watch two Simpsons a day every single weekday and when my brother and I would usually

like watch watch Simpsons then watch other Simpsons and then watch Mystery Science Theater. That's everything we absorbed. And it was just hours and hours of dorky stuff. And that was absolute like peak, peak Simpsons. Like it was season four, over and over and over. I think the latest it got was like Mr. Sparkle season was kind of the one of the last seasons that aired when I was still living at home. Anyway, so and then I went to college and like a lot of people like just stopped watching it. But those like iconic seasons are so implanted in my brain that when you brought up this one, I was like, Oh, yeah, I know every moment of that episode. Yeah, yeah. Season four specifically, I feel like if you're in my age group,

that's just every line by line. It's such an incredible season of television. We find that about 80% of our guests have the same Simpsons biography and it usually involves being conditioned by those two reruns a day. Happened to Henry, happened to me. Okay, great.

Happened to almost everybody. Born between 1975 and like 1987, I think. Yep. That's the age range. Twice a day, maybe. Well, now just like your sketch that's the age twice a day maybe well now just like your sketch that watching simpsons all day in the mystery science theater again nothing at all like my life it's not identifiable at all that's true this episode though is or kind of was very legendary because it made its mark on a lot of top 10 lists or top 30 lists or what have you.

So in February of 2003, Entertainment Weekly ranked the top Simpsons episode of all time. And this was number one. And two through five are Rosebud, Cape Fear, Marge vs. the Monorail, and Homer's Phobia. But when Entertainment Weekly put out a new list in 2022, this fell to number three while Marge versus the monorail rose to number one. And on the circa 2004 commentary, the news of this being the funniest episode of all time is just hitting the writers. And their response is basically this one. Really? In every retrospective, they're just kind of confused because this was just part of the Simpsons assembly line as everybody is getting burned out as half the staff is leaving to do other things

maybe that punchiness lent to a anything goes kind of atmosphere but yeah this was considered for about I would say 20 years the funniest episode of the show I mean based on that my brother Dash bought me the DVD set of season four being like oh there is this list came out and it's got like this is the best one like he pointed it out and we watched it and I was like yes we agree I mean I think I also totally get the enduring power of the monorail episode and Conan O'Brien and Phil Hartman and everything that comes with it. But I just think it's very easy to put this up like second for second. What's the funniest episode of all time? I think possibly it was always this.

It was always Last Exit. Every 30 seconds in the episode is a moment I go like, oh, right. That's in this episode too. And that one too. Like every three seconds is an amazing moment. Yeah. There were so many things I had forgotten were in this episode. Yeah, me too.

And speaking of lists. So this episode has kind of fallen out of fashion. I think it's an effect of it just being talked up so much that now people are being contrarian, including me and thinking, you know, well, there are funnier ones,

but you know, going back to it for this, I thought, yeah, there's new kinds of jokes invented for this episode, but on the 2021 variety list of the best episodes of all time, Homer at the bed is number one and this is not even on the top 30 list that is what has happened in the passing of 20 years wow boomer

wrote that episode but homer at the bat yeah no homer at the bat is i'd say it's a very influential episode in that it made all of them have a lot of like, here's a lot of guest star episodes, but, and I still love that episode. I don't dislike it, but honestly, my personal top 10 would be just some mix of season four, five, six, and seven episodes. And I love season three, but it wouldn't crack my top 10 probably. You know, for me and my pals,

when the DVD came out and that's how I first learned how high ranked this was in so many lists. And we usually did feel that, like, Mr. Plow or Bart's Comet was usually in our chat as the best one. And Monorail. We all love Monorail as well. And then to read, like, I sent it to you, Bob. The Wrap did this really great 25th anniversary oral history of it. And when they're talking to all four of the main writers on this one, that they all were like, why does everybody love this to us? Mike Reese points out, he's like, we don't call back to this like we call back to the monorail or to the baseball episode.

Like the dentist never came back. The Homer's union never really came back. This is not a beloved one internally like those. Yeah, but I feel like it's also a pocket universe. Like a lot of Simpsons episodes, like characters never come back. Though watching it this time, I was like, this dentist is so funny.

His weird affect and stuff is so strange. Yeah, nothing that's true in this episode is true after. That's not the layout of Mr. Burns' mansion. We never see the basement again. I assume Lisa always just has has her invisalign in after this point for the past 31 years her super invisible braces that never yeah it also i had discovered this because the ringer did a list i had forgotten about that was done by the writer alan siegel and he also put this as number one on his own list and when I had a correspondence

with him recently and he's like, oh, you don't think it's number one? Because he felt very sure he had properly weighed everyone to make it number one. So yeah. But to me, it is like, what gold is heavier? It's like, you know. I've come to agree with Bob. It's like the empirical idea of what is the best Simpsons episode or the Simpsonian Simpsons episode, Bob has made a very strong argument of who shot Mr. Burns as being. And just part one, if you're only allowed to count one episode. Sorry, what's the sugar one? Oh, Lisa's Rival? Yeah.

I don't care as much about the Lisa's Rival storyline, but the B story in that one might be my favorite Homer storyline. It's so stupid. It's just how stupid and crazy do you like your Homer? I feel like that is part of the taste too. Do you want him to be grounded in any sort of objective reality or should he just be all just reactions and being so, so dumb? As a comedy writer, I've heard, you know, some other writers working on The Simpsons say they worry they write Homer too stupid. Professionally, how do you feel? Like, can you write Homer too stupid or is there no line?

I think as long as he's kind, he can't be evil or just like so reckless that he's cruel. The core of Homer is that he's a good person at his heart. But I think the crazier and stupider he gets I don't know within this context of these seasons I don't think you can I think that's the gift of Homer is that the stupidest character on television for a few beautiful years and for the making of this I think too that's why the writers don't have as high opinion of it or were surprised that it was number one because it sounds like none of them remember making of this as a fondly i don't think yeah i think they mostly remember the crew of 2020 showing up to document the making of this episode and them pitching for a montage and not thinking

of anything funny and just looking very very pathetic as a result i have been on the search for that 2020 episode i haven't found it yet but i'm digging i've sent an email to the abc news company to see if i can get a copy of it but it's not out there i do wonder what number is this within the season 17 yeah out of 22 there's like a thing that happens in a lot of rooms where in the middle of the season, some episodes just become slush piles of like a bunch of stuff that didn't fit into other jokes that didn't fit or like concepts that didn't fit. And that's sometimes how you end up with an episode. That's just crazy.

Is that because it becomes a catch all for things that like were loved, but we're like orphans basically. And I wonder if maybe that's part of the reason this didn't stick for the writers is it just it's where a bunch of stuff landed that i mean maybe that's why i hate to use the word random but maybe there's a surrealness to this episode like both the a story and the b story or just things like i'm sure you'll talk about this because you're gonna do clips but like how many sounds homer makes this episode, like how many crazy reactions he has, how twice he like has these weird conversations with Mr. Burns that get derailed.

Like it would only happen once in a normal episode, but it happens both times here. Things like that. Yeah, like the kind of like wild, without regard repetition and just surrealness of it. It might've prevented this episode from being memorable. The fact that the writers of this script were kind of out the door along with everyone else. So it felt like the end of this season was very much a scramble.

And I mean, season four, you know, one of the funniest TV seasons of all time. The back five, six episodes are noticeably not as strong. And they're a little more punchy. Their plots aren't as interesting. But they're just doing everything they can to get this finished so they can all move on to other projects yeah we've characterized this before in other episodes but just to give context to where they're at production wise like so the originals writing staff a lot of them came out on one or they got hired in two and by four they're all getting pretty exhausted and also they're getting big

offers to work on things that are not as tiring as the Simpsons. And Jay Kogan and Wally Wolodarski were the writing duo on this episode. And they signed a big development deal, which Kogan jokes on the commentary of how no show came out of that production deal they did. So they leave in the middle of the season. They still put out this script. And this one apparently went through a big rewrite i actually pinged bill oakley about this our pal bill oakley who was on staff then him and josh got hired to replace wally and jay and so when i asked bill how he recalls the rewrite

for this he says that it was a really big rewrite this is me paraphrasing what he told me that was big rewrite early in their time like they were had been there a couple of weeks and they're junior writers on it. And it was a big staff room rewrite from Al and Mike, Al Jean and Mike Reese overseeing it. Jay and Wally had already left, so they're not there to be part of the rewrite. It's Al Jean, Mike Reese, and when they're busy, George Meyer is running it in the room. And yes, Bill says it was the most substantial rewrite he can recall from season four. So I do think that's why you end up with like so many just packed with jokes of like, here's another cutaway, like a movie reference goes into a movie reference in this script. It is interesting that you're saying this is just like a room written script. makes sense yeah it sounds like punched up and like

sending people away to work on little parts of it and that don't have to connect necessarily but it's but it's such a talented room doing the rewrite ends up being a very funny script built out of that yeah and on top of that mark kirkland and his team animated this gorgeously like this is a great looking episode of tv too and And also the inspiration for this came from Mike Reese saying like, what if Homer was in the head of the union? Jay and Wally then say that the hinge point would be a dental plan versus Lisa needing braces, as we all know from the line. But also it's partially inspired by Jay and Wally and other writers on it being involved in the then recent 1988 WGA writer's strike.

Right. It might have come up the first time we covered this, but definitely the year 1988 struck me as intentional in terms of them referencing what they had been through before. Which that was done over the summer of 88. And I looked this up. It said five days longer than what ended up being how long the 2023 strike was.

Yeah, I think they didn't want it to go six more days. Too embarrassing. You guys didn't want to break the record. Yeah, I know. It's too bad. Well, it was actually, I had a different, it's interesting.

I watched this episode during COVID weirdly. My husband and I watched a couple Simpsons. I was like, this is the best one. So we watched it. And then watching this again, having just done this strike last year, it hits different, guys. It really does.

There's like undercurrents of chaos and worry and resentment that you feel when you're on strike that I felt actually permeating the episode more than I ever. Also just like having never been on strike before, having never done a labor action before in my life because I wasn't a TV writer.

Last one came around. Yeah, it's a different experience. I wonder. Yeah, I heard you on the Doughboys talking about being on the picket lines of the WGA SAG strike from last year. So yeah, I still have David Zaslav on my phone. It's my phone case. From his wonderful speech about how you got to work with people you don't always agree with. It was such a great speech. of gritty stories about the working class people of Brooklyn in the 1950s. It saw a film adaptation in 1989. One of the stories is about a union leader, and I won't tell you what happens in it, but I think the word problematic was invented to describe that short story. I see. Probably hasn't aged very well, but I'll say maybe this is a popular novel at some point,

but that's what this is based on so there you have it just in title anyway it does feel like a very random there's a bunch of union things you could use as a title it seems like if it's just one story in the book you're really stretching guys this is like a first pitch best pitch title i feel like it's it's a real poochy situation well they've said in other ones that they never thought the titles would be like cataloged in books or on websites like just an internal title i guess it's just a tv guide or yeah you know but it's not like even flashes on tv i think one of these harvard guys took a working class studies course and wanted

to show off well you know the two writers they're two of the non-Harvard guys. Well, I mean, well, Jay and Wally, but then again, as we established, it was a lot of Harvard guys did the rewrite on this. I was just joshing. I would suggest folks check out that oral history in the rap by Brian Welk, because Wally Waldarski, especially, he talks about how like being part of a union did inform how he approached this one though also they talk about how the way simpsons was are like take no prisoners shrapnel hits everybody kind of attitude which is why this is both pro-union and unions are all crooked and connected to the mob jokes this episode oh and also on internet, there is what I believe to be real, a final delivery script for this episode dated August 21st, 1992.

There are a few interesting changes from it that I'll note as we go, too. So it's always fun to get one of the original scripts to compare and contrast with what it broadcast. Though I would think it's a final delivery. This is after like five rewrites or something from the room, not one of the mid-rewrite ones. So we open up with a McBain sequence and hope you folks enjoy this. This is the last you'll see of the McBain movie for a long time on the show. Chronologically, not the last in the series of clips they've shown us so far because we see the end of this McBain movie at the beginning of the episode,

Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? Somebody online has put these in sequence, and it all adds up to one movie, for better or worse, more or less. Yeah, if you don't like how Senator Mendoza gets one over on McBain in this sequence, just watch Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? from season two, which starts with the ending of the movie where he kills Senator Mendoza by throwing him through a window and into a gasoline truck that explodes yes i only as an adult did i get the joke of 10 times more addictive

than marijuana that joe flew right over my head as a kid can i ask a question about this scene sure did arnold as mr freeze also say ice to see you eva i look this up and i think they intentionally avoided that because of this sequence okay good it feels like yeah he might have i had memories of arnold saying that but that's the one thing he didn't say maybe it was in the script and they cut it like all the simpsons did that we laughing stocks with our mature batman film it's like because mcbain is arnold you can't be so bad okay good thank you no i'm i i had a similar question when i was sitting down to watch this again we all had the same thing and yes i also looked up the montage on youtube of every ice pun from the movie and i was shocked thank you guys

for doing the work that's why we're here and also they do talk about on the commentary that they stopped for a time because mcbain was the name of a 1991 christopher walken film apparently the fox lawyers were worried that like hey this is a real movie and even though the simpsons could prove in court that they made up mcbain before this movie was made even so the fox lawyer told them that's why rainier wolf castle the character and actor will be on the show continually but it'll be a few years before you see a movie called mcbain or a mcbain sequel in the show i don't know uh eva how much do you guys run into in in your writing career have you run into like walls of oh legal says you can't do this or this isn't close enough to parody kind of deal actually not a ton when I worked in comedy.

But since I moved over to working in drama a few years ago and I worked on a couple like based on real life things, including the WeWork show for Apple, we crashed. And that was like we had to annotate that entire script, like the way the social network was annotated because everything has to be like you can't say someone did something illegal unless you have proof or you can like make up composite characters and then you can have them do things that nobody did like there's all these kind of extremely legal rules when you're dealing with real people in comedy it's more just like i got pinged for naming a character after my high school boyfriend and i never did that again so on a drama you can't just go like i was joking it was a joke like that's yeah exactly he won't care this shootout is extremely violent like the people get their brains blown out on screen it's so violent i'm shocked every time i watch it the eclair bit is maybe one of my favorite physical jokes in the entire thing. I do also like the understated bit of the musician continuing to play, but he gets shot

too. Yes. So many times. Nobody leaves. Big gaping head wounds in this 8 p.m. Thursday night show. I'm not ready for Martin when this is over. I'm too shaken. Also, too, I love that it's like how they make it in bad action films how he kills everybody except

for mendoza and then mendoza's like salmon puff he's like sure and he just bites it just so he can be knocked out to be in trouble for the next scene and great bad acting by harry shearer as he and falls over then we see this evil guy and then we cut to mr burns to show somebody that evil can't exist in real life as he's laughing as a window washer falls to his death seemingly by the next season they would just show mr burns fully watch the guy fall to his death they close the blinds just to give you just a little leeway of like well maybe he's not dead i mean when you were on strike eva would you say the people you were up against were more or less evil than mr burns i mean if you would ask me in the moment i was very very mad at them yeah i mean mr burns is a stand-in for all the money in the

world right all the cronyism and the ivory tower and i you know having a yacht party at the con film festival a super yacht mega yacht party maybe not the best move that's all i'll say though mr burns doesn't want to be cool that's his one difference from a lot of those guys yeah he's the classic billionaire he doesn't want to pretend to be one of the common rabble yes his burns is mulling over the union thing and this is where we get our first my mom totally had to explain this to me because the cut to a man buried on a football field made no sense to me as a kid and then so she not only had to explain organized crime to me but also jimmy hoffa and unions had to explain all of these things that was the day little henry grew up

though now my mom could have just shown me the film the irishman and then i know all of the plot of what happened to jimmy ho Hoffa and his connections between organized crime. That was one thing that really struck me throughout. And there's the speech about the Japanese eating us alive that comes later. But I was like, oh, this is a much more like both sides look at the unions than I think people in like my peer group perhaps would like openly say now which made me feel like perhaps the writers room of the simpsons was a little resentful of the 88 strike like a little more like on main than a lot of people would be these days i think well this writing room was not unionized yet oh so they were just not until yeah not until season nine but some of them had worked

on shows that were part of the wga, like Saturday Night Live and ALF. And were you saying that the main writers that have the credits had struck with everyone else? The impression we got, we interviewed Mike Scully about this, who's a very active WGA member. The former showrunner, Simpsons, ran the show when he fully joined the WGA. But basically, to paraphrase my recollectionection now i'm talking like i'm on the stand here mr gilbert would you please let us know please continue but basically i believe all the writing staff were are wga members but i believe gracie negotiated for like wga parody with what the writers were getting paid and following all of the rules so they

follow the wga rule set but they were technically not a wga show and then it unfortunately then set a precedent for primetime animation not being wga written shows so when family guy started and mike scully says a big credit to seth mcfarland he says this of like when that show started seth mcfarland joined up with scully and also greg daniels's team on king of the hill and they're all like let's all unionize together and make these officially wga shows with fox and fox agreed to it but yeah's cool but yeah that was in the ninth season of simpsons damn yeah and the showrunners for this era algin and mike reese when the last strike happened they were posting pictures of themselves at the 88 strike

because they've been working that long they were part of that strike as well in the 2007 strike as well but there was a lot of also like non-union guys who worked on animation that walked with us last year, for sure. How many 88 veterans did you see day to day on the line? Oh, a lot. Yeah, tons. You would always spot they had great shirts. Their shirts were way better back then. They looked like Electric Company shirts.

So, jealous. Oh, that's fun. Yeah. Sorry, going back to that thing, Henry, we were talking about where the WGA and the Simpsons, there was a vote within the staff members to unionize and it was never unanimous until Mike Scully said, I'm just doing it because I'm the boss. So there were attempts before this. I think John Schwarzwalder was the guy going, nay, in the back. You know, I don't want to assume the most libertarian member of the group would be

the one that would allow him in the strike. If I was betting man i would bet that yes yeah mike scully shifted it to be a simple majority to join the wga instead of full unanimous vote by the writing staff that's cool uh back to corpses though jimmy hoffa i was looking this up in as recent as november 2023 the theories about him being buried under the third baseline at Milwaukee County Stadium are still being talked about. That stadium was demolished in 2001, but presumably they didn't move his corpse and rebury it under the new stadium. Incredible. But what a ceremony. The head of the Teamsters, Lindsay Doherty, who everyone really was into in the last strike, very beautiful, foul-mouthed woman. Giant Jimmy Hoffa tattoo covering her,

like a sleeve tattoo of his face. Oh, that's badass. Yeah. You know, that movie The Irishman gave me a new impression of Hoffa, of like, as played by Al Pacino, which I was like, oh, like he's a cool guy. And then when he made deals with the mob

to get better deals for Teamsters, I was like, yeah, it sounds cool. This guy's cool. That was my feeling. What else are you going to do? We're all throwing Danny DeVito's Hoffa under the bus here. The 1992 film?

No one? No, I know. He went against RFK. Is that why we all have to like, they were mad at each other and we have to side with Bobby. Is that the problem? Maybe that's it.

Yeah. I didn't watch the DeVito film. It's Jack who plays Hoffa, right? It's Jack Nicholson, I believe. Yeah, that was one of his first films after, I think, War of the Roses? Yeah, that's right. So cool. The Irishman, spoilers for The Irishman, it's based on another person who says,

no, I'm the guy who killed Jimmy Hoffa. Which there's apparently like 80 books by different guys who are like very old men now who say, no, no, no, I'm the mobster who killed Jimmy Hoffa. So, which there's like, apparently like 80 books by different guys who are like very old men now who say, no, no, no, I'm the mobster who killed Jimmy Hoffa. Like a lot of guys

have tried to take credit for it. That's cool. I do that. Yeah, I was sorry. One last thing about this conspiracy theory. It was revealed in the coolest way. A dying police chief

wrote it on a playing card. That is the coolest way to reveal a conspiracy. That is awesome. Oh, man. Yeah. That is the coolest way to reveal a conspiracy. That is awesome. Aw, man. Yeah. That is like a Twin Peaks plot line or something. Yeah.

I want to believe it. And then you play cards with the deck of cards and that one comes up. Like, whoa. You've got the backs to you. Also, Eva, as they go over the union things that they're demanding, did you guys get green cookie on St. Patrick's Day? Has that been achieved yet?

No, we were still fighting for that. I think it'll be that and then animation and then reality TV. grew up i realized how much funnier this was this should be like i don't know like an oil company or whatever but that in a time in possibly 40 years before atomic energy it's an old-fashioned atom smashing company incredible done with hammers and anvils and they can be pocketed as well these valuable atoms i know he pulls out his pockets and it's like it's such a funny joke they take the concept of you know if you work say for a gold mining company or whatever it's like hey you're you're taking the gold home except it's atoms which are microscopic and he pulls out his magnifying glass and count six of them and then they kill him they They killed this kid. Oh, it's so good. They walled him up.

One thing I took away from this. So upon coming back from the flashback, Burns vows to avenge his grandfather. That's what he takes away from the anecdote about killing a young boy. Yes, that's so great, too. No, it's like the boy should, you know what I'm talking about, but come on. That's just a tiny part of the joke that I finally... Just really hit me this time. I will say that the other thing that hit me this time was the line, and the Japanese will eat us alive, was like, man, this is so of its moment.

It was an anxiety of that exact age that before or since hasn't been the big terror of whatever, the American working class as of this morning we've never been more terrified of china and their diabolical apps exactly oh that's true yeah well i guess that also shows you there's always a new you know scary thing used by the mr burns's of the world to say well this is why your union's overreach or whatever it's like well ai is going to replace you has been the new lie these days the japanese have been replaced by that and china of course as well i also love that burns puts it as we'll take on that greedy union that's such a great great framing this is much funnier but in the original script they did cut out the thing that leads mr burns to pick the dental plan is a callback to a character

who they never brought back Mr. Snappy the alligator puppet that Smithers uses when Burns sells the plant to the Germans in the original script it's Mr. Snappy who pops up to tell Burns to go and tack the dental plan so they cut out a Mr. Snappy call so Smithers was more hands-on in the original script. Diabolical. Well, Burns scared him because he told him he was going to send Mr. Snappy to the hounds, which of course means to attack Smithers. Another big cut they made in the episode was a funny one,

which is as they go to the dentist, Bart is eating a Butterfinger and is going to cause his teeth to rot, which Marge warns him. So they cut out a joking product placement of Bart eating a Butterfinger in the show. I'm sure they weren't seeing any money from that. Day-to-day writers weren't seeing any money from Butterfinger endorsements in the room. Though we know for a fact

they were getting lots of free Butterfingers and BBs later when those were invented, yeah. Josh Weinstein recently just shared an old photo that I'd seen of the writer's room before in 92 but he circled in the photo like this yellow canister he's like that's the butterfinger bb dispenser right there on the coffee table in the middle of the room season two of comedy bang bang we did a cheese it commercial with casey wilson and we got a closet it was literally called the cheese it'sIts Closet on set.

And it was every flavor just like walled into just a weird, like a broom closet. And so anyone could go and just get a box of assorted Cheez-Its from there. Well, Bill Oakley, I think, told us that any new writer would typically gain between 30 to 50 pounds on their years on The Simpsons. And I think the Butterfinger BB dispenser was a big part of that. I think so, yeah. The Simpsons will be right back. Homer's head of the union.

Hey, what did this job pay? Nothing. Don't! Unless you're crooked. Woohoo! But when the workers strike, can this novice negotiate? Or is his boss the bigger man? Full power, Smithers. The Simpsons. Tomorrow at 7 on Fox 25.

When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance, I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care about you. Home and auto insurance personalized to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part. Visit Desjardins.com slash care and get insurance that's really big on care. Did I mention that we care? Welcome to the break, everybody.

It's Henry Gilbert to say I hope you're having the blirst of times with this week's episode because we certainly had the blirst of times with Eva Anderson who was awesome we had been wanting to have her on for such a long time and I think it was a really good one thanks so much to Eva for coming on check out all the cool stuff she does follow her Eva Faye on social media and all of the cool things she writes check out that comedy bang bang episode I was talking about the first Christmas episode that they did back in the second season. I think it's all streaming on YouTube for free right now. Thanks again so very much, Eva. And if you enjoy Talking Simpsons, you should know this podcast is only possible thanks to supporters at patreon.com slash talking Simpsons.

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And if you sign up this month, you get to hear us talk about the Futurama movie, Bender's Big Score. That's right, we're covering the Futurama movie there. So please sign up at that ten dollar level to hear it for yourself at patreon.com slash talking simpson well so now let's talk about this dentist here because he has an interesting background of how they tried to cast it yeah he has a name too it's dr wolf mentioned by bart once and that's the maybe the first time i picked up on that but they wanted a guy with a sinister voice to voice Dr. Wolf.

They reached out to Clint Eastwood. He said something along the lines of, hell no. Still has never been on the show. They also reached out to Anthony Hopkins, presumably to, you know, play off of the Hannibal Lecter role. He said no. And then they found Anthony Perkins, who played Norman Bates in Psycho. He said yes, but then unfortunately he passed away. So it lands on Hank Azaria, who does a great job,

but this was built for Anthony Perkins. I will say it's one of my favorite Hank Azaria voice performances in memory that I can pull. It's so odd, and it makes sense now that he's maybe aping what one of those guys might have done. It's a really good sinister voice he does. The Anthony Perkins aspect of it is extra sad after I got the original script to look at, because one he's listed in the cast for the script,

which would mean it is likely he was there for the table read if he's on the printed thing. But also if you're going by dates, if they did the table read on the date of the final delivery which was august 21st 22 days later is when perkins passes away from aids related pneumonia it's really too bad he really wanted to do it they even have a joke in the script where you see the nurse who works for dr wolf that they write looks suspiciously like dr wolf wearing a wig so they make it more of a psycho reference too.

Oh man, that would have been really cool. Yeah, Anthony Perkins, that then led me down a rabbit hole of reading like a lot of sad facts about Anthony Perkins' life and sexuality that brought me down. But he sounded like a great... He had a great relationship with Stephen Sondheim. They wrote Last Days of Sheila together. They were super into puzzles. I was reading great Sondheim quotes,

him talking about the therapist that tried to make Anthonyony perkins heterosexual and sometimes opinions on that i will tell our listeners go back to the brother from the same planet episode we talk at length with andrew jupin about the many many psycho sequels and their varying degrees of quality and this is when the dentist his intro scene is is torturing Ralph, who is written a little smarter than he was in the Valentine's episode a couple episodes ago. But this is a joke that has haunted the British ever since this one. I think because The Simpsons is so big in the UK. And I read several articles last night from British writers going like, is this what Americans think of us in our teeth? What?

Unless it's just Prince Charles. Yes. We should let people know we're recording. Classic heightening. We're recording this two months before it goes live. We don't know the fate of King Charles. And frankly, we're not responsible. So I just want to put that out there.

Or Kate Middleton. Or might I say anyone in the royal family right now. Oh, yes. Oh, my God. That's true. There's a lot of mysteries yeah no the big book of british smiles i was thinking about these two because the joke yeah again as a kid i didn't think about british people have bad teeth then when austin powers makes that a joke like four

years after this that's when it finally you know drills down for me but i really think what it is is that it's not about people in like americans and british people per capita having worse or better teeth it's about the expectations on american celebrities to have perfect teeth while british celebrities are like well no i'm an actor i act don't stop looking at my teeth i think that's the difference yeah i looked into this and it will not surprise anyone when i tell you that on the whole british children have much much healthier teeth than american children shocking i know but maybe less orthodontia perhaps or at the time i think everyone is falling into line with the american standard of beauty unfortunately i got braces uh and i had them for a very long time. But my Hollywood career is kaput.

You know, I was looking into this too with like, well, one, I found a 2015 British medical journal report called Austin Powers Bites Back trying to disprove the myth of British teeth. And here's their empirical conclusion. Quote, the oral health of U.S. citizens is not better than the English. And there are consistently wider educational and income oral health inequalities in the U.S. compared with England. And I was thinking, too, about actors like how Christian Bale, I was rereading these stories last night. When he did American Psycho, he was told, like, well, the character I'm playing has to be perfect physically in every way. And I have Welsh teeth. I got to fix my teeth.

He got caps on his teeth to be truly perfect. And he wrote a whole article about like, I miss my old teeth and how he kept like a shape or a molding of his old teeth just to remember him by. Or same with like, again, one of my all time favorite actors. I love him in everything. Ian McShane. remember him by or same with like again one of my all-time favorite actors i love him in everything ian mcshane if you've watched john wick for his teeth are crazy like they are the brightest whitest most perfect teeth you've ever seen and it's just like it's distracting what he does with his teeth by john wick for and again i don't want to guilt a british actor over like you changed your teeth i'm just saying it's distracting to see i McShane have such very good teeth in his early 80s in John Wick 4 but the big book of British miles such a funny number of drawings and it's Sherlock Holmes it's Prince Charles it's all the

hideous teeth all the hips this is when I'll play our first clip here as the dentist takes issue with both Maggie and Lisa. Maggie's teeth are coming in crooked. Has she been sucking on a pacifier? Not to my knowledge. Liar! I'm also afraid little Lisa is going to need braces. Oh, no. I'll be socially unpopular.

More so. Are you sure, Doctor? Well, judge for yourself. Here's Lisa today. Without treatment, here's what she'll look like at age 11. Age 14. Age 17. And finally, age 18.

Cool! She'll be a freak! But... We can stick her in a trailer, drive her around the South, and charge two bits of gander. Cool! She'll be a freak! But! We can stick her in a trailer, drive her around the South, and charge two bits of gander. It is kind of the big book of British smiles again. Like in back-to-back scenes, which I don't hate. It's just like, how many ways can we draw the worst teeth you've ever seen? Oh, absolutely. These teeth are impossible to the point where Lisa is growing tusks that are penetrating her skull. Yeah.

I mean, it's also a great joke about the hard sell. I feel that braces are given by some dentists who go like, well, I mean, I guess you don't have to. But here's how, like, in this case, they have a fake AI thing that projects how she's going to look. The tooth finally caves in through her, like by 18 is just amazing my mom told me that i would have ferengi teeth if i didn't get braces so that is what made me hop on board deep space nine being a new show at the time highly specific mom relationship the ferengi is really stuck in her brain i don't know why you know I did not have braces growing up I went to the dentist regularly though and got other treatments it was though I mean I hate the

dentist took me a while to get over Bob the last few years finally got me a dentist type frost maybe this episode had partially to do with it but just the idea of like somebody putting metal in my mouth and scraping my teeth it's just oh I hate it so so much nobody likes that i know i know henry you have like complicated dentist feelings because when you talk about little shop of horrors you admit that you got bored when the dentist disappeared you're like i want more of the mean dentist who hurts people get him back in here he has a great song you can't deny it he is i mean best character maybe if your mean dentist sang a song to you you would be all on board with going back bob even unplanned we went to the dentist at the same time one time i think bob got to hear my coping mechanism of talking too much and

trying my best to enter like meditative like fugue-like state of of trying to be somewhere else oh yeah i leave my body. My dentist just shows Netflix now. Oh man, that sounds awesome. You just put on headphones, you watch whatever you want. I don't have a screen in my dentist. I haven't got a new one yet in Seattle. I'm doing that soon, but the- Look for one with Netflix.

Okay, that's first search. Well, second after insurance, do they cover my insurance then? Netflix. Yeah. You're going to get a Roku dentist if you have bad insurance. Hey, I love Roku City.

I love seeing the Roku City screensaver. That is one of my favorite things about my Roku TV. I'm sorry. You're going to get a Pluto dentist if you don't have good insurance. No. You're going to be watching Murder House Flip. Murder House Flip. And other Quibi originals.

Oh, yes. Is that where the golden arm went? Is that on Roku now? Yep. Okay. You're going to be watching 50 yes is that where the golden arm went is that on roku now or okay you're gonna be watching 50 states of fear the golden arm now i'm thinking all of the quibi shows should have just been sold to dentists like we have all the quibi episodes we have fierce queens in reno 911 and uh i've run out of quibi there you go what was the dan harman sex doll show what was that one called? Dummy. Dummy. That was it.

Dummy, yeah. Watched Dummy in its entirety. I've heard that was a good show, despite being on Quibi. I like Anna Kendrick. I love the cut from Marge being called a liar that Maggie isn't sucking on a pass fire to her putting the tooth in her mouth. Also, cut from the script is you might be wondering why isn't Bart doing anything in this? Like the joke just was that the dentist hates Bart because Bart has terrible oral hygiene and yet never has cavities. So he can't make Bart feel guilty. So then we cut to Homer

watching TV. I've said it before, but Wally walidarski was the big pro wrestling fan in the writers room then and so there are little things in here that if you're a wrestling fan you would notice which is a texas death match is a real pro wrestling match type though you don't kill someone it's just well either of the guy answer a 10 count that's a texas death match and a no disqualification match and also when they say the the killatorium i believe it's a Texas death match. It ain't no disqualification match. And also when they say the Killatorium, I believe it's a parody of the Texas Sportatorium, which I guess if you saw the new movie, The Iron Claw, that you'd learn all about the Sportatorium.

I believe it's the Grapplerium. And also because you said it's Wally Wolodarski who was the big wrestling fan. Yes. Yeah. When he leaves, I don't think we hear about another wrestler until Bret Hart appears on the show in season eight. I think so. i think that is the end of wrestling jokes on it yeah you're right

and the funny story with that is they just cast a guy they like had their casting team just find a person to play a wrestler and then when they learned he was a real wrestler then they're like oh then we'll write it to be bret hart like they didn't even want to cast pro wrestler Bret Hart to play himself at first. This is when Homer recounts his own past as a striker. Now stay tuned for professional wrestling live from the Springfield Grapplerium tonight, a Texas death match. Dr. Hillbilly versus the iron yuppie.

One man will actually be unmasked and killed in the ring. Well, I hope they kill that Iron Yuppie. Thinks he's so big. Homer, Lisa needs braces. Don't worry. We won a dental plan in the strike of 88. That's where I got this scar.

What do we want? More equitable treatment in the hands of management. When do we want it? Soon. Where's my burrito? Where's my burrito? Where's my burrito? Where's my burrito? Ow!

Then I got this scar sneaking under the door of a paid toilet. And we've learned in recent years, TV writers have much more memorable chants and signs. So this leads me to two strike questions, Eva. One, how important was ordering burritos to the strike efforts? And two, how many scars do you have? I know no scars luckily and you know um sometimes they would bring burritos to the strike line which was great you'd have to order from a roach coach i mostly heard about the drew carey philanthropy incredible yeah you could get free breakfast and lunch at bob's big boy on drew carey the entire strike he paid for all of it, including the tip.

Wow. Even the tip he'd covered. I only did it once and the tip was crazy. That's impressive, man. Then at the same time, you can think about you're eating at the same place where they filmed Heat and had the Beatles eat there. And where David Lynch would write, usually. I could just see Drew Carey with an adding machine every night going, who tipped 30%?

Who's doing this? No, I think the tip was just included in the check. Yeah. Oh, okay. Hey, simple. Were you the recipient of any of the jay leno doughnuts lord and miller though would drop off the super doughnuts like jay leno gave one dozen doughnuts lord and miller would drop off primo's doughnuts which are the best doughnuts on the west side and like stacks of them themselves it's just sony where nick weiger was the chief oh that's cool but yeah like again as a kid saying the strike of 88 meant nothing to me other than like oh it happened when i was six that's all i

thought but it was i think my favorite photo i saw floating around from the 88 strike was the one of odin kirk and robert smigel on the lines at new york for the snl side of it yeah it seemed like odin kirk made a lot of appearances that would get on the news, which was good. He was using his fame, I thought, to get the strike covered in the news. Yeah, then we cut to the union. They say the sign of the union is based on a freeway sign in LA that's on the 405 to Carson.

Did not ring any bells for me. I don't drive much in LA. Or at all, ever? Yes, or at all, period. I didn't recognize that. We see that Carl, this is an interesting thing that they don't really explore. Carl basically, I feel like, is the shadow puppet master of the union. Like, he sets up somebody to be the fall guy of the union, but he's making all the decisions at this place.

Yeah, he's the one who calls the vote. Right, yeah. He's the one who installs Homer. Yeah. Yeah, later it's not Homer who says, I call for a strike. It's Carl who does it. And same with it's Carl who nominates Homer to be the president. It makes me wonder if Carl has a connection to the organized crime that keeps killing people like Chucky Fitzhugh. It's also a great dark joke that they all just laugh at the idea that their friend was

very likely murdered. They're all just like, but seriously. But this upcoming joke, legendary, I i mean i'm sure there were similar attempts at this kind of joke but to me this is a new kind of joke being debuted on network television and i remember where i was when this joke happened of course i was in front of the tv but it was very much like a moon landing moment for simpsons fans i remember that was spring break in grade school i was actually at my grandma's watching this with a friend and we felt that we were part of something important when this joke happened we didn't know what was going on nothing like this had ever happened to us before i believe it to fully i'll drop it in but we don't all need to listen to 40 seconds of dental plan repeated here but

to deconstruct it is like that homer hears dental plan and lisa braces. It should take him once or twice for it to occur to him to move on the plot next in a sitcom plot. It is a great joke about sitcom plot tropes and that instead it echoes in his mind over and over again. And the thing that breaks it up at first that makes you think it's going to stop

is the pencil that lands in his butt crack. And then it just resets him to just repeat it again like three more times according to the writers the showrunners didn't understand the joke they thought it was a mistake in the outline they were handed and they basically begged algea to mike reese no leave this in it's going to be very very funny so even they weren't ready for this kind of it's a very uh sideshow bob with the rakes kind of. It was done again, but it does feel like a setting of a precedent. I think it set a precedent for them to start doing it. Yeah, yeah. And the oral history you sent me, Henry, who wrote that? I mean,

what website published that? Oh, it was on The Wrap. Yeah. It was either Jake Hogan or Wally Wadarski saying, we were just building off of a joke that John Vitti wrote where it's the joke where Homer says, mm, chocolate. And he opens the box of Neapolitan ice cream and sees all the chocolate is gone. He does that two more times in the same scene before asking Marge, can you get more vanilla chocolate and strawberry ice cream? So there was a similar idea. They just didn't have the guts to push it to 45 seconds. The freezer wasn't big enough either. But this time, especially again with a script that they're like we just got this in it makes them punchier and take wilder swing for good measure like eva have you done in your comedy writing have you done much with like extreme repetition like it can be very

fun i mean i feel like really effective our sketch group would do stuff like that on stage a lot just because there is a fun to punishing the audience even as you're like they've come all this way to see you i guess the repetition would be even more fun in live theater of like you can feel the audience right in front of you going like really it's just doing it again paul russ had a bit he would do on stage that he's done on comedy bang bang as well where he was just like a mad scientist have you heard him talk about his creepies my creepies yes yeah he did that for the first time on stage i think to stun science and then was not discouraged in the slightest and kept it going and did like full six minutes of the creepies and then took it to the podcast it was

such a gift i love the creepies the last time i hung out with my brother, we don't talk about much, but he was like, oh, did you hear the my creepies bit on Coffee Pank Pank? Yeah. Watching someone be like bold and be like, you have no idea how much longer this is going to go. The madness that sets in on a performer's face is really exciting. So this scene brings us the dental plan, Lisa has braces joke. It also brings us the first yoink in The Simpsons. george meyer thought this up because it's based on a sound effect you would hear in hannah barbara cartoons just the person saying the sound effect while grabbing something and this would become a very long-running gag in the simpsons having a character say out loud yoink i mean that's also a great like simpsons approach

to cartoons where instead of putting in a sound effect a character says their own sound effect out loud now i can't think of not like just that's the sound of taking something from somebody it is what you say of like yoink i assume that was a bugs bunny thing it started on the simpsons that's so funny to literally write it like if you were to look at the dictionary yeah i can see y-o-i-n-k yeah that was the simpsons yeah george meyer he's not trying to take credit of like i made up yoink nobody ever said it before it's more just that they crystallized it they coined it yeah i love it also as a funny coincidence here is homer is listing all the things one the diamond tooth that is yoinked out of letty's mouth we then

cut to a walter bnan type, which is funny because we haven't recorded it yet, but the episode that precedes this one in our podcast that we're covering on season 14, Dude, Where's My Ranch, that also has a lengthy Walter Brennan character in it as well. So it's funny when it rhymes 10 years apart. It's one of the many Dan Castellaneta impressions that he needs to trot out because we're not talking about Walter Brennan enough anymore. I just think of it as the Gummy Joe voice, not the Walter Brennan voice. It was years before I learned the name Walter Brennan. So yes, Homer freaks out. This then leads him to being nominated to be the new president of the union. And I love that he's trying to tear up

the contract that he was offered. And then this is another bit of them like topping previous jokes and also maybe it feels like writers on the way out of like can we explode this joke before we leave though they didn't successfully do that which is they just point out that mr burns never remembers homer even when they list four previous episodes where him and homer interacted quite a lot he still goes like doesn't ring a bell it's done again in homer the smithers and i think i like the wording of the joke better where smithers is trying to explain to burns who homer is and he says all the recent events of your life have evolved around him in some way and then he still doesn't understand it's so great and in who shot mr burns part one they

play off it even very well because it's the entire reason Homer hates Burns in it. But when they send the photo of the family in the chocolate box, every other Simpson, when Burns sees them, he's like, oh, that's Maggie who had my bear Bobo. That's Bart. He was my heir for a time. But it's still Homer is the one he does not remember. He's a blind spot. Homer then also is happy to learn that if he's

crooked he'll make a lot of money in the union as well which is then followed up in the next scene as homer is told by lisa it shows that both sides ism of like that lisa is trying to say you can really do something for the working man and homer instantly is like and make lifelong connections to organized crime organized crime one of my favorite cutaways this ruined the godfather part two for me later in life when i finally watched it you know i still haven't seen it and when i do i'll just be haunted by all the simpsons references this one specifically is during the flashback sequence and it's a gorgeous scene in godfather part two where it's the don that don corleone like murders and replaces you see him walking around little italy and being

treated as you know a big celebrity and getting free things though in homer's vision it's just donuts italian immigrants are all handing him donuts all the time we also get a good joke of homer being tricked by a delicious doorstop it does look delicious so then we see lisa being presented where her new braces lisa and marge these braces are invisible painless and periodically release a delightful burst of calvin klein's obsession for teeth and doctor we don't have a dental plan right now, so we'll need something a little more affordable. These predate stainless steel, so you can't get them wet. If you can't get your teeth wet at all, that sounds like a bad thing for a pair of braces. This headgear was not happening to kids around me 30-ish years ago.

And I had basically everything in my mouth, but they tried to keep it all in your mouth. Even back then, I had spacers. I had a palette expander. I had bands. I had the braces. I had the whole magilla going on, but nothing extended beyond the mouth.

I think they figured it out by then. The tech was there at that point. There's a good line in the script, too, that he says, if I make these any tighter, they're legally fox traps, which is also a great line in the script too that he says, if I make these any tighter, they're legally fox traps, which is also a great line. Also for the longest time until very close listening, I always thought he said Calvin Klein's obsession for teens, not for teeth. Oh, I thought he said teen. Yeah, it's teeth. I don't like it as much. I like that she's only attracting age appropriate boys. That's why I always heard it as teens too. I don't like it as much. I like that she's only attracting age-appropriate boys.

That's why I always heard it as teens, too. I thought she'd like, oh, it's obsession for teens. I want that. You know, I don't want to be smug. I was always in camp teeth. I'm sorry. That's just what I heard. This will be the new battleground saying goodbye to a shoe.

Or when Ralph sleeps, is he a Viking, literally or metaphorically? Let's not talk about it. Ava, these are the many fights within Simpsons fandom of how you heard a line or took it. I'm for it. We cut to Homer thinking that he's exercising, but actually he's just trying to reach a sugar daddy on his back. That is a perfect bad candy. Nobody wants a sugar daddy. And then he eats it, which is disgusting. It's happened more than once, according to Lenny.

I love how the sound Dan makes as Homer, as he just like empty eye, just like as he just shoves it back in his mouth. So funny. I like sugar babies and Danny. Oh, really? They're good. They're just like hard caramel. Well, wouldn't you just rather have just like a Brax cube then if you're going to have one of them? They last longer.

Okay. Where would you rank them next to Milk Duds? Milk Duds pull your fillings out, but I do love them. I just can't do them anymore. My teeth are too fucked up. Yeah, man. When I was a kid watching this show, my mom would say she couldn't have Milk Duds anymore. And I'd be like, oh, that's dumb.

Just sucking on a Milk Dud, slowly killing my teeth in the way that they would be now. You went back to just gnawing on random objects. Kid teeth are so strong. We then go to a scene that they say Sam Simon pitched. So it works even better because Homer is setting up the organized crime thing. So Homer wants bribes. He wants to be bribed by people but he's too stupid to understand this is burns offering him a bribe and instead thinks burns wants to have sex

with him this lengthy proposition is is pretty funny the two sides not understanding things we don't have to be adversaries homer we both want a fair union contract. Why is Mr. Burns being so nice to me? And if you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. Wait a minute. Is he coming on to me? I mean, if I should slip something into your pocket, what's the harm? Oh, my God, he is coming on to me. After all, negotiations make strange pedfellows. Sorry, Mr. Burns, but I don't go in for these backdoor shenanigans

sure I'm flattered maybe even a little curious but the answer is no Homer is using the term backdoor shenanigans to mean a homosexual affair that's what he's saying and the thing that for me makes this not the classic

like gay panic scene that was just in everything at the time is homer being so flattered yeah and curious yeah this is one of two scenes in this episode where burns has a long speech using lots of metaphors that either confuse homer or make him have to pee. Yes. I know. It's so many things in this episode happen twice. There's so many joke runs in this that they even start repeating themselves. And if you were to take this in like a dissection way or whatever you hear about comedy script writing of do's and don'ts, a double beat like that would probably be called, well, you're not supposed to do that. And yet this is like one of the most beloved episodes of any sitcom. Yeah.

I don't know. It's all funny. These rules might be more suggestions, I guess. I love that they found a collection of euphemisms Byrne can use that do sound like both an invitation to an affair or wanting to bribe someone, euphemistically. Like, it's so's okay but also the wink is almost gratuitous it's like then it's just a kind of a cute wink so he takes it one step too far even well not just the wink i love to the leans over the table in a very suggestive manner too yes he's being cute also in the script there's one topper to that that i don't know if

they animate it there's no deleted scenes on the dvd so i can't tell you but in the script, there's one topper to that that I don't know if they animated. There's no deleted scenes on the DVD, so I can't tell you. But in the script, there's one topper to it that after Homer leaves, Bruns runs to the door and shouts at Homer, I'll give you $10,000. And then Homer like shudders and is disgusted and walks away. So I think it's better without that. I like leaving him flattered. Yeah.

He's got a warm feeling. We head back to the dentist. The scene of being introduced to all the tools. I was more scarred by a similar scene to this in the Little Shop of Horrors movie. Similarly, this is like what scared me about the dentist for sure. These made up tools that have never been used on me ever. The gouger. The gouger is crazy. I love how they animated to like the way

the three claws are like coming at you as well i like to yardley plays it really great of like being scared in the scene she has so many great little deliveries in this it's a very funny written line but the way she says i'll be socially unpopular more so that's such a great delivery speaking of legally distinct things this is when lisa is given the gas and they play as close of a melody to lisa in the sky with diamonds as they possibly can legally they're just having so much fun i've never actually watched this movie i think i get all of it i need to out of this parody it's a good time well i watched it as a kid honestly watching this episode i think made me watch this it's the best beatles movie heart is night is funny oh really heart is night is pretty good though it was a favorite of my mom my mom isn't like a mega beatles fan but she definitely loved the yellow submarine and sharing

it with me was a fun thing especially the blue meanies i bought her a couple blue meanie toys that she is a big fan of they mentioned it in the commentary but i've read it in the script they call it a yellow submersible in the script purple even the color is different they named them cartoon mop tops and it's cartoon mop top one says this cartoon mop top two says this the visuals are gorgeous. It's done by people who grew up loving the yellow submarine. Even like the thing that says hatred in the background. If you don't know the reference, it's because it says love in the background in that way in the actual movie.

I know McCartney was on an episode, but Ringo and George. When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance, I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care about you. Home and auto insurance personalized to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part.

Visit desjardins.com slash care and get insurance that's really big on care did i mention that we care they had every living beetle yes ringo was first in season two marge made a painting of him about two three months we'll be talking about george harrison's appearance in the show yeah then paul showed up to make Lisa a vegetarian, which by agreement with Paul McCartney, they never go back on that, at least as long as he's alive. Cool.

He said, I will only do this show if you make Lisa a vegetarian forever. I know how cartoons reset everything and make people change back. You can't do that if I do the show where she becomes a vegetarian and they've never gone back on it. Imagine saying yes,

not knowing what forever could mean. Yes, that's true. What does this show got in it? Like four years of gas left? Let's go. The Beatles sequence is longer than I remembered it too. It's all fun. It's pretty.

It's got almost like dental plan pacing of her just floating, staring at nothing. Like as a child, I was like, what is happening? What are we doing? Also, it's always fun for animators and the writers to write a scene where one of your characters gets high but isn't officially doing drugs so you can get away with it i guess lisa was just tripping in selma's choice at duff gardens boy yeah lisa's had a lot of trips this season hasn't she she's lost brain cells this season definitely and then again in something that would say be egregious in a script doctor sense they go from that long

parody sequence directly to another long movie parody sequence so funny the batman 89 thing it's one of those parodies they did twice i like the second one where crusty is given breasts and he's fine with it yes yeah you see me complaining about the breasts i mean yardley's cackle her laugh freak out is great lisa doesn't normally get to go crazy and act that way so yardley is doing a great job with it she's even scaring the scary dentist like that's how intense she has gotten in seeing this. Lisa is joker-fied. That's what happens to her here.

Unlike all the other references in this, Hoth I didn't get. But when I was 10, I knew a Batman 89 reference the second it happened because I'd watched that movie like 800 times by that point on VHS. Lisa now has her braces when she comes home. Everybody is shocked by it. And even the dog is scared. And this is when Homer is sad looking at Lisa. And then we get, knock, knock, knock, hired goons.

It's just perfect scene to perfect scene. Okay, this is the best episode ever. It changed my mind. It's another, like Dental Plan, it's another case of Homer not getting something for a very long time. Where he says hired goons again once they bring him to Burns. Yeah. Hired goons. It's like the same take where after he's told hired goons again by Burns, he just goes like, hired goons.

Yes. I think I miss this on the commentary bird, the Burns vulture, is a reference to Citizen Kane because one of the cuts to a new scene is like a screeching cockatoo in that movie. This episode has a Citizen Kane and a Godfather reference. This is like early Simpsons bingo. It's got it all. I always forget this one in my mental list of all the Citizen Kane references in the show. To start on the bird. Well, and also like, you know, Charles Foster Gane has a giant giant aviary so that's why they gave it to burns in the first place too

for reference yeah kirkland is a big movie buff old movie buff so he loves the challenge of like oh yeah again to be more impressed with it back then the animators couldn't just pull up an hd clip of a movie to draw it perfectly they at best maybe they could get a laser disc but I've heard stories of like no the gophers who worked on the show would just all they could get were VHSs that was the best you could do my first PA job was like 2002 2003 I was working in the valley and there was a video store that I would have to go to all the time to pull things for my boss just rent things and then also like copy them so he could have them but yeah it was crazy eddie brant's midnight matinee that was the name of the it was a very weird indie video store

we did a batman episode where i think that's the video store they directly reference in the batman episode when he's trying to find the copy of the Grey Ghost TV series. I think I've heard Mike Mitchell talk about having to drive around to find movies for Simpsons references too. Yeah, because there was YouTube, you know, but YouTube just had SNL. It just all it had on it was Lazy Sunday. That was the one video on YouTube. Exactly. Didn't have entire movies yet.

We get a tour around Burns' home. I guess, too, this speaks to how they're jamming in everything that's funny, that they know is funny in a script that they're maybe heavily rewriting, because Mr. Burns is always funny. So they're just like, let's set aside five, six pages, just touring Burns' mansion, which is just a series of rooms that are funny. Each room has a joke in it. This giant TV is wonderful.

What people have now, I guess, do the rich do a better thing than just having a private screening room in their homes? They certainly don't have a big TV anymore. They're not like, no one's doing an Elvis with a bunch of TVs. Oh, that's so, yeah. That impresses me and Ozzzy smith in that episode of six flat screens are not fun to shoot at that's why it fell out of fashion yeah you're right it's true go off a tube tv breaks so much more wonderfully than a flat yeah also when burns turns on the bumblebee man i believe what he he's saying in Spanish is like smelly cat, not the Spanish word for skunk, which is zorillo.

Henry has been using Duolingo, I see. Well, look, I'm just going by what Google tells me, that when he says un gato malodoro, it's like a cat with a bad smell would be the more direct. I think it's safe to say that's correct. Yeah. Stinky cat. And then we get another, like, like oh yeah this is another of the

greatest moments in simpsons history in the next room here this is a thousand monkeys working at a thousand typewriters soon they'll have written the greatest novel known to man let's see it was the best of times it was the blurst of times you stupid monkey oh shut up i think it's wrong that it's still called the infinite monkey theory it should be called the blurst of times theory that should be what it's renamed to again as a kid i just thought this is a funny monkey joke like isn't that funny a monkey writes the blurst of times instead of the worst of times but obviously it's based on a long-held mathematical theory that basically it's to explain infinity that if you had an infinite number of things being

randomly typed out that you could end up with anything because that's how big infinity is but for burns to put it into practice by actually chaining hundreds of monkeys to typewriters and then getting the blurst of time uh because it's not gibberish it's just he had one typo on worst but it's blurst and it's uh usually i think the theory is hamlet they'll eventually type out the script of hamlet so i like that they go war and peace instead it's just a funny pivot it's a big ass to tell your director of this program draw a thousand monkeys they fit in as many monkeys as will a tv screen can contain but they quickly cut to a close-up which i totally understand the monkeys are like the stereotypical like 50s writer who is like chain smoking and

frazzled it's great funny design on the monkeys too and the next scene pays off why homer is carrying a beer stein around with him for the entire tour yes again a bunch of listing of things that sound like peeing and also a great design of the dank basement i love how burns like i don't know why i am the tour here it's all the peeing metaphors it's the dripping water it's the pouring of coffee when burn says you'll make a big splash he knocks his coffee cup a little in the water swirls around and spills out into the saucer. And also later you'll see a version of this room again, a different room, like when they go down into the Batcave.

Once again, two of the same joke, but I love it. Yes, you're right. It's long opulent things and then it's a disappointing thing at the end. You're right, both with Byrne in it. Oh man, I wasn't even thinking of right. Both with Burns in it. Oh, man. I wasn't even thinking of that. There's another cut joke from here.

Demonstrates how to be a good Simpsons writer, which is, it's a funny scene that they end up cutting where basically Burns opens a room and there's a gladiator battle happening. And he's like, oh, I didn't even know this was happening. And then he's like, hey, stop that. And then closes the door and leaves. They cut that a version of that joke is then in burns baby burns when he's showing his son around and he opens the door and it's a play that's going on they're performing death of a salesman and he's like i told you to close this play close it i say that's funny i like that more seeing death of a salesman being acted on stage funnier than

just like a random gladiator opening the door and seeing a gladiator fight is like a muppet baby's joke it's true it's like either a gladiator fight or nosferatu is behind the closet door so homer finally asked to go to the bathroom clearly, again, the joke is he didn't find the room and he peed in a hallway somewhere in Burns' home. Implied. Rarely do I have this kind of distress. But recently I saw the movie Holdovers and I loved it. But the last 15 minutes I had to go to the bathroom so bad that I didn't want to miss the end of the movie. And I normally never need to go to the bathroom during the movie.

But I did drink a lot of water like Homer. So unfortunately, what should just be happy memories of loving a great movie like The Holdovers, the last 15 minutes in my memory is an undercurrent of bathroom stress, which is not the intended feeling you're supposed to have there. You need to bring your movie diaper with you. I keep saying this. What's it called? A stadium buddy? It's like a two-legged leg what's it called a stadium buddy that's like a yes yeah you're a stadium buddy yeah it's a fun catheter for entertainment purposes i overestimated my abilities because i went to endgame no problem i watched long marvel movies no problem at all but for some reason i think it's because i went out to breakfast with my mom and stepdad before seeing

the movie then i drank more than I normally do beforehand. It was like, you know, mimosas, brunch. And so that probably added to the problem. Now all of our urologist listeners are weighing in in the comments. I did have a friend who did like an international flight in high school and didn't want to ask the people next to him to move. So he held his pee for like eight hours and then he had to have surgery he like fucked his kidneys up oh oh god that's scary yeah this is what this leads to it's a cautionary tale henry don't fuck around hey i just did a flight to tokyo that was 10 11

hours and i was responsible with my bathroom use i did not challenge myself to hold it in the whole time they don't give you extra pretzels if you do so that would be great if there was a pa announcement like this is your pilot the person in seat 3c has not peed yet let's give them a round of applause you know they applaud for the military people when you take off they should applaud for the people who don't pee when you land it'd be great also at the start of that flight i was just so excited like oh boy vacation time i've been waiting for this vacation for four years and then is the plane right after it takes off a like 10 year old girl sitting across from us just like pukes on her dad and i was like unfortunately that was not a sign of things to come but it was a crummy start to the flight yeah uh but so okay then uh cut from that to homer homer also running off to p burns just takes that it's him

playing tough like every choice homer makes burns thinks is homer being an amazing negotiator then they have another insane thing they have burns be crippled in the middle of this episode but he's fine the next time we see him but this is another great moment of harry sheerer acting i'd say well you've won this round, Simpson, but I'll grind you into the earth like a bug. Oh! Simpson, be a dear and rub my legs till the feeling comes back. A bug, I tell you, a bug!

I'm going gonna resign. I don't know why they made me union president in the first place. Because they love you down at the plant. Yeah, you're right. Guys are always patting my bald head for luck, pinching my belly to hear my girlish laugh. Hmm, that doesn't sound like they like you at all. You know, I think you're right.

First thing tomorrow morning, I'm gonna punch Lenny in the back of the head just a completely disconnected bunch of funny shit it's so funny i don't know what else to say yeah it made me recall that my twitter avatar is based on the picture of lenny getting punched in the back of the head. And that was, for the longest time, my LiveJournal avatar was that still frame of Lenny just getting punched. Your incredibly talented wife draws a great parody of that as you in the Lenny space. It's such a great spit take they draw in the episode, too, of Lenny being just shocked by being punched hard in the back of the head out of nowhere by Homer. And there's no consequences. Yeah. No, that's true, too.

Like, Homer realizing, like, he's told, Marge convinces him that all his buddies are mean to him. And he's like, all right, I'm going to punch him in the back of the head. And everything's fine the next scene. Yeah, the next scene, it's all set back, hard reset. It shows a lot of confidence in that they don't even show Homer. It's just the close-up on Lenny's head and an arm you just assume is Homer. That's confidence to me in writing. Can I just say a news thing to set this in time really quick, and you can cut this out?

The House just voted to ban TikTok. Did you guys see that? Oh, yes. Right before the recording. I guess it was before we started. No, that's so crazy. That is nuts, yes. I wonder if

it'll pass the senate that'd be pretty crazy and then biden said he would sign it again it's like but facebook did so much worse than tiktok i know true evil it's nuts sorry well no facebook killed our entire old jobs me and bob like we used to work in the games press oh were you part of the pivot to video uh oh big time yes big time yeah this is relevant to the time because twitter person i'll call them parker molloy tweeted a great simpsons meme based on this where it's homer saying nobody evades our privacy but me and maybe the boy and homer is wearing the american flag shirt and bart has the logos for x google and facebook on him. So perfect description of what's happening.

Two months before you hear this. What horrors has our government wrought since then? I don't know. Also, the Burns being horribly injured and airlifted away. They say on the commentary it's an intentional callback to the Bart the Daredevil ending of Homer being airlifted away and hurt. And they both get their heads bonked. Yeah.

Which Jay and Wally wrote that episode too oh and also in a crazy thing too marge's hair gets cut off and it grows back fine the next scene as well let's just assume six months pass in between the scenes and they've been on strike the whole time they also joke i love on the commentary where they needle mac raining about how he had said originally the plan was that marge has rabbit ears under her hair they were like so even if you didn't know that one joke mac reigning thought of when he first designed the characters was oh and in one episode we'll reveal that marge's hair is just a cover for rabbit ears like a life in hell character yeah that makes sense and i thought about it for two seconds i don't like it but and that joke only exists in the Simpsons arcade video game for whatever reason.

It's so crazy. If you look up just the sprites from that game, one animation is Marge's vacuum cleaner, which is of course her attack item in the video game. It will yank her hair off some and you will see the rabbit ears or when she gets electrocuted, you'll see the rabbit ears too. So they did put it in that no this is like how splinter and the teenage mutant ninja turtles game is like turns into a man at the end don't like that being a rat and becomes an old man i assume the developers got like the first version of the story bible where it says march well of course she's a rabbit and also a

housewife exactly so yeah then we have a quick bit of picture day with this area when i was 10 this was speaking to all of my anxieties about picture day as well much like one of the kids in here i also had a lazy eye then i still have that today so that was more of my fears than the braces stuff for lisa here and i also love the photographer's response of there is no god that's a perfect reply in the script it's just oh my god there is no God is such a great punch up. It's just ruining his life. Homer then, he's just complaining at the next union meeting. And then it's Carl who shouts on the strike, which I feel like it takes a little more work to start a strike vote than just having one person say, I say we call for a strike.

A little more complicated than that, right, Eva? Yeah, you have multiple levels of voting. And yeah, it's all online now. This is also the return of the droopy voice man, though we get to see him on screen. If I ever have to say something like, who keeps saying that, I have to say it in the, like, the tenor,

the style Homer says it, because it's just so perfect. Like, we see him. I mean, I was at a meeting for a club that i'm part of this morning and we literally were voting on bylaws and it was like all opposed like yay all opposed and then i all uh opposed it's so hard not to fill in the space with the voicemail yeah yeah because it won't affect anything and it's just become the joke for 20 years it's so perfect just go knee i love the design of him holding his little hat and it's like points at the huge man and they all 30 guys jump on him at once to beat him horribly they start wailing on

this hunk yes who's sitting kind of sexy yes yeah yeah great character design on all the weirdos in this one too like all these one-off characters amazing come back for the commercial break for act three and we hear lisa's song they don't say it on this commentary but in other ones they just go like yeah she can play the saxophone she can play guitar same difference she can just do it like lisa's guitar playing skills not normally featured in the show. Come gather round children, it's high time he learns about a hero named Homer and a devil named Burns. We'll march till we drop the girls and the fellas. We'll fight till the death or else fold like umbrellas. It's written by Jane Wally with Jeff Martin helping on it.

And Lisa's second lyric, Fold Like Umbrellas, obviously you can tell the lip sync's all off so you know it's ADR. But I have the original lyrics from the script here. Oh, good. He tore up our dental plan that twisted old miser now there's a pain in my left incisor so i actually prefer the adr lines they're on the same level for me honestly i like that she's acting on behalf of the workers and no longer on her own behalf yeah that she's basically becomes a bob dylan union supporting singer songwriter yeah

they also cut a joke where apu is making money off of selling picket signs to all the workers with basically fill in the blank parts on it though wga seemed to have a good collection of signs yeah good sign planning at your picket lines oh yeah yeah people were writing signs all over i mean they're writers funny sign this third though, opens with two long set pieces. We have Lisa's song, which glides right into Grandpa's giant speech. Okay. I forgot this was in this episode. That was one thing where I was like, I cannot believe this is also in this episode.

Recently, I've seen someone who has the tattoo of the entire speech basically running down their leg on a banner. And I think Grandpa's in the center of it. Yes, that is such a perfect one. of the entire speech, basically running down their leg on a banner. And I think Grandpa's in the center of it. So funny. Yes, that is such a perfect one. How can you not say, which was the style at the time, without, how do you not just say it? Try not to fall asleep, as Burns almost does, as we hear Abe's winding story.

Smith is, get me some strike breakers, the kind they had in the 30s. We can't bust heads like we used to, but we have our ways. One trick is to tell them stories that don't go anywhere. Like the time I caught the ferry over to Shelbyville, I needed a new heel for my shoe. So I decided to go to Morganville, which is what they call Shelbyville in those days. So I tied an onion to my belt, which was the style at the time. Now, to take the ferry cost a nickel.

And in those days, nickels had pictures of bumblebees on them. Give me five bees for a quarter, you'd say. Now, where were we? Oh, yeah. The important thing was that I had an onion on my belt, which was a style at the time. They didn't have white onions

because of the war. The only thing you could get was those big yellow ones. Oh. And it's not just a bunch of mad libs comedy. It's very observational. I find that a good old person trait is telling you what things used to be and as i get older i found myself thinking about what

things used to be and what things used to cost and i recall my grandma doing that a lot when i was little it happens to us all yeah yeah and the delivery of which was the style at the time which is so kind of arrogant or sort of like you should know this and then he says it a second time and the story's still not over it's just chef's kiss i love how abe goes which was the style of the time well and he just like starting it now like and also like i would guess i read a bit about the history of nickels obviously there were never bumblebees on a nickel i would guess this is a reference to buffalo nickels and uh yeah but but it also just feels like when an old person tells you something that's patently not true and that you can't even interrupt. Someone who's so old they can annoy Mr. Burns is also rare.

You would think it doesn't make sense that Abe is telling a story that's too boring for Mr. Burns, the guy who tells old stories. And yet that's how boring it is. There's a limit for everyone also that like now as i got older and learned history of like strike and strike breakers that abe and his friends are the old pinkertons who used to like murder people yes and yes if you read the original script abe's story stops at the first which was a style at the time they made the right call to double it and link and add more details amazing and then we cut to a purely visual joke of burns losing the hoses himself on them which then flings him all around it's also like you guys didn't have to face hoses

but you didn't have to face trees being trimmed very cruelly i remember that was that about the worst it got no we didn't get blasted with water trimmed very cruelly. I remember that. Was that about the worst it got? No, we didn't get blasted with water. We were good. That's good. And then comes another joke. I totally forgot why I think of Unrelated this episode. Classical gas.

They talk about how the layout artist Paul Wee worked very hard with his guitar expertise to make sure Lisa was playing the correct chords and finger work in all the shots which they make fun of him on the commentary like oh nobody would notice that but I love that they did that that's why there's just a glorious close-up of her hands working the strings just to show you we did our research we made this look right so we'll march day and night by the big cooling tower they have the, but we have the power. Now do classical gas. and they said that the writer of the song mason williams saw them at an event at the aspen comedy festival in 2000 and said how much he loved seeing this in the show and i love seeing the way

lenny nods his head back and forth satisfyingly. Like, I think that's how I show I like music too. Then we then cut to another very funny little scene of Burns looking at Homer scratching his butt and says he thinks he's cock of the walk. He's cock of nothing. And it makes it ten times funnier to cut to Smithers just like agreeing with that. Smithers has very little to say throughout. I wish there was more Smithers, but I guess you said a little bit was cut out, Henry, with Mr. Snappy.

A teeny bit, yeah. Then here comes another scene that had a lot of cuts and one big recasting. On Smartline, there's Burns, there's Homer, and then there is Dr. Joyce Brothers. Now, in the original, this was annoying because I thought it was going to be in this script i found unfortunately it must have already been cut out in the cast list they do not list dr joyce brothers

they write have the original person they cast there but they don't have the lines and that person was oj simpson yes i know it was crazy to find out. To give you a timeline, this would be 15 months before certain events would happen. Yeah. And actually, OJ guested on a show before the double murder, and that episode was never released. It was an episode of the Adventures in Wonderland series called White Rabbits Can't Jump. A book version, like a picture book version of that episode was released in some form, but they never aired the episode because of obvious reasons but you were playing with fire having oj as a guest at that time but you wouldn't have known uh i mean he had had the cops called on him a few times i mean that's true yes it is that thing where people do know some stuff there is like uh should we put this guy on the show and then you're kind

of running a timer you don't know it's an oj timer but sometimes you're running a timer of like what if they do something bad like if you were going to have say let's just say andy dick you're running up against a clock on how long andy dick won't get in trouble between now and when this thing airs you know that is true yeah or casting kevin spacey in something perhaps yeah putting ke Putting Kevin Spacey. Yes, exactly. But I say this to noted Kevin Spacey-ologist. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Now, I wish that I knew what the jokes were they originally wrote for OJ, but I would assume it would just be my guess would be some sort of joke about booking the wrong Simpson on the show would be the joke. That's what I figure. But maybe they had something more creative. Hey, everybody. This is Bob and Henry jumping in weeks after the original recording because O.J. Simpson is dead. Dead tired of not finding the real killers and a prostate cancer.

But he's no longer with us. And back when we recorded this originally, we wished, we prayed upon our Dark Lords that if only we had the original dialogue from O.J. Simpson in this episode. And after the recording, it was uploaded to Archive.org. What funny timing that right after the passing of him. And yeah, I figured listeners, when they hear back to the podcast we recorded weeks before he passed away they'll be like yo goober why are you talking about him like he's alive i was so like oh god if only we'd had the original oj lines and we guessed what it would be but now we we have them we have the uh the original it was uploaded as revised table draft uh it's dated 10 days earlier than the previous draft we were talking about

through the whole episode. So at last we, you know what they originally planned to do with OJ Simpson. So basically the scene begins as before with Kent Brockman. And then he welcomes on football, great OJ Simpson. And so then OJ says, Kent,

I haven't seen you since that night in the grotto at heffs please oj i was drinking heavily back then that's not all you were doing so fun what a fun joke about ladies man oj simpson that's what he was known for hanging out the playboy mansion basically the scene continues uh with burns and homer as as it appeared. But then Homer is saying, trying to remember the dental plan. And then O.J. goes, if you ask me, a labor strike is a lot like football. Well, it's even more like a football strike. But out, Simpson, says Burns. And then Homer says, I wasn't saying anything.

No, the other Simpson. And so the obvious joke did happen. A lot of comedy because, folks, they're both named Simpson. And we did lose a chance to see Mr. Burns talk to O.J. Simpson here. Oh, two great supervillains. And, yeah, this was all cut for Joyce's brother saying, I brought my own mic. And they cut way more of her, too. And the last joke here is Kent Brockman, after burns his big speech about how no one will

be spared kent brockman says tomorrow we'll explore the new germany with helmet cole eric honaker and of course oj simpson oj simpson replies new germany i don't like the sound of that that's a good i like that i like it yeah yeah well you know he was hilarious in the naked gun movies he could have done a great job on the simpsons but they they dodged a bullet yeah perhaps perhaps they dodged a a knife being shoved towards them it's so funny to see a year before two years before ish that their jokes with oj simpson are about how like as we all know oj simpson tv commentator on things that's how we all know oj simpson uh playboy mansion gadfly yes also full of like uh we talked about it before and i bet we'll talk more about on the crusty gets canceled but the fun idea of the grotto

not so fun now after a lot of exposes no we're going to be talking a lot about Hugh Hefner very soon. But so, he's dead, and now you know what jokes they wrote for O.J. Simpson before they cut it and replaced it with Dr. Joyce Brothers. Instead, we have Dr. Joyce Brothers, who has one line and then is never seen again. And I like how dismissive they are of her because they don't go to her. She says nothing else. And yes, she was a TV mainstay. She passed away at 85 in 2013. And she famously won the game show, The $64,000 Question, despite the producers intentionally choosing subject matter they thought she wouldn't know, which was sports. And outside of that, she went on to become a renowned psychologist and you know promoting

psychology to the mainstream she was a very important pioneer in that area she was a constant in talk shows also it'd be easier to name the sitcom she didn't appear on around this time because you look at her imdb and this is not appearances on talk shows this is her playing herself in scripted content movies tv shows 93 entries are in there of her playing herself in tv shows like for instance i pulled this up she was in the elf clip show that al and mike wrote that is parody of the tonight show it's a really fun episode eva if you've never seen it yeah i don't know that one it's really great basically elf takes over the Tonight Show set as a framing device

to go like, let's show a clip. Then it's just an hour-long clip show. As a joke, he has on Dr. Joyce Brothers. She comes out. It's really funny. She starts talking and he's like, what happened to your accent? She's like, accent? He's like, oh, I thought you were Dr. Ruth.

Oh, I booked the wrong doctor. I was about to say. I feel like they were neck and neck at the time. It's a great joke. It's a great joke. Yeah. Henry, you weren't kidding. She was on three episodes of Melrose Place and two episodes of Baywatch.

That's wild. Just call Joyce again. She'll do it. No, actually, two years before this, she's even on an episode of night court season eight's attachments included where the joke is just for a one-off joke bull has placed a strange personal ad that freaks everybody out and then she arrives in the lunchroom to answer the personal ad and bull's like oh you want a date and she's like no i need to help you you need help and then boom yeah it's the fact that

she was willing to do one line and then leave was probably what made her so appealing to so many different properties i think she's the only actor with a credit on both baywatch and the jack benny program no one else can say that no baywatch she was replacing ojJ Simpson both times. Right. I think they must have cut lines for her that maybe were animated even. So all she says in the episode is, I brought my own mic, which is funny because it's a joke that she's on TV so much she has her own mic. She doesn't need it given to her. But they have a couple more jokes in there that she just shows up wherever people are filming things. And she says she's about to break into where they're filming an earnest movie to appear in that then they say when's it coming out and then she says let's see an earnest movie about a month from now joking that it takes very quickly for it to make

and homer's woohoo that they cut to that was his reaction to learning there'll be a new earnest movie in a month from now so oh i love it so much it's just him not having to talk anymore yes he all he does is scream and woohoo like he has nothing more to add to smart life and also it perfectly rhymes with the end when he's so happy to not be the union guy anymore i assume they thought they did too much earnest bashing in these first four years let the man entertain he's harmless and then he'll be on the show in like five years. We were too mean to Ernest. And also he was an amazing actor who we missed the second he passed away. He was so great. Yeah, he's a cool guy. They also cut a scene here with Just Stamp the Ticket Man where Marge has to go back to work to support Homer while he's on strike. And it's a

very realistic thing about, you know, income doesn't come in when you're on strike. So Marge is taking an extra job. She is promoting a pork product, a pork substitute. And when she presents it to somebody, Just Ant the Ticket Man tells her, yeah, like I care and walks away. It would have been a classic Just Ant the Ticket Man appearance. When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance, I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care about you. Home and auto insurance personalized to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part. Visit Desjardins.com slash care and get insurance that's really big on care. Did I mention that we care?

It also, it leads me to tell a fun story of when I went to Universal Studios. I wanted to go to the new Nintendo area and this was during the strike. And our tour guides were two Striking SAG members who were very open about being on strike. So I was like, wow, that's cool. I was, tell me more. I was prompting them to tell me more about being on strike. It was really cool. They were trashing Universal Studios, their employer, as they were showing us around.

God bless. It was really great. Our guy, I forget his name. I have a picture of him. His main job was acting in and being the stand-in for tom hanks on the like last 20 years of tom hanks movie oh so he must have been a tom hanks shaped and sized he had tom hanks's haircut and build i would say but if you looked him in the face you wouldn't be like oh you look just like tom hanks like he doesn't look that close but if you watch that recent tom hanks

movie what was it the jerk moviek Movie. Oh, yeah. It's called A Man Called Otto. Right. Yes. Because I think the book's called like A Man Called Oleg because it's a skin and ears. Oh, OK. Interesting. Well, if you watch that movie, my tour guide plays a cop in it for like one scene.

So that's fun. He was very nice. He told us a funny story about filming on the Coen Brothers film and saying how Tom Hanks had said, ooh, the brothers are fighting today. That's awesome. But okay, so Homer, we hear Burns threatened the entire town that no one will be spared. No one. Then it leads to another dual reference scene here because it's the opening to Get Smart until it becomes the Batcave sequence of Batman 66.

But it also quotes Elfman's score to Batman 89, so it's actually three references. It's very deep. I wonder if they have to call Danny Elfman to be like, we're going to quote your score. Is that cool? They're paying him every week for the Simpsons theme song, so maybe it was an easy call.

As long as I don't have to call my own score. Maybe it was within under the threshold of notes you can get away with, but it wasn't a sound alike. It was definitely the da-da-da-da-da, that part of the score. That's cool. And it's fitting for the writers, too, because they've seen many an interview where the original writer says that the Simpsons for them, as inspiration as as writers was Get Smart and Batman, the Adam West Batman show. Those were the two biggest for them as comedy writers. And there's also a cut joke here where Burns would pull a lever to turn off the lights, but it instead starts playing the song Winchester Cathedral, which is like Winchester Cathedral.

It's a gramophone hit is what you're saying. It's a 1960s song made to parody gramophone songs by the New Vaudeville Band. On the commentary, they say Burn Sang from Hell's Heart I Stab at Thee is just a Moby Dick reference. But I feel like the framing in a button press makes it feel like a Wrath of Khan reference to me more so. Which is what Khan says when he... That seems likely. Of course, Khan is referencing Moby Dick because he's read that book. Isn't it funny in that the Star Trek future, they only reference things from the 1900s.

They never reference things from like 2005 in the future. They still read literal physical books made of paper yes yeah yeah they only listen to classical opera they're not quoting uh what billy madison but so all the lights go out in town they also were writing this in 1992 so they're putting a lot of riots in here because uh you know la scared white la writers thinking about riots you get it um so i remember they said on the commentary that fox told them to go home and they were just kind of confused because they were nowhere near where any writing was happening yeah they said it was nothing yeah fox yeah all the way across town exactly by the nakatomi building

more than a building henry There's an entire plaza. It's a studio. I worked at the Fox lot all last year before the strike. Wowee. It's a beautiful old lot. It's really cool. And you can walk across the whole thing in like five to 10 minutes. So it's really, it's my favorite.

Me and Bob got to be on there once. I remember marveling, not just at the Die Hard building, but also there was a plaque on one of the studios that was like, Batman 66 was filmed here. And I was like, whoa. Yeah, it tells the studios that was like batman 66 was filmed here and i was like whoa yeah it tells you everything that was filmed in that studio soundstage it's really it's beautiful really grounds you i was really marveling at the lack of security and how no one asked me uh why i was there what i was doing yeah everyone's real nice i assume some security guard was like yeah they look like TV writers to me. Exactly. Meaning also harmless.

Harmless dudes. Easy to spook. So all the lights go out, but everybody in the Strikers, they unite together and sing. So we'll march day and night by the big cooling tower. They have the plans, but we have the power.

So we'll march day and night by the big cooling tower. They have the plans, but we have the power. They're singing along to Lisa's song. It's a very sweet moment, framed entirely like the Chuck Jones adaptation of How the Grinch Stole Christmas. It's beautiful. And there's a great story on the commentary that me and Bob got to tell the artist who animated this scene, actually. So on the commentary, the director, Mark Kirkland, mentions his AD on the show, Susie Dieter, did the whole layout for the scene.

And she's like, I love the Grinch, please let me do it. And then he mentions that Phil Roman, the head of film Roman, who animated on the original Grinch special saw it and thought it was amazing. And he's like, wow. And so when we interviewed Susie Dieter, we told her that she said she'd never heard that at the time. So she was happy to hear it many years later that's awesome smithers makes a very good max stand-in because in that scene i think the grinch is grabbing his paw as max is dangling in front of him but the tie is a good stand-in yeah it undoes his little bow tie for him to keep pulling him in and burns his eyes like his design shifts to be the grinch design like it's technically off

model and it's just how little it takes to turn him into the grinch it's just a slight change of his hand and a like an arch and he's just immediately it's so funny and suzy dieter guys listen back to our interview if you haven't she has so many interesting stories about being the first woman to direct an episode of the simpsons it wasn't all sunshine and lollipops and i believe the critic as well right yeah and the first female director on the critic too and she's still at it she's one of the best animators around she works i think she worked on the mario movie or what she worked at illumination and on recent titmouse productions so yeah oh cool actually yeah eva have you worked on any animated shows no never have not yet i would love to but not, but not in my lifetime so far.

But well, here is when, well, let's hear a little bit of the Grinch and Curly meet up in this next clip. Look at them all through the darkness I am bringing. They're not sad at all. They're actually singing. They sing without juicers. They sing without blenders. They sing without flungers, capdabblers and smendlers. Tell Simpson I'm ready to deal. All right, Homer. You can have the dental plan on one condition. You must resign as head of the union. Woo-hoo! must resign as head of the union. Wahoo!

Smithers, I'm beginning to think that Homer Simpson was not the brilliant tactician I thought he was. So funny. Yet more repetition in this episode. That works so well. He makes three circles around on that last shot.

Yeah. As a kid, I hadn't watched much Three Stooges. I just thought like, oh, Homer's doing that. I definitely tried that at least once or twice as a kid. I did not know the reference at all as a kid. I just thought it was the craziest thing I'd ever seen. I mean, it looks so fun to run on the ground like that. You need a lot of clearance.

Most homes aren't equipped for you to do the curly run on the ground. We did the Doughboys when we went to the Vegas airport and ate at Chili's too. We were stuck in the airport for a few hours. Mitch got on the ground and did do that over by the slot machines. It was so funny. He did it slowly, but he did do it a couple rounds of it just to pass time while we watched. Yeah, it's cheaper than gambling too. That's a good time.

That's so funny. Man, I'd love to see Mitch do that. But yes, Homer tricked Burns into agreeing to everything, which is great. And also, all those things Burns names, I don't think are real things. But it's a good list of Dr. Seussian type items. Good Seussian objects. They would be in Whoville. And so then we get our final little scene.

This also is a joke style they have done several times since which is they write the sitcom ending that would be on full house or many other regular sitcoms of like you have your parting line and everybody laughs fade out but this is where the laughing just lasts a little too long you forgot about the fake vomit factory turning yes yeah okay thank you and all the porn theaters yeah yes and don't they all high-five each other at the fake vomit factory like the dream is not dead thank you the turning back on of the lights to the fake vomit factory that was my mom's favorite joke that she laughed so hard because like fake vomit is such a specific of a you know a prank joke shop

of buying the fake vomit and that there is a whole factory that has a thing that just spits it out and that the workers love their jobs they're so happy it's yeah you know we've moved all the fake vomit jobs overseas at this point it's a real damn shame it's really true i looked up how do you buy fake plastic vomit on amazon or like which ones are on amazon now and the first thing i saw was like an eight dollar one and it was classic amazon thing of like oh it looks like this in the picture and then all the reviews are like this sucks and it was pictures that look nothing like the real people's pictures and i was like oh man so buyer beware when you're buying plastic vomit on amazon i want to know what you're thinking after you review fake vomit on Amazon.

What's going through your mind about how you got here? What happens next? Yeah. How did this go south for you? This purchase? What was it supposed to be for and how did it go wrong? I mean, I can't imagine buying it on Amazon. I only think of it as like, you know, when you go to a fun joke novelty store, like the

one Pee Wee Herman goes to in the start of of big adventure where you see the fake vomit on the wall there has to be like people that make the good stuff i mean morris whoops rubber vomit is the classic that's the one you would see at like hollywood toy and costume i am seeing it places but i'm not seeing it on amazon so you have to go morris it's like whoops morris is like the manufacturer, the most disgusting laugh getter, L-A-F-F. So that's, you know, there's a lot. It's great fun at home, party's office is what it says on the front. But that's the classic. Go Morris.

I have to assume there are Etsy sellers that can customize your fake vomit. You could tell them what the person had eaten before the vomit happened. Like, I want less corn than is what usually is in the fake vomit. That's a little too obvious. You know, if you buy that classic fake vomit, they're basing it on like, you know, 1960s diet. It's just a steak and martini vomit. It's not happening as much anymore. If there aren't vomit artisans on Etsy, there should be. There's a market. Sorry. But yes, thank you even for reminding me of that. I almost went by

my mom's favorite joke in the whole episode. Then we have a laugh to take us out. Oh, honey, you can hardly see your new braces. And that's the tooth. Oops, I left the gas on. so they're all getting high on nitrous oxide that's our happy ending but also yes you can't see lisa's braces because they'd have to fundamentally change your character model for her to have braces yes from the show onward you know what we're talking about ideas they like so much in season four that they use them again they'll use this ending again at the end of the clip show where they all laugh about homer not knowing he's been in a coma for six weeks yeah that's a good one i was thinking of the one from the homer and

apu episode where they go like and still a little time let's hug them again i remember seeing these types of jokes at the end of Police Squad as well. They did. Yeah. They'd all freeze while laughing and then things would be happening to them as they were frozen. Yeah. This also speaking of ideas being reused again or in season 31, they do the episode Hail to the Teeth where Lisa again gets braces. And they actually do the joke in the beginning where basically she's told she should get braces,

but I already had braces. I've done that before. Then Marge says, no, you didn't actually have braces technically. And she says that it was a rogue periodontist posing as an orthodontist. So, you know, they don't count. Not important, but one thing I want to say

about that episode, Hail to the Teeth. Lisa getting braces is the A plot. Artie Ziff making Marge clones is the b plot that is the less important story in Hail to the Teeth and it blows my mind that is pretty crazy though the changes that can be made and it is because it's HD they actually draw her braces on and it's still directed by the same guy Mark Kirkland who directed this episode so they keep it in continuity with that. Oh, and also, there's no reasoning given why Lisa needs braces in this show. Like, you know, what's causing her teeth misalignment.

In the episode, they make the joke that because Lisa plays the saxophone, it is causing her teeth to shift more than they normally would. So they at least have more reasoning for it. But yes, if you want to see more jokes about Lisaisa having braces season 31's hail to the teeth also on disney plus but yeah i mean i guess final thoughts for me this yes one of the best episodes of simpsons ever there are ones that i find just as funny that i like their heartfeltness just a little more like i think bart's comet is just as funny as this but also has a little more heart to it or homie the clown i think of that as one of the funniest ever but as far as like scientifically speaking as we chart out all of the jokes in this episode it is hard to deny that this isn't like could be the best and is right up there i'd say this is

definitely like in my top 15 there are other episodes episodes I like more, but this one, there's no denying it's funny in that it has invented new kinds of jokes that have stuck with us as people for the past 30 years. I think it being number one for so long might have caused too much discourse, so there's a lot of baggage when it comes to talking about

this episode, but there's no denying that it is one of the best. Eva, any final thoughts? I never paid attention to the discourse, so I go number one. Hmm. Wow. We're trapped in the damn discourse. I know, it's your whole life.

Yeah, can I ask a question that you can cut out if you want? Oh, sure. Have you guys ever talked about like the real comic book guy? We've talked about comic book guy origins that we've read about, but is this about,

I've heard some people say it's the golden apple guy from LA. Is this what you're talking about? No? It's this guy named John Brian King. He was married to a coworker of mine at my first job. I met him a few times and he worked at a bookstore. They said comic book store, but it was an art bookstore. And he's a currently like, he has a website and stuff, but he was the one who was eating

fried clams when the Simpsons writers came over to the store. And that's why the comic book guy eats fried clams but he's like a very funny sarcastic guy he's also a title designer he did the titles for like Punch Drunk Love and stuff wow no I've never heard this before I met him when I was in my early 20s I was a receptionist for his wife who was a famous music supervisor um who's I think since remarried but we all went to dinner together and he told us and when you meet this guy there's no question that he's like the entire comic book guy model but you guys should track him down i think he would be really funny and having a show yeah okay this is new mission sorry his name again john brian king john brian king all right i'm writing this down

johnbrianking.com is his website maybe they're being a little coy when they come to describing his origins, but they said he's a composite of various comic book guys, and the voice is a roommate of Hank Azaria's from college. But I could see them drawing more from this particular character than other comic book guys they knew. I guess they would come over and he would be sarcastic and bully them, but he would also be eating fried clams. It would definitely fit that it's in L.A.

I'd heard the golden apple comics guy in la as well as mentioned and other numerous comic book guys but i had to figure la bookstore makes a lot of sense as being like a visual inspiration for sure yeah yeah no no we're gonna keep this in i'm gonna look into this well all right yeah we're glad he's still alive because many of the comic book guys from the early 90s are no longer with us i am too i haven't thought about him since like 2003 but i was something was like oh i know and i was able to track him through like movies i knew he had done the title okay we're gonna dig more into this so thank you eva see this is the type of deep hollywood lore that i expect from eva anderson oh thank you sir but thank you so much for coming on the show eva please let us know where to find

you online if you want to be found and let us know what you're working on if you want to plug anything that's the time i don't have anything to plug right now oh you know what i'll say that i worked on a show called interior chinatown which will be coming out later this year on hulu so keep an eye out for that it's got a comedy bang bang favorite lisa gilroy as one of the leads and she's awesome also ronnie chang and jimmy o yang a lot of really funny people. And you can find me on Twitter and on Instagram at Eva Fay. That's E-V-A-F-A-Y. Were you impressed with us

that we never called you Ava? I appreciate it. You did first, but that's my day. No, thanks for having me, guys. Yeah, anytime. This was so much fun. Thank you so much to Eva Anderson for being on the show.

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