Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - Mom And Pop Art With Cait Raft

Episode Date: December 4, 2019

This week we welcome back Cait Raft (This Podcast Is Self Care, JackAM on Twitch), not only to talk more about the Simpsons writers' room, but also the world of art! Homer accidentally becomes an artist after almost killing a few people, and Homer is very happy living out Marge's dream. But when Homer tries to learn more about the art world, he somehow floods the entire town. Listen to learn more PLUS what Al Jean sometimes has for lunch on this week's podcast!! Support this podcast and get dozens of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! And please follow the new official Twitter, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

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That is patreon.com slash talking simpsons. Now, please enjoy the rest of this podcast. I heartily endorse this event or product. Ahoy, ahoy, everybody, and welcome to Talking Simpsonsons where we fail at every attempt at masonry. I'm your host, Botch Hibachi Bob Mackie and this is our chronological exploration of The Simpsons. Who else is here with me today? Henry Gilbert and I'm shaving my shoulders. And who do we have on the line? It's me, Kate Raft.

Excellent, and today's episode is Mom and Pop Arts. But you'll have to live with the guilt of ruining my Saturday. Can you live with that, Marge? Huh? Can you? Yep. Can you? Today's episode aired on April 11th, 1999.

And as always, Henry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history. Oh my God! Oh boy, Bobby. Backstreet Boys' I Want It That Way single is released. Never Been Kissed can't unseat The Matrix from the top of the box office. And Old Town Road creator Lil Nas X is born on this very day. Really? What a monumental day in music history.

The greatest song of all time. The biggest song of all time, perhaps. Move Over Thriller and Icky Breaky Heart. Old Town Road is taking it. I couldn't believe when i saw that i was like no they can't be the same guy right and like yes he he was born when we were watching this episode it's one of those songs that's huge but i still haven't heard can you believe that wait are you serious i've never heard it i've somehow that way oh no uh the old town road song oh yeah i thought you were like saying you've never heard it. I want it that way. Oh, no. The Old Town Road song. Oh. Yeah.

I thought you were like saying you've never heard the Backstreet Boys. Oh, no. I was like. You're going to be very worried. I was a teenager when that song came out. So I heard it about 50,000 times. Okay, good. I think I know all the lyrics. If you ask me to write them down, I think I could write them down.

Okay, good. Thank God. You haven't heard Old Town Road. I've never heard Old Town Road. No. I mean, it's an instant classic. Maybe it's because like I have no ads on anything and I don't listen to the radio. I guess I don't know where it would find me.

It has to find you whenever you're ready for it, I think. Have you at least seen Jimmy Fallon's parody of it with Bernie Sanders singing? Oh, God, no. That's a Kate AM classic. We do like a thing on Jack AM, my Twitch show, where my husband Jack finds like political parody songs and we play them on Fridays. It's called Political Parody for Friday. So fucking stupid.

But there is one where Jimmy Fallon, well, Jimmy Fallon does a lot of political parody songs and one of them is he does Old Town Hall about Bernie Sanders. Like, the only joke is that he's old. Yeah, that's about it. Yeah. He would make that joke about Biden, I gotta say. I feel like he would not make a joke about Biden being old.

I mean, Biden is also, like, so much more, like, falling apart in an elderly way than Bernie Sanders, but whatever. And Never Been Kissed, the Drew Barrymore classic. I just read an article about, is Lili Sobieski in that movie? I think she is. Yeah, let's just say she is for the sake of this conversation. I just read an article about her. Yeah, she is. Okay, yeah, Minnie Helen Hunt.

Everyone has made that comparison before. Well, now Helen is alone on Movie Star Mountain because she is retired from the business. She's been retired for a while. Oh, Lele. Yeah, I guess I haven't seen her in anything. She's now an artist, like a fine artist, I think. Really? So it fits in with this episode, yeah.

Oh, it's kind of cool. It actually kind of looks like she drew Homer's barbecue. Oh, man. We're already getting art knowledge here i i forget drew barrymore's love interest in that who was it it wasn't paul rudd is it like a secretly creepy movie because she comes back to high school like undercover as an adult to kiss children or something oh yeah i never thought about it that way and then falls it's weird i think then she falls in love with a teacher yes which is also weird she wanted to get a kiss from an 18-year-old boy, I guess, which is not illegal.

Well, that's like, remember in Pineapple Express? There we go. In Pineapple Express, they set up in the beginning, he's dating an 18-year-old who is in high school, played by Amber Heard. And it's just like, that's weird. Why is this a needed character detail? Makes it more likable, right? Yes, yeah. Different time. Different time.

Different time. 2008. 2008. Yeah, different time. But hey, Kate Raft, welcome back. Thanks for having me. It's so good to be back. And in case folks don't know, you're a writer, comedy performer, Twitch streamer, podcaster.

You do Jack AM, this podcast is self-care kate paints which is very important like quintuple threats yeah oh thank you thank you thank you so much what is it like to be a painter is it like homer in this episode it's exactly like that every one of my paintings starts as a failed um home goods project yeah um you, my dad used to paint when I was a kid. So he kind of taught me how to work with acrylics. And then I kind of toyed with the idea of studying art in college and then ultimately went with writing. But I've taken like a few art classes. I went to art summer camp in high school. And so I've just like kind of always done it. But right now I mainly do watercolors. Did this episode bring back any artistic memories for you? I mean just like kind of always done it. But right now I mainly do watercolors.

Did this episode bring back any artistic memories for you? I mean, it kind of like reminds me of how bad I am at art history. Like I feel like most people expect me to know a lot about art history. And I'm just like always like, I'm just like, I never took an art history class. I like truly don't know that much. And it's just like i i like was barely getting the references i was like okay there's sunday in the park with george that's the famous one i know who andrew warhol is obviously it was like you know i felt like i got some of the

references and i was proud of myself for that i think for the most part there may be for like 65 percent of the audience will get them yeah they're still general enough right like i still kind of should be yeah i still kind of don't know who jasper johns is but uh he i mean my reference point for him is this episode i guess he's a thief is mainly what he is not for kate i was counting on you to explain every reference in this i know I'm sorry. I'm truly not like art literate at all. Sorry. Well, folks who didn't hear your previous appearance on the show with this little wiggy, you also have a personal, like professional connection to the Simpsons as well, right? Yes, I do. I used to work there as a writer's PA for, I think, three years. And so you can go back to that episode

and hear all about the lunch orders. Who gets what. You can also just slide into my DMs. I'll tell you all about the lunch orders of the writers of The Simpsons. I got all the piping hot tea on what they like in their fruit plates. Coming soon in a tell-all book.

Yeah, I really should start shopping that around. Well you know me and bob this brag time we got to finally got invited to a simpsons table read uh since we last recorded with you so we were curious if we did any faux pas while we were there oh my god i can tell you so much about the table reads i mean those were like that was my that was my most important job i mean lunch obviously comes first above all but then the second most important thing i i would do when i worked there was like i would set up the table reads i would like help bring the conference call phones and set up the phones get the lunch orders during before the read get people's guests into the read i mean it's a whole thing it seems like a very elaborate uh

you know thing they have going on but it all went off like clockwork it was just perfectly organized and perfectly orchestrated oh yeah well they've had many decades to perfect i mean it's truly the same method they've used since the beginning of the show i'm pretty sure so it's a well-oiled machine nothing there like there's not a ton of innovation i think that's in the in the just like organization of the production in terms of like they just use the same like fax cover sheets i mean i don't know if it's changed in the last couple years it hasn't no i thought that was we we got our scripts from the table read and a few extras that were left behind and it's still the sort of off model season two uh maybe simpsons drawing or probably like season one production

art it's great i love seeing just like oh that looks wrong but it's great that they kept it this long there's something like soothing about how unchanging some of the traditions are over at the simpsons like it is like there's like the world may change you know it's chaotic out there it's owned by disney now trump is president. But hey, they're still going to use the same cover sheets. You can still see Homer with an extra line out of his muzzle, coming out of his muzzle. Yeah, exactly. It's comforting. Yeah.

So would you be one of the people to print the scripts or order the scripts to be printed? Oh, yeah. That was my main job. I would pick the scripts. I would drop the scripts off at the print shop, and then I would pick them back up. And oh, boy, sometimes there would be a fiasco, like a page would be missing, we'd have to get them all reprinted and scramble. Sometimes the print shop, like the person would like come in late to work, and the scripts would be ready, and we'd have to like rush them over. Oh, my God, the drama of getting the scripts to the table

read. And sometimes they come out really late the night before wow oftentimes they don't because the simpsons doesn't take hiatuses so they have plenty of time for for most scripts to be like ready for the table read but sometimes if something needs like a big rewrite or something you'll be there like kind of late and it's that's drama i'm guessing there's a copy shop on the lot. You don't have to go out to FedEx or whatever on your break to get copies. No, yeah, yeah. The Fox lot, they've got it all. We did ask for some autographs while we were there from voice actors. Is that okay, or did we—

Yes, that's totally okay. That's totally okay. I remember one time Nancy— Nancy is so nice about giving autographs and she's like she's really nice um and she when when i first started working there asked me if i wanted one because she didn't realize i was working there i mean i did want one oh yeah of course i would too yeah i have it somewhere we were on i have a whole file folder of my simpsons like script covers that I've saved.

Oh, that's cool. I mean, you can't throw that out. That's valuable stuff. I'm going to get all my pages framed individually. All 44 of them. Yeah, I think we were on our best behavior as fans. We could have been way more fanboys and fangirls, but we wanted to be respectful. We knew that they were basically at work.

So the people who were out the door, I was like, I'm not going to chase down Dan Castellaneta or whatever. They have other things going on. girls but uh we wanted to be respectful we knew that they were basically at work so like the people who are at the door i was like i'm not going to chase down dan castellaneta or whatever they have other things going on but the people who stayed i'm like they're staying for a reason yeah if they're rushing out usually they've got something else to do dan's you know he's always doing stuff and yeah i think they like it i i think like it's sort of like fine day to ask for autographs at the table reads like that's i think it's nice for that for everyone i think it's like that's a safe place to ask for some autographs the writers love to give them to not like not like they're like waiting for someone to ask but it's just like because when you work on a tv show you don't always get to see like you know in person like

the adoration or whatever you know what i mean i assume that they like going to it because julie cavner was there and no spoilers for the episode but she had about three lines oh no so she was like she didn't have to be there for any of that but she was just there and having fun so it was nice oh i love that yeah i let julie was um mostly on the phones when i was working that's what i've heard yeah she would come in every once in a while yeah yeah actually that was a special thing about our this is more table re-talk but yeah this was this was a thing we had heard was special about our table read that nobody was on the phone for R1. Wait, really? Yeah, well, Harry wasn't there.

Someone read Harry's part. Oh, did Chris read Harry's parts? Oh, no. Actually, Kevin Pollack read Harry's parts. I'm sorry. Our listeners might have just heard our table read podcast. We go over all of this, but yes. But yeah, Kevin Pollack was there and reading reading harry's parts and it was uh just uh

nobody on the phone it was a big event hank was in person too it was oh my god so you really went to a really good one because hank is like well when i worked there it was like it was a very special occasion when he could come in and actually do it man what a treat is it making this sound even more yeah that's a good one do you know can you say whose script it was jeff westbrook jeff restbook oh nice great yeah it was uh it was a fun day let's just say what happens in the whole episode we're gonna repeat our table read podcast love it uh no okay well i'm glad uh we i took a fiji water for the road too too. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

They're on the Fiji. Okay, so when I was there, they were doing Evian. See, I know the waters was my job as well. We had to set the waters out. It was a whole thing. We had to switch from Arrowhead to Evian because we were in a California drought, and we didn't want to be taking the California water or something. I don't know. I took one of the bathroom fixtures as a souvenir.

I hope that wasn't rude. Oh, yeah. You took like a faucet? Yeah, sure. Just pocketed it. That's not my department. I don't care. That wasn't my department.

I'm not in the bathroom fixture department. There's so much Simpsons writer DNA on that thing. I got to keep it. I mean, you could clone them. But unfortunately, at our table read, Al Jean was not there. He was off in New York. Was it a Selman script? Well, Selman was at least taking the notes.

I couldn't tell if it was a Selman-run episode or if Selman was just taking Al Jean's place in the room because Jean was out of town. I couldn't tell. I mean, I feel like that sounds like a Selman script situation. Okay. I feel like unless something, I don't know. I feel like Al doesn't usually ever mess a read. You know, then I think it is a Selman run one. Cause I know we had heard from Scully. He was there too, to support Selman in the episode. So that sounds like a showrun one by him. Selman seems surprised that we asked for his autograph. Really?

That's so funny. Yeah, Selman's the best. Man, we should have bothered him more and given him our card. And a spec script. And it hip-pocketed. That's the insider term, right? Yeah, yeah. Slip him mine, too.

I guess I mentioned Al Jean because this is Al Jean's official return as a writer. I know. I was Wikipedia-ing it, and I saw that. That was like, what an iconic moment. Really fun to listen to this commentary recorded 13 years ago where Al Jean is saying up front, this is my first return to The Simpsons full-time, and whenever I wasn't working on the show, I was at Disney. I was like, I wish I was on The Simpsons.

I hate Disney. I want to come back to The Simpsons so bad. And now guess what, buddy? You're back. You cannot escape Disney. I can't believe they're owned by Disney now. That is such a mindfuck. Can I curse or anything?

Oh, yeah. Fuck yeah. Fuck yeah. Every time it hits me, I'm just like, just like oh yeah that's a joke by disney people but especially it is like mike reese too he talked about how it is book when we interviewed him he like he talked about when he was unhappy while working for disney but he was he decided to take out specifically saying it was disney because they just bought fox when the book came out uh like i i would bet i would bet al wouldn't be this open about how much he hated working for disney then no no the critic was was what they're working on was the critic right uh well then it

was teen angel oh okay but the critic was like a disney-ish like production deal right because it was abc it was a sony show on abc so it definitely was working with disney yeah yeah and uh this is when al just went through his uh creative divorce for mike reese like well that makes it sound like negative but they're still friends yeah mike reese just was like well i'm done writing for tv i'm gonna go have fun all over the world he has the best life i mean mike reese like he i think he made the right choice of like i've i'm now a millionaire from television and i don't have children so fuck it i'm gonna just fly he really has like the best life his life looks so fun also he still like comes in like once a week like gets his checks like then goes continue like goes back to wherever he was traveling like it's such a sweet gig. Mike Reese truly hit the TV jackpot.

He really did. And he did it right. Every time I think of people who got success in Hollywood, who work themselves to the bone or whatever, I'm like, you could also just be Mike Reese and still be creative and still do whatever you want and also not work that hard. Get to have fun. I like that.

Mike Reese has a real vacation uniform, too. Whenever I see pictures of him, it's always him in a tucked-in rugby shirt and shorts. He's not a dad, but he's wearing vacation dad gear at all times. Yeah, he's definitely got... He and his wife have a distinct sense of style, and I appreciate that about them.

Yeah, it's wild to think that Gene came back just as a member of the writing staff in season 10. 20 years ago. And then in season 13, he'll be showrunning, which he's still doing to this day. I know, that's so wild. I can't even picture a world in which Al is just a staff writer. Yeah. It's so ingrained in my brain. In our,

in our interview with Scully, he talked about how it was just a no, no brainer for him to hire Al Jean when he was, when he was free. And once his deal with Disney was up and he was uncoupled from Reese, Scully was like, no, let's,

let's get him in. Yeah. I mean, Scully basically hired back George Meyer too. So he was interested in getting some of the like, no, let's get him in. Yeah. I mean, Scully basically hired back George Meyer, too. So he was interested in getting some of the old schoolers back on the staff, too. Scully's the man. We love Mike Scully. Love Mike Scully. And yeah, this episode, I think it has a lot of the ups and downs of Gene's solo writing work in it, I think. I think there's some really nice sentimental moments. And I also think that in this age of the Scully years is marked by Homer being a very cruel man.

I think Gene especially tries to make Homer at least understandable and loving in the third act. Yeah, there's a sort of sweetness to Al's Homer. Yeah, I think the cruelty from Al's Homer is that he has a very one-track mind if he's focused on something he will like dismiss everything else which we see with his art career here and we also see the return of things like little set pieces that al and uh mike use a lot in their seasons like the margin homer in bed scene like basically halfway through an episode like let's put them in bed have them talk about the episode like that happened so much in the al gina mike reese years even in like david merkin's years as well it was a set piece that mike scully kind of lost for more

uh heightened comedy yeah well and also it does have the uh the kind of modern simpsons thing of guest stars who were just themselves like hey yeah true uh even isabella rossellini technically not playing herself but looks exactly like herself right I think this is a stronger episode than the last couple Jean oversaw in the satellite office years. I think because they just have the benefit of a full rewrite room instead of just like four extra writers on the script. For sure. They can just give it another coat of paint. You know, this episode about the modern art world i never i never really looked too much into modern art i it seemed like uh you know pretentious to me i suppose

the only stuff i could get into would be like pop art because it took like a fun comic book page and recontextualized it yeah and now i think it's just a way for billionaires to launder money it is in a way yeah yeah that's true i wish like someone would buy my way for billionaires to launder money. It is, in a way. Yeah, yeah, that's true. I wish someone would buy my... I wish some billionaire would launder money through my art. That would be nice. I should start hammering things together. I feel like my tastes have really changed in both art and literature.

I was in college for almost a decade. I went to grad school, too. So when I was there, it was like i want the things i uh read and you know absorb to uh you know reflect how smart i am so of course it was all of like the approved boomer white authors like uh philip roth and john irving and of course all the art was just very highfalutin but now like after i got out of grad school i was like you know what i like genre stuff and i like pop stuff and uh i'm okay with that i'm okay with that now i i think you have to ask yourself like do i only know who jasper johns is so i sound smart when i say oh that reminds me of jasper

johns like i like modern art i think i like some modern art sometimes it makes me laugh like if it's like if it's like if it's so so like it can be very like funny and silly like modern art can be like you know i think i think the artists i always feel like that people who appreciate modern art take it way more seriously than the artists sometimes i like just imagine like because like marcel du champ would be like this is a toilet and then people would get like so mad like like modern art kind of started as a troll and i do appreciate that like as a troll myself like i respect i respect the scam of modern art yeah you know i do like that i though then they get built up so especially like

banksy that he oh god i mean yeah well when he did that what was it despair land he called it where it's like the disneyland oh yeah yeah gone yeah a little too on the nose there, Banksy. Yeah. But I guess I have enjoyed walking around a modern art museum and feeling culture. And I should probably do it more often. I do. I go into a museum thinking I'm going to read every one of these little paragraphs. And then about halfway through, I'm like, okay, got it, got it, got it, got it.

Art is good. I like art. It's too bad the museum here costs about $80 to get into. Oh, it does? Yeah, the SF Museum of Modern Art, where it just like... Is it really that expensive? When I took my parents there, the last time I went was maybe 2011, and the tickets were... If you want to get like the...

So a certain wing of the museum is closed off unless you have like the special access pass. So you can get like general entry for maybe $50, but I believe like... Jesus, what is this? Disneyland? Well, it's San Francisco, so even more expensive. the special access pass so you can get like general entry for maybe 50 but i believe like what is this disneyland well it's san francisco so even more expensive but uh yeah like i got the special tier it's like well they're here they're visiting here i want to see the whole museum and i believe it was like 72 or something oh my god probably more even more now i think

that's that's criminal just to look at art no well mean, that's the elitism both of San Francisco and modern art coming together. I know, seriously. Almost as much as a Disneyland ticket. There's nothing to ride. At least at Disneyland, there's attractions. And you can just buy art there of a poster of Mickey Mouse. Yeah, you can buy some pins. You can buy some pins.

But yeah, so this episode, though, begins with Homer singing a song about coconuts in this first clip. You put the beer in the coconut and drink it all up. You put the beer in the coconut and throw the can away. Homer! You throw the can away. I said Homer! You throw the can away. All right, you'm out of beer. You know, homie,

a lot of men use their Saturdays to do things around the house. Hint, hint. But Marge, I'm not like other men. That's why you buy my pants at that special store. I'm serious. You never finish painting the garage. And apparently... I hate Marge

in this episode. I hate how Marge is written in this episode. It's truly a bummer how hate marge in this episode i hate how marge is written in this episode it's truly a bummer how marge acts in this episode it's like she's like mad she's like a naggy wife who's like do chores and then she's like can't handle homer being successful like it bums me out marge bums me out i guess britain better than in a lot of the Scully episodes. Well, she runs a gamut of naggy to envious, which is, I guess, is it better than her normally just being cast as like, I clean things.

Yeah, at least she isn't in love with sweeping. She wants Homer to clean things too. And I guess also the date on the garage is Mike Scully's anniversary with his wife the second one on the commentary he jokes the good one oh okay it means julie thacker yes uh this fellow simpsons writer i didn't know that what i for now that 1995 joke gets better and better as time goes on but it's been there for 24 years now i like marge's gardening outfit that's a good design i wanted to ask about the hostage ribbons because i feel like there's a lot of uh jokes in this that al jean would put into a you know johnny carson monologue in 1986 or whenever he worked for them but was he referencing the iran hostage crisis from the early early 80s yeah like seven i guess

i think it was 79 to 81 that's the only hostages i could think of yeah like i i don't think there's a lot of at least the ones that the american culture gets behind putting ribbons on trees for i don't think it happens that often and i think there was another joke about them in uh an earlier episodes where mo wouldn't give them free beer that's right yeah they shouldn't have been there in the first place as as Mo said. Let me tell you that Homer's singing the coconut song. It was a very long time before I realized that Ned is inadvertently singing the other part of the song. I said, doctor. Oh, really? Okay. I say, Homer. That's what Ned is doing there. So Ned is singing the other part of the song.

It always struck me as very awkward because I've never heard the full song. I thought the joke was Ned. It was implying that that was Ned's catchphrase in the show. Oh, yeah. So, boy, I don't know the 1971 novelty song, Coconut. So I guess I didn't get the joke. It's in Reservoir Dogs. I've seen that one recently.

It's been a long time but yeah so that's why i think it was really just on this viewing that i realized him saying i say homer is a line from the song. That snake in the piano joke, that's just random as hell. I do like it's glowing, it has glowing eyes. It looks like something

from the Haunted Mansion, right? You guys don't have snakes in your pianos? No. Had to sell the piano. I know. Too many snakes. Pianos are snake magnets.

There's a lot of space in there for a little creepy crawler They head over to a mom and pop store That is now owned by a giant corporation Which now they're watching it On a Disney property It's even more funny Oh god

Hopefully that sign joke doesn't get cut off Oh yeah, I didn't test They gotta fix that on disney plus how do they they spend a billion dollars on disney plus and they can't give it to you in sd that's uh just shaking my head they messed up that was the whole thing right people were mad they messed up the aspect ratio for the simpsons yeah you get the uh the cropped and pan and scan 16 by 9 versions on disney plus not the proper as they were presented 4 by 3 episodes so lots of righteous

anger I'll call it. I think it's important to watch it in the right aspect. Me too, yeah. I personally did watch this episode in a fucked up reverse to Dailymotion Russian player so

it was like definitely not how it's intended to be viewed. You're our second recent guest who watched it in the Dailymotion flip version. I was too lazy to get the free trial for Disney+. Also, when I do get Disney+, I want to do the Mr. Boogity Challenge. Did you guys hear about that? Oh, yes. Yeah. Oh, there's a challenge now?

Jack AM is a big booster of the boogity challenge i'm that's not part of my childhood i know people are talking about that movie a lot and it was referenced apparently i think my sister might have been into it or something yeah but i've never seen mr boogity neither have i but when i get disney plus it's going to be the first thing i watch because apparently the first thing you watch affects the algorithm and everyone everyone on twitter is is trying to confuse the Disney algorithm so that they make a Mr. Boogity sequel. The first thing I watched was bonkers.

I want to find out if there's a Mrs. Boogity. There's a bride of Boogity. Oh, sweet. Cool. The Sentence will be right back i hope you're enjoying this week's installment of outsider art and we really thank our guest kate raft for coming on and giving us so many insights, both into the world of art and into the world of the production on The Simpsons. You should follow Kate's podcast. This podcast is self-care and her daily streams on Jack AM.

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Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse, Tiny Toons, How I Spent My Vacation, and so many more. Over 40 hours of podcasts that you can only hear if you're at the $10 level at patreon.com slash stalkingsimpsons. So please, sign up or upgrade today. but uh but so yeah they head to the hardware shop the squeaky voice teen is uh trying to get with a cute girl which he actually does like it's the only time squeaky voice teen i think he's ever gotten romantic success he's come a long way from if i had a girlfriend she'd kill me uh but but homer's uh i do like that homer is there just to get bolt cutters for a toolbox uh that also feels like

this again feels like modern simpsons as well of like they they go to that store to do to buy something to do yard work and then homer is instantly distracted and does a new thing like it's it's all thrown off it also feels like classic era simpsons and that homer is much more a reflection of the writer's parents where the dad of the 60s or 70s would be like a handyman he would build things like birdhouses and benches and things like that where we saw a bit of homer's poor craftsmanship in like the earliest seasons of the show they kind of forgot about homer is like an actual dad who does those things homer recently has just been like a a drunk just a blackout drunk man that he doesn't build anything the modern day father

and then uh we get a quick aside with skinner and edna which feels like a lost it's like i guess technically a b plot since it comes back at the very end of the episode but it i feel like something got cut of skinner and edna yeah i was seeing this and i love the skinner edna thing and i'm sorry it came to an end in a pretty bad way after this but uh i i was like they should have pursued this i mean there will be more skinner and episodes but it's like oh this could have been a fun like a route to travel and they actually remember the continuity of that they like to have sex in the janitor's closet out of necessity but it became a uh real makeout hot spot yeah it's just a turn i turned into a fun turn for them though i also so i had a sad moment of this of When I saw the baby subplot, I was like, oh, I should go to Wikipedia and see if they did follow up on this in an episode.

I forgot. And that's when it reminded me, like, oh, yeah, canonically, Edna's dead. And that's just depressing. Like, you're seeing, for some reason, watching a woman who I now know is dead in the series, the character, saying she wants a baby a baby like that made me way more sad i could see i could see why that's a bummer i don't know i think it would uh i i know they did it to like be respectful but might have been better just to say like edna moved away or something like now she lives on the puppy farm now that's like they didn't say that like what happened to troy mcclure oh he's dead he's dead t, they just never talk about him.

That's true. But yes, Homer gets distracted by a videotape in this next clip. Why don't we continue this in pool supplies? Hi, I'm Doug Macaro. You know me as Chip, the wisecracking assistant on the hit sitcom Toolin' Around. A man in an apron. But today I'm here as a tool of Global Dynamics Corp. You know, installing your own barbecue pit is no harder than adding an aviary or Olympic-sized swimming pool.

In fact, it's a snap. Or if you're not into chicken... No, no, I'm into chicken! How about wild boar? Or swordfish? Or hippo? not into chicken. No, no, I'm into chicken. How about wild boar? Or swordfish? Or hippo? Small hippo. Hippo.

White-hearted apron not included. Snapping fingers may not make food appear. How about it, Bart? Would you like a new backyard barbecue pit? Can I burn evidence in it? We can all burn evidence. I really like, so at this point in history, backyard barbecue pit. Can I burn evidence in it? We can all burn evidence. I really like,

so at this point in history, Home Improvement is ending. This is their last season. Yeah. So I enjoy that Al Jean is getting some final digs in on Home Improvement. I enjoy that Al Jean is finally getting some digs

in on Home Improvement this late because they were the lead in. The critic was the lead into Home Improvement. And we all, and we all assumed The Simpsons was a very

popular show in the 90s. So in the 90s, like Home Improvement was the lead into home improvement and we all and we all assume the simpsons was a very popular show in the 90s so in the 90s like home improvement was the number one show for a few years simpsons after the first season was always like number 60 or 70 it was way down the list of course it's persisted because it's a really good show but it was never even close to the top 10 oh really yeah yeah it got fully eclipsed by Home Improvement. And I know the pain they felt on The Critic was that everybody just thought of them as a show coupled with Home Improvement. Or they were told, like, you're not as good as Home Improvement. Why can't this be as popular as Home Improvement? We are going to take you away from Home Improvement because you're hurting Home Improvement by being here. One episode ends with Jay saying, you might be confused

because you're tuning in early to watch Home Improvement. Yeah. That's funny. I was going to say, I can confirm that Al Jean is into chicken. Ooh. That's more lunch secrets there.

More lunch secrets. Seasoned, fried. Dropping bombshells over here. We're talking broiled, fried chicken breasts. He used to get like this like kind of half chicken over like um french fries from this seafood restaurant by the fox lot he would get the chicken from there they did have good chicken you need protein to write comedy you do you really do i i wonder if they reached out to richard karn for this gag

too or if they always were like Richard Karn for this gag too, or if they always were like a Richard Karn type. Was he in the making those family feud millions at this point? Oh, not yet. Whatever happened to him? What's he doing now? He did host the feud before it became the Steve Harvey feud, which that's no one will replace him.

I think he's living comfortably somewhere. Those home improvement residuals got to be paid. That pays for a house on its own. Yeah. To be on the number one sitcom for like, I don't know, eight, nine seasons. I hope. I fear if I search his name, I'll find out he's like a MAGA guy now. I mean, Tim Allen is, right?

Yes. He's a big Republican. The governor of Ohio. He was a big supporter of him. Oh, John Kasich. Yeah, Kasich. Kasich. He was big behind that guy. Cool. the governor of ohio he was a big supporter of him oh uh john casich yeah casick he was he was big behind that guy well luckily john casick is way too ugly to be in a prominent place in politics it's a rat face just can't accept it no too ugly looking too ugly too ugly for politics tim allen at least national politics yeah i hate It was only after this scene where I realized, like, oh, yeah, all these music cues, this just becomes a Tool Time parody for, like, five minutes or so.

Or I should say Home Improvement. I do the bad thing of most fans of, like, oh, it's Tool Time, right? Like, no, the show is Home Improvement. I could tell you about Richard Carlin, an update on him. As of 11 years ago, he replaced Patrick Duffy as the host of the game show network's Bingo America. That was 11 years ago? Yeah, and that was the last update on him.

Apparently he was in Snow Buddies. Can someone check on Richard Carnes? I think he's okay. Someone check on him, I'm worried. You know, if he hasn't been in the news, I say no news is good news these days with old celebrities. Oh, he must be cool

because he was in two episodes of the show Pen15. I hear it's a good celebrities. Oh, he must be cool because he was in two episodes of the show Pen15. I hear it's a good show. Oh, okay. Is he the dad on Pen15? He plays Fred Peters, according to my entry here on Wikipedia. Oh, I did see him

on that show. He's actually really good on that show. Wow, I forgot. I filed that one away immediately. I always enjoyed Al. And I would hope that one day that he would actually kill tim for all the uh bad natured ribbon he suffered you gotta write that fanfic oh man think of all of the uh tim taylor and al borland slash fic that's out there oh my god i can't believe you just put that in my brain now i have no choice but to seek it out i've heard on twitter that uh al was very it was

and is very popular in the like bear community like he's like a real he's a little bear yeah he's a gay icon al borland i'm not even kidding no i i believe it i believe it i think mike mitchell is a big in the bear community too for like the same reason they got that like what the same look a flannel on them i mean i'm i'm straight i'd like to be held in his large arms for maybe a minute or two hey same i think it'd be comforting al is hot like i'll say it fuck i'll say it exclusive right here al al borland hot i've never been seen without flannel so he is a big influence in me in my life. We wore flannel to the table read because that was our nice shirt.

I'll put on my button-up shirt. I'm sure you fit right in. Yeah, how dressed down is – sorry, this is back to the table read. Is there – do some people just show up in T-shirts and jeans? Yeah, it's like a casual. It's definitely a casual thing like no one that works at the like everyone that works at the simpsons like no no one's like dressing up to go to work it's like a regular oh man hank i don't know where he was going he was really dressed up

he was i mean he's like a star he's a star he's always looking good he's got great style and uh so homer uh takes the barbecue home He starts working on the grill. It's another, like, cruel Lisa moment. They just, it wouldn't be a scully season if they didn't treat Lisa poorly. Totally sick. Making her lay the concrete foundation, cement foundation down herself. That seems pretty cruel. Reminds me of making Ralph put on the new shingles on the roof.

Yeah. Like, these tar fumes are burning my eyes Oh, they'll do that What makes me feel worst for Lisa Is how she has cement in her hair It's just like, well, you have to shave your head then, Lisa That doesn't wash out She can pull off a shaved head Yeah

She bounced back from that gum incident Oh, that's true Yeah She's no stranger to hair incidents. With building stuff, I'm no Al Borland, but I do okay with up to an Ikea thing. You see this couch here? I did actually build this Ikea couch in my apartment.

I'm saying see the couch to Bob. Oh, I sat on that couch. I've had an Ikea couch for the past nine years that I built and it is still standing but it's uh on its last legs i i'm moving and it's going to be thrown out into the street where all furniture goes in berkeley when you're done with ikea especially yes yeah but i've never i would never take on an outdoor thing like building a grill probably out of fear of what homer does in this very episode this This mainly, this next clip is just to appreciate the screaming that Homer does while trying to build something. Ah! Stupid Lisa!

Gotta build fast. Cement drying! All right, let's see. English side ruined. Must use French instructions. Le grill! What the hell is that? Come on.

Come on, fit. You. I mean. Yeah, that's one fine looking barbecue pit. Why doesn't mine look like that? Why? Why must life be so hard? Why must I fail in every attempt at chastity? How's your father's project coming along?

I think he's almost done. Oh, all the screaming. So good. He's so good. A high-pitched dance scream is some of my favorites yeah that's classic he's such he's so funny but man that stupid lisa that makes all the cruelty even worse that he goes like he screws up instantly and says stupid lisa that that le grill thing is a persistent meme now it's there's a few good memes in this episode but uh that is one that i hear come up a lot in fact my girlfriend just bought me a toaster so i could have bagels when i visit her and uh i saw on the box it says uh le bagels

on it because i was french uh french on it and i was like what the hell is that le bagels uh that's that's i need to use that more in my life yeah well now that you're gonna be living in canada in the future you'll have a lot of chances for that i'll be told to stop saying that joke yeah well i've seen that why doesn't mine look like that meme a whole lot too yeah any anytime it's a perfect way to encapsulate a thing that fails to meet your expectations. I'm just like, this movie was great. Why doesn't my movie look like that? Or I've seen it for wrestling events too. But to explain those memes would take too long.

But for pro wrestling, boy, there's some funny memes there. I'll tell you that. I also like, you can even see Homer's watch somehow got mixed up in his grill pile there. And I also like that he just shoves, when he puts the two bricks together and shoves a pipe in the middle of it. Oh, yeah. And then the wheel through the grill. Oh, yeah, like jamming the wheel into the grate of the grill. Very, very funny.

It makes no sense. Yeah, I did like that part. I mean, I think it looks like good art. I think it's good. I think Isabella Rossellini was correct in valuing that art. It was worth something. There's some fun stuff on the commentary where the director, Stephen Dean Moore, talks about how he did consider being an artist in that style before getting into animation instead. I think that's why they execute the recreations of classic modern art in here really

well i think it's probably a lot him i did like on the commentary how he was uh he feels a bit insecure he's like i could have went to cal arts but i didn't because there are just so many cal arts people on the staff well kate you work with a ton of uh in animation you must know a lot of cal arts graduates as well oh yeah, yeah. They're all over there in the animation world. I'm like, damn, should I have gone to CalArts? I wonder what the student loan debt is like at CalArts. I think, isn't it

really expensive? I would just assume so, yeah. Or wait, is it public? No, Disney partially pays for it, so I know it's not public. I'm sure it's expensive. I mean, hey, I went to NYU. That was expensive. partially pays for it so i know it's it's not public i'm sure it's expensive i mean hey i went to nyu that was expensive it's all too much it's too much i went to state school i'll be paying that off until i'm 50 ish probably god man i feel pretty good as a college dropout on this part well

i've got two degrees and you don't and they won't go me uh do me any good ever. On Jack AM, when I hear Jack Allison talk about his lack of his college dropout and having no college debt, I'm like, man, we did the right thing. It truly is. His biggest mistake was marrying someone with a ton of college debt. He was almost free from college debt. And now I've saddled him with mine. The best thing college did for me was give me eight years of someplace to hide from the real world and actual responsibilities and obligations.

That does sound pretty nice. So yeah, I guess now I'm paying for it, but it was pretty nice to be like, no, I'm a student. I do have to say, I worked at the Simpsons because I knew Henry Gamble from NYU, whose dad is Tom Gamble.

So if I didn't have all this debt, I wouldn't have gotten three works of assistant work on The Simpsons. So, hey, it led to something. I got one job from college. That pays off then, yeah. And now I'm on this podcast. We only accept college graduates on our podcast as guests. So we had to have her uh you know her records checked too yeah i did send you my official transcript and you were you said

it was like fine you wish i had higher gpa gpa was too low but you got it notarized that we respect that so yeah one of the i prefer the job applications that said like or equivalent experience i'm like ah there we go reminds me of the paul tompkins joke about some college yeah i think of that like give me that please give me the choice of some college uh yeah so homer tries to get a refund he shows off that the receipt in boxes and pieces inside of it it's almost like a cute child walking around with his red rag wagon full of uh his art or his garbage and uh yeah again squeaky voice teen this has to be the only time he's gotten a kiss in the entire series so enjoy it while it lasts uh and yeah then homer uh tries

to drop it off in toys for tots and that's when we get like this. I have the whole clip here. This whole Wiggum bit is so funny because it's just one joke four times in a row. Hold on there, Santa Claus. That box is for toys only. Well, of course. Any kid would love to have this activity center. It teaches them while they learn. Yeah, nice try, Saint Nick. Now hit the road, Chris Kringle.

You heard me, Pear Noel. What you got there? Beanie Baby. Ooh, it's like our second Beanie Baby joke in a row Yep, yeah, it's like two episodes ago In Maximum Homer Drive We heard about Beanie Babies And now another one

That Wiggum joke feels like Writers coming up with Like, what is the one thing Wiggum would say? And then they're just like Well, he could just say all the things Like, we need one Santa Claus joke Oh, we have four? He could just do all of them

I forget which Simpsons writer talked about it But they had a writing room joke called Cranberries, where it's how everybody jumps in to add on to things with something obvious. And they're like, the joke is that you would say, okay, guys, pitch me Thanksgiving dinner. And then the most eager beaver would just jump in like, cranberries? That's what's a Thanksgiving dinner. So cranberry, I wonder if that was a cranberries type joke of like, cranberries. That's what's at Thanksgiving dinner. So cranberry. I wonder if that was a cranberries type joke of like, what's every Santa nickname you can think of? Yes.

Deceptus in 1999, we have a Beanie Babies joke. Kate, were you a Beanie Babies owner? Oh, yeah. Big time. I would write in my journal about my Beanie Babies. I have journal entries of me as a child being like, it's my, it's like Bruno's birthday today. Like. I had a rich inner life.

That's amazing. What was your most prized beanie baby? Oh God. I don't remember. Probably like the leopard one. Cause I just found a picture of myself in a Halloween costume where it looks like I'm just dressed as like a leopard, like cat as a child,

but then I'm holding up a matching leopard cat beanie baby so it's clear that i've dressed up as my beanie baby i hope you corrected every adult that said oh i'm sure i was so annoying about it i am this specific beanie baby yeah like no no no i'm not just a cat like yeah uh so So Homer drives off with his cement block. And this, again, is real sociopath Homer sequence here. What's odd is that there is basically an eight-second psycho parody where it's playing the psycho-ish music. Oh, yeah. And it's a parody of Marion or whatever her name is from that movie, driving after she steals the money.

I forgot that was a psycho reference. Just for maybe seven seconds of this episode it's very it doesn't really go anywhere and then it just fall his bumper falls off which homer says act of god not my fault which is like no no it is not i mean the the height of sociopathic homer was it crushes somebody's entire front of their car could have killed them for all he knows and he goes oh and then he tilts his thing slightly and sees deer and like oh it just drives away like nothing happened i feel like the way he addressed that situation he's like how do i make myself feel better exactly uh it's so extreme uh but homer homer just doesn't give a crap uh but he drives away and it's the next day, and he's shaving his shoulders.

I have to hear the whole shaving shoulders song here. Shaving my shoulders. I'm getting it all shaved off. Homie, someone's at the door. They want to talk to you about some sort of car accident. Take your kids out back. I'll handle this. Mr. Simpson? What sort of car accident? Take your kids out back. I'll handle this.

Mr. Simpson, I believe something of yours struck my car yesterday. Oh yeah? Prove it. That's your license plate, isn't it? It says single and sassy on it. Don't get it. I mean, that again feels like Homer advertising that he wants to cheat i think but uh but shaving my shoulder song i sing it every time i remove uh hair for my shoulder right like i'm shaving my though i don't have uh apparently homer has such hairy shoulders he has to shave them regularly i i don't do that my shoulders are hairless i have that gene yeah i've never shaved my shoulders i if I at least remove one hair,

it still is enough time to sing the Shaving My Shoulders song. But I hope Dan gets ASCAP for that or somebody does. I'm sure, yeah. It's long enough. And I think you talk about that psycho parody just being kind of slipped in there. I also think it's a godfather parody that homer takes the shotgun from out behind a toilet tank yeah especially because they change the toilet to

make it one of those old-timey toilets where the tank is way above the actual bowl yeah yeah i mean now al jean and his heirs they love they love a godfather parody to the point where they'll get james conn on an episode to be shot to death like he was in Godfather. It's funnier, too, that he leaves it in crib as well. Yeah, yeah, that's good. And she immediately starts reaching for it. I thought they'd do more with that, but they kind of just dropped that.

But yes, we have our guest here, Isabella Rossellini, the glamorous actress. She's great, still with us, us 67 i guess she's most famous for blue velvet i would say so yeah at least in america an incredible role in a very hard to watch movie but uh an enjoyable movie i never watched it more than once but uh i did like her in death becomes her though too that's oh that's right she plays like the immortality uh mogul yeah it's like it's her and her like most beautiful and youthful so yeah she's she's perfect to play this like ageless goddess kind of thing in that movie

at uh that death becomes there's such a funny movie i haven't seen that in forever though i haven't seen it in a while either i've never seen it i need to see it oh good time it's on my list it's a special effects tour de force from uh like it was like what he did after roger rabbit right oh it is basically yeah so it is a zemeckis uh show off special effects movie but it also it like it lets actresses be old in a movie though like i feel like meryl streep was like 35 in that movie playing an old woman yeah but yeah it's still i mean just a goldie hawn versus meryl Streep movie. That's a fun movie. Yeah, that sounds so good.

Bruce will play like a schmuck. Yeah, he's the dork in the movie. He's basically a William H. Macy character in the movie. Really? Interesting. So Homer gives it up. He admits that he gets sued a lot, and apparently his average is $68,000. So how do they have any money? Do they just have a constant lien on their house

from all these lawsuits? So many mortgages. No, it's the 90s. Everyone had more money. You just rack up debt really easily then. Yeah. Homer learns about outsider art. My name is Astrid Weller. I own an art gallery

and I'd love to display your piece. You mean this hunk of junk? This isn't art. It's just a barbecue that pushed me over the edge. Didn't you? Didn't you? You stupid dog! Art isn't just pretty pictures. It's an expression of raw human emotion.

In your case, rage. Oh, I got that lady. Is everything okay? I got worried when I didn't hear any shots. This lady says I'm an artist. You? An artist? Your husband's work is what we call outsider art. It could be by a mental patient or a hillbilly or a chimpanzee. In high school, I was voted most likely to be a mental patient, hillbilly, or chimpanzee. In high school, I was voted most likely to be a mental patient hillbilly or chimpanzee. Well, you should be very excited because outsider art couldn't be hotter. So you'd better catch the fever.

Catch it. It's very fun to hear Isabella Rosalina say hillbilly. Oh, yeah, that was funny. She's like fighting that word a little bit. So her concept of outsider artist, as she explains, it does sound kind of classist to me. It does. I mean, I don't think she's supposed to be that sympathetic in this portrayal. They're making fun of people like that.

I feel like you're supposed to like her at least. Like she's too nice to Homer. But yeah, everybody else is a piece of shit in the art world. They show later. But yeah, the way she explains it of just like these elites saying, oh, can you believe these nobodies accidentally made a piece of art? They're too stupid to even know it's good art. I don't think that's how they normally present outsider art. I think that's kind of a masked off definition of it.

They just draw her to look like Isababella as well yeah yeah that's kind of what they were doing at the time even if you weren't playing yourself they wanted you to look like yourself i also like that homer like with a closed fist is threatening bart like he's got a punch part like we are in we're approaching the homer shaking his fist jokes uh era of the show shake harder homer uh so. Homer becomes a professional artist. He shows off his piece. Oh yes, actually, we have another guest star in this upcoming clip.

Jasper Johns, he's 89. So, still with us. I have to play the official anti-death jingle to protect Jasper Johns. Jasper Johns! I ain't dead yet! This episode will go live in like two weeks after we record it right yes hang in there jasper come on jasper just two more weeks come on make it to 2020 at least for us

please uh but like jasper johns i i only know the only piece of his art i know is because it was on my like middle school history book or high school history book he did a piece that was like uh the american flag and then like other american flags concentric out from it like it's oh yeah i feel like that was on my one of my history books too we were all getting it from the same place i think someone approached aljean and was like oh that was so funny and clever how you know jasper johns makes art from found objects and he's stealing everything in the episode. It's very clever. He was like, oh yeah, I knew that. I knew he made art from found objects. He wasn't even thinking about what Jasper

Johns did. It'd be funny if he was just a petty thief, stealing food and light bulbs and things like that. Well, I think we've all been at fancy parties and tried to take as much food as possible. You never know when you'll be invited again. Hey, I did that every time I was at the Simpsons. Take as much food as possible you never know when you'll be invited again hey i did that uh when every time i was at the simpsons take as much food as possible i loved hearing mike mitchell

stories of just being able to feed the rest of the birthday boys off oh yeah that's how i fed jack in the beginning of our relationship i would just like get two dinners two lunches bring one to jack oh dan grainy barely touched the sandwich there is so much uneaten food at the simpsons it'd be sad if it went to waste i don't think dan grainy eats sandwiches though just for the just for the record he's kind of you know he's a healthy diet he's like you know a lean fish and and some vegetables type of guy man that's uh that's uh i i always wanted to just order the if i was in a writer's room i just ordered the biggest sandwich every day it'd be uh jersey mike's if you fall asleep after the first act like jersey mike's every once in a while not regularly oh i mean you can't eat jersey mics every day that's uh you get a heart attack uh but yeah the yeah i mean you also actually did uh you just went to a fancy

premiere of that apple tv show c didn't you yes i did or did you see anybody doing the jasper johns thing of pocketing a bunch of free food no there wasn't like tables of stuff out. Everyone just had like a gift bag at their seat. But I was very tempted to take the gift bag that was under the seat next to me because it was like a no-show. Oh, you should have. I should have just done it. They had like good stuff. It was like really good popcorn, really good like truffle chocolates. I assume there'd just be a big punch bowl full of iPhone 11s.

Just take one. Sadly, no iPhones. But they do have iPhones in every scene of the morning show. It's like they're really trying to have the characters always be on their phones so that they can always be iPhones. Jack and I were joking that we were hoping the villain would have an Android. And that's how you could tell who the bad guys were. It makes more sense than every other movie where it's like oh Sony sponsored this

or they're using the Sony phone with Sony laptops just like things you never actually see people using well that's their mistake in that series C that it's post apocalyptic so they can't use iPhones I know that's my first note more iPhones

does it have to be post apocalyptic and so yeah we get to see this might be a page one rewrite uh i i also a positive in this episode i it feels like a gene thing to remember you know back from season one marge being a great artist like they i feel like they barely they did touch on it in that tax episode Very sad one Very sad joke You had a lot of talent, kid I mean, Marge

You know, if you delve too deep into it It's just very, very sad Of this very talented woman Who just suffocated all her dreams Yeah, buried her gifts To be married to like One of the worst men who's ever lived if you talk too much about it it gets real sad homer's not anymore blocked that out of my memory

that she was an artist like probably to protect myself and uh we also get to see the yoko ono style character in the background here bob you'd said something to me before about this oh yeah so it's like uh in season uh four they had their first uh japanese woman character who is unnamed a yoko on a parody here we have our second uh japanese woman on the show ever in a decade and she's in the same room as the yoko on a parody uh kyoto who we meet later so uh if you are a japanese woman like my girlfriend there are very few cosplay opportunities on The Simpsons. And now you have two. And they almost have no dialogue either. No, no.

I mean, they don't give her a joke. I don't understand. I mean, you know, the only jokes are for the guys next to her, I guess. But they have to go through their collection of characters to find artistic-looking or bohemian-looking characters. And one character I noticed that they pulled was the I guess the Chinese pirate that captured Otto

the guy with the headband is one of the pirates who captured Otto in Das Bus and put him into slavery I forgot that's where that guy came from I mean look it's hard to design a bunch of new characters you gotta take them where you can.

Damn, I didn't realize that's where they got that guy from. But yes, Homer sells his piece of art and becomes a professional. I don't know. I studied art for years, but I just don't get this. Sounds like somebody's jealous. No, I'm not. I just can't believe some people are paying hundreds of dollars for something a hillbilly pulled out of the trash.

Hey, I done studied for years on how to get over that junkyard fence. Then I learnt the gate was open. Smithers, I think I'm in love... with this sculpture. Sir, that's by Homer Simpson. I don't think you want to buy it. Smithies, years ago, I blew the chance to buy Picasso's Guineca for a song. Luckily, that song was White Christmas, and by hanging on to it, I made billions.

Anyway, I love this hideous thing. Young lady, I'll take it. Congratulations, Homer. You're now a professional artist. Woo-hoo! Look, Marge, my first sale. In your face, Jasper Johns. Huh?

He's stealing the light bulbs, even. Yeah. What I do like with The Return of Al Jean is I think Mike Scully, by his own admission, was trying to de-Harvardify the show. And that meant of all the a lot of the old-timey stuff with like burns especially like he kind of didn't do a lot with burns but now that al jean is coming back like burns does uh start you know increasing his appearances i like hearing him tell the story that he almost bought guernica that he was that old and could have White Christmas or Guernica at the same time. Which I also, thanks to Al Jean, that's how I know what Guernica looks like.

Take that, Guernica. On a critic joke, it was about destroying Guernica. The classic painting. But yeah, Homer. This is the first act, by the way. This first act is 10 minutes. I mean, I like that they do in the first act even lay in that Marge is jealous. That she's envious of all this success that Homer's getting.

Bart just is eating a wheel of cheese there. I guess he grabbed a whole wheel off of the thing. Yeah, that's relatable. So we come back. Homer has decided he's going to be a full-time artist. So this is also a Homer gets a job episode. And I like Homer's description of the things he's going to destroy for his art. And then we get a very unlikable Homer moment at the end of this clip, I'm going to say.

I'm going to be an outsider artist. That way I can turn all these old baseball cards, Disney memorabilia, and antiques into something valuable. Homie, I'm really happy you sold your sculpture, but don't you think it may have been a fluke? Hey, I've always had an interest in art, dating back to my schoolgirl days when I painted portrait after portrait of Ringo Starr. That's my life you're describing. I think I remember my own life, Marge.

Astrid said the key to my art is anger. But you know me, I'm Mr. Mellow. So I'm giving you kids permission to get me mad. Come on, give me what you got. Well, if it'll help, uh, Mom found out her engagement ring is made of rock candy. Good work, honey. Keep it coming.

Well, I'm flunkin' math, and the other day I was a little attracted to Milhouse. The first of two gay jokes in the episode. It's more gay rage than gay panic. Yeah, gay problematic. And the director, Stephen Dean Moore, was channeling the Roger Corman movie, Bucket of Blood, which I have seen. It's a good B movie. It's like a satire of the Bohemian scene at the time, where this guy, this kind of idiot, becomes a great artist by killing people and killing animals and covering them with plaster. So it's really good.

It has a good name, too, Bucket of Blood. That's a good... I like that. Also, I had to go to the subtitles i was like i always heard i never knew what bart said when he says i'm flunking a math like it's kind of he goes by itself fast it almost sounds like i'm a plunking mad or i it almost sounds like fucking i'm fucking mad i'm fucking mad uh and uh but the final line is what really stands out yeah i mean i i appreciate that bart is secure enough in his you know self to

admit like yeah i found myself attracted to millhouse he can admit it though i feel like he's lying i don't think he actually was attracted to yes but not making homer very sympathetic no i mean i guess the joke isn't like it's disgusting that Bart could be gay, but that the joke is that Homer as a father would hate to play his son to be gay. Though that also sucks. I think it's like Bart being like, I know it's as bad as doing bad in school. It's like a bad thing. He knows it's to set off homer for sure so

i get that but uh yeah it's that was a line that gave me pause this morning i was like oh but uh but i do i do like homer brings up brush with greatness the season two episode like right to the ringo star painting specific i like that know, normally I think they'd be afraid of getting that specific with an episode because they'd worry like, will people remember that episode with Ringo Starr in it? I guess it was one of their biggest guest stars before, you know, Paul McCartney and the rest of the Beatles. Yeah, poor Ringo got outdone by Paul. And George Harrison. Yeah.

Also, Homer's listing of old baseball cards, Disney memorabilia, and antiques. That feels like an eBay reference to me. This was when, in 99, eBay was getting big. Everyone was cleaning out their closets and being like, I'm a millionaire now. My mom thought she was going to be very rich with all of our saved McDonald's

Disney toys. We had the full collection of Bambi toys from Disney Happy Meals, and she thought this is going to be worth so much money. They are not. It turns out 80 million kids also had those. We just got to wait for all the other kids to lose theirs,

and then it'll be rare again. I do like that Homer describes it as my schoolgirl days, too. He remembers them as when he was a schoolgirl. Schoolgirl, yeah. There's the deleted scene I'm glad they cut of just another thing Lisa uses to get Homer mad is to make jokes about Oscar hosts

like Letterman as an Oscar host. And I'm like, that's really... That was dated in 99, so I'm really glad they cut that. It feels like Al Jean blew the dust off a critic joke. I would suspect that. We couldn't do our Oprah-Uma, Uma-Oprah joke. It was a good joke.

Yeah. I mean, in 99, who remembered Uma-Oprah? By the way, that was a one of... David Letterman was not a good host of the Oscars, apparently. I think I did watch the Oscars. It didn't stand out to me as particularly bad. But his kind of cranky weirdness does not mix with the Oscars. Yeah, no, I remember liking it, but I also, as a kid,

I do think the schmaltz of a Billy Crystal song parody fits more with the glitz of the Oscars. But yes, Homer then, he makes some friends in the art scene who they get to meet Moe, and yes, this is where the other Japanese woman in the show who has no lines, uh, but identified as Kyoto, they all get to meet Moe.

Oh, this is Astrid, my dealer. And these are my fans, Gunter Kyoto and Cecil Hampstead on Cecil Cecil. So, uh, you guys are Euro trash,

huh? How's that, uh, working out for you? To be honest, we are adrift in a sea of decadent luxury and meaningless sex. Uh-huh. So where might the sea be located? I must get back to my hotel and practice my affectations for tomorrow. Bonsoir.

What do we owe you, Moe? Nothing, nothing. Just give me a priceless sketch with a certificate of authenticity. All right. Hey, Moe, can I pay with a drawing? Yeah, nice try there, 12-step. Ah! Uh, Homer, you're making us a little bit uncomfortable. Relax, big guy.

He's just doing this for his art. Right, Homer? Oh, yeah. Art. He looks to both sides. Yeah. So Barney doing a forgery. He could be an art forger, you know?

To do that on a napkin, that's pretty impressive. But it's the famous Ferris Bueller painting we all know. And I have to wonder, at this point in history, it was okay, but with a current TV show, can you make a joke where it's like, oh, we're referencing that famous painting? I think outside of the Mona Lisa, you can't expect an audience to understand what you're doing or recognize the painting.

Yeah. I think memes are referenced more now than actual fine art. Like, oh, we're doing the thing just like the meme that's online now. And that's good. Yeah. I'm pro memes taking over. I mean, we've talked about it plenty on this show, but the Simpsons referenced their own, you know, Homer backing into the hedge meme on the show.

So even they've moved past referencing fine art to reference memes about themselves. I feel like their reference base is still like, there's some high art references still going on every once in a while over there yeah but intellectual stuff i feel like they can't count on people to know it as well as before yeah like i don't know if they had like a lichtenstein thing i think people would just think it's a comic book page or whatever which is what he did like, you guys should look up what happened to the poor artist to Lichtenstein ripped off to make those pictures. He copied that art poorly also. Yes.

Yeah. But I didn't know that was the European way of smoking cigarettes until I listened to the commentary. Cause like, all I don't smoke, never smoked. And my friends who did smoke all did it in the american between middle and four finger way you gotta smoke like uh dan akroyd and ghostbusters where just the uh the cigarette

just stuck to your bottom lip with saliva you just walk around with it dangling and on fire smoke going right up your nose it's great i also feel like that cecil guy is designed to look like hitler without a mustache i think i think that intentional. He actually looks just like George Plimpton, who Al Jean would eventually have on the show in like two or three years. No, George Plimpton is the... No, you're thinking of Bill Plimpton. Oh, sorry. George Plimpton is the...

In television. Oh, yes. Intelligent television. Yes, Bill, he's known for only in television commercials. Yes, that's all he's ever done. But he would be on The Simpsons in I think season 13 or 14. Okay. Yeah.er's drawing of

letty and carl knew that it adds more dimension to his anger at bart's same-sex attraction is he mad that because he keeps his true wraps like why why is he peeping on them in the shower i didn't think about that joke in uh relation to the angry at bart possibly being gay joke i thought there's two not connected bad gay jokes yeah no i mean it's just an easy sellout joke of homer being like a peeping tom on his friends for no reason it's a classic like the joke is he's gay yes yeah and it's so funny that a man would want to see another man you believe a man Wow. We went from what if Bart was gay to what if Homer was gay. The height of comedy.

Truly, truly the height of comedy. Hey, 1999, different time. I think in the commentary, they even joke about like, we sell out every character as gay if you give us enough time. Homer is getting very happy, but Marge is seeing her dreams come true

through Homer. Why won't you be art? Here he is. This is where the magic happens. Wonderful news, Homer. Is it about pies? No. We're going to hold a show devoted entirely

to you. Wow. It's like Marge's dream come true for me. Isn't that great like Marge's dream come true for me. Isn't that great, Marge? For me. Homer really should have read the room there on that grumble, I would think. But that also makes you wonder, like, how stupid is Homer when he says, for me?

It's just like, you know this is making her jealous. Come on. But I feel bad for Marge. I don't know. Is Marge an unlikable person because she can't be happy for her spouse yeah i think so like i see like i feel like like you can do art and your husband can do i don't know i i feel like she's or i know we're supposed to be like homer's a dick. And we feel bad for Marge.

But I feel like, you know what? Let Homer have his moment. And you can do... It's just not going to stop you from doing your own thing. And she can profit from this. They're part of the same household, right? Yeah. Yeah.

I feel like... Yeah. I don't love it. I don't love it. I want more from Marge than to be just bitter and jealous. This could have been her in into the art world of like, oh, well, if he's selling in the art world, maybe me too. Yeah.

Well, it's also like one thing they don't say is that like, well, why should you be jealous? You stopped painting. You never paint anymore, Marge. So it's not like him getting the success is preventing you from selling the art you don't make anymore. Yes, but she is saddled with all the housework and childcare. That is true.

You know, I guess it is. It's just a bummer all around. It's just like not self-actualized enough to be an artist. And she's like a victim of like gender oppression. Yeah, boy. Depressing episodes depressing episodes yeah it's like kind of a bummer to marge always i don't know you know what she has her own you know high points in her in her career explorations this is not one of them this episode is not one of them homer then is even reading about himself in art in amer, which is a real magazine that's still published to this day.

Yeah, it started in 1913, so it's real. I feel like they did that to get a reference in the magazine, but I don't know if they actually did. Now it's owned by the same giant mega media conglomerate that owns like Condé Nast and Rolling Stone and all these things. Oh, I thought Condé Nast was the media conglomerate. No, they were. They went above them. They bought them. Everything's owned by like two things now.

It's actually probably also owned by Disney. We just don't know. They're a subsidiary of Zineco. Well, I did read this company is owned by a hedge fund as well or partially pushed up by a hedge fund. So, I mean, I'm sure soon enough there'll be a bunch more mass layoffs at Art in America. Love it. Always fun. pushed up by hedge funds so i mean i'm sure soon enough there'll be a bunch more mass layoffs that art in america always fun then there's a very random joke where homer says like you're not

jealous me and barney went to machu picchu it just feels like a fun like a comedy word a fun word to say yeah kookamonga uh and then there's like after this there's a classic aljean and uh mike reese is no longer around but in in their era, they really like to, you know, have the in bed conversation. I think number one, it, you know,

grounds the story a bit. It lets the characters reflect on what's happened. But I think number two, especially in their seasons, it let them reuse a lot of footage in case they

wanted to say, well, the story's getting lost. Let's just cut in some in bed footage because during those seasons, we definitely noticed like, oh, they just

reuse this bed scene from another episode just to sort of refresh the audience's memory as to what the stakes are. Yeah, this is the least original that I'm using at all. Now it would be so, in season 10,

if you saw a shot from season three, you'd be like, whoa, what is this episode? I think he was much more confident coming back to the show than he was as a showrunner, for sure. I like too that homer

at least will recognize later that he's being selfish but uh i i like how march says like uh well you know if you're happy then i guess nothing else matters he's like now you understand like that that sums up homer pretty well i think uh also though that homer would be turned on if she entered a belching contest i like that as well uh but so Homer Homer has this big premiere uh there's a line that gets cut there if you wonder why it seems weird where Isabella Rossellini's character says he's a one of the most dangerous artists and then it just cuts to that feels like it's set up for a joke and there's no joke the joke was she says this line you snorted my father's ashes or he snorted my father's ashes yeah i did hear the line and i think aljean was like uh with her accent it was just it didn't

read very well because he was like she kept saying she snorted my father's ashes like that like uh the intonations were off so you couldn't really tell what she was saying yeah so they just they just cut it which probably i think too it sounded like asses like well then it just confuses things in the moment i it just it's a weird like did homer think it was cocaine or something is that what's happening here cocaine with these fancy celebs a hundred percent a hundred percent yeah i guess you're right it's the art i feel like i don't know that much about the art world even though i am i do uh do art but uh i imagine it's pretty kooky i think just with any field once you hit a certain level

of success that's when the cocaine comes in like even with podcasting there's got to be like i feel like podcasting like out of all of those is probably like i guess it could i guess it's i guess everything's kooky when you get up there I mean once you have Enough money You just You gotta spend Something with it Now that I think about it

Cocaine would be a good Podcasting drug Just never shut up And You're just like Oh my god Like we're talking Like we're just talking

Like we are so smart And we're talking That's why it's like Pot is more the fuel Of most podcasts Though Me and Bob are sober All the way

I'm drinking some nice black coffee right now. It's also like 10 or 11 a.m. It was something I learned about Hollywood. Why are all these people just weird or off-balance? They're mostly

doing cocaine. That's why. That's the real reason. Yeah. Homer even puts on nicer shoes did you notice that he's not got his usual cloven hooves he has like white tips on him or something i don't know shoes but they're nice shoes it's funny that at the same uh opening that homer is at barney is there and his yoko ono ex-girlfriend is there at the same time that's awkward pretty awkward this episode has a number of jokes that are reused starting with a deadly bird house that kills a bird yeah it's uh it's a cutaway joke in uh saturdays of thunder the season three episode

where homer's talking about all the things that he built and one of them is like in that bird house and it just they smashed bird house And Bob is a bird owner. I'm sure you didn't appreciate the bird. They make sure you know the bird dies. Yeah, we need an everybody hates birds jingle because of all the bird violence we encounter in these cartoons. All right, I'm going to make it. And people here right now. Everybody hates birds, right?

But, yes, uh, yes. Homer's debut doesn't go so well. Finally, my thing de resistance, attempted birdhouse won. Shall we start the bidding at, say, $10,000?

Alright. How about a million? I'll give you two bucks for the bird, if it's still alive. What's going on here? You weirdos love this stuff. Homer, I'm afraid they only love what's new and shocking. These pieces are just like your earlier work. You've gone from hip to boing. Why don't you call us when you get to kitsch? Come on, Gun-Tuck Kyoto.

If we hurry, we can still catch the heroin craze. Wait, come back! I'm a gun to you! Worship me! Or fear my wrath! Or please fear my wrath! Please! Call me

It's interesting that I think an issue with the Algy and the Micra's episodes when they came back Was that the episode ended in the second act And the third act was just sort of meandering I don't think this is as extreme But I feel like Homer's story is done here Like Homer, he faces comeuppance for being too

Getting too big of a head And sort of rubbing his success in Marge's face So i feel like the story does feel like it's over now yeah you know most homer gets a new job episodes he loses the job at the end of the episode but but here he loses it in act two it feels like they i mean it makes room for the more romantic stuff that comes in the second act and a lot more like art jokes but yet i think it loses something by getting rid of the art scene so quickly they introduce them and then they're gone immediately but i i like the clever it's almost too clever but i love that line of like why don't you call us when you get to kitsch like that's a that's a good art burn i did like

his stifled laugh was good he can. He's too serious to just completely laugh. He's got to just cram it down. They're not on coke now. They're on to heroin, these guys. That sounds dangerous. That sounds like a real health risk for those guys. It'll cut down on your productivity, if anything. That must be why we don't see them again.

I bet they all just overdo it. They all died uh so yes homer is defeated when it comes back from break he's crying on the ground and wondering why don't people like his stuff anymore i do wonder if al jean is channeling a little bit of his anger towards critical uh appraisal of teen angel perhaps i don't know if he really believed in teen angel that much. No, that's true. It sounded like a thing to finish out your three-year deal at Disney. He's like, here's a softball we can throw at TGIF.

Yeah, Teen Angel? How about that? That's a thing. That's also where another callback happens, where Homer references Ray J. Johnson. Oh, that's right. Which, that was a joke in season four, and Krusty gets canceled.

You can call me Ray. You can call me Jay. Got old after about five minutes. That's six seconds. Six seconds. Wow, I gave him too much time. So yeah, this sucks, but the guy who was Ray J. Johnson

or did that bit, Bill Saluga, from my hometown of Youngstown, Ohio. And I recommend if you want the full history of Bill Saluga, you go out and you find the episode of the Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal podcast that he guested on. You can hear all about him growing up in the Youngstown theater scene in like the 50s or 60s or something like that.

But he has an interesting career, and he lives off of the Ray J. Johnson money. Still? Still, yes. If you were that famous in like 1973 or whenever it happened you have are you made for life there were like there are three channels and you were on one of them once wow yeah oh you know it also i forgot to mention on the date thing it's funny homer mentions the brush with greatness plot because i i double checked this this episode aired April 11th, 1999. Brush With Greatness aired in 1991 on April 11th as well.

Wow. It was the eight-year anniversary of that episode. Oh, eight years. Wow. Wow, geez. I don't know if that timing was intentional, but it's pretty impressive. That is cool. I like that.

Nice coincidence. Which, now to think about eight years separate those two episodes then, even that just makes me feel old. I had gone through, when I saw that in 99, I was remembering an episode I saw when I was nine. No, eight. I was eight when I saw it. But yes, so Homer needs to find new inspiration.

Marge takes him to the museum, the same museum from Lost Our Lisa that they broke into. Oh, yeah. To see the orb of Isis. Were the openings happening at that same museum from lost our lisa that they broke into oh yeah to see the orb of isis were the openings happening at that same museum too earlier it feels like they go back to the museum like three times in this episode yeah uh no this museum this was the big museum they went to where the elite meet magrete yeah the other one was like american louve it was more of like a small installation where homer was selling stuff. But yes,

they head to the museum and where they meet a familiar face. It's so exciting to do something cultural together. Matt Groening? What's he doing

in a museum? He can barely draw. Ow! Oh no! I'm being erased! Move it, bub! We got an installation to installate.

Mmm, a class oldenburg. He's a European who defied convention and embraced American popular culture. He must be a hundred feet tall. Now this is a Joseph Turner. In an era when everyone else painted portraits, he broke away by painting the Venetian canals. It's glorious. The streets are paved with water.

You could write a walrus to work. And Picasso started out painting realistically, then moved on to cubism. By the end of his life, he was just painting crank letters to the editor. They call it his angry jerk period. Eh. Ah! Split pea. Frank letters to the editor. They call it his angry jerk period. Split pea.

With ham! I did like that joke. I like that one. Getting excited, I was like, of course it will have ham in it. I think they don't make it without ham. They reflect in the commentary of how, like, wow, Springfield's got a pretty amazing art museum. That's true. And the first time I think the name Matt Groening has been said, Matt Groening will eventually be on the show in like five or six years.

It was pretty surreal to hear Homer say Matt Groening. Yeah. Which life in hell has been displayed in at least one museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art. Nice. In LA in 2005. This is where it definitely deserves there. It deserves to be there.

Yeah. And also this episode uh what i don't like about it like thematically is that it drifts away from modern art to be like well here's a bunch of references you probably know where it's like it's like when we see the joseph turner painting that's like the 18th century so just like we're no longer in modern art anymore and then we see things like michelangelo, you know, Dali and things like that. I mean, I think they're just kind of drifting around like, okay, here are some things you might have recognized. I think the audience would not know modern art as much as they would know, like, classical art pieces.

Yeah, yeah. Although I think Dali is modern art. Yeah. Yeah. Like, modern is like 20, it's like 1914 is modern art. Yeah, that's true. Basically. Picasso would be in there, too.

Yeah. 1914 is modern art yeah that's true basically picasso would be in there too yeah i did like uh well that picasso joke it wasn't my favorite but it did remind me of one of my favorite picasso jokes in that tv fun house with the picasso the life of picasso cartoon where he says like i'm gonna break you down to cube yeah that's right i did like that uh but i i do like seeing marge kind of come alive discussing arts like it does feel like she's excited to share an interest she never gets to talk about and actually knows a whole lot about it is for the benefit of homer who's like i'm going to go to sleep now marge that's yeah you we were saying this to each other before but it's it's not the most um clever way to go into

a dream sequence of like i I'm going to lay down. They should have just hung a lantern on and be like, it's time for a dream sequence, Marge. He just shuts his eyes. But I do like Homer's reductive way of saying, I can never think of something as brilliant as a soup or a pencil. I do like that. That's a good line, yeah. Those kind of modernist things like that, that is something that really, I think, you hear about how people turned on art and the common folk turned on art because they'd see things like, you know, paintings of soup cans that are just like recreations of it. Yeah.

And they're like, how is that art? How's that worth a bunch of money? Or like the common refrain of my kid could do that, where if you go to an art gallery and you see like just like oh just the painting of a square or whatever and people are just confused as to why that's art because art is a troll that's somebody got away with it that's that that's what that's why it's there yes and then when and it's it's easy to feel rejected by modern art when if you feel like well this doesn't look like a real painting then you feel like, well, this doesn't look like a real painting, then you feel like you're judged for wanting a painting to just be pretty. Like, oh, stupid. Oh, you like representational art.

Dumb, dumb. What a child. Yeah. Out of Warhol's dozens and dozens of soup cans, they felt Split Pea was the funniest. I mean, with ham, that's a funny addition from Homer. And you know that was a conversation. That was like a 20-minute conversation about what kind of soup would be the funniest i'd say cream of mushroom my second choice yeah cream is you got the sea where you got to see where cream is funny cream is funny a lot it's

also dirty so you have that but i guess homer would be more into ham he would be true yeah so homer has a dream sequence where he meets a bunch more famous art pieces i do i mean steven dean moore and his team like they did such a great job animating motion for famous art pieces that look both like they exist in the simpsons world but also recognizably like their uh originals dolly's dripping clock or uh i though I do think if you're going to do the Vituvian Man, just draw his penis. Come on. I feel like Fox told

them they couldn't draw a penis, but it's like everyone's seen it. In season two, they got away with drawing David's penis, but they can't draw this one. I like that they're all just trying to murder him in this dream. It's not even like Andy Warholhol's painting is andy warhol throwing soup cans and trying to bludgeon him to death with a giant one yeah so he's just a murderer i do like homer's

andy no amy he at least knows who andy warhol is the that's that's surprising for homer there uh but yeah as homer wakes up he then is still no inspiration. He is back in the exact same spot, which almost makes the museum thing seem unnecessary, almost. Other than the inspiration Homer gets for the canals, he just ends up back where he was for the next scene. And then Lisa explains Christo to Homer, which I also didn't know about. I knew about his stunts, his various stunts. He's like a supervill villain of the art world so yeah i was very sad to find out that joke wasn't a joke and he did those umbrellas did kill someone oh shit i didn't know that was a joke i've seen this episode plenty of times and i assume like well cristo is real and the thing he did was real but i think the lisa thing is just a joke

because like that's ridiculous but no on october 26 1991 one of the umbrellas in california was toppled by high winds killing one woman and injuring several others the exhibit was ordered closed immediately and then a second death occurred during the removal of the umbrella somebody was struck by lightning while removing the giant metal rod out of the earth so cristo must be brought to justice that's that's cursed because it's a cristo cursed that's uh no that's that's very sad yeah this poor uh the the one i'd write about the one crushed by the thing her name her name was laurie kevel matthews just so the world could know her name like one of my greatest fears in life is to be killed in a very stupid way because that's what

you're known for and it's like oh yeah bob mackie killed by a giant umbrella what a sucker can you imagine yeah i hope she at least got her family got some money she was only 33 also that's so young oh uh but uh it's small price to pay for art on the roads of bakersfield killer umbrellas yes so that honestly makes the joke seem less tasteful because it's about real dead people. Not even, they haven't even been dead 10 years. Yeah. A decade. They could have been alive to watch Homer, sorry, Brush with Greatness.

They could have. Yeah. But, yes, R.I.P. the victims of Christo. So then it turns into a Homer zany scheme, like a real extreme zany scheme after Oh wait, actually, let's hear about the killer umbrellas. No, Christo is a conceptual artist who does huge outdoor projects. He once wrapped the Reichstag in plastic. Not the Reichstag!

Oh, yes, and he also set up hundreds of yellow umbrellas along the California highway. Why'd he do that? To make the world a more magical place, I guess. Although they did blow over and kill some people. Killer umbrellas? Of course. Exquisite. No, Dad, no. My point is you have to do something big and daring.

Big? Daring? Lisa, that's it! I've got an idea for a wonderful art project that'll make everyone love me again. So Homer's plan, I would think, killed dozens of people. Lots of people on the first floors of buildings. What Homer ultimately does is far more killer than cristo's plan so i think he actually does have a murderous line here i i like also it's it's a weird transition to collecting a bunch of doormats that that's going to plug every great i mean this is an insane scheme. This is Bugs Bunny sawing off Florida.

We're really on a ride here of suspending. I say it's up there with moving the town 20 miles down the road, where it's just like there's a lot of credibility that needs to be extended here to this plot, where it's like, well, of course, the ground should absorb the water and things like that. It's like, what's happening? Just because you plug the sewers, it's very strange. And also, water shouldn't be blue anyway it would be filled well i mean now we know what a flooded town looks like it's not so fun no um after after say 2005 uh certainly not fun to see uh so yeah i mean this is just like this is zany pure zaniness here and mixed in with some bard abuse the park gets like torn apart by bears

and tigers and homer doesn't seem to care at all though he cares enough to not to put snorkels on the animals to try to not let them drown i would think those goats still drown yeah yeah they're just gonna chew right through that scuba gear snorkel or no so homer killed lots of animals too in this plan let's remember that uh but yes homer floods the entire city also wastes like i mean billions in water like he is going to jail uh but that's that's another callback line well not callback but like familiar line yeah that's for the court to decide that's um from lisa's pony where uh he's talking about you're gonna keep the pony in the garage he'll sleep nestled between the cars and marge is like that's illegal and homer says that's for the

courts to decide so it's a fun line and it might be intentional but he is calling back to an episode that he wrote yeah this is pony so i i mean it could just be like i wanted that to be homer's catchphrase and that would fit for many reasons in homer's life that's for the courts to decide it's a good catchphrase. The whole town gets flooded. We get some very silly jokes about, say, oatmeal filling up. That did make me hungry for oatmeal. The burn ward joke.

I mean, what's going on in Springfield that there's so many burned people they need a whole building full of them? That's a giant ward. Maybe they are getting all burned at the power plant. I could see that. That's true. And so, yes, the entire town is flooded a giant ward. Maybe they are getting all burned at the power plant. I could see that. And so, yes, the entire town is flooded, and everyone

loves it. Behold my latest work! Homer, what have you done? It's conceptual art. The Grand Canals of Springfield. Just like Venice, without the Black Plague. What do you think? I think some people are going to be upset.

I love it, Homer. You've turned this town into a work of art. I just wish Jasper Johns hadn't stolen my boat. So long, suckers. Well, they're in the business. Real people might not be so understanding. What the flood? Maud, it's a miracle.

The Lord has drowned the wicked and spared the righteous. What the flood? Maude, it's a miracle. The Lord has drowned the wicked and spared the righteous. Isn't that Homer Simpson? Looks like heaven's easier to get into than Arizona State. Maude will find out soon. Oh, I hate these flood pants. Hey, they're working. My feet are soaked soaked but my cups are bone dry everything's coming up millhouse another classic line classic moment yeah so why don't we give that line of the episode actually

that's the joke this episode has a surprising amount of memes lines and very, very, you know, remembered lines, too. Kind of an iconic episode. Milos had no idea he was wearing stylish capri pants before they were fashionable. Well, I guess they're flood pants on boys. They're high water pants, they're flood pants, they're capris. It's whatever, whatever, like high, high legged pants you want to wear. I remember this line independent independent of the episode, like, same with, why doesn't mine look like that?

I just, in my mind, I never put those memes in the episode Mom and Pop Art. Yeah, I never think of why there's a flood in his house. I just remember the flood. Well, also, like, if you guys don't make your own GIF of it and you use the GIF that somebody uploaded that's on the Twitter autofill gif thing, it's the one that has Patrick Starr behind him for no reason. That's weird. I don't know if you stole it instead of just made your own gif from Freaky.

I think that was the gif maker putting their own stamp. You're going to steal this gif that I made. I'm going to put something in the background. It'll reveal it the i believe it was dan graney in our interview that said he he had pitched this joke that he also was like he couldn't he was i believe he said he was surprised that everything's coming up millhouse just became this like catchphrase because all he did was take everything's coming up roses yeah and replace it with millhouse but you never know what's gonna stick you know maybe they thought what the flood was

gonna be the big catchphrase all over the t-shirts i was gonna say speaking of dan graney i was surprised that this was an al script because it feels like dan graney would write he like loves art he's like very like versed in the art world really okay yeah i thought i thought this was a great episode but i was wrong it's harvard boys maybe he added in a lot of the references there he is like a great art like reference base i feel like i wonder yeah grainy knows a lot about art i wonder if that's where simpsons millions are going into is an art collection i think i don't know but i have a feeling he is a good art collection i I talked to him a lot about art.

We'll have to ask him if we interview him again. So something that I just remembered is that, I don't think it was referenced on this commentary, but I believe on another commentary, Al Jean said, for his return to The Simpsons, he was writing this script in lines at Disneyland, taking his kids there. So that's just where this script was written. So not a lot of Disney stuff worked its way in. It's pretty useful, at least, that while you're waiting in line, you gotta

do something while taking care of kids. There was no Twitter in 1998 to scroll through while you're waiting in line at Disney. Yeah, how was he writing it? He didn't have a smartphone. Probably just like a legal pad or something. That's so funny, the picture. Can't take that on Splash Mountain, though. You know, now nobody can

write their scripts in line because they're just looking at Twitter while they're in lines now. Yeah, but you could notes app it. That's true. You could file a draft express. My ability to write has been killed by Twitter. Oh, yeah, for sure. I used to write reviews of things or articles expressing essay-linked thoughts on video games or TV shows. Now I just like, if I can say it in three tweets, I'll just do that.

People's ability to read has been destroyed by Twitter. I just discovered an old blog of mine last night. I was like, wow, I would just sit down and write 2,000 words about a movie I saw. When did I have the time for this? Did I assume people would read this? We had no time anymore because all of our time is spent tweeting. But hey, better than being on Facebook, I still say. Oh yeah, nobody wants to know.

Al's on Twitter. He's always tweeting. Oh yeah, he adds it up a lot. He always does the at the Simpsons that is in every one of his tweets. It's a bit strange, but he's learning. Hey, honestly, good for him.

He's almost 60. it's a new technology but anyway everything's coming in millhouse i guess we should also mention that like our friendly competition the other uh simpsons podcast that's where they got their yeah from as well our buddies ali and julia and they're coming back with the springfield files brown springfield sorry i made up a different name for their podcast by the the way. But I felt it should be mentioned there. The song Everything's Coming Up Roses, that's from Gypsy. I thought so. The classic musical.

So it's funny that... Everything's coming up roses. Oh, you're such a great singer. That's awesome. I love that musical. I saw it on Broadway with Patti LuPone. Oh. With Patti LuPone. Wow. With Patti LuPone.

Wow. Henry's a big super fan. It was so good. It was so, so good. I guess it does make sense to comment on Milhouse's character that he would reference a popular Broadway song. Yeah, that's true. It does feel like a Milhouse.

It feels like another gay joke, honestly, on Milhouse's part then, too. What if also Milhouse was gay he would then everybody isn't drowned somehow a lion is swimming which again that was in barth the daredevil so another like old joke coming back there they're feeding a popcorn oh and the and the later the lion is laying with the lamb which that was just in the last episode we did, the Bible stories. But we have a romantic ending set to the Dean Martin song, Arrivederci

Roma. Edna, I'm going to pop you a question. I hope the answer is yes. Do you think Mother would like this hat pin? Oh, yes. Oh, you've made me the happiest man on Earth.

Well, Homer, I have to admit, you created something people really love. You truly are an artist. No, I'm just a nut who couldn't build a barbecue. You'll always be the artist in the family. Is that our house? Yep. And is that us on the roof? That's us.

Are we kissing? Oh, I don't know. Could be. I need't know. Could be. I need some inspiration. But yeah, this song has a cover because I tried to have... I was like, I don't feel like looking this up. I'm going to ask Shazam what the song is. It's like, I'm sorry, I don't know this song. So I assume that's why it's a cover.

Okay. Dean Martin originated it, but yeah, I bet you... Who's that? Who's that? Who's that? Who's that? Who's that? Is it Kip Lennon?

Is it Kip Lennon? They probably is somebody like that, yeah. A Dean Martin-ish figure. Yeah, a Dean Martin original probably would be more expensive. When Skinner and Enda show back up, I did go like, oh, yeah, that was early in this episode. But the hat pin popping of the question, that was funny. I did like that. Yeah, that's good.

Any hat pin joke I'm a fan of. Every hat. For all the old ladies out there who love their hat pins. What is a hat pin? What's a hat pin? It's like... To keep your little hat on? When ladies would wear a dress hat,

when ladies would wear fashionable hats, and hats were just part of fashion for men and women, I believe women would just pin the hat to their hair with a hat pin, like a large pin. Love that. Love that for us women in our tiny hats. Wind blows your hats away too much. We should all be getting those hats.

I'm going to get a hat pin, I think. Man, so many accessorizing you could do with that hat pin. I think I could rock a hat pin. There's got to be some bright yellow ones. I just know that from watching old sitcoms and all the jokes about you know wives spending their husband's monies on new hats so many hat box jokes in like bewitched or whatever i know i feel like i i know so much about hat boxes for someone who's like never maybe even seen one in real life you gotta you gotta put those hats somewhere I mean, we're the slobs putting our hats just on the floor or whatever.

I know. On a hook. You got to get your hats reappointed and then kept in a nice box. This crazy ending with the drawing over it is wild, but at least it inspired Marge to paint again. Yeah, yeah. It's a cute ending in that way. This act of terror helps make one painting come to life We do get to hear Jasper Johns say yoink

At the very end That was cute Homer didn't say so long suckers in this episode But Jasper Johns did I love a yoink And to make a famous artist say yoink Is even funnier I agree

So I guess final thoughts on this I welcome the return of aljean it's nice to see him back and we're going to be talking a lot about aljean over the next uh thousand years of our podcast because until we retire yeah or when we can whenever we catch up which hopefully will be never no i got a lifetime of gene uh yeah it was fun it uh this was a fun episode to go back into to just remember all the memes in it i think uh i'd forgotten a lot of the stuff there's some jokes that don't totally work for me and i i think it uh it abandons the homer's job thing for a zany zany plot a little too early

mr burns is even there yeah like why aren't you at work uh but uh but it's it's a fun episode that uh you know it lets you see what the future of al i think it is a peek into al jean's era on the simpsons even though it's a scully run one i think this definitely has the feel of solo al jean show running to it for sure like like like you'll see in season 13 yeah any final thoughts on this kate before we let you go i liked it i i was nine when this came out so this was like peak me being a kid watching simpsons so like i do remember this episode and like i think like the the later skull years especially are like the ones that are the most drilled into my brain so i think it's just like it's nice to watch it again and and uh this might be my favorite one of my favorite eras of The Simpsons.

So I liked it. Will this inspire you on an upcoming Kate paint stream? Maybe. Hey, if you're listening to this and you want to request a painting, you can make me paint Homer watching Lenny and Carl shower or whatever. If we hear about horrible floods hitting LA, we'll know it was you. Exactly. I need to yeah yeah inspire me i might kill some people in my heart i mean if cristo can do it it's better

than fire i say start the floods now to fight the eventual fires which are always happening why hasn't anyone thought of that uh so thanks a lot for being on the show kate can you please plug everything you're doing right now you've got a lot of things going on i have uh jack am which is my daily morning twitch talk show that i do with my husband jack that's twitch.tv slash jack am we do it 7 a.m pacific every weekday and then i also have this podcast is self-care my podcast that i do with drew spears check that out we also have a patreon for that and then i have my own Patreon for zines. I'm doing a comic zines that I write and illustrate every month. That's patreon.com slash C-A-I-T-R-E-O-N.

And I'm at Kate Raft, C-A-I-T-R-A-F-T. Oh, and red and yellow, right? Oh yeah. I have a red and yellow show. If you're in LA,

um, my sketch comedy duo that I do with Joan Haley Ford, Everyone. Oh, and Red and Yellow, right? Oh, yeah. I have a Red and Yellow show if you're in LA. My sketch comedy duo that I do is Joan Haley Ford. We have a show on December 12th at UCB Sunset. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Kate, for coming back. Oh, thank you for having me. It was a true delight. So thanks again to Kate for being on the show.

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It's time for us to part Save the wedding bell for my returning Keep my lover's arms outstretched and yearning Please be sure the flame of love Keeps burning in her heart Oh, leave a empty room all It's time for us to part Save the wedding bells for my returning Keep my lover's arms

Outstretched and yearning Please be sure the flame of love Keeps burning in her heart See you in hell, God bless this house. So long, the Simpsons. Ow!