Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish With Nina Matsumoto

Episode Date: July 21, 2021

We return to this season 2 classic with the fantastic artist Nina Matsumoto joining us to discuss this episode covering Japanese culture AND bucket lists! Homer eats potentially fatal fish and has to make plans for his final day, as we reflect on this 1991 portrayal of a Japanese restaurant and mortality. Listen now to this fan-fugu-tastic podcast! Support this podcast and get hundreds of bonus episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron! Check out our new shirts on TeePublic! And please follow the new official Twitter, @TalkSimpsonsPod!

attention talking simpsons listeners we have a new podcast miniseries exclusively on patreon right now for five dollar and up subscribers at patreon.com slash talking simpsons you get talk king of the hill season two part one that's right we're returning to king of the hill once again putting out 11 new episodes covering the first half of the show's second season. Again, that is patreon.com slash TalkingSimpsons. Be there or be not right. I heartily endorse this event or product. Ahoy, ahoy everybody and welcome to Talking Simpsons, the podcast that's fan-fugutastic. I'm your host, the scum-sucking, puss-bucket Bob Mackie, and this is our chronological exploration of The Simpsons. Who else is here with me today?

How European! It's Henry Gilbert. And who do we have on the line? Nita Matsumoto. I'm here for atmosphere. And today's episode is one fish, two fish, blowfish, bluefish. We have meatloaf. Get it while it's unbelievably hot, kids. Today's episode aired on January 24th, 1991. And as always, Henry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history. Oh, my God.

Oh, boy, Bobby. Bart Simpson is about to head off to operation desert storm as we've seen in all the famous t-shirts uh meanwhile super bowl 25 happens the new york giants defeat the buffalo bills i'm sure they'll do better next year uh and and whitney houston famously sings the star spangled banner at that as uh it's jingoism personified and finally in a monumental moment for children watching tgif steve urkel crosses over on to full house oh my god and the sitcom was truly born i i believe it was stephanie got glasses and is being teased about them and then steve urkel tells her to not let the bullies get to her. Did he arrive on a jetpack perhaps?

Is that how he got over to the full house? You know, I just remember seeing him walk in the front door with Uncle Jesse and they're like, it's our neighbor, Steve. Oh, maybe he left on a jetpack. I don't know, I feel like he came in through the door and that was when Steve was very young

still. I think that's when he was starting to gain popularity. Not when steve was very young still i think when he that's when he was starting to gain popularity not when it was like becoming the steve show on family matters he wasn't yet the nutty professor yeah not yet and did you know that jaleel white what his new business is his new line of business as of like the last month he is now in the designer marijuana industry like a lot of celebrities but i will say i want to look into see if he's giving profits to you know bail uh funds or anything like that because if you're a celebrity you're getting into the weed business please give some of that money to people in jail for drug offenses yes and whatever you can it's called purple oracle purple oracle perfect i i would think

they should advertise that it's so good you'll turn into stefan or cal i remember that being a big event it i didn't watch many live action sitcoms other than tgif at the time but i i was definitely watching that and and yeah super bowl 25 like it lined up perfectly now it's uh it's a whole thing about the national anthem at football games but it was really only done at the big ones like the super bowl back then and and whitney houston rip one of the you know best singers of her generation i gotta think the mega popularity of it was that we were all like so heavily advertised to by every cable news network about desert storm and the invasion of kuwait and everything that uh we were just like yeah star spangled, all right.

You immediately switched to live war footage as it happens. Yes, yep, yeah, as seen in the Critic, in that classic Critic episode. And this episode, of course, I will say up front before I introduce our guests, I will not say the full title again. This is just like Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Hours on Every Fish. It's a very tortured title. It's a parody of something that's also very long, so I will now call blowfish that's all i will say from now on i only said the main title twice but yes joining us today is nina matsumoto welcome back to the show nina i'm here to complain

about the title of the episode uh it really should have been why wasn't it one fish two fish red fish blowfish oh better title why it wasn't blue fish made into blowfish yeah yeah or dead fish yeah uh but something i find that odd is this one of the band dr seuss books i wonder i've got my stock of dr seuss books ready and uh and if people don't know nina listeners like she's an an Eisner winning comic artist and someone who is such an accomplished artist, truly a master of how to draw in the Simpsons style, but also in many other styles.

Like you're just awesome. Including one of your things you got first famous for was a crossover of Japanese culture with the simpsons which is also a very like fitting thing for this episode yeah that's that's true i was discovered online because i did a picture called the simpson zoo which is simpson's big cast picture in my style which is like a japanese cartoon style it's not like i was trying to do like a super anime looking picture i was just like oh what would it look like in my original style and then most people call it anime style whatever uh yeah so and then i was hired by bongo comics to draw a manga parody for them for simpsons comics and

that was my first time being published ever as an artist and i started doing regular simpsons comics for them too and i was a penciler for 10 years and all these acclaiming credits you decided to marry me but yeah what did the the one that won the eisner was one of was that one of the japanese comic ones yeah it was it was the the death note parody that you guys talked about in the water cartoon about death note thanks for uh bringing that up by the way i had to um force bob to talk about it i was happy to talk about it oh thank you every time i come over i spin the little eisner globe it's it's behind a locked case you can't get to it bob no more spinning but it's so fun keep your grubby hands off of it yes welcome, welcome back to the show, Nina. She was last on the show for The Road to Cincinnati, the season 32 episode. And before that, it was Dumbbell Dumbdiny, I think.

Oh, that was a long time ago, yeah. Both Hank Azaria-focused episodes as well. And this is the first show that she's on, I believe, that we are officially a married couple on a podcast, so it's going to be disgusting. I can't take it already this guy won't stop talking about his wife the dumbbell indemnity was when we first announced that we were dating wow man and now we're married that feels that's how fast it progressed

yeah i mean this is also like a famous simpsons episode for many reasons and uh but it is the first time on the show the simpsons interacted i think with with japanese culture ever and they've done it many other times but this absolutely is very um of the late 80s view of japanese culture i'd uh from an american perspective i'd say it really is and i was thinking about this because nina was on our episode of talking to the hill our patreon podcast series she was on the episode of king of the hill our podcast in which uh khan and his family are introduced and the joke in that one uh towards the end of the show is that hank thinks khan uh stole his dog and cooked it and you can see there's sort of the same anxieties happening in this episode in which um it's playing off the anxieties that Americans had about Asian food in the late 80s where you know it's this foreign thing it's

very scary and the worst possible thing happens to Homer for trying a new thing he's immediately punished with a 24-hour clock until his own death and I mean I talked about it on that episode but in case you didn't hear growing up in Ohio I didn't eat Chinese food or any kind of Asian food until I was in my very late teens and a friend took me. No families would go to Asian restaurants. No one was getting takeout. I would see it on Seinfeld. I was like, oh, how exotic. People in the city must eat this. But adults growing up was like, that food is dirty. It's dogs and cats. You'll get sick if you eat it. And that was a story. And you can see some of the same anxieties happening in this American

family of the same era. I think they treat sushi with a pretty decent amount of respect in this episode. It's kind of surprising. Right, right. They could have made a lot of like jokes about you gross or, you know, when they go to the seafood restaurant in the first season, Homer's night out. Extra tentacles. Yeah, there's like jokes like that, like you seafood. So they could have done like that kind of stuff in this one. But no, like Homer is really into it and they're pretty accurate with their their portrayal of the

food yeah it's it's pretty funny that they i i think it's pretty funny that they both want to say sushi isn't as scary as it seems and a regular guy like homer would love it but also they still want to have the joke of well it could kill you if it's made wrong. And they but they at least have to say it's like, well, a lot of unprofessionalism happened for it to kill you. It doesn't normally threaten your life. And we are right now in the era of race appropriate casting, which is great. And I never think about this episode when that comes up. But early in the seasons of The Simpsons, they established at least one time a precedent like if we have minority characters that are new on the show of course we'll hire the appropriate race to play them

and people that can speak the language if they're going to be speaking the language on the show for whatever reason they stopped after this episode and until 30 years later so I'm wondering why this was the precedent and uh George Takei did not even come back to play Akira after that they're like ah Hank can just do a Sulu impression. It's fine. What do we need to call Sulu for? We'll just get him. This episode really stands out in my mind

because growing up, there were rarely Japanese people in TV shows. And a lot of times when there were, they'd be played by non-Japanese Asian actors or if there's what's supposed to be Japanese writing, it would be a bunch of scribbles. And it was rare to see Japanese cartoon characters, especially. So this episode really surprised me to hear real Japanese, see real writing, seeing Japanese names in the end credits.

It meant a lot to me. And it really surprised my parents, too. Like my parents were from Japan. And because they always expected inauthentic portrayals of their culture on TV. So like to actually recognize what the characters on TV are saying, it was a delight to them. Yeah, now that I know some Japanese words and I can recognize actually it being spoken in this episode,

I'm even more impressed by it. And I do think it's hardly true all of the time, but in the first decade of the show, if Apu was talking to another person in in hindi he usually does speak hindi or or spanish-speaking countries though it's not always true but it's certainly not always race appropriate i i was thinking of this one just the same with the mr sparkle bit that in both cases they did hire japanese or japanese american actors uh to play the parts and well i i came to a big theory in this episode oh okay uh but i think i'll save it for uh when we get to the karaoke section okay but uh but i i also uh didn't i don't think

i had sushi until i saw this episode when i was eight and i was not an open minded eight-year-old like lisa and also were they serving sushi anywhere in jacksonville florida probably not yeah uh back then but uh but if they were we we our family didn't our family does that did have kind of the way of thinking like if it's beyond fried chicken pizza or burgers it may as well be mars like that but once i was like late in teens early 20s that's when i started eating at more diverse restaurants including japanese places and i i came to really love sushi it's a very nice tasty thing but i i probably still had this episode in my mind because I think it did make me think like, but what if it did kill me?

But yes, silly thought. It wasn't accessible to me until I went to grad school and went to a bigger town. So I had like Chinese buffet sushi when I was maybe like 19 or 20. And all it was was just like cucumbers rolled up with seaweed and rice. So there was not even like meat in it. Maybe imitation crab was in it, but not until I was maybe in my like 24 or 25 to actually have sushi for the first time. And I was thinking about it and sushi probably is my favorite food now.

I think I was used to seeing roll sushi and I thought that was the only type of sushi there was. Or it was a while before I saw nigiri-style sushi at places, which I really loved. I didn't ever have sashimi until my first trip to Tokyo in 2011. It's good that sushi is your favorite food, Bob, because you're going to be moving to Vancouver eventually. And we have so much good, cheap sushi. It's true. And I will credit Nina for really, I mean, I thought I knew a lot about Japanese food,

but she has really gotten me to try a lot of new things. And she makes a mean bowl of New Year's soba. That was very delicious. I tried Sukkoman ramen for the first time on your suggestion via Nina. And that is ramen that does not come with broth with the noodles. You dip it. It's kind of like a thicker broth. It great it's like disassembled ramen yeah growing up uh i ate japanese food obviously but i didn't like sushi as a kid i think that's a very common thing though like in japan like

tamago and ebi that's like the egg and shrimp which are both cooked that's known as like a kid's sushi like that's what you start kids off with first and also i want to bring up like sushi the word sushi refers to rice it means vinegared rice and the stuff that goes on sushi is called neta so sushi is not always raw fish um even though that's what people associate with like sashimi that's the raw fish like they have on itself by itself without the sushi but i'm not going to be pedantic enough to like correct people when they make jokes about sushi being raw fish like whatever like a lot of it is is cooked though but i think i guess raw rawness is what turned a lot of people off back then and uh bob and i were on an episode about um sorry to bring this up again i know you hate we both hate the game but

we're not an episode of retronauts about Escape from Monkey Island. Because there are a lot of jokes slamming sushi in there. And that game was made or released in 2000. And by then, I think it was too late to make EU sushi jokes. Which is why it's even more surprising that this respectful portrayal of sushi was done in the 90s, like the early 90s. Man, that's surprising not to talk more about escape from monkey island i didn't know that i also because i assume that the developers like live in the bay area which they did yeah they have much more access to quality sushi and japanese culture than you would and you know if they lived in middle

in north carolina let's say or Well, people can listen to that episode. I liked it. I hated playing the game for it. I'm sorry I put you through that, Nina. But I think it was a reaction to people living in the Bay Area as the dot-com bubble was changing it and a lot of trendy sushi places were popping up all over. It's like, more sushi?

I say, all I want is sushi. That's all I want in my life. If I could eat it for every meal, I could. I would, actually. And it's great how accessible it is now. You can buy it at a gas station. I wouldn't recommend getting at a gas station but you can get it there and during uh like the quarantine or lockdown or whatever at the beginning of the pandemic when i was trying not to venture out too far the sushi they sell at the asian grocery store near me like

i live by a huge asian grocery store in canada called tnt and their sushi is great i actually bought some to enjoy after a recording because i know int and their sushi is great i actually bought some to enjoy after a recording because i know i'm gonna crave sushi afterwards and i have no sushi but i am making ramen tonight with ramen eggs uh man well the sushi i'm wondering now if the nearby sushi place uh still does they do okay i i get it from there all the time well not all the time but like probably once a month i love that we're talking so much about sushi when that's not what this episode is about really folks it's noon and we're all hungry it's mostly about homer thinking he's gonna die it's true uh let's talk about the writer of this episode though nell scoville so if you want to know a lot more about her we interviewed

her a few years ago on our patreon so it's patreon.com slash talking simpsons that's just one of many interviews we have on there but also also she put out a book around that time called Just the Funny Parts about her writing career. And we both have a copy of that book and it's a great book. So for this, Henry and I both reread the section about this episode. And we're going to be talking about what was originally in her draft and pitch and what got changed. Yeah, it's it's a very good memoir about what the career in general would be of a hollywood writer a comedy writer in the 80s and 90s in into the 2000s but additionally you know she dealt with a lot of sexism in her career in her time like a lot of she she tells some stories that aren't so happy but but are important to share about how it was in the industry then and you hope it's better now there's there's a lot

of interesting stuff in there and also just fun stories there's an entire chapter that is the writing of this episode the from to such a level of detail that we'll we'll talk about a lot of it but but not all that you should definitely read her book also she wrote an episode of space ghost that's really great i love hearing the story about her friendship with Joel Hodgson back then. She was very nice in our interview, too. I liked her quite a lot. So her biggest claim to fame on television, at least, is creating the TV show Sabrina the Teenage Witch, which ran for seven seasons. Yes, Sabrina is not her character, but she's like the developer and the creator of the show.

First season showrunner, yeah. And so she is a 1982 Harvardvard graduate uh she did not write for the lampoon she did write for the crimson which is the serious student newspaper the uh the harvard crimson yeah we talked about that with uh brianna joy gray because she is also a crimson alum and we mentioned that yeah so in the mid 80s uh nell sculvell moved to new york and in 1986 she was the first staff writer hired for the long defunct Spy magazine which apparently if you're a Gen Xer or a late boomer was a really cool subversive magazine. I know Bill and Josh love that magazine a lot. I think one of them even wrote a few articles for

it in their time. But yeah Spy magazine she also wrote for Vanity Fair. So from being a journalist in college she went over to be a journalist in New Yorkork yeah i think spy is like the av club for our generation was it didn't last half as long as the av club did though so this is how she got into the simpsons world so she pivoted to tv when one of her spec scripts for its gary shandling show was picked up and then after that she was hired as a story editor on the final season of new heart which i believe david murkin ran so she's working with with a lot of future Simpsons people on these projects. It's the Gary Shandling Show. That has Sam Simon, Gene and Reese, many other...

Gamble and Pross. Gamble and Pross. And it's in the Brooks sphere. So they were definitely aware of her from that. Yes. So she left L.A. and moved back to New York because she got her dream job at the time writing for Late Night with David Letterman, a very influential late night talk show. This was in the late 80s, and she was the second female writer hired on the show at that point. I kind of think maybe the first was Meryl Marko.

I would assume so. Yeah, yeah. So you can read all about this. There's a 2009 article called Letterman and Me, which she wrote after David Letterman, the scandal came out and that he was being blackmailed because he had a history of having sexual relationships with women who worked on the show. And she wrote an article about her time on the show. And she did not have that relationship with David, but she did say that, yes, that's what happened in my time. He had relationships with women on the staff and those women were given power, more power than any other on the staff i was not comfortable with that and that is why she left even though he wanted her to stay and she didn't notice but other people on the staff said yes he gives you more attention than other people so clearly she was in his uh in his sights as another potential

relationship to have no i and and she would confront that with him later in a one-on-one interview a couple years ago, or maybe it was just last year. But Letterman has been kind of on an apology tour since retiring. Which, I mean, hey, I think that's good that Letterman can at least recognize these criticisms or faults of his. But it's, I don't know all it all just feels too late i wish if i had one note about what disappoints me with letterman is that i wish if he's going to do all this apologizing start a new comedy show and hire only a female writing staff and and give uplift a bunch of new careers me and and all these new stars through your name maybe that could that would make up for it to me more.

I'm also of the mind of like, an apology is nice, it checks better to people. Or how about an apology with some money? But yeah, it looked like Nell Scovell and Letterman at least buried the hatchet for themselves in that interview. It feels like people have really largely forgiven Letterman. No one really spits out his his name disgust or anything um maybe if the stuff was revealed like nowadays there might be more anger towards him yeah it was pre-me too and i mean they were consensual

relationships but there was a real power difference there so yeah for so many people in the comedy world if they didn't work directly for letterman they always looked up to them of a certain generation and older and so you know if it feels like a settled matter you don't want to rock the boat by bringing it up again and because you like the guy but yeah now when you talk about it the power differential is to such an extreme it's it it at the very least is it makes one uncomfortable for sure yes and so she left letterman for the sitcom coach and then she went on to have an extensive career uh in sitcoms and other shows and after writing this episode as a freelancer she would return in 2020 to write the

episode sorry not sorry so there's a 29 year gap in her written episodes on the show i wish they delayed it by one month because if they'd aired it in january 2021 instead of december 2020 it had been exactly 30 years come on guys but that episode yeah she uh she tweets about it a bit she did have a good tweet about how she's like you know nobody has had this big a gap in between writing episodes and and the episode is definitely in she she also wrote the book and i think helped coined the term lean in um and that episode is very much in like the lean in mindset or just like it's about that lisa doesn't feel like she should have to apologize to mrs hoover and there's always pressure on women to apologize for things that are not put on to boys like Bart and it's yeah it's uh it was an interesting episode I watched it I also just like seeing you know I felt good for Maggie Roswell

having a lead role in an episode in a Miss Hoover centric episode so yes a lot of writing credits for her I'll go over a few of them she was on the staff of several shows like Murphy Brown Providence Charmed NCIS Warehouse 13 and The Muppets, that recent Office-y Muppet show, which Nina and I saw a few of those over break, I believe, and I thought it was pretty good. Yeah, it was fine. And on the commentary, I like, she's a bit sassy, rightfully so. So on the commentary, she says, quote, I came in and it was 12 guys, and I would believe it was the first female they'd ever seen.

There's a little bit of an awkward beat, aljean says but not the last so this commentary likely recorded in early 2002 based on when these dvds came out and at the time i believe carolyn omine was the only female writer on the staff and to this day the simpsons does still have a problem in terms of the amount of staff female writers that they have on their team so i will say that this is still an issue they should be dealing with and they are getting more female writers especially freelancers but uh yeah it's something they really have to work on still and there there is an important thing to know if you're you're outside of the industry of hollywood uh is the difference between staff and freelance like on on simpsons and most shows i believe it's a WGA rule though the Simpsons was not WGA officially

at the in season two but a rule is you have x amount of freelance scripts a year seemingly it's about giving opportunities to other writers or to try people out but if you're freelance you come in and you hand in the script and then you go away you're not in the rewrite room you don't have structural power in the system and you are definitely lower than a staff writer and so you know uh the simpsons did not have one woman as a staff writer until season six and that was jennifer crinson and she stuck or season five and she left within 18 months i think it was and and then carolyn omine was the second one i think at best they're up to like three or four women have a written by credit in a season of Simpsons. And a lot of them are freelancers.

An improvement over, you know, zero. But they could always be better. Omine said the same to us when we interviewed her too. But I did like harassing the guys on yeah i did that was 20 years ago so she was pointing out yeah it's still a problem and then uh you know much later she talked about it uh in regards to mimi pond yes yeah yeah we've yeah so as mimi pond you know talks about many times as she talked about in our interview with her too she was the writer of the first aired episode of the simpsons simpsons roasting on an open fire

she mentioned that um she had applied to be there on staff after writing the episode and uh she was not hired and she said she had been told that it was because sam simon did not want women in the writing room like he didn't want to staff any women that that is what mimi pond said and we interviewed her as well. Yep. The Simpsons will be right back. Hey, paper baghead. Oh, man. How much money you got, Simpson?

A dollar and three cents, Mr. Bully, sir. Keep the change. Thanks, man. Think I'll take dollar and three cents, Mr. Bully, sir. Keep the change. Thanks, man. Think I'll take that Butterfinger, too. Think again, Nelson. Crispity, crunchity, peanut buttery Butterfinger. Nobody better lay a finger on my Butterfinger. And try new Butterfinger ice cream bars.

Cool, man. Butterfinger on a stick how we use electricity can be smarter cleaner and greener at Electric Ireland we can help guide you there you see our new net zero hub has all you

need to know about smart meter plans EV tariffs solar panels and much more. Making your usage clearer, your trips greener, your home cozier, and your world brighter. Find our net zero hub at electricireland.ie. Welcome to the break, all you fans of Raw Fish and the simpsons it's henry gilbert here and a big thank you to our guest nina matsumoto we always love having her on not just for all her expertise but also just to talk to somebody who does something as cool as the comic book sparks

and all of her cool stuff that she does at fangamer please check all of that out and follow her on twitter for some great art and if you're a brand new listener to our show you should definitely be checking out patreon.com slash talking simpsons that's where subscribers are able to support me and bob doing this podcast is our full-time jobs we've been doing it for over six years now talking about every episode of the simpsons and for five bucks a, supporters at patreon.com slash talking Simpsons get access to hundreds of exclusive podcasts. Me and Bob have covered series like Futurama,

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talked about but your ten dollar a month subscription in patreon.com slash talking simpsons also gets you once a month our often over four hour long podcast what a cartoon movie on our sister podcast what a cartoon we cover an animated series just the same way we go super in-depth into the simpsons and for the what a cartoon movie we go super in-depth into the history of films like recent pics hercules hunchback of notre dame coming up at the end of this month cool world shrek and a giant back catalog over 150 hours of exclusive podcasts covering many classic animated films and also some that aren't so great, but we had a ton of fun talking about them.

Please go to patreon.com slash TalkingSimpsons today to check out all of the offerings we've got at the $10 and $5 level for all of you awesome subscribers. but the uh but the account in the book is of her writing this episode is really interesting i i also like her talking about she could see the dynamic between sam simon and matt graining already in like just her couple hours around them. Yeah, she was brought in actually to pitch some ideas. And she was more part of the process than I assume most freelancers are. And she explains her other pitch in the book in that it's Bart playing basketball at the free throw line saying,

you know, God, if I make this, I promise not to bully Lisa. And he makes the shot. And the entire episode is him trying not to break his promise with god and that was her other pitch for the episode she wanted to write which i think that sounds like a funny idea it is more of a regular sitcom script though i'm sure you know the simpsons would make it even in early season two they'd make it more than just you know how a tgif show would have handled it and yeah i mean she brags in the book that like she she was into the simpsons like january 1990 like watching uh like the third episode she told her agent i want to pitch to the simpsons her agent gavin i assume it's gavin

polone must be agent to the stars yes yeah i'm sorry we all know we know all this nina so she she wrote this and then the only other episode she wrote was in season 32 yeah that's insane i i do wonder if uh partially she was offered to come back as a way of a some level of apology i also wonder that too not that she but also she's like she is slumming it honestly to do a freelance script for the simpsons she is slumming it she's like an executive producer of tv shows she's not a freelancer uh level person and probably did not get paid you know super awesomely for it but it's an interesting thing she came about that that to me feels like aljean's trying to make something

right which hey you know that's good good yeah i mean um this isn't one of my favorite episodes but i think she did a very solid story with this and uh when her book too she even she apologized she's like i'm not perfect either when i show ran sabrina the teenage witch like i didn't have a very diverse staff either like she she had more women but she admits like it was mostly white women uh everybody was straight it's not no tv's frank was there tv's frank was there yeah she's she's i love that she is like on the outside of the mst3k family like just to the though she wrote one of the new uh season 11 episodes too but wrote on it like she was pitching jokes in the room but

uh but i guess we can i i mean we'll mention the bigger stuff that got changed but one of the most interesting things to me in the pitch process was that she outlined was that sam simon and she wrote the book after sam simon passed away she mentions that she had her pitch and then in the middle of it he's like you know what actually in act two what if this leads homer to like join community theater and star in streetcar that was trivia i didn't know. And that's why I want a history of the writing of every episode. Yes. Yeah.

There's like three things she mentions that were like, well, that got canned. And I was like, but that came back. Like all of these came back as ideas. It was. So Sam Simon, she sells it so funny in her memoir. She says, Sam Simon makes that streetcar pitch. She says that she clearly made a face that he's like oh you don't like that and they said well will she's like i think it should be about you know what do you do with your last day alive and so he takes it up to brooks and

sees which one he approves of he prefers the 24 hours left to live and simon's like but but simon's like i'm not forgetting this street car thing no way if they had gone with the street car thing that would have changed the entire tone of this episode it would have gone to to captain wacky town yeah and it's better to make i prefer it being about sad marge in street car instead of instead of homer being the perfect uh stanley and we should point out that this episode produced long before the movie The Bucket List, that now the term bucket list is now just a commonly used expression. I was shocked when I heard that film was popularized that term.

I was like, no way. And I looked it up through some Google searches. I'm like, oh, wow, it's true. People didn't really use that term very often until that movie. No one remembers that movie at all either yeah uh but uh yeah i guess well i guess we should start the episode proper now the the uh the opening of it is a very type that rugrats kind of ripped off after uh the when they get started up which is this is yeah close-up of a thing that looks weird and then you quickly figure out what it is well this is like the um the thanksgiving episode in which you start inside of an oven or a

microwave oh and a door is open uh bart the general general okay yeah baking uh thanksgiving is uh pulling the guts out of the turkey so they've done this device before and marge is a very modern housewife now she's using the microwave to cook a meatloaf. That can't taste good. I think it's a great device though. It's like the kind of thing that's way easier to do in animation than in live action. So why not go for it? Yeah, it's exciting.

Like you can't on a regular episode of Cheers, they can't say, can we start the scene with the camera inside a microwave? Like that sounds really hard to do. This does remind me of an older style of cooking in which when the microwave was popularized, people thought, oh, you'll cook everything in this. It's so fast. microwave like that sounds really hard to do this does remind me of an older style of cooking in which when the microwave was popularized people thought well you'll cook everything in this it's so fast and now it's just like it's understood the microwave is for reheating foods and sometimes uh the package will say not recommended yeah and i will say a big part of growing up for me is that

i became an oven directions man and that's the lifestyle i live i live with the i live through the preheating process i wait longer but the food is better you just need more planning you're tempting me to talk about something oh no not the air fryer anymore no no air fryers but when nina when nina and i live together one here it's true and when our wives when nina and i live together we will be an oven instructions family or else the marriage will dissolve but i like using the microwave you have not lived until you've eaten a burrito that takes three hours to cook on a cookie sheet i want it now you guys say you didn't have uh sushi until you were an adult i didn't have meatloaf until i was an adult i only ever saw it on shows like this and i one day uh when

i was in my 20s i bought some at a grocery store and i heated it in the microwave and i was very very underwhelmed by it i'm like oh this is just a lobe of meat it's exactly what it sounds like it's a meat lobe it's meat i don't know what i expected it's meat but it's better it's meat but it's adulterated with things like corn flakes and breadcrumbs it's like it's it's a meal for if you have no money. And just like, I'm going to take meat, I'm going to stretch it out a bit into a meal. The way Homer always drooled over it, I thought it would be something way better.

Like pork chops are really good. That's like a solid piece of meat. I think too, you have to like bury it in ketchup for most family-made ones. Yeah, you know, meatloaf was not in my mom's repertoire growing up, but if I ever had meatloaf, usually it my mom's repertoire growing up, but I, if I ever had meatloaf, usually it was when I was eating a lean cuisine microwave thing and didn't want to, just wanted to be done, have it ready in like two minutes. I think my grandma would make it. And

it was sort of like a meat cake and the frosting was ketchup. It was had like a ketchup glaze on the top. So yeah, you need a ketchup to sort of like make the dryness more palatable. You know, I'm just not a big fan of when ground meat is clumped together to form like the main meal. What if it's Salisbury steak? What if it forms dinosaurs? Oh, those are fun.

Okay, there you go. You got to make like roaring sounds and move it towards my mouth though. Okay, I'll remember that yeah but you know what it's funny like people always think oh japan is all about seafood and sushi or whatever but no they have a huge like meat-based diet there and i think meatloaf would do very well there because one of the popular dishes in japan is hamburg or hamburg steak or i think it's more commonly translated as salisbury steak here and just a meat loaf and they put a lot of ketchup on it

over there they should bring meatloaf over to japan and say hey look at this american thing on my one of my last trips to japan one of the greasiest things i ever ate was the uh menchi the deep fried uh burger it's it's ground beef and then fried in a i believe is that's menchi right they uh it it was so greasy because well because none of the none of the beef juices could come out of the outside because it was all you know inside of a of a fried casing i did like this joke about the farting ketchup bottle because uh spoilers we're preparing for the episode worst episode ever which opens with a joke about a farting uh bottle of pancake batter that marge then puts a silencer on so the joke was uh was exaggerated 20 years later

or sorry 10 years later as as a kid it was one of your few just like laughs like a fart noise happened in the in the kitchen. It's not, I didn't make it. I can just laugh at it that it happened. Homer is stupider here than I thought he was because he's asking Marge when it's going to be over. And Marge looks at the same microwave timer he could look at and tells him it's eight seconds. And I love his little bing. That's very sweet or cute.

That's true. I guess that would look kind of weird if you could see the microwave from the front right yeah we can't see the timer therefore homer can't see it in the shot i like lisa she's close to moaning lisa here with her like despondency but i kind of like that she's just like so sick of it she's like it's the same five meals every day of the week i'm tired of it and well now to think of a plot is that it is lisa eats one kind of meat and wants to eat a different type of meats it that's very different for lisa it's not in character for her to want to try all the meats lisa makes the pitch for where to go instead. Homer is not particularly receptive. Thursday, meatloaf night, as it was, is now, and ever shall be.

What are you getting at? Well, you're always trying to teach me to be open-minded, try new things, live life to the... What are you talking about? Nobody's trying to teach you that. Shut up, boy. Well, maybe Lisa's right. Tomorrow night, it might be nice to go out for dinner. Tomorrow night? Friday? Pork chop night? Marge! We haven't missed pork chop night since the great pig scare in 87. Friday night, pork chops.

From cradle to grave, etched in stone in God's library somewhere in heaven. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Where do you want to go? Anywhere but hamburgers, pizza, or fried chicken. Fine! We'll go to Mars. There's that new sushi restaurant on Elm Street. Sushi? Hey, maybe this is just one of those things you hear on the playground, but isn't that raw fish? As usual, the playground has the facts right, but missed the point entirely.

Sushi is considered quite a delicacy. Please, Homer, can we try it? No. Definitely this is a show wanting you to take Lisa's side and not Bar and not part of like hey don't be so close-minded to sushi like i know you've heard it's raw fish but give it a chance i think people today still have that mentality of like oh no hamburgers pizza or fried chicken fine we'll go to mars i i know that like even the idea of like mexican food is crazy to them they wouldn't even think of chicken tenders there. Mexican food, that's still a lot of meat in there.

Oh, yeah. A lot of ground meat. You can find greasy things covered in cheese in so many cultures. You don't just need to see. Yeah, totally. Things that are close enough to a burger or fried chicken, if that's what you're looking for. Oh, my God. I mean, Japanese fried chicken is some of the best fried chicken i my about this we should have eaten before this podcast i have a small

sandwich with fake meat inside of it waiting for me in your fridge but also the pork chop night thing this is coming right after itchy and scratchy marge which is all about pork chop night season two is the real pork chop season on the simpsons uh we don't really hear about it much more after that it's just a fun word to say i think i also like uh lisa's the cross talk it's again the thing that's kind of lost in the show now of lisa lisa's saying her whole line which is so funny like etched in so etched in a book in heaven and then homer is just going like okay okay okay what what do you want what do you do and even marge is into the idea i like that it's it's out of character kind of maybe not so much in this season but marge is like oh i've heard about that place yeah oh you know i was gonna say later i think homer should blame lisa not marge for making

him go to sushi because it was her idea but you're right marge is the one who says you know there's that sushi place so if homer can blame anyone for almost killing him then it's then he can blame marge not lisa there's a season 23 episode where marge bart and lisa become food critics because marge tries ethiopian food and she's like oh wow food from other cultures is really good and they try all kinds of uh food from other cultures after that and uh yeah like i think i think it makes sense that she would be kind of more adventurous. I know they're not like planning this far ahead. Like they're not going like, oh, maybe Marge could become a food blogger later. But there's like there's some seeds of it in here.

This Marge is different than the Marge that goes oregano. Yes. I like when they tease the Marge dreams like occasionally goes like I could do something beyond a homemaker i could i i view a world outside of these four walls of the home oh yeah that episode uh sorry that was referencing is called the food wife and that has uh tim and eric in it oh yeah because they're foodies too i mean eric is i when my uh a co-worker of mine he was on instagram before i was and he's like yeah i follow tim and eric tim's great eric just shows pictures of food like that's all his instagram and matt selman is a huge

foodie as well oh yeah yeah i think uh well you know this this back and forth about like isn't that raw fish like that reminded me of uh how you know i still think that conversation happens uh with people to this day oh sure but i watched uh this 2018 japanese animated series called isekai isekai uh isekai isekai which is about you know an isekai restaurant in another world and so it's one of those in another world type stories basically people who are like mid-century european type fantasy guys they go to an izakaya and they're like whoa karaage that's amazing or whatever but the episode about sushi where the foreigners have sushi for the first time in the plot they go so insane that they're just like raw meat what what i want to get my parents to eat sushi before before they leave this planet and go back to their home world.

But they still never had it. No, no. But I mean, I think just the idea of something being from a different culture can put you off, even if the food is familiar. Because I wanted my mom to eat some sort of like, you know, exotic in quotes food when she was visiting here. So we went out for ramen and she was just like very nervous and anxious but i had to be like hey mom it's soup you like soup right it was sort of like the roles were reversed and it's like when i was a kid my mom was trying to talk me into eating things and now it's just like no it's soup you like soup it has doodles and broth it's fun on menus when they say things like oh okonomiyaki that's japanese pizza i'm just like

well i guess you could reduce it to that like but i understand why they do that we call this a crunch patty like it's like you want people to think like like oh okay there's some familiarity here even though i would not say pizza is that similar to okonomiyaki i was lied to by all the animes that it told me it was and then when i finally had when i and i liked it the first time i've had it though i've i've never every time i've gone to one in japan i've not been trusted to make it myself they the the servers are like we got this that's not why i'm there anyways that's true no i you know the first time i went to a ramen dedicated place uh with my mom as well i had to her it wasn't that she'd never heard of it before,

but I had to tell her like, this is not the 25 cent a bag ramen. This is better than that. Yeah, I had to tell friends back home that, but I was saying, oh, when I went to, when I lived in Southern California in 2010, a friend took me to a ramen restaurant for the first time. I had never had non-freeze dried packet ramen.

And I was telling folks at home that they're like, they have ramen restaurants in LA? That's crazy. Thinking they're just, they have ramen restaurants in L.A.? That's crazy. Thinking they're just dumping the cup noodle in a pot and selling it to you for like 20 bucks. It's like, no, no, it's different. It's different. The noodles are handmade and there's all these ingredients. But it was hard for them to get over that.

Like, oh, it's not the thing you eat in college? The brick of noodles? Yeah, it's interesting how instant ramen was first well known here before the real stuff. And I had friends in college who would just eat the bricks like a candy bar. You know, my husband did that, too. He says like he well, my husband's Filipino and he says that it's like dry noodles are just like a more normal snack thing for him. They sell a snack dry ramen that's seasoned and stuff. I think it's easier to chew, though.

It's not the same. OK. Like I'm also someone who loves eating just uh the brick of ramen uh without cooking it and i know they have the snack version like of it but it's not the same the real brick of ramen we are like three minutes into this show we're talking so much about food but i will say i'm not above eating dry ramen in that i'll i'll drop the uh the you know the brick into the into the boiling water but then i'll like get the little remnants in my hand and scoop them into my mouth.

So I'm not above this, people. So you're not saying you're better than us? No, no. In other ways, yes, but not in this way. Fair enough. But yeah, after a bunch of please dadding, they decide to go. They go to the Happy Sumo, which it's a it's a cute little neon sign and it to me does have the feel of like uh for where i grew up like the feel of the strip mall japanese restaurant

or we the last time me and you went to la i think we ate it like a couple strip mall japanese uh places which was not it was not worse quality food but it was just funny that the you know it was a japanese style restaurant but in the hole in the walls of a strip mall sumo that's another thing that got mocked a lot in the 90s maybe still does maybe not as much maybe people are more um sensitive about that but like um sumo was often made fun of and that's something my mom always hated seeing she's like oh like people here just make fun of or uh make fun of sumo all the time when it's like a big respected thing in japan it's not just giant fat guys in diapers which i don't like when people call them diapers

like hey have some respect yeah i think it was i mean the joke was like oh yeah japan is wacky backwards world and all their athletes are out of shape and they wear diapers. It was just like the easiest joke in the world. First of all, like they're not all just like fat guys. Like look up Chiyo no Fuji. He's like one of the most famous sumo wrestlers of all time. He's like super built. He's like E-Honda in real life.

And I love how fit E-Honda is such a badass. And he owns his own like bathhouses and stuff. That's cool. If I were to marry any member of the Street Fighter roster, I think it'd be him. is such a badass and he owns his own like bathhouses and stuff that's cool i if i were to marry any member of the street fighter roster i think it'd be him but uh but well i also think for a lot of harvard comedy writers like say the guys on snl2 they liked the comedic possibilities of sumo wrestling because like al franken for example he was like oh we'll do a sumo sketch which was really just an excuse to have their asses hanging out in a sketch.

Oh, yeah. And they could say, no, no, it's culturally respectful. Like so. And it was really just so they could get something past a censor. There was like a period on TV where people would wear those inflatable sumo suits and fight each other, like on game shows and kid shows. Do you remember those? Oh, I've worn one of those. You've worn one?

Yeah. Participating in appropriation? It was 2001. It was normal. Hang your head in shame. Where did this happen? Well, so it was grad night. I don't know if you guys know that practice.

Nope. Well, so on graduation day in some cities in America, and this was in mine, there is a very big and real concern that after graduating, all the kids are going to go out drinking and die in drunk driving accidents. And so community sponsor grad nights where it's like, okay, go to this place. We will give you free things like uh like food drinks uh sodas not alcoholic soft drinks and you know play games and stuff and so at that too was put on the sumo suit and it was like i i think of wearing that sumo suit is the last time i talked to one of the people i've gone through all of school with who I'd never see again after high school. And we both just slammed into each other in the sumo suits.

And, you know, it was a different time, guys. I'm sorry. During my grad night, I went home and played Vagrant Story for the PlayStation. There was no drinking or fun. Bob wins. It was where all my friends in the AP classes were going. I didn't have other friends, just my AP nerd friends. I do want to talk about the guests on this show.

Yes, yeah. A lot of Japanese actors who are in America, Japanese Americans. And if you look at their other roles, it was like, oh, we need a Japanese person on Coach or Ellen or whatever. And they would fill the role. So the MasterChef is Sab Shimono, who is also later the voice of Mr. Sparkle. And of course, there are other guest stars like Joey Miyashima as Toshiro, Diane Tanaka as Hostess, again, Japanese-American character actors, and also George Takei as Akira, named after Akira Kurosawa. When I mean Toshiro, it's named after Toshiro Mifune.

I didn't even think of that, yeah. The two Japanese names, mosticans knew that and akira would sort of become a recurring character but in the future it would just be hank doing his sulu impression akira is the karate instructor they go back to akira in the mr sparkle episode to read the box and later takei would be back as a wink in 30 minutes over tokyo and a few more times after that but i don't think he ever played Akira again. I don't think so. I, I was looking up the lives of these.

I mean, everybody knows about George Takei. He's, you know, he's, he's quite a, a social media guy these days, but I mean,

man, his life, like, you know, a very rough life, like born in LA at age five, he was in an internment camp in, in 19.

I mean, the concentration camps by america but anyway 1942 is in that became a working actor in hollywood as a japanese-american right after world war ii like how and on top of that he has to be a closeted homosexual like he's in the closet the whole time like it's it's quite a life he had and then becomes you know uh for his time the most famous japanese american actor on tv i would say thanks to star trek uh and i did i looked into the life of sob shimono he is so interesting too he's also he's a berkeley graduate oh and but yeah saburo is his full name but he goes by sob shimono and yeah he's like he is a broadway legend like he has been in the works of stephen

sonheim and worked with angela lansbury in the original cast of maim an incredibly gifted performer when i looked and saw that he had done a performance like three years ago here at at the berkeley rap i was like oh man i wish i'm really regretting not seeing that now you could have signed your mr sparkle box yeah so I'm sure you would love that. Like, hey, the decades and decades of your career as a TV and film and stage legend. Could you sign the cartoon of the Simpsons character you did for two minutes? I hope he's proud of his role as Mr. Sparkle. I was in the In Marjorie Trust episode, too.

Oh, yeah. and we talked a bit about uh sab shimono there we've got two openly gay japanese american actors in this george takei and sab shimono wow i was happy on the commentary they do say takei i know i've said takei a lot in my life i've said it many times i hear that a lot too i can't kills me every time i've i've learned i've learned now so okay now it's time for my theory yes and why i think they did this now you definitely hear mike reese on the commentary say it was a pc choice to be politically correct and hire the correct actors and graining is talking about how you know he wanted it to not be gibberish said by characters and it to be a little more respectful.

But I also think that it is specifically in the case with the Japanese characters that a Japanese American person on Simpsons is a very powerful producer on the show and could probably have more of an effect of saying, hey, no, that's insulting. Like, you're not doing that. And I'm talking about richard sakai of course who gets parodied so my bigger theory is that i definitely think matt graining supported it too but i also think richard sakai to a degree also said no let's get japanese actors for this and i think that's why they goof on rich Sakai in this episode. My personal theory is that it is sort of a poke back at him of like, you made us cast all these actors and go to all this extra work. Well, now we're going to make fun of you singing karaoke and draw you into the show. Yeah, he gets his own scene in this episode, which is wild.

And I think we talked about it before, on uh on season three you can see some storyboards for episodes and matt graining has annotated all of them and i believe on one of them uh he writes you know watch your caricatures richard sakai was not happy about the sushi episode i'm just paraphrasing i i can't speak for sakai i think the caricatures of the main staff are perfectly fine and not offensive but if you look in the background of the karaoke scene there are some real like one step removed from 1940s bugs bunny cartoon very squinty eyed men obviously they don't go as far as like having the buck teeth or whatever but i i want to say that's probably what he was talking about they didn't spend as much time on those characters i was gonna bring it up when we got to this but the richie sakai uh karaoke

scene i've never understood that scene. I would be like, why is this here? This isn't funny, I don't think. Does this get cut in syndication at least? Because it feels like it's completely, unless you work on the show, it just comes out of nowhere. I think it's, I want to say the joke is this, it's Dan Castaneda doing a very like meek, like wiener little voice. He's an anesthesiologist, but then he belts out this Cher song. And I listened to the song on the way over here, and I was like, if I get hit by a car,

and someone's like, what was this guy listening to before he died? Cher. And that'll be in the newspaper. Apparently, he loved Cher. I mean, yeah, I guess karaoke was pretty new in america then too and the i i think it is maybe the joke is just about the novelty of oh isn't it funny to see a person who seems very meek and timid but once the music starts oh they become a whole different person is that is that funny and i mean well richard sakai himself he's on one commentary at the very start of the simpsons movie commentary and then he goes

away like he's he is this silent producer on the show he is a non-writing producer on the show uh and there are some things that allege he's not the greatest guy but he's uh one thing for sure is that he is one of jim brooks's like top men like he's produced on most of his things uh done through Gracie Films since the mid-80s and he's worked with him and he's you know gotten very rich off that he's he's a very powerful tv and film producer the unauthorized Simpsons history book alleges from numerous anonymous sources that characterize Sakai as the hatchet man for Brooks, that if there's bad news that needs to be said or if somebody needs to be the bad guy on the job, that Sakai is the guy who's do that

and he's not known for being particularly nice if he has to break bad news to people. That was how he's characterized in the unauthorized Simpsons history. And similar is alleged about Sak characterized in the unauthorized simpsons history and and similar is alleged about sakai in the alf clausen lawsuit that's still ongoing at the time of this recording which is that you know that matt selman jim brooks and richard sakai are on the record is saying they were disappointed with clausen and that they wanted to let him go but i believe sakai was the man who called him and said we're

letting you go like it was sakai who was the choice there but but aside from that like again he almost does no interviews like there's i did find a funny interview with the creator of usagi ojimbo whose last name is sakai and sakai and sakai he got into an early screening of the simpsons in hollywood because he showed up to it and they're like he said his name is sakai and they're like oh it must be richard let him in and he got that's great but yeah you'll see uh you'll see this caricature of richard sakai all throughout the simpsons you'll see his name uh pop up on like every episode so that that's the mystery of richard sakai well if he's a reason why they went with the authentic casting here like this is why it it matters to have a diverse staff

yeah i think i when i hear some of the grousing about like this was too pc i wonder if they're annoyed that perhaps of higher up who was not white was offended by something. I can totally understand. I would be on Richard Sakai's side if he had said, hey, you can't just have the Japanese characters just say a bunch of nonsense. And I don't want to hear Hank Azaria just do a bunch of things that sounds like Japanese. And I will say from after this episode until I believe like January if you see an Asian woman on the screen and she's about to open her mouth here comes Tress McNeil yeah it's

always Tress McNeil I think you can vouch for this Nina and that we were watching a ton of episodes and like from see in the 20s but like every time it was an Asian woman it was always Tress not just as Cookie Kwan just like if an Asian woman had to talk Maggie Roswell's not doing it Pamela Hayden's not doing it Tress was Hayden's not doing it. Tress was your choice for that. Yeah, yeah, that's true. I don't know why they don't get the other female voice actors. They usually have to do those voices.

Is it because Tress always does an Asian accent? Maybe the other woman can't do an accent. Maybe they're like, oh, Tress is just the best at this all-purpose Asian accent that she does. I mean, she is like a very funny voice actress and I think they like her, I would say intense voice she does for Asian women sometimes, which I don't think Cookie Kwan's ever going to speak.

No. I think I... They could recast her. Yeah, but her voice would have to change entirely. Like I don't think a Chinese American actor or Korean American, I'm sorry, I forget. I don't think a Chinese-American actor or Korean-American... I'm sorry, I forget. I believe she's Chinese, Cookie Kwan,

but I wonder what Chinese-American actress would want to do that type of voice for the character. Yeah, I'm not trying to throw her under the bus. I just find it interesting that this was the time they were careful about it, but after that, they're just like, oh, what's Tress up to lately? Even though Jessica, the character, is Asian,

it doesn't mean they have to have an accent. You could just have an American accent. No, it's, I mean, it was only this year that Jenny Yokobori took over the role

of Kumiko in the series. Like, I think the first, the first Asian American regular voice actor on the show. And she puts on

an accent for that character. Mm-hmm. i guess because the character is supposed to is is born is japanese and not well born in america she's following in the footsteps of trust mcneil's performance which was an accident character so i'm saying like um they could recast cookie kwan and and you know they could have a chinese american actor uh do an accent but it would be a more authentic accent. Maybe. But yes, the characters all arrive for sushi.

And I like the timidness of everybody in this clip. Oh, that music. Please do not be alarmed. Our chefs are just saying hello. Oh, okay. Hello! This is our karaoke bar. Do not be alarmed. Our chefs are just saying hello. Oh, okay. Hello! This is our Karaoke bar.

Now it is empty, but soon it will be hopping with drunken Japanese businessmen. I am Akira, your waiter. May I take your order? What would you recommend for a family that's not sure they should be here? The sushi surprise. A little bit of everything. It is very non-threatening. I'll have one of play. i like that sampler plan i i like that marge can be so directive like we're all very scared yeah we don't know what's not intimidating and that's right i must say seeing my parents thought that was hilarious and that would scare laughing at that that would scare white people i'm sure it

startled me the first time i went to an authentic japanese restaurant because they don't all do that they don't all say that when you come in. But I appreciate it now. I think the one that does it the most is the ramen place, Ippudo in Berkeley. Oh, yeah. Everybody shouts it at you. I love that. I don't know how I feel about it.

I don't know. When they welcome you so loudly when you come in and say goodbye so loudly when you leave, I feel a little self-conscious. Well, now it's like I'm the star of the show. I'm the star of the restaurant show for a few seconds here. Don't call attention to me. People don't need to know that I've entered or I'm leaving.

But I'm also someone who doesn't really like to announce when I'm leaving. I don't say goodbye. I just, I'm gone out the window. That's called the Irish goodbye. Or Batman. So stop appropriating my culture, Nina.

I guess, you know, on the goodbye one when i'm waddling out like full of ramen broth maybe that is i'm like don't look at me it's not like they like yell out what you're actually though they i guess you do sometimes yell out what you've ordered because they yell to each other that would i would be more embarrassed by i would be more yeah you know it wasn't until i listened to the commentary track of this 20 years ago that I didn't realize it was an oversized bottle of Duff or Duff-a-ha, I think. Duff-a-hama.

Duff-a-hama, yeah. I miss, again, I miss restaurants. Maybe I'll go to one by the time this episode goes live. But getting the giant Japanese beer is always fun because it's a low ABV. It's so light. It's fun to drink. I love it. It's meant to be split with other people, but I fun because it's a low ABV. It's so light. It's fun to drink. I love it. It's meant to be split with other people, but I just have it by myself.

Me too. They can get their own. What I love the process of like, and here's your chilled glass to pour it into. Like, ah, so nice. Japanese beer is so light that you can easily down one of those giant bottles by yourself. No, that's what I love about Japanese beer. I don't like heavy hoppy beers like i i prefer japanese style beer but uh though i i'm more of a the plum wine i really love plum wine

on on the rocks good stuff but but yes then of course i mean if they're gonna do sushi jokes they gotta do karaoke jokes so oh i noticed some of the writing in this oh okay like for the madhouse of the restaurant it says amagi Oh, okay. The Mad Asari restaurant, it says Amagi, which uses the symbols for heaven and castle, which might come from the Amagi-class battle cruiser ship. That's the only thing I could find. The only thing notable I could find has the name Amagi in it. And the banner in the background inside,

it says Tanoshisumo or Happy Sumo in incredibly bad handwriting. But somehow I can tell that's what it says. And the waitress is wearing a kimono and it's folded the wrong way um it's supposed to be like in relation to the wearer left over right and the other way is only done on dead people i thought so like this is yeah this is by far the most common mistake i see whenever anyone non-japanese draws a kimono so i always look out for that and it's also the easiest to look up like especially nowadays but the easiest way to remember is to imagine um a lowercase y okay that's how you know

it's the right way okay so if you see it the wrong way that person is dead yeah that's run uh i well i with the writing being so bad in the background i just think of like probably in america the background was painted or designed by somebody who doesn't know the language. And then it's sent to the animators in Seoul, Korea to then draw. It's just through so many different hands. I can see why. I'm glad it's at least legible, though. I appreciate that they put in the effort.

They obviously found someone to translate Happy Sumo into Japanese and write it out. Maybe it was Richard Sak well then richard sakai's character appears in real life his uh his wife's name is amber but um but he sings a song that the title of which is uh now pretty insensitive it seemed normal to use the term gypsy back then uh but you don't don't do that if you're somebody who still says that word know that it is offensive and you probably should take that out so we've seen this at karaoke you should call it like maybe gummies yeah gummies tramps we can't talk about pacific rim anymore but yes we we get a bunch of karaoke and fugu in this next clip my name is Richie Sakai. I'm an anesthesiologist, and I'd like to dedicate this next song to my wife, Patty. I was born in the wagon of a traveling show. Mama used to dance for the money they threw. Papa would do whatever he could.

Oh, oh, and two of these things. Two uni. And oh, oh, I don't believe I've tried the flying fish roe. I recommend it with a roe quail egg on top. You're the doctor. Who's the black pride of death that's a sex machine to all of shit? Shaq. You're damn right.

Who's the cat that won't cop out when there's danger all about? Shaq, right on. There's gotta be something I haven't tried, huh? Hey, hey, what's this? Fugu? It is a blowfish, sir, but I should warn you

that one... Come on, pal. Fugu me! That's why they wanted to do this. They found out that in Fugu, they could just say something that sounds like fuck. Also, fan-fugu-tastic. Originally in Nell's script or pitch, Bart and Lisa were going to be singing

Carly Simon and James Taylor's Mockingbird. Shaft is a funnier choice, but I know as a kid, I was just like, I don't know what this is. Totally lost it. The word shaft was not associated with a penis when I was eight, at least not to me. And only when I was a teenager did I realize, like, oh, it's funny,

they're singing this kind of naughty song from a movie they shouldn't know about. Bad Mother, Shut Your Mouth, yeah. Black Private Dick, Sex Machine to All the Chicks. Yeah, they tell the funny story that the censors almost didn't let him do it until they could prove by showing Isaac Hayes singing it at the Oscars for the year it won. And showing like, see, this was sung on television 20 years ago. You can do this on TV. It's a cute scene, but I think they could cut out all the karaoke scenes. It was just such a novel idea for americans in 1991 just like oh people do this and i think the idea of like

the idea of like the salary man was new too which is they kind of riff on in this a little bit with the waitress saying oh drunk businessmen come here every night and that is where the uh less uh good caricatures are that's the guys nodding along to their singing yeah this isn't even how like most people in japan like to do karaoke yeah like the private booths this is the more american style you know performance instead in front a bar karaoke not i once i got did my first private room i'm like oh i never want to do another karaoke again like no way i could never do the american style no way it's crazy to think that i mean i guess that is a very american thing of like now you do it in front of everybody you have

the one i've seen these guys the last time i was at a bar that did american style karaoke it was a guy who got up and he's like i always do love shack and i sing it the exact same way every time he was so he was a little he was a little too proud of how he sang love shack and i sing it the exact same way every time he was so he was a little he was a little too proud of how he sang love shack i think i graduated to japanese style karaoke which is when you're in a private room with all your friends and whatnot but i did uh quite a bit of this kind of karaoke in my 20s but to be fair when i started doing it in the night i was very drunk so it's like you start very drunk and you just go on from there did you have a go-to song that you did uh madonna's like a prayer which i still do to this day yeah i love that one that and i think that and birdhouse are two of your

favorite oh and uh christmas at ground zero that's yes uh weird al spam was also fun if rm stand is not there weird al spam might be there and they're the same song i don't know any of these songs well you're gonna find out next time we hang out the last time i did the karaoke in japan i love that they had they had much deeper cuts of like oh this is every weezer song from pinkerton you have in this that's amazing or like i did streets of fire which is a film that it was really big in japan in the 80s like i could finally sing one of those songs they had it on in the karaoke machine at the the place i went to in uh shinjuku that they didn't i never see it on anything in america oh speaking of karaoke and weezer like i'm not a weezer fan but i heard that

the uh cover album they did recently was really bad so i finally listened to it i was like oh my god people are right this is terrible nina you're not a weezer fan and it tears me up every day i don't hate them i just never got into them especially after this cover album i listened to and not gonna get into them now no it's like you're supposed to put a spin your own special spin on a song if you cover it but they just do like a karaoke version weezer will play your wedding now yes yeah and do i get well let's talk about fugu huh let's talk like uh i've i've never eaten it probably because i was terrified from this episode i i don't see it available you know you i think it's well it's also apparently very expensive if you're getting the real kind of like i i was just thinking of

homer's bill the entire time with all this like yeah this uh upper lower middle class family cannot afford a sushi dinner for four and i guess maggie's there too yeah like he was ordering like two pieces of uni that's uh sea urchin which i'm not a big fan of but i don't like it very expensive yeah i've only i only ever had uni one time where was that a very expensive place where you just get the chef's picks, and that was it. And I was like, I liked it all right. Salmon roe, I normally would never order either, but from that chef, I was like, oh, that was pretty tasty. The little eggs, I don't like it as much. Oh, I love it.

The flying fish roe he was ordering is tobiko. Yeah, it is sometimes served with a raw quail egg on top, and it's great. I do like the salmon roe more, though. That's ikura. I should try that flying fish one, see if I like it more. But yeah, so I did a little research into it. First off, I think from reading on the Wikipedia page, there was a 1981 New York Times article about it that i think is what

first told spread the news among americans that like there's this killer sushi and it's killing japanese people like uh and and in that article cited a number as as many as 176 people a year died from it up to 1981 i then watched a 2015 bbc news story on it where they they talked to a top fugu chef rikizo okamoto who runs a fugu specialty restaurant and in that one they said this is in 2015 they say at most in recent years three people have died from it and in all they said in those cases it was because an amateur caught one of the puffer fish and didn't prepare it correctly to remove the toxins how we use electricity can be smarter cleaner and greener at electric ireland we can help guide you there.

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at electricireland.ie Yeah, they weren't from restaurants. I wouldn't want to risk it, though. Honestly, how good can it be? I bet you would have it and be like, yeah, that's okay, I guess. I don't know what his sources are, and again, this was 20 years ago on the commentary. Matt Groening said, apparently,

it's the coral they feed on that makes them poisonous, and farm-raised ones are not poisonous. The poison comes ones are not poisonous. The poison comes from the fugu eating other things with toxic bacteria in it. And the fish themselves become immune to it. So they just breed non-poisonous fugu by feeding them non-toxic stuff. Yeah. So in the 2015 BBC story too with Okamoto, they also mentioned that, know you can buy farm-raised non-toxic

you can ship them out already carved up to america like if you're if you're eating one of those puffer fish it was likely shipped from overseas from japan or another asian country but that top level chefs like okamoto uh they run fugu only restaurants restaurants. Like, apparently near the Asakusa Temple in Tokyo, there's a lot of fugu specialty places, and he runs one of them. And he talks about, like, part of the appeal is that he goes to the fish markets and buys fresh, wild-caught fugu that are still toxic. So you know that the implicit risk is there, that he's like, no, no, no no this is clean properly we

could buy farmed rays but and i i think the uh the news story portrayed it as the the connoisseurs of it they're like no you can taste the difference between a wild and a farmed rays like and they they they pay extra for it and i definitely think it's kind of a date they they portrayed it as being also sort of a date they they portrayed it as being also sort of a date night thing of like oh isn't this a fun risk we're doing together and also and also i'm spending like 200 to have a big platter of sashimi uh fugu sashimi yeah no thanks if you go to the the uh wikipedia article for fugu there's so many like instances of people dying from this stuff my favorite case was in 2011 a chef at a place called fugu fukuji served fugu liver like the liver is the toxic part he served

it to a customer who demanded it i want to die now yeah he said fugu me yeah he had it and he went to the hospital with mild paralysis but he recovered but i think the chef like lost his license because of that probably for the best and yeah that's uh well that's also uh yes when you read more things about how the toxic uh toxin works on people then they should know instantly homer is not poisoned because he is not asphyxiating and slowly losing his ability to breathe the at least from the descriptions I read, that the toxin makes you numb at first and slowly you stop breathing. It does not make your heart explode. It's a mystery ailment Homer has that is cleared up with no reason,

but Nell has her problems with that, and there was going to be a different ending with different results and things like that, but we'll talk more about that later. But yes, Homer demands his fugu meanwhile the master chef leaves uh to to get to get uh to get some side piece action yes uh this started uh maybe like two or three years of jokes uh of mrs krabappel being loose and uh in the future they play up her you know uh sexual freedom as not a not a joke it would be uh kind of you know put against skinner's uptightness for sake of humor but in this it's more like she's a loose single woman and uh you can hear so there the one of her lines was cut

from this episode or maybe not even recorded in that you can hear when they're in the car together you can hear the master chef saying oh your hair smells so clean and apparently according to nel scoville the cut line krabappel had was oh mr hirohito can you really get me a futomaki roll so i don't know i don't know i'm glad that character's name wasn't said as here that's a bit it's like learn learn one other japanese name than the emperor in world war ii so there's i was more fixated on the futomaki role line that's lewd yeah oh yeah uh i i well you know i will say i've i've heard you know one of the complaints about stereotypical writing of asian characters in american stuff is that asian men are often written as like sexless and too timid or whatever.

So it's certainly against that stereotype that the head chef is, you know, making out hardcore in his backseat. It's like having sex during work. He's like, I have 20 minutes with kerbopple in the backseat of this car. You don't get a second date with a kerbopple or second chance, rather. Yes, yeah. I forgot to mention. I thought there was the opposite like aren't there like jokes in um this era of comedy where the foreign character is like like a sex maniac

i think it's a woman i think it's more played up that they're you know curious virgins who are just completely inexperienced not like a man who can have sex casual sex when he wants to right i guess i like long duck dong yeah exactly yeah which yeah he'd be a voice in the substance in the future he would yeah getty want to nabe i also just like shimono's acting and this is so funny like i just i love how he just screams like at him because he's he's really I mean, he's a great actor. So he's in the moment of like, I don't want my assistant to stop me having sex. Get get away from me. But but yes, I have a little clip of that, too.

Master, you are needed in the kitchen. I said cover for me. But master, we need your skilled hands. My skilled hands are busy. You do it! Poison, poison, tasty fish. Concentrate,

concentrate. I want fugu! Mmm, fan fugu-tastic. Oh, no! What are you doing? Wait, wait, wait. What are you doing? Beautiful language, isn't it, Bart?

God's sake, don't eat another bite. Oh, I couldn't possibly. Mr. Simpson-san, I shall be blunt. We have reason to believe you have eaten poison. Poison? What should I do? What should I do? Tell me quick.

No need to panic. There's a map to the hospital on the back of the menu. It's funny because you can see that map throughout all the scenes. It's true, yes. Oh, man, I love that tasty fish line. I always think that to myself whenever I have fish. If you're ever cutting up fish, tasty fish. Also, what was he using to cut that blowfish?

It looked like a pirate sword. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's like a giant cutlass, not the normal sushi cutting. Well, then again, earlier, the master chef does a sushi cutting technique I don't again, earlier, the MasterChef does a sushi cutting technique I don't normally see of throwing the fish in the air and chopping it super fast.

That's a fruit ninja. They do use a special knife to cut fugu, apparently. They keep it separate from the other knives, which is a good idea, I think. It doesn't look like a pirate sword, though. In the original draft or original pitch of this episode, one of the jokes was going to be, and I'm glad they cut this out is that when they find out homer is poisoned the master chef tells the junior chef you must do the honorable thing so uh he gets the ornamental sword

down from the wall and instead of killing himself with it he runs away so there was a there was a ritual suicide joke because it was one of those it's 1990 what do i know about japanese people of course ritual suicide it's going in the script no that would have been a great fake out yeah i do like the idea that he was pretending to do that to just steal a nice sword and take it with him you know that this episode was notable to me because um it's the first time i left a comment on the podcast the first time you guys uh visit visited this episode uh you were afraid that like homer going oh beautiful language isn't it marge might be uh seen as offensive somehow and i remember leaving a comment saying like oh i don't see it as homer exoticizing the language

because the joke is they're obviously fighting and yeah homer is oblivious to that and when my parents saw this they thought this was hilarious too because like they were speaking actual japanese and i actually actually tell you what they're saying the chef is saying you've been in poison what were you thinking you idiot and the apprentice is going hold on hold on and and like when he says like you idiot he goes and um my parents had a good laugh at that i you're right it is it is a good joke that homer is hearing people that mostly even if you don't know the language you should probably tell through context that they are yelling at each other and not happy and and homer views it as a beautiful length i do see it that way now it's homer being oblivious uh i and yeah i watched that uh in that video i watched the chef do the full uh taking a part of uh it's not the most

appetizing thing to watch but if you want to see how it is done with with the fugu it actually is that involved because i was like oh i thought you'd probably just take out the guts but no the skin is very toxic too so you have to very carefully remove all the skin and all the entrails and make sure all that's gone first before you can start cutting up the the the tasty fish as they say it's like the liver ovaries eyes and skin mostly that's like a lot of the fish don't throw away those ovaries uh i was gonna say that uh in the episode they leave the sushi restaurant here and they never come back to it and nell's original idea in script there are a few different ideas floating around in that. In the original draft or whatever, the idea was that the sushi

restaurant overcharges them on accident. Homer's about to die. They call, they say, we overcharged you $6. You can come by and pick it up whenever you want. That is what gives Homer the will to live, getting $6 back. So he pukes up the poison and they get the money back. The other alternate idea for that was, going back to the restaurant was homer's okay and the japanese restaurant then charges them for the meal because it's like well homer didn't die so we want we want your money for the meal now so they're originally going to have a call back to the restaurant but march should be actively getting lionel hutz on the line saying this restaurant killed my husband yeah we need to shut them down and take all their money maybe that was an after homer dies idea yeah i got once you're dead then we'll sue him

yeah i but i do like the idea homer what gifts in the world live is getting six bucks back that that's fine and i i totally agree with scoville that she should be annoyed that it's just never explained like he's like well he, he's told he's going to die, then he doesn't. The closest it is, and I got it in the clip, is that Hibbert tells him, it's likely you have eaten the poison. I assume it is. So that is the closest you get to a gray area explanation. But they never, at the very least at the end, they could have come back to that line of saying,

well, Hibbert did say it was likely, so I guess that guy actually did carve up the fish fish correctly so when she talks about the writing of this episode was was a whole uh episode supposed to be centered around homer thinks he's dying it's uh i mean that's always been the main thing definitely act it in i think in even the earliest bit of her full pitch act one is they go to a sushi restaurant and act two is homer dealing with thinking he's going to die yeah yes i mean we said we said it earlier but sam simon's idea was like oh yeah act one he gets over the poison and then that encourages him to become a community theater star he gives them something to live for but they decided to go with the bucket list idea

and it all started with uh you know fact two is just like okay nell write down a bunch of things you know homer should do before he dies it's gonna be little sketches in the show yeah so Nell always wanted to be that but the other writers thought like oh we could take it into wacky town yeah I believe Nell said her grandma her her saying was before you die you should have a child

plant a tree and write a book yeah I also there was another dynamic they lost that I think it would have been interesting if they kept it in was that instead of everybody being bored the reason they went to sushi was that it was lisa's birthday yeah and they didn't want to so like homer that was another reason they didn't want her to know because it would ruin her birthday like oh what you chose killed your father lisa take that lisa's beliefs yeah i think that do I gotta play the sound? I guess

because it's for an alternate version of the show that never exists Take that Lisa's beliefs There we go. Bob and I have both written a book. We're not gonna have a kid but we can plant a tree one day. I'm putting off that tree planting for a while. The kid is a bird in this case

But yes Homer is finding out some bad news Your wife agreed that I should break this to you No need doc I can read Marge like a book It's good news isn't it No Mr. Simpson If in fact you've consumed the venom of the blowfish,

and from what the chef has told me, it's quite probable, you have 24 hours to live. 24 hours? Well, 22. I'm sorry I kept you waiting so long. Oh, Mark, I'm gonna die. I'm gonna die. Well, if there's one consolation, it's that you'll feel no pain at all until sometime tomorrow evening when your heart suddenly explodes. Now, a little death anxiety is normal.

You can expect to go through five stages. The first is denial. No way, because I'm not dying. Second is anger. Why, you little... After that comes fear. What's after fear? What's after fear?

Bargaining. Doc, you gotta get me out of this. I'll make it worth your while. Finally, acceptance. Well, we all gotta go sometime. Mr. Simpson, your progress astounds me. I should leave you two alone. Perhaps this pamphlet will be helpful.

So you're going to die. First of many pamphlet jokes in the series. So you've ruined your life. You know, now I like those pamphlet jokes even more you've ruined your life you know now i like those pamphlet jokes even more than the joke is that hibbert doesn't want an uncomfortable conversation so he's like and read the pamphlet that does it here's some literature for you and i mean as a kid i'm pretty sure i knew homer wasn't going to die but i did buy into the drama of it and the stakes

of it even now when i watch it uh i've seen it for like the 60th time uh 30 years later i do buy into the stakes even though i know like there's going to be 800 more episodes after this i think they do a good job of that making it real and that was jim brooks's idea nell wrote a jokier script and he was like no no make the drama real make this about the emotions yeah uh despite the extremely heavy topic they do help keep things light with the jokes i kind of wish there were more jokes though it's a little bit too serious for me uh for my taste but uh they strike a good balance and i think it's because of those lighter jokes i never really cared that much about homer's fate for this episode i'm like oh we'll see how this plays out it's good that they make him go through the stages of grief so fast or the stages of dying so fast the kubler ross thing because the rest of the

episode is like he should be more affected by this but he said he has like obligations he has to do he's not like lying in bed crying and just sick with grief he's just like all right gotta do this now all right now time to make a video i love that right away he just like sleeps and hits the sleep button that's a great joke. I constantly am telling myself like Wyden could never, if I found out I was about to die in 24 hours, or I found out my husband was, the same thing was going to happen to him,

I could never sleep. I would just be sobbing the whole time. Like it's just, definitely since the last time we did it, now I am married and I do come at this more as an adult of like well how would i go through this in this kind of moment like it was just i'm just thinking of like very heavy things that this episode unfortunately because they go through the kubler-ross thing in five steps instantly they're like that's why nobody's crying most of the time like barge barge is even told not to cry yeah he's the one who's dying i think if they did this episode in season one it'd be a lot heavier but i i feel like um bart failing

a test is treated with more seriousness than homer dying that is true yeah but also we're pretty lucky that homer's bucket list didn't have anything like well because i'm dying tomorrow i'm gonna go murder someone i'm gonna murder mr burns finally or whatever in four years it would be number one kill flanders oh yeah yeah uh also it's funny that uh maybe it's just because i read all of death note in one month but to hear homer told that at a certain time his heart's going to explode it just made me think it made me think of death note that's true i guess i i do like it's like your heart will explode yes the poison will just make your heart burst which like oh i'll feel fine until eventually my heart explodes it's like that is not a relaxing thing to learn which is makes it a great joke i listeners have heard me say it before but i 100 bought into this when i

was a i was sure homer was dying it was actually made me really scared of the whole episode that so all of the things about homer being sad he's about to die affected me much more like i i guess i had definitely seen so many cartoons to that point and but those were kids cartoons in the daytime this is a nighttime cartoon i think i felt it was different roles and i i've told this story before but i was just reminded of it because on twitter there's the very helpful simpsons history account daily simpsons and i don't know how much they're doing it these days but when this episode hit its 30th anniversary they aired on twitch one time and they didn't store it because

probably copyright but they played with all of the commercials that night's airing of it that somebody taped and in that night's airing in between acts two and three there is a commercial for next week's episode the way we was and in my mind my kid brain i thought the homer definitely dies here and now they're rebooting the series from high school. Are they going to start? I didn't know the word reboot then, but I was like, they're starting over from high school because Homer dies.

Oh no. So I bought in. Interesting. Wow. Wow. What a world that would have been if it's like now it's that 70 show, uh, nine years earlier.

Like I was a dumb kid who didn't know TV. I also bought in every time of like Batman and Robin arein are definitely gonna die this time in the adam west show i like the concept of oh this is a nighttime cartoon you don't know what's gonna happen all the rules are off yeah that's cute uh but so yeah i i told that story before but watching the daily simpson stream of it i was like i remember half of these commercials in my market as well and my i was instantly traveled back to the feeling of seeing that commercial then himmert is a little jokier but he's not mr laughter yet either though and so yes we're finally done with the first act yeah i think we'll have fewer notes than the rest of this one

but um oh yeah i'm looking at my notes i have like pages for the first act the rest is just like meh well yeah so homer you know as he's planning out his day i love that he's like he lacks the empathy that he thinks like marge why are you crying i'm the one dying why would you you're not dying and he wants a class your rate or what class your way to write have sex with marge yes i love i and he misspells intimate as well which uh actually i i have that clip because i just love how dan like trails off this is very natural acting here hello marge hello i'm the one who's dying not you i'm sorry hom. Have you thought about what you want to tell the kids? Nothing. It'll just upset them.

I want my last hours of family life to be happy ones. Well, have you decided what you want to do tomorrow? Almost. Uh-huh. Oh, good. I'm not done yet, Marge. What's that word you use for when you and I, you know When we're intimate?

Intimate with Marge I just love that he's like, Homer has never needed to say in a polite way, have sex with her But now he's, I mean, they already know the word snuggling, though, at this point Yeah, this is before they started know the word snuggling, though, at this point. Yeah, this is before they started using the word snuggle, I think. Oh, yeah. I guess the big one is when March loses it on the highway. He says snuggle.

Yeah. And you know what? I'm not the biggest fan of, like, sexual euphemisms. I feel like that's often somehow grosser and more obscene than actually saying the words sex i can't imagine going like well let's go to sleep it's like i i will be dead in 24 hours i'll i'll sleep when i'm dead i think i'll experience every second of life just the smash cut to him hitting snooze is very very funny still just like i think it still gives me anxiety as a kid it definitely just like god damn it homer

you have one day left i think it's great because it really sets the tone for how he's going to deal with his remaining hours for the rest of the episode he's running late the rest of the day i mean i've had nightmares like that i'm, oh, every, just things stack upon each other and every second I'm later because of it. Like he's taking it seriously, but he's also still being very Homer about it. They never write, this is like a season one kind of ditzy Marge line

where Marge is like, but you look so peaceful lying there. Like that Marge, Marge should. That's sweet too. Sure, yeah. There'll be plenty of time for that. His last meal seems to just be oatmeal and boxed donuts. I figured Marge would make a better last breakfast for him.

There's not a joke about Homer indulging in food on his final day, which is odd. But I guess it's still earlier Homer. He's not the total food monster we know him to be, though he certainly wolfs down that sushi, the same piece over and over and over again. But yeah, Homer, now he's going to start his day. First, he visits Bart. to be though he certainly wolfs down that sushi the same piece over and over and over again uh but yeah homer now he's gonna start his day first he visits bart bart reads it as homer wants to spank him that's the only reason he would talk to him oh yeah would they ever do that joke now oh i mean bart's butt hanging out even the idea of just like the casualness and acceptedness of

like well homer of course spanks bart all the time like yeah they never they never do that for whatever reason the idea yes yeah spanking i'm glad you said that for whatever reason the idea of uh strangling bart is still funny but the spanking just like god homer you monster monster uh just part like he's like all right here's my butt there let's get this over with i i also love how when homer tries to tell him this he's just like bart just pushed back i just get to give it to lisa he's like shut up i got pissed off he is like even though he thinks this is the last words he'll ever say to his son he's like shut up he needs to move on with his day but yeah that's actually another of the big changes in the script too uh here i'll play the original or the aired version of the

advice homer gives the three little sentences that will get you through life number one cover for me number two oh good idea boss number three it was like that when i got here hey this is good stuff told you now come on you're gonna learn how to shave finally, the little spot under your nose. Next, we take some toilet paper, tear out some teensy little squares, and stick one there and there and any place you're bleeding. There and there. Don't worry.

The blood will hold it right on your face. Now, some aftershave. Oh! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Oh! Ah! You son of a! your face and now some aftershave and that's how we save so that joke was written before home alone came out. But Home Alone popularized the aftershave burns my face thing. I shave a lot my face. I never have used aftershave in my life.

Really? Yeah. It's really an old man thing. I never knew what that thing was. I never heard of those jokes. Yeah. When I saw Home Alone, I don't think it took me years to understand, like, why did he scream? I don't understand.

No, I've been scared of aftershave my whole life because that Home Alone joke. Though I'm more of an electric razor guy who also shaves less often than Bob. I think I would say, as you see me on the arts on the Simpsons Patreon, Talking Simpsons Patreon, that is the usual level of facial hair I have on my face. These days, quarantine I shave every three or four days. If I'm staying with Nina, if she's staying at my place, it's every day before our nightly kiss on the cheek, the man and wife do in a relationship. Otherwise I tear up her face.

Yes. But yes, the Scoville had a very different, she quotes in her book, a different set of suggestions. They were, you'll end up in it with a bad job but if you kiss up you can take a day off every now and then find a woman who loves you and think twice about having kids yeah which that's very funny to say to bart and then the last one is don't eat blowfish which that's a good i like that joke that the the other version is a more well actually i was gonna say brooks but it actually feels more like a simon thing that it's about how to be a lazy employee.

That's what the jokes are. I do like that. You know what? I feel the idea that the cut yourself shaving jokes are just such a thing of the past because these days razors have 40 blades in them. And not that that makes them more dangerous. It's just they're so much more efficient. I only cut myself when I'm shaving around my giant Adam's apple. It's a real problem.

So, like, I rarely ever cut myself myself shaving maybe like three or four times a year just like a little nick is after a shave supposed to help with the bleeding i think it's like an astringent or something like that i think it's like a disinfectant for your face yeah your face is more raw and so then when you splash it on there it's very pain i love homer just like gritting through the pain like oh so good maybe people don't use aftershave as much anymore i don't cover face as much i think so it does feel like an old man thing people in the comments let us know how wrong we are uh man if wasn't there like a big manly man movement a while back where everyone was using straight razors well i wish we had a razor company we

could advertise yeah it's so natural to put this in now like beard box like oh i have my mustache wax came and my beard conditioner is here well if i had a beard i would never want to use uh straight razor those things look scary yeah i i definitely think it was part of that obama era thing of like i'm gonna be a man like madman the characters for madman i'm going to i'm gonna shave just like john ham does and that'll make me and i'll have pocket squares and sock garters i'll ignore like the social commentary just look at the fashion yeah it's all about the fat it's about fashion and day drinking that's all madman it's about dudes rock yeah dudes rock the bits then come with lisa which uh we're recording this right

after john swartzwalder gave his first interview ever and it was in my head because he fully articulated how homer is a dog and i was thinking about it this entire scene because homer flies from emotion to emotion instantly through his entire bit with Lisa here. Listen to Lisa play her sax. Hi, Dad. Want me to cut out this infernal racket? Oh, let me hear you play. Why?

Does your father have to explain? Let's just share your gift, okay? Okay? Yeah, that's more like it! Ho ho, woo! Oh, I want to be in that rumba And a saint go over there Oh, I want to be in that rumba. And the saints go over there. Oh, over there. Oh, over there.

The down tempo when the saints go marching in after that scene, I think I just realized that. That's why I wanted to keep that in there until I had the audio by itself. I was like, oh, yeah, Claussen connects the scene by having a down tempo versionpo version of it take him to the next scene. I don't hear that. I never realized that. I don't hear that song often, but when I do, I think of the Homer lyrics. I think of rumbas and going over there.

Yeah. So that Homer, just that, I love that joke too because the implication is Homer always thinks that's the lyrics of the song. He's lived into his late 30s and he's like like, yeah, it wants to be in that rumba. All right, Homer at this point, 35. Yeah, oh, right, right. Do you know what Lisa's playing at first? No idea, not credited either. I would love to know.

I don't know if it's like a real song or if the sax player was just riffing or what. I love the reaction that Lisa can see in Homer of like, oh my God, what am I doing to my father? I need to turn this song around right now. And also that she's quoting back to him the infernal racket line. There's a lot of, like, season one sequel jokes here. Like, also Homer's beard popping right back at the end of that scene.

Without the sound effect of the pop that you get in Enchanted Evening. Homer without the beard is always unnerving to see. I that uh nel scoville just heard do the bart man like what does homer think of lisa all right stop playing that damn saxophone yeah that's what he says to lisa well we meant to say it before but when bart was asking about the squid like that's the same thing he asked the guy at the rusty barnacle in uh in homer's night out yeah bob what you just said that's also what homer had to recite to himself to remember what lisa plays yeah that's right yeah uh and uh but yeah that's homer the dog there i just think of this as instant turning on emotions because he's he's that shallow of a

person that's i've not read that article yet the interview because, because I ran out of free New York Times, no, New Yorker articles. But once I'm able to read it, I will devour it. I've seen people posting screenshots of the best parts of it, and it sounds great. I just love how Schwarzwalder is so Schwarzwalder, even when he's giving the interview. There's some great Schwarzwalder jokes in the interview. He's such a funny guy. Yeah, he is one of the funniest

guys I wonder if this will be like you took the genies out of the bottle now like maybe he'll do like more interviews now and I can't believe that I always was sure that Twitter account couldn't actually be him and it's a poser on Twitter but it's really him I

couldn't believe it I'm curious as to why you thought it was a poser on Twitter everybody fakes me i've i had to see so i guess it's kind of over now but the number of times i had to see dave chapelle shares this thing or like oh the bill murray or like chris rock parody yes oh the chris rock parody ones true but like uh short soldiers account is just him plugging his own book yeah it, nobody's trying, but I felt it was like it has to be a long con. And also, I guess I thought there is no way the Luddite I imagine John Schwartzelder to be would ever have a Twitter account. I guess that's also what I thought. I couldn't imagine him having a Twitter account just to say, buy my book.

That's all they ever say about him on a commentary. If you mention John Schwartzelder on a commentary, you also have to say buy my book that's all they ever say about him on a commentary if you mentioned john swartzwater on a commentary you also have to say buy his books on amazon they're the funniest thing which is true they are good and it's been almost 20 years since he's written for the show so it's been a long time and so uh homer heads over to ned's to borrow a cam quarter in bar to the lover when ned approaches homer uh for something homer says if it's about your camcorder i lost it so ned never gets this back some continuity there yeah uh i also have to thank gene and reese for paying attention to this flanders barbecue plot point because they brought it back in the second or no i think it is the final production one of season two when flanders failed yeah and bill oakley and j and Josh Weinstein had the Flanders family reunion barbecue.

Flanders and barbecue, it fits together. Buenos diddly ding dong DS. I'm surprised the episode doesn't end with Ned calling Homer up to ask him about the barbecue. Well, Nina, I'm glad you mentioned that. You set us up perfectly because Nell's original ending involved homer being at ned's barbecue being miserable and everything uh basically the effects of his last day are coming back to haunt him like he has a you know meeting with burns in the morning uh abe wants to play catch with him like all of these things are coming back to haunt him everything he did on his last

day is now affecting him in the present now that he's not dead and it's him fuming at this barbecue in march saying now homer aren't you so happy to be alive that was the original ending that was written uh that would have been great yeah i mean plot wise that makes so much more sense like you set up all of these things and there is the implicit joke multiple times in here of homer making a promise and then laughing he's like i'll be dead by then i don't have to fulfill this promise. Like he's celebrating his death in a way, or the opportunity it gives them. The joke should end with him having to deal with the consequences of it, but they just slam right to the ending.

Like, yeah, the, the actual ending of this was definitely not in Scoville's thing. And she's, she says it in her book and she kind of even mentioned it on the commentary. It bugs her. There's no real ending

to this episode it's still funny but we'll get to it and uh so yes homer gives a video message to maggie i'd love to come to your barbecue i'll even bring the thickest juiciest t-bones you ever seen sounds terrific it jokes on him i'll be dead by then. I'm trying to get him. Is that it? This is a videotape for my daughter Maggie. Hi Maggie. I'm speaking to you from beyond the grave. Hope that didn't scare you. Well Maggie you're grown up now and unless you taped over this you're probably wondering what kind of man your father was he was a simple man a kind man a gentleman who loved his children and hello yeah he's here who is this bart's friend millhouse bart get your butt down here it's a real, this is Bob's ADR corner,

where that thing, after he says, hope I didn't scare you, it's just one looped mouth animation of him chewing, it looks like. And I really want to, again, we always say this, I really want to know what he originally said, because clearly that was written way after the fact. I love Homer's obvious disdain for Milhouse here.

Milhouse! Bart's friend Milhouse. I love every, this has to be the first time but every time homer hates the just the idea of millhouse like yeah you know there's this little wiener cut named millhouse like he complains about millhouse to burns later it's probably millhouse yeah he can't stand millhouse i love that uh god and yeah you're right though they they definitely tacked on like four or five extra seconds to this, which sometimes it's for ADR. And also it can be just like, oh, we're under.

Can you just make this scene last four more seconds? Also, another big cut here after he made the messages to his kids is that he was going to visit Reverend Lovejoy. And that whole thing got cut. Based on the text in her book, she made it sound like it got some level of animation done for it. She kind of mentions like, oh, I wish it didn't get cut and it had to get cut for time.

I couldn't tell if it had gotten like boarded at the very least, I wonder. Unfortunately, we have no access to cut Klasky Chupo scenes. Klasky Chupo cuts or like season four the first film romans uh season they could have made the first act a little shorter i think if this episode were written today they would just start from the simpsons at the sushi restaurant they don't need all that setup that's why they're there that's a great point they could

have that conversation at the the sushi table it's just like i can't believe we're at the sushi restaurant and then go from there you're right totally right about that uh but you know back then i think uh especially with brooks making a lot of the uh the calls they liked you know what is the family life like let's see the their dinner and tv viewers are stupid they they watch the show about a family they're in a sushi restaurant do they live in the sushi restaurant i I need answers. And then Homer heads over to the retirement castle, which first time I caught this, you caught it too. Yeah, go ahead.

Sorry. That Homer, when he walks in, they just use the shot of Homer entering the place from the Thanksgiving episode. You can see the Thanksgiving decoration at the top of the screen when he enters. I thought it was a joke. Like they still have their thanksgiving decorations up in january but it's also reused animation it's great as that yeah it does work as an unintentional joke though you're right i mean because in the thanksgiving

one they make the joke that they uh no later they'll do the joke on valentine's day that they just staple the decorations on top of each other endlessly so uh but uh but yeah the retirement castle visit to abe i like just how cold abe is to him he's just like oh it's you like it's uh this that abe instantly though falls apart and just like i do love you too yeah i do like there's a very weird looking abe there isn't there? Yeah, to the point where Matt Groening shudders on the commentary. And it is the worst looking character post-season one. It's the line on the facing camera view of Abe after when he says, What do you say we go fishing?

It looks like when Troy McClure shows you the early picture of Grandpa in the clip show. It looks like that. Oh, you're right. I sent Nina that when i was watching it the other day i was like look at this grandpa that's a great drawing i think um you know not intentionally so is his grandpa he has a lot of abe has a lot of lines in his design compared to a lot of other characters so he there's more chances of him looking grotesque yeah i was gonna ask you if abe was harder to draw having drawn him i actually like i like drawing abe like any character that has more lines they are easier to draw because

it's easier to make them look like the character it's the more simple characters like like bart or lisa that are hard to nail because if you don't get the the few lines they have perfect then they don't look like the character and also abe gets to sneak in a lot of shorts style uh character design rules that they've ironed out of a lot of other characters like crusty doesn't look much like shorts crusty but or there's there's some definite changes there but like abe looks pretty if you see abe in his first couple shorts like he looks pretty similar to how he looks here just change his shirt color yeah yeah his uh his hair is really weird his weird onion anytime he pulls at it or they they

do the joke of march cutting his hair i'm like how much of that is hair i well it's hard to read what's hair on his head one thing i love about grandpa's design is he wears his slippers everywhere yeah never wear shoes always slippers and it looks especially weird when they're they're later playing uh they're playing around in the forest and he's still wearing slippers yeah uh like when he's chasing after the turtle he's still got the slippers on yeah was he never shown outside a home in the shorts i think he was just in the living room yeah yeah he's in the living room yeah he wants to play one last he'd have to go outside i did laugh laugh is like one last game of hacky sack oh god i uh and yes bob you linked me to the clip of it but this is a very specific reference here of homer and abe having fun

together as as abe takes up all of homer's last day it's a reference to the uh 1967 anti-smoking ad like father and son i guess it's about you know have fun with your kid like no you're wrong it's like father like son think about it won't you which you hear that riff all the time mystery science theater what it is is like the little kid is imitating his dad doing all this stuff like you know hammering a nail into something or like climbing something and then it's like the dad is smoking but then the kid is going for the cigarettes so you're a bad influence and so the music you hear in this uh parody will later be heard in the scene uh of bart and jack in the box homer hanging out so it's just them fuzzily remembering this psa that they would see on tv in the late 60s wow i've

never seen that before just like seen it referenced many times just not the the actual thing i didn't know the music was referencing it we could play a bit of the music but it's just visuals until the very end so the very like cheesy 60s music you hear in in the episode is a parody of this music from this psa like father like son Manos, the hands of fate. I was thinking the exact same thing. Anytime you hear like a flute, that's enough. Okay. But yeah, just like really cheesy 60s music. They're not using the same music, of course,

but if you were a boomer watching this in 1991, you're probably like, oh, they're riffing on that old anti-smoking ad that we saw. It was sort of, this is your brain on drugs for boomers almost. I see. I always forget that when tom servo says think about it won't you like that it's a reference to that uh but yes homer and and abe play around together all day including uh they wrestle in the mud uh and so i do love that homer cancels all of his other plans and then uh crosses through him and then he he has to abandon his father because he's like, I can't spend all day with this guy. If you're into collecting cells, there's a nice cell of Homer and Abe playing catch at comicmint.com for $610. Oh, man, that sounds good.

You know, on Twitter today, I just saw somebody shared what I was like if this was a bit it was somebody showing off their collection and i was like if this was available i would pay 600 for right now and it is marge as the queen and bart as rat boy in the background and i was like oh rat boy cell i would kill for that i saw that too yeah i want that i do want that and i can't there's i there's too many i i make now enough money to make a stupid cell purchase and i have to stop some cells for the rest of us there's only hundreds you already have a great grandpa cell yeah no i do have the perfect grandpa cell which i got to even show off to wes archer himself uh but yes uh homer then has to speed off from his his love

star grandpa she did way to hog my last. Just a quick game of hacky sack. I love you, John. Yeah, yeah. The old guy's a little love star. Get moving, you hunk of junk. I gotta make up for lost time. Don't! I'm sorry, officer.

I know I was going too fast. Just give me a ticket. I beg your pardon? Just give me a ticket. Oh, well, that sounded like an order. I pay my taxes, and they pay your salary. So when I say give me a ticket, just give me a ticket. Uh-huh.

Maybe we don't want to give you a ticket. Maybe we want to haul your butt in wise guy hey look what else your tax dollars pay for huh the most sinister eddie we've ever seen maybe this was the first time as a child i was introduced the idea that cops can be not nice i maybe had never had to have that thought before as a kid you know you grow up in the 80s with uh with the reagan years you know cops are only nice guys they're officer friendly they're often from beverly hills like eddie murphy yeah yeah but i really love as as a mean joke uh the

cops saying like look at what else your tax dollars pay for like that it's very it's a very funny line but yeah god that sound of abe just going maybe that's where they discovered how great it is to hear just dan in the old man voice he does the best with that in grandpa versus sexual inadequacy yeah we we mimic sex earlier today yes the word sex so just that and when he says that that medical ailment oh yeah that line i can't it's it's from inhaling volcanic ash yeah we come back for the commercial break homer is trapped in prison he's with a guy who's in there for atmosphere which uh it's a very vaudevillian joke but it's it's cute it's funny i that joke. How we use electricity can be smarter, cleaner, and greener. At Electric Ireland, we can help guide you there.

You see, our new Net Zero Hub has all you need to know about smart meter plans, EV tariffs, solar panels, and much more. Making your usage clearer, your trips trips greener your home cozier and your world brighter find our net zero hub at electricireland.ie and then comes another bit where as a person now who is married feels totally different to me that homer going like i can't waste margie's time it's like no the first person i would call is my spouse to say get me out of jail i'm gonna die i don't want to die in jail i wouldn't try to save i i wouldn't want to also spend less time with that person by calling my alcoholic friend instead

and this is back in the era only in the first three seasons were homer and barney truly friends you know uh i feel like all of his jokes be shifted over to lenny and carl like oh lenny and carl can be outside of the the power plan and they can talk to homer barney is probably my least favorite character in the simpsons so i'm okay with him fading after these seasons you wish he'd shot mr burns and be still be in jail to this day he's okay in small doses i love barney here not only is he like just they this is my favorite version of barney that he is homer's bachelor friend and they both were bachelors but barney stayed in the bachelor life into his 30s while homer became a regular dad and that barney still lives in the same place that's like, we've heard it said before about Rich Moore.

Yeah. And other animators lived in the apartment they drew Barney's apartment to be. Apparently that Humphrey Bogart poster was the Scarface poster of its time. Just like the poster every guy had. Oh, God. What is it from? I don't know. Just like a stock photo of Humphrey Bogart.

Probably from some Humphrey Bogart movie. Yeah, it's like him with a gun and everything. Yeah, it was. You see, then it was Scarface with a gun and everything yeah it was you see then it was scarface and for our generation it was fight club or the two women kissing sure the two women kissing in black and white yeah that when scott pilgrim has that in his apartment i was like yep that's real that's that is the correct thing oh at least for straight guys anyway i want to talk about crazy calls oh yeah let's talk about crazy calls i got the clip right here uh homer calls uh barney's phone and he gets the nobody's here nobody's here and then homer just like damn novelty answering machine message tapes this is real it was a commercial i saw all the time as a kid and i have it uh set up to play before their parody of uh's Fifth. Take your call on the 1495 When I will get right back to you

Take your message, leave your message at the door Give someone the gift of gab for their answering machine. What you've actually done is bought a one-way ticket to the answering machine zone. Nobody's home, nobody's home I'm glad you called, but I'm not home But I'll be back before too long so yeah there that was a parody of crazy calls a commercial i saw all the time as a kid but they're simpsons it was nobody's here on this one it was nobody's home nobody's home which is better and when i was a kid i was like if only my family was that cool that we could have crazy calls i was gonna ask you guys if this

was a real thing i'm delighted to find out that it is because i i unironically love this i wish i could use that for my answering machine which i never check um a voicemail rather just to like tick people off oh imagine someone and they get bad instead uh i well i especially love that like in the 80s it's like well i gotta pay i can't just make this funny thing myself i gotta pay 15 bucks to have all this classic comedy prepared for me i i especially love that the last one was called the rap yeah like that's the name of it on the screen i would want a song that says don't call me email me instead i'm not gonna listen to your message couldn't do that in 1991

15 in 80s money that's not cheap either for i guess you're paying for quality there with barney has priorities my favorite version of this joke is George's answering machine message in Seinfeld. Yes. Yes. Yeah. I had never heard that song before. I heard it first from the Costanza version. Me too. Oh, same. Also, when Barney gets the call, I just love his like, I'm home, I'm home.

That's very realistic here. Actually, I got the clip. Wait, I can't call Marge. It's our last day on Earth together. I can't drag her into this mess. I know. I'll call Marge. It's her last day on Earth together. I can't drag her into this mess. I know. I'll call Barney. Nobody's here. Nobody's here. Nobody's here. Damn, no novelty telephone answering machine tapes.

Thanks a lot, Barney. I just wasted my one phone call on your stupid... I'm home. I'm home. Hi, Homer. You gotta help me, Barneyney i'm in jail you are hey homer go to the window hi neighbor i can see you just get over here and bring 50 bucks for bail 50 bucks what'd you do kill a judge i'm gonna get 50 bucks i just love the Popeye muttering that he does. In this disgusting apartment. I like the weird old technology joke that it's even hard to think about now.

Is that there's feedback because when Barty answers the phone, his voice is also coming through the speaker of the answering machine. So it's causing feedback and he has to turn it off. That's what that whining is from. And that was like a common tech issue. If you answered the phone while the answering machine was picking it up, you'd hear the feedback if you were too close. That's great. And I love the implication that Barney's apartment is in such a bad part of town also. Not only is it ugly, but it's also right next to the lockdown, like a police station.

And yeah, Homer is let out because he they collect 50 of rusty money yeah uh which uh they they joke on the commentary too of like oh wigum actually does something here they he doesn't drive around and arrest people but he can at least like take the bail money and uh i do like the little cut to them trying to have their nice final meal together and marge dressed them up and bart is just non-believing of like no no, really, why are we doing this? It's not, it couldn't be because we love our father. Why are we all dressed up? Because sometimes it's fun to dress up for dinner.

Why are we using the good china? Because sometimes it's fun to use the good china. What's with the candles? Sometimes it's fun to use candles. Why are we waiting for dad? Because we love your father and enjoy his company. Why are we really waiting for dad? And so then Homer is freed.

And I swear Heath Ledger watched this because Homer on his way out of the after leaving the police station, he is sticking his head out of the window to feel the air just like the joker himself does in 2008's the dark knight fugu joker fight him or he's just being a dog yeah that's it's about the joker is ripping off dogs this whole time you know barney he can come off uh i like to see that barney actually gives a shit about his friend like he's he's a little too needy to be like you don't want to spend time with your your buddies you want to be with your wife but but at the very least like he is sad that his friend is about to die like i i like that and uh this is where homer tells off burns and i feel like they them looking at women's ankles together on the commentary they're like oh smithers is straight here because he's checking out girls i'm like no no no he's at best i think he's turned on by like burns being turned on he's like oh ring-a-ding-ding yeah ring-a-ding-ding sir

yeah that's that's his uh impression of a straight person i guess yes which to burns reads as normal like that's how the straight people talked in 1923. Yeah. There's an animation mistake here because Smithers layer is overlapping Burns, even though he's like supposed to be behind him in the perspective wise. So he looks tiny next to Burns. It reminded me of the picture,

the photo that came out recently of the, the Biden's next to the Carters. Oh yes. Enormous. That's so funny. Yeah. Man, I missed, I didn't catch catch that i should be fired for

that blunder of not catching that blunder so i i just figured they had given them binoculars so smithers could use them to identify homer as they drive away like that that sounds right yeah it makes physical sense i i also like the let's see who we'll see who eats whose shorts i i will you know you mentioned richard sakai earlier the unauthorized uh the unauthorized simpsons history book also does allege that richard sakai is is smithers and that burns is jim brooks like that that is another of the potential sources of those characters you're dying and you weren't even gonna stop at most for characters. That's it, baby. Work those ankles. Ring-a-ding-ding, sir. Hey, Burns! Eat my shorts! Who the Sam Hill was that?

Why, it's Homer Simpson, sir. One of the schmoes from Sector 7G. Simpson, eh? I want him in my office at 9 o'clock Monday morning. We'll see who eats whose shorts. Wow. Of all the luck to think I almost died without telling the boss to eat my shorts oh come on you got time for one last beer please so yeah homer heads back into the bar tries to call but there's a prank phone call that's preventing him uh and i i also like mo saying it's the birthplace of the rob roy which which is famously not there. It was the Waldorf Astoria in 1894. You know what?

Weirdly playing I've got you, babe, in the background is happening in this scene. Wow, they're still doing it. Yeah, yeah. That's crazy. Second Cher reference in this episode. Oh, you're right, man. But it's so expensive for a thing you barely hear. I didn't realize it continued into season two it's definitely a

cover but they still had to pay money for it and uh but but you know rob roy vermouth and scotch whiskey i could go for one of those but yes homer then tells all of his friends uh at the bar who he never remembers uh that he he thinks of them and smiles it's a very like cute little speech i do love the guy's reaction to being kissed like you better be dying like that's funny and uh and then another great joke of as they're trying to leave you can't tell you think the car's moving and then it zooms out to show the like no homer they are stuck and barney is twirling as fast as he can there's also the the prank call from bark yeah the the classic seymour barts uh seymour bus i want to see more barts how often is this show on tv so the kids were demanding back

in the 90s where did you guys hear about this um fan theory about mo's prank calls which i don't buy at all apparently it's from 2016 i found this uh yahoo news article about it i don't think it's particularly newsworthy but i guess he had a slow day back in 2016 someone called senior schnorf on reddit had this theory that mo always knows that it's bart and gives him a big reaction just to make bart stay because he's a lonely man who loves children he's so sweet i'm like i don't think so i really don't think so i think he'd murder more children than that. No. But it's a cute theory, but as we all know, when he thought it was Jimbo, he was going to stab him to death.

Yeah, seriously. With a rusty knife. Yeah, the Yahoo article is called The Simpsons Fan Theory, but Mo is heartbreaking. Oh, come on. I mean, when I'm trying to pull together news stories for our community podcast every time, there's a couple of websites I just have to be like, oh, it's that website. They just publish like a fan theory. They have like a fan theory quota at some websites. They have to publish like two a week.

I don't blame them. I was part of that grind once. We were part of it. Yeah, I understand. And then we get one of the first of the many references to the graduate on this show i think it was only after they did deep graduate references and mrs boot lady bouvier's lover that i was like fine i guess i have to watch the graduate to get these jokes i guess that's why i did it good movie it is a good movie though though for baby boomers it's how they felt ways about things in their in their it was the breakfast club of their age i can see that uh for me it was rushmore that was my graduate me it was can't hardly wait no it wasn't i don't know what mine was

mole rats oh it was definitely for me it was ghost world uh that's a good that is for any um artsy girl growing up in the 90s oh yeah ghost world is where it's at as homer runs back i i like the shot of him screaming at the window and i also i just appreciate any time snowball 2 is like pawing at them playing checkers anytime there's natural cat acting i'm like ah they i wish they still did that i'm a real dumb dumb i realize not just the musical uh references graduate but him pounding on the window yeah whatever reason until you just said it now i'm like oh fuck that's the lane yeah how did i get the end of wayne's like oh fuck that's the elaine yeah yeah how did i get the end of wayne's world without that that's that uh that had to be the other one so

yeah wayne's world too i was like i i i just know it must be a thing because i've seen the exact same thing in like three different things made in 1991 to 94 and so homer rushes off to bed they've only got so many times he knew who knows when his heart's going to explode you know what if it happens while they're being intimate oh god risky oh poor marge traumatized much forever yeah it's she'd just be crushed by him there'd be two deaths yeah actually she'd suffocate yeah uh she tried to scream but she her mouth was she had a mouthful of flab. Gross.

Sorry. But this is another first in this episode, though, a sexy first. It's the first time Marge sleeps nude in bed, and first of many times. I think definitely Mark Kirkland really likes drawing it that way. I mean, I like that if marge is in the mood that she's like you know what i'm going to bed naked like it it perhaps seems risky for you know you never know when a kid's gonna have a nightmare knock on the door or whatever but i i like that bit of personality for marge yeah yeah this is purposeful nudity though in this scene yeah they uh this kind of shot would not be in the in the hardcore nudity

uh cutscene montage not in the don't turn on the light don't turn on the light scene that's the one you want to go for oh by the way the the chest hair on homer in this season and all the early season i guess very distracting yeah i'm glad they got rid of it yeah it's like uh it's it's uh bluedo chest hair yeah uh but uh scoville mentions that in her original script they she wanted a joke that homer failed to perform and marge is saying like hey with all the stress you're under i totally understand it which uh that's it's a cute joke but but yes this is the bit where uh james l brooks told her be real like don't don't run from emotion. Where can he be? Marge!

Marge! Homer! Hey, don't have to explain. Love you, love you, love you. I wrote a poem for you this afternoon, Homer. It's called To a Husband. Okay, okay. The blackened clouds are forming.

Oh, give me a break, a break march soon the rain will fall my dear one is departing but first please heed this call that always will i love you my one my love my all that was beautiful. Though now I'm shocked of like Marge fell asleep after that. Like I'd be like, I'm going to stay awake with you until, you know, maybe she was quite satisfied at the end of that intimate moment. The original joke Nell had was my da da da da da. And she says, sorry, I didn't have time to finish the couplet. But then Jim Brooks, I don't think he said, I think Jim Brooks was in in the habit of handing people notes yeah like literally like in a very enigmatic way he's a busy man he's trying to make a musical that he'll then make not a musical and yeah that's why

she actually finished the poem and i will say um that we just recorded our we hate movies episode about simpsons movie and uh that scene with the tape in marge uh you know just really broken up people say you know it's so moving. I don't like that. I think it's very manipulative. This, I feel, has more real emotion in it and it's not just making Julie read something 30,000 times until her voice is about to break.

Like, I feel like there's more to this that I like than that scene, which feels a lot more forced. I agree. As you know, I like the Simpsons movie, but I don't like that scene either, especially because by that point, there's been so many times where she's like, I can't do this anymore. I can't be in this relationship. That kind of takes away from that moment. The fact that she's tried to pull away so many times. Yeah. Good reason too, I should say. doesn't want her talking to Zweig anymore he knows he knows that's the final diagnosis but

yeah this this poem is much more naturally sweet and I do I also did chuckle at Homer at first not just receiving the poem but thinking it's corny and just being like come on Marge lighten up yeah uh but but yes Marge is asleep Homer walks over to say goodbye to his kids I I still love that he just compliments bart on his sheets he has no other he doesn't think bart will have a great life or anything it does feel like a callback to uh marge writing her christmas letter and her saying in bart well we love bart you're right yeah very similar joke but i'm not saying it's even in his dying moments he can't think of something nice to say about i'm not saying it's it's like a theft i'm saying it's

just what you say about bart and it's just like um there's something later uh in like the the country club episode where uh I love exactly yeah it's like they can never think of anything Bart's good at or any kind of qualities to him that they like so like and Bart I love him he's great yeah or sheets are nice so in originally inner pitch the bible was read by phil collins of genesis that was the joke but uh i really like that they got the late larry king for this i guess uh we're gonna play the death jingle but it's also dying yes this is this is the final death jingle we're like you know what enough of this it's it's uh i'm tired of making guests uncomfortable making them hear a death jingle yeah i mean seemingly mock a person for dying after 600,000 Americans died needlessly in the past 18 months.

I'm kind of done with the death jingle. That's fine, though. I will always appreciate Nina, your suggestion for creating the anti-death jingle. I really appreciate that, which sadly must go away in conjunction with this, I guess. But but here, yes, the final death jingle for the guest. Death stalks you at every turn. There it is,

death. Larry King, who passed away on January 23rd of this year, 2021 at age 87 from COVID-19 complications. So even the healthiest among us can suffer of covid of course he was uh he'd been through a lot in his life a lot of health scares in 1987 he had a quintuple bypass surgery and uh he lived a life he lived a life that's two more bypasses than homer got well no and conan had him on his show many times and all the jokes

are about like what happens when you die are you gonna live forever like it was always about his mortality and he had that like hulu show still like right before the end his buff sons will live on his memory i'm sure his large sons were pallbearers oh man no it's it's incredible that larry king passed away one day before the 30th anniversary of this episode wow it was the day before i i remember i tweeted it out and nell scoville like she's like yeah it's pretty eerie right like she she quote tweeted it and said that like yeah it's that he missed it by one day for such not just the episode he appeared in of two that he appeared in but also the one that is about mortality and dying like yeah it's uh it's eerie it's eerie yeah he only appeared one more time in sideshow bob

roberts i'm surprised like he was on everything he interviewed the ghostbusters back in the day like if he would be a talking head in any movie or tv show if you wanted him to be and you know i'm okay with the anti-death jingle dying as well because you were starting to get a little too trigger happy with that, I think. Sure. You were doing it for people who were like in their 60s. 58 years old. They're not near death. Yeah, and I'd also have to audibly knock on wood right before I played it.

I was getting too nervous about it. You didn't have to. You chose to. But yeah, Larry King, he was so funny. There were so many great clips of him in his late career that were coming out that were just hilarious of him i mean one of my favorites was seeing him asked about just tell me about working on ghostbusters he's like oh i got a huge check from it every time it played on tv one of my favorite movies i was in there's a great clip

of him in seinfeld and uh they just ended the show and larry's like so why'd you get canceled and jerry is just like do you even understand who i am canceled what are you talking he's so bad yeah and also of course just just look up i'm on ducktales larry yeah that's that's a classic clip but uh comfortable socks but uh why don't we hear Larry King reading the Bible? It's a good book. On tape. Ooh, it's read by Larry King. Hi, I'm Larry King. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without a sayer.

Beget Phineas. Phineas begat Abushua. And Abushua begat Ahimaz. Phineas begat Abushua. And Abushua... Beget Ahimaz. Ahimaz begat... Beget Amariah. Onward. Amariah begats Ahithoph.

Ahithoph begat... Shalom begat Hilkiah. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children. And the heart of the children to their fathers. Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse. Well, that's it. My old friend Duke's here for standing by. We'll'll get some coffee we'll get some matzo ball soup i love the san antonio spurs by the way if you're betting in the nba this year i think they're going to win it all

so i guess there's nothing more to say but so uh the bit homer fast forwards through his chronicles six four in general chronicles is just the section where it's like, and this father had this father and this father had this father and blah, blah, blah. I didn't understand why this was funny for the longest time because I didn't know what the good book was. If it said the Bible, I would have understood. But no, I was like, okay, I guess it's just some boring book.

I don't remember when I found out what the good book is. But yeah, now i understand like him fast forwarding through an audio version of the bible is pretty funny apparently according to where larry king stops the book reading he ends on the book of malachi which is most of the old testament but i feel like a christian like homer would want to hear the new testament it's where the stuff gets really good yeah though you know larry king why would he want to read the New Testament stuff? Also, Larry King is quite wrong because in the NBA finals in 1991 was the first of many Chicago Bulls winning the NBA championship. They would three-peat it, then they'd take two years away,

and then they'd three-peat it again. The Spurs would win once the showtime bulls were over and it was the and that was 1999 but uh he was quite wrong in the in 1991 you could not go wrong betting on michael jordan and his team and so marge wakes up she goes down and checks on him this is where it was james brooks idea that it would be warm drool to prove he was alive it's very sweet and uh and i like they could have just ended on homer's excitement at being alive here because i think it's really played well but i i agree with neil scoville i'm i'm still annoyed that they at least explain why homer isn't dead if you're not even gonna pay off all of the promises

he made like you know you know, explain it. I guess her original note was that they would have gotten a call from the restaurant saying, oh, it turns out the poison was weak and wouldn't have even paralyzed the cats or something like that was the line. I do kind of like the crass smash cut to this recycled season one animation and just the very, very not funny, but very boring bowling commentary from Dan and Hank. Barely in this yeah i still like this ending and when he says like oh from this day forward i vow to live life to its fullest and then he just goes on to eating pork rinds in front of the tv like that's how i feel this is absolutely how i will be once this pandemic is over i'll be like oh i'm gonna live life to the fullest and then just do the same thing i always do which is just stay in front of my computer all day homer chewing that one pork

forever over the credits bugs the hell out of me though you should read for another one it's warm he's alive homer homer wake up you're alive wake up you're alive you're alive what are you talking about you're alive i'm alive i'm alive and i couldn't be happier from this day forward i vowed to live life to its fullest yeah the pork rind scene it's uh from moaning lisa i thought so yeah it's right before homer learns that barney's bullorama burned down and that he's he's sad about that or upset by it i like too that reese says of like oh you know he had to it's a really hard to write boring things that aren't funny and then g goes like so but that's my specialty that's a good joke too i do like that but yeah i wish i wish it had a more conclusive ending but especially for a freelance written

script by an outsider to the simpsons i think it fits their style least of season two pretty well it's it's uh it's still the brooks season two kind of like no emotion emotion like that you're not allowed to go to silly town and i suppose by 1991 standards it's more respectful to culturally to japanese people than most things were in american sitcoms at the time yes it's a uh i still like it it really understands this version version of Homer from this era very, very well. I do like that. And I do still like I said, I still buy into the emotional aspect of the episode, even though I know obviously Homer is not going to die.

It's just really fun to see this kind of man deal with his final day on Earth. It's a fun idea for an episode that I've never seen before this. Yeah, it's a fine episode. Very notable for me because i saw like authentic uh japanese representation on a tv show especially one that i was really into that meant a lot to me i love that stuff the first act is uh is great the rest i'm like i could take it or leave it but it is a very solid script good one of the quality ones that will still forever scar me of like oh i thought homer died no so nina matsumoto i know we're gonna find you but

where can our uh listeners find you and support you and what you do uh well first of all i like to say uh happy birthday bob yeah yeah happy birthday well this will go coming up in three days live in late july so all the listeners that you missed your chance it was may 7th thank you that's right. Happy birthday. Whoa. Is this happening on the air? Yes. That's from me.

Whoa. I sent Henry to buy a bottle of Laphroaig for you. Nice. Enjoy that on your birthday. Age 10 years. Single malt whiskey. I've never had this, and it comes in a tube. You've had Laphroaig.

Oh, I have. We've only ever had it at bars, though. Okay. We never bought it. That's a different Bob Mackie that went to bars bars, though. Okay. We never bought it. That's a different Bob Mackie that went to bars and, you know, went outside. So that man is gone now. No, it's a very, very smoky gotch.

Oh, thank you. I know you like. I'm going to resist drinking this all in one sitting, but thank you so much. Time for my real plugs. Go to SpaceCoyote.com to see my art. Follow me on Twitter at SpaceCoyote. And I'm also on Instagram at Space.Coyote.art. Not very active on there, though. If you go to fangamer.com, collections, sort by artist, click on Space Coyote.

You can see all my video game merch. Most recently, I did stuff for Homestar Runner, Conker's Bad Fur Day, A Hat in Time, Life is Strange, and Slay the Spire. And you can also go to sparkscomic.com to learn about my children's graphic novel, Drawn by Me, written by Simpsons Comics writer Ian Boothby. It's about two cats who pilot a robotic dog suit to save people. And the royalties I made from sales of Sparks help pay for my application to sponsor my spouse, Bob, in Canada. So your money will fund our love. Please support our love. And I also often stop by the Talking Simps since it's discord oh yes yeah see me on there

so thanks again to nina for being on the show ask for us if you want to check out more of our stuff please go to patreon.com slash talking simpsons sign up there for five bucks a month to get all these episodes one week ahead of time and ad free and also access to everything behind the five dollar paywall that includes all of our limited miniseries. The most recent one was Talking of the Hill Season 2 Part 1. That was 11 new episodes of Talking of the Hill, our King of the Hill retrospective. And there will be a new miniseries coming up in the fall of 2021.

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about the what a cartoon movie podcast you may know that we do our sister podcast what a cartoon two times a month but we also do the what a cartoon movie only for our most premium of patrons at the ten dollar level you get all the five dollar things bob just mentioned and then you get at the end of each month a brand new often over four hours long podcast discussion about an animated feature film recent ones have included disney's 1997 hercules the cult classic cool world and celebrating the 20th anniversary of shrek and tons and tons more you've got at least 130 hours of podcast waiting for you if you sign up today at patreon.com slash talking simpsons at that premium level to get it all so as for me i've been one of your hosts bob mackie you can find me on twitter as bob servo and my other podcast is retronauts a classic gaming podcast about old video games find that

wherever you find podcasts or go to patreon.com slash retronauts sign up there for two full-length bonus episodes every month henry what about you i'm h-e-n-e-r-e-y-g on twitter follow that to stay informed about henry gilbert and all he's doing in his life. And also you should follow the official Twitter account of at talk Simpsons pod at talk Simpsons pod. Nina has helped a ton with that. That is how you'll stay in the loop. Whenever new podcasts go live on the Patreon on the free feeds,

whenever we got a poll or an announcement of a new schedule, any of that stuff, you stay up to date. If you are a follower of at talk Sim, any of that stuff. You stay up to date if you are a follower of at TalkSimpsonsPod on Twitter. Thanks so much for listening, folks. We'll see you next time for Season 12's worst episode ever. And we'll see you then. I'm going to go into the gun, and there's no spin.

My, my. Well, if he makes this, he'll be down by 40 pins. This match, though, is far from over, as you know. Yeah, it is far from over, but his approach has been wrong from the beginning, as far as I'm concerned. Well, he's an erratic bowler, Jed. Yeah. He tends to explode in the 789. Right.

So, he takes it out on the. Well, I remember that one. . Pauline, Illinois. That's actually, that was Pontiac, Michigan. Oh, it was Pontiac. Thirty-eight pins going into the eighth there. That's right.

Well, he's stepping up now. If he needs to get at least a spare, he's going to have to get a little bit of a break. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. eighth. That's right. Well, he's stepping up now. If he needs to get at least a spare.