Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - Simpson and Delilah (Revisited) With Mark Malkoff

Episode Date: February 10, 2021

We welcome on podcaster/comedy writer Mark Malkoff--check out his great show The Carson Podcast--for the landmark episode of Homer growing back his hair. We chat about dream assistants in Hollywood, old SNL sketches, non-canon Burns history, and MORE. So listen to this week's podcast, live from Hair City, Utah! Support this podcast and get dozens 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!

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Ahoy, ahoy everybody and welcome to Talking Simpsons, the podcast that's smothered in bargain basement lime green polyester. I'm your host, Scout Blaster Bob Mackie, and this is our chronological exploration of The Simpsons. Who else is here with me today? It's Henry Gilbert and my mother told me never to kiss a fool. And who do we have on the line? It's Mark Malkoff. And today's episode is Simpson and Delilah. You know, some women find bald men quite virile. Marge, weren't you listening? This is a miracle breakthrough. Not one of these cheap old sucker deals. Today's episode aired on October 18th, 1990. And as always,ry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history oh my god oh boy bobby a florida jury acquits two live

crew on obscenity charges george steinbrenner hosts saturday night live and on the tonight show this very night jay leno is the guest for guests Kadeem Hardison and the Neville Brothers. He's already planning his coup. Yes. I remember the two-life crew thing, but it's a shame on Florida. But it also, like, it only began the self-righteousness of Florida, I suppose. It says it's an important landmark case in free speech history. Was that the Bad As We Want To Be album? Yes.

I'm thinking of the Charles Barkley autobiography or Dennis Rodman. Yeah, but banned in the USA. Well, that was their sequel one too. For the George Steinbrenner SNL, even as an avid viewer of SNL reruns as a child,

I don't remember one breakout sketch from it. I'm sorry. I think it was as nasty as they want to be. Ah, okay. Thank you. I can actually do the episode breakdown. The cold open was George Stranbrenner at Yankee Stadium.

He's having a dream in his dressing room and he's fantasizing. It's this dream and he's dreaming and he's at Yankee Stadium and he's playing every single position there because he's such a control freak. And then the main sketch that they wrote that really did well was George Steinbrenner playing a boss that had trouble firing people because he was so known for firing people. And he was like,

who would be so dumb to be firing all those people? And that was one of the episodes, actually, that Conan O'Brien, I think he was with Greg Daniels when they try to go in and talk to him and try to convince him to do something. Steinbrenner was not very happy and snapped at them. Unfortunately, when I think of George Steinbrenner, I see the back of a man and I hear Larry David's voice. So I vaguely know what the real man looks like. I guess as a child watching SNL reruns as not a New Yorker and who didn't know much about the Yankees. The episode confused me.

Also, I'm surprised. Like, I don't know. How often is the host in the cold open? I guess I'm just used to the last, like, you know, 20 years. The cold open is the political thing and not not the Steinbrenner scene. I really miss it. Yeah, I was just thinking about that the other day. They would open cold with things like that all the time.

I'm guessing just because it's YouTube now and it's just in the last 10 years, it's very, very rare. But like Steve Martin, they opened up with a musical number that had nothing to do with topical, anything topical going on. And those were some of my favorites. They used to do them pretty often. I mean, they would still do the topical stuff with like Dana Carvey or whoever doing George Bush or whatever. Phil Hartman as Clinton. But yeah, I miss that. And yeah, in Tonight Show history in 1990,

Jay Leno with these guest host things, he must already been getting, you know, this was the tryout, right? Yeah, pretty much. He was the permanent guest host of the Tonight Show. So yeah, he was the guy that nbc was thinking about but they hadn't made their decision yet and of course our guest today is mark malkoff of the carson podcast he is a font of tonight show wisdom and mark i love your podcast i consider it a

companion podcast with the gilbert godfrey amazing colossal podcast and that teaches me about an era of show business i was barely alive and also not alive for. Yeah, they do a great job. I'm honored to even be in the same category. We owe you so much for you. You and our pal Nick Pruer, you got us into our Simpsons table read, and we really appreciate that. Oh my goodness. Are you kidding me? I mean, I know what this is like. People have been so nice to me doing things like this. And I mean, obviously, and I've been friends with Nick for years, and it took him one time, and it'd been a couple years, and Nick was going to fly to LA like he did the last time. I was out there for some work. And it was one of those things like Nick's like, I can't go. But is there if there's any way these two people that you do not know that are complete strangers can go with you? And after he gave me some back history, I'm like, yeah, absolutely. One hundred percent. I mean, that was really cool just being with you guys, because, you know, the show so, so well.

And if anybody should have been at a table read, it's you guys. Well, we thank you for the hospitality and also for shoving us at james l brooks and matt geraning when we were too shy yeah yeah you guys i it was it's interesting like you guys are very respectful which i i am too but at the same time when you go to those things um because i've been to them people go up to them and they're really friendly like when i i took you guys and we went up to to matt graining and we talked he was really uh genuinely interested that you had the simpsons podcast you talked to him about it i remember yardley smith after the taping was hanging out with you guys for like i don't know it looked like five minutes probably more she is a fellow podcaster yes yeah that was uh man and now now i just think like will there ever be another table read like that

for The Simpsons again? It's hard going back to the second. Like sometimes when it's like the second thing of something, it's not as good. But if I can do anything, and I don't know if I can, it would be fun to go back. I loved going with you guys

just because you got to meet all the people and you were really excited. I was excited too, but I know that you guys are on a different level for sure. The Carson podcast, you know, you've chatted with so many people, like not just people who worked on the show, but also like regular guests on the show. And I really enjoy the ones you've done with like Simpsons legends like Al Jean and Mike Reese about their time on the show. Yeah, they were great.

I really enjoyed talking to both of them. Al's been on, I think, two times. And yeah, it was one of those things where they were at the Tonight Show with Carson for like a year or something like that. And that was back when Carson wasn't very accessible. Later, after they left, he'd have writer meetings at his home in Malibu, and the writers would come like once a week. But yeah, they didn't really have access to him. And then in 93, which I'm guessing you're going to get to, I think it was 93,

that's when Johnny Carson came into The Simpsons and did his voice. And yeah, basically, Al and Mike told everyone, Carson's not going to talk to anybody. He's going to be in and out. And it was the complete opposite. You know, Carson was retired and was just hanging out and everyone was having a great time. It was making everyone laugh.

Yeah, it sounded like Gene and Reese worked with him at a very dark time in his life. He went through so many divorces and so many tragedies. So yeah, it was one of those things like Steve Martin said he was like the most famous man in America and just self-protection. He was definitely more accessible than another host or two. I'm not going to mention. But yeah, he definitely near the end was a lot easier to get to. But he had a really good time over. He drove himself over to the Fox lot and was telling the Simpson writers afterwards stories about how Bob Hope was was not his favorite guest and why and how he just couldn't believe bob hope stayed

way too long when he should have retired i mean he was doing it up until he in his 90s and carson just just didn't get that and uh i i know we've we both interviewed reese now i'm wishing though when we had done it that i had seen the alf clip show that they did in 88 that was just filmed on the Carson set that Gene and Reese wrote on. And basically used a lot of, I think they used a lot of jokes that were rejected by Carson because I think Reese told the story in your podcast, Mark,

that they had to write basically 20 times the amount of jokes that were actually used. And they were thinking in their heads, if you just had us write fewer jokes, they'd all be good. That's really funny. I want to mention Mike Reese. I've never said this publicly and I think he'll be okay with it. He is the only guest in the history of the podcast that he made me take him out to dinner afterwards with his wife, Denise. And no one has

ever done that. I had gone out with people and hung out with them socially, but he was like, what am I going to... He's basically like, I do these podcasts all the time. Can I get something out of it, Like dinner or something? I'm like, if you want to hang out with me, dinner. So Christine came with me. We had dinner afterwards. But that was definitely, I was strange. I'm like, he really wants to hang out with me more.

But hey, he got a free dinner. And I know he needs the money. I would pay for a pizza for a millionaire just to hang out with him for another hour, honestly, for extra Simpsons stories. Yeah, it was fun. We had a good time i i don't know if him and denise are currently here i mean their home is here with without everything covid i haven't talked to them uh i haven't talked to him in a while but yeah it's good hanging out

with him for sure based on reese's tweets he's still he's still traveling around a bit i just saw like in the last week he was in some faraway country uh in his in the last week, he was in some faraway country in the same rugby shirt he always is wearing. I'm going to steal that look. I like that look. Yeah, it's consistent. It's a real dad look, but he's not a dad. He's stealing dad valor. Dad, it's weird.

But yeah, so I mean, Mark, I remember us chatting about it on the day uh but you you were uh a Simpsons fan of the same style we were like from starting from around the same like from season one or even earlier yeah I mean I mentioned it to Matt Gray and we were we were all talking about it that I mean I was watching it during the Tracy Ullman years when they were just you know featured on the show very quickly kind of crude drawings but no I always sucked in right away And I remember watching episode one and it was so exciting. I remember when the T-shirts, the Bart T-shirts came out and it was like this competition to be the first person to get them. They were strangely, I mean, they were at the beginning, at least they were hard to get. And then they became ubiquitous. But at the time it was like it was kind of like we're in air jordans but uh i don't know in a simpsons way i mean have you you know as such a late night historian

do you do you think about how the the simpsons connection to to late night not just you know gene and reese and and conan and also like so many as we found out from doing the research on like the first run of of writers like a number of them came from letterman too like my george meyer and uh jeff martin among them yeah yeah no definitely you know saturday night live you had a couple like ian maxton graham who was there for um quite quite a bit yeah i mean definitely the simpsons i mean i say a handful of things have influenced comedy um daveman, for sure, his sensibility is seen everywhere. And I've talked to well-known people about this in comedy,

and it's a fact that he influenced more comedy in the last 30 years than anybody. And so Dave, and then the Simpsons. Yeah, you just see it in pop culture. You just see playing to the top of one's intelligence and what definitely what's capable with animation oh my goodness it was definitely one of those things where you you can just tell that people um just like we're we're gonna like we're gonna step up our game and uh yeah that's definitely um yeah beyond an impact and uh and yeah i i remember watching this episode live i thought i think the um i think there was like a commercial that was all of like a preview of like in season two crazy stuff. And it was like about more than one episode. And just the shot of Homer with hair.

I was like, wait, what? It's hair like that. It's it's funny to think of a time in the show when there was so much unexplored territory that just the idea homer gets hair like that can be a whole episode and you can really tell who the writers were in love with compared to the audience because the first two production episodes are burn centric the first production episode is burns running for mayor i'm not going to say the full title it's a mouthful the second production episode is this one and it's burns promoting homer so they were so obsessed with burns right from the start of the second season.

If this had aired in production order, Homer would have ruined his political campaign and Burns would swear revenge. And the very next week, Burns would hire Homer to be a junior executive and then be very forgiving of him. So I think it's better this one aired before Three Eyes on Every every fish and there is a

new composer for this episode so season two is weird in that there are three different composers eventually alf clausen will take over in the fourth production episode but this composer only composed one episode of the simpsons this is it his name is patrick williams and the connection is that he uh scored on the mary tyler moore show uh and lou and Lou Grant and I believe Rhoda as well. So I'm pretty sure Brooks just knew this guy and is like, OK, let's try out another guy, because it felt like everyone they were trying out really wasn't working until they landed on Alf Klassen with the first Halloween show. And I think the composition in this, it's not as like blaring as the season one stuff. It's I mean, it doesn't hit the sweet spot of what i think

alf klussen discovered like right from his first episode but it's good it's it's fine it's fine uh musical direction in it but i think you know the composition for a live action show versus the simpsons you know it's a mary tyler moore i think had had fine music so did rhoda but it's like you know you don't really remember it and you don't need i i guess too in mary tyler more like or or those a regular sitcom you're in the same set all the time there's not like action without dialogue too much you don't need to score a ton of things in the same way you have to with the simpsons and he did pass away unfortunately in 2018-1979 so yeah this is his one uh brief you know brush

with the simpsons and that was basically it so yeah no alf clausen yet but then when alf clausen does the show there's an episode after that without him because they're running out of production order so just want to let everyone know about that and uh you know you mentioned the those brooks shows i it's something too i forget about james l brooks is like he's such a we just think of him like he's either the Simpsons guy or this Oscar-winning director. But if he was just known as the guy who was the showrunner of the Mary Tyler Moore show, Rhoda, Lou Grant, Taxi, just that spate of things, and then he didn't do anything after, that would be an incredibly memorable career, you know?

Yeah. I mean, what an incredible man. And he's the one and i'm sure you guys have talked about it so many times that really gave the simpsons freedom i mean to do what they actually wanted to do and kept them the network away yeah no if he didn't creatively yeah if he didn't have the seniority he had and the and if fox wasn't in the low point it was when they went to brooks and brooks was like so much bigger than him they than them he wouldn't have got that deal i do you know at some point when disney owns simpsons that that no notes

rule is gonna go away like that it's it i can't imagine it it at last in perpetuity you know and that and i don't think that'll be a good time i don't know well speaking of the corporate world it's something that watching this episode as a child all this viewpoint of like homer and in the business world and having to like move upward in a corporate structure that made no sense to me as a kid uh and now as an adult i'm just like god all of this how it's just there's no meritocracy it's just a bunch of dumb luck and how you look and empty posturing like i now it is a real much realer episode to me and also the health insurance factor of it all oh yes yeah

the simpsons will be right back something is happening to homer simpson The Simpsons will be right back. Something is happening to Homer Simpson. Something wonderful. Wait, who is that young go-getter? Sort of looks like Homer Simpson. Something magical. Mom and Dad have been sleuthing again. What could it be?

It hasn't been this risky in years. I don't want to think about it. This Thursday, Homer's dream will come true. I am here. I am here. The Simpsons, Thursday at 8 on Fox 29. When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance, I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care about you. Home and auto insurance personalized

to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part. Visit Desjardins.com slash care and get insurance that's really big on care. Did I mention that we care? We hope you guys are enjoying this week's podcast while you grow as much or as little hair as you need. And a big thank you to our guest, Mark Malkoff. Thanks so much for coming on. He's our good buddy. He also hosts the Carson Podcast and so many other

cool things you should definitely check out all of mark malkoff's stuff and if you're a fan of this podcast you should really check out all of the stuff we do on our sister podcast what a cartoon as well as all the awesome exclusive stuff on patreon.com slash talking simpsons me and bob do this as our full-time jobs thanks to the support of subscribers on there who for five bucks a month they get every episode of talking simpsons a week early and ad free you can hear next week's episode right now the same goes for the what a cartoon podcast and you get a ton of extras like once a month you get talking futurama where we cover an episode of futurama right now we're in the season three

doing the same kind of in-depth chat that we do on The Simpsons each week and twice a year we do a weekly Patreon exclusive mini-series covering shows like King of the Hill, The Critic, Mission Hill and more you can hear Talking of the Hill season two coming very soon so please sign up for five bucks a month right now at patreon.com slash talking simpsons to hear it all. But if you want something as fancy as the full DeMoxenel plan, then you're going to want to sign up at the $10 a month level of patreon.com slash talking simpsons you get all those many exclusives on the five dollar level and you get our most exclusive podcast each month we do what a cartoon movie where we cover an animated feature film in the same way we cover the simpsons and what a

cartoon we've covered movies very recently like Whisper of the Heart the Overlooked Ghibli classic Dexter's Lab Ego Trip the End of Evangelion and so so many more over 120 hours of exclusive podcasts for you you get the whole back catalog and a new one each month in addition all the other stuff for just 10 bucks a month of support at patreon.com slash talking simpsons and yeah so i mean this episode begins with uh there's a cute little couch gag i like their little dancing couch gag it's fun it's fun in its simplicity but the episode begins i i like the simpleness of it too it's the extended family just like sitting in front of the tv with tv trays watching a game show yeah it was still in the early days when they were like this is what most american families do they're not at the table

they're in front of the tv i know my family was table dinners were like maybe easter and christmas but that's it and uh and i also like that selma just like lights a cigarette as she's uh like just relaxedly it's like yeah i'm i'm home. I'm smoking after the big meal. But as they're watching the game show in this first clip, Homer gets some good news. Okay, the capital of North Dakota is named after what German ruler? Hitler. Hitler, North Dakota? Bismarck.

Bismarck. Hitler. Hey, I'm still beating you, boy. Okay, the colors of the Italian flag are red, white, and what? Blue, yellow, orange, red, purple, white, black, green. Green. I was right! Okay, we'll be right back with more grade school challenge after this important message. I used to think that losing my hair was as inevitable as the tides. Then I found out about demoxanil

the new miracle breakthrough and hair regrowth miracle breakthrough there's been a miracle breakthrough the odds are demoxanil can help me grow as much or as little hair as i want to hey today i'm gonna do it for your free brochure send five dollars to demoxanil. 485 Hair Plaza, Hair City, Utah. Hair. Hair. Just like everybody else. I love that desperation on Homer there. That's great. But there's a little, there's so much little things in there I like. On the commercial, you can hear Harry Shearer like intake air as he's about to do it, because it's like they had the national commercial and then the local guy has to record the actual message of where to send your money. And that's so good.

Like, it's such a great little specific. And I couldn't pin down the exact commercial. This is a parody, but I feel like the the metaphor of like running free on the beach comes with a lot of medication commercials. That's true, yeah. Though I did find one hair replacement commercial that at least has one phrase I think they took from it. It's real. It's the hair maker's new permanent replacement.

A whole new thing. They give you back the hair you used to have, as much or as little as you need. Okay. Yeah, just the as much or as little as you need.'s okay yeah just the as much or as little as you need that does sound like hair plugs but that guy's his hair plugs yeah if it if it says on there like they use your own hair that means they it's hair plug city i have a little uh minoxidil corner to uh hopefully not get too boring but in the show the parody is demoxanil

and in reality it's minoxidil. And 30 years later, these products basically support every podcast now. Right, yeah. They went, like Viagra, they went generic. So that's what people are advertising on most podcasts, isn't it? So just a really brief history on that. Minoxidil was developed in the late 50s as a treatment for ulcers, but then they realized it was good at helping with hypertension. So it was approved by the FDA in the 70s.

And when it was approved, they noticed a different side effect, which was hair growth. So this ulcer treatment that was good for high blood pressure also made you hairier. So all of these unexpected things are coming out of minoxidil. So skip through all the boring stuff. In August of 1988, minoxidil was approved by the FDA to treat baldness in men under the trade name Rogaine. So this was only two years before this episode aired. Wow. So Rogaine, very recent at the time of this. And in 1991, it was made available to women. And by 96, you could buy generic versions of it over the counter.

And like I said before, now listen to any podcast. You'll hear things from like hymns. And it covers the whole gamut of male problems in middle age. Full circle, yeah. But as I understand it, Rogaine, or similar, it's about keeping hair. It can't grow new hair, right? It's not a magic hair growth potion. It really is for Homer in this.

It is. Nobody really knows how it works, but it's really ineffective if you've been losing hair over the course of more than five years and also it works in uh areas of smaller concentration not on a giant bald dome so yeah uh that is essentially what minoxidil is a huge scientific breakthrough uh and a fun idea for a sitcom in the uh early 90s it was a very very new product back then i wonder what dan castellaneta felt like doing all these lines about losing your hair and being bald like i i i wonder if he had a good sense of humor about it or not he was at that point a baseball cap guy and i think it took him a few years before that cap came off in public i'm like ron howard yeah still still only the oscars is he taking that hat off uh the i did look up that monoc like rogaine was like 50 bucks

a month or in 1989 la times article said rogaine was 50 bucks a month so uh the price is increased a bit for homer here or he's getting an obscene markup by the guy he goes to oh also on that as an eight-year-old like i didn't get any of those questions about you know i didn't know bismarck north dakota or or green the the color of the italian flag i i was the right age for grade school uh championship i really i also love in the sound design you can hear patty and selma say green twice before homer finally says it i can hear a lot of things all the chewing it's still a very noisy show up front and also bart's still in his salmon pink shirt that he wore and bart gets

an f like they haven't fixed that color thing yet i also on the commentary i didn't need them to tell me this but on the commentary graining mentions these hitler jokes are partially done to needle him because he does not like reference to references to hitler using hitler as a joke and that that only made hitler jokes appear more on the show in this time that is true uh and then homer goes to the medicine cabinet and uh they're not quite uh where they would be with sign gags quite yet a lot of them are illegible uh and they don't really give you enough like space to see them all but we see all of the failed hair treatments that homer has like a hair chow bald buster gorilla man scalp blaster hair master and then there's something in the lower right

corner the words i made out were you you lawn baiter you l-a-n-b-a-t-o-r i caught this one okay it is you the letter you wanna be the letter b hair then the letter e okay you wanna be hair e wow okay uh that was uh that's quite a lot take in, but there's things like obscuring it in the foreground. Yeah, yeah. I do think, though, this was Rich Moore, wasn't it, the director on this one? I think his team did a really good job. The background designs and detail in it, you compare it to a season one episode. This is the first one his crew did for season two.

And they have stepped it up big time in the design element. Like the interior of their bathroom for one thing. Or like you'll see when they were told draw a disgusting bathroom later in this episode, they do it great. Like they honestly do it too good. And I'm like disgusted by it. And Hair City, Utah, not a real place. I've canceled my vacation already. But I do like Marge.

Marge is just, you know, the comforting wife of this episode. But I love how sweet she is to Homer and just like, you know, trying to make him feel good about his how he looks i i like her you know even saying these supportive things that are the opposite of the accepted wisdom that uh bald men are found to be quite virile it is interesting that in 1990 they're doing an episode about the male self-image because i feel like all of the 90s home improvement style sitcoms would be like a man doesn't care what he looks like he's a caveman gorilla and who cares but homer is extremely vulnerable and the entire point of this episode is he is very insecure about his self-image which is why the ending is so sweet yeah you don't do too many episodes about being bald these i don't know it's uh i it was one of my favorite uh of the

old dick van dyke shows that i used to watch i really love the one where um mary tyler moore's character outs that carl reiner is uh wears a wig on tv like that was such a great one just gonna say the ending was the one thing i remember from watching when i was a kid i know we're jumping a little bit but just hear marge singing tenderly there wasn't really there wasn't comedy it was just this tender moment um was the thing that really surprisingly out of all that stuff is the thing that really stood out most to me and uh and well i think vd like finds a lot of i love vd on the commentary john vd i think he is you know he's more self deprecating and he's like very funny about like dumping on his own things that he thinks was like bad writing or or things he wouldn't right now i i like that a lot i also that he's and he is another like a former snl guy as well like he came i think

straight from snl too or maybe he was like snl army man and then and then simpsons i like too that homer says i think it is meant to be a joke homer says no cheapo sucker deals and then he's going up an escalator to like a mall kiosk like this is the hair clinic is not not really a doctor's office uh but uh yes homer is uh asked for the treatment he finds out is a thousand dollars he then is told he's then handed like hair in a bottle for 20 bucks hair and a drum hair and a drum that's right and any hair growth would be purely coincidental i love that that way he said that but as homer finds out the cost i love how broken he is in this scene and then the the quick turn in the in the cut a thousand bucks of all the rip off

screwed job joint forget you pal thanks for nothing so i say forget you. Thanks for nothing. So I say, forget you, pal. Thanks for nothing. And I storm right out of there. That's telling him, Homer. No, not a tartar sauce. They call this a portion. Hey, Lenny, are you going to use all your tartar sauce?

Try fish sticks. This sucks. Put complete a crumb, Dom. If I had hair, you wouldn't be calling me that that oh man don't be a sap all your life just fill out a few medical insurance forms creatively charge that the moxonel stuff to the company it's a thousand bucks first would can my butt in no time flat oh a thousand bucks so what to mr burns that's one less ivory back scratcher yeah so i think we get our first real lenny and carl scene like they have their regular voices and they are like the working stiffs that we would come to know and love them

as when when we interviewed vd he i think he underplayed his importance as the creator of lenny and carl because he just said he needed like you know two bodies for homer to talk to at work and he named them lenny and car Carl and he was very gracious of saying other writers built them up and everything but here they are in the second appearance like he created them in the first episode he wrote in season one and then here they are in his first season two episode and he is like giving them they're doing things that Barney Gumbel can't be to Homer like they're they are a sounding board they are creating the next like step in the story for him i i will say lenny sounds uh different but not i mean it is sheerer doing it but it's like

i don't know it's a whinier lenny it's not it lenny usually has less confidence than this i think well we've seen how he lives yes yeah slowly over time they destroy lenny i i also uh i'm with graining i'm surprised they got screw job on television like in 1990 that's shocking hearing this sucks from a character on tv in 1990 was pretty risque only on the fox network that's right oh yeah that's what my molasses mom said yeah yeah no that's true the first time that they ever did and it was huge news was when they did the uncle buck television show which who was with that was it kevin meanie i think was uncle buck yeah and one of them said sucks on the air and it was like this huge thing the first time it was it was on prime time but it might have

been on fox before but for maybe one of the other networks but yeah that was definitely something i i love that just this pronouncement to dry fish sticks this sucks like just so childish yeah and he just shoves it with me like it's uh i and also the design of the cafeteria like so good like it's never honestly the cafeteria never looks this filthy when it's seen in most other episodes no they usually just have like a little break room with donuts yeah they drop this lunch plan from the uh snpp uh union contract i guess but yeah like uh i want to go back just really quick to the to the weird hair doctor uh with kind of like the droopy voice yes yeah he does not appear again and uh like the the name of the establishment does not have a joke name

it's just like hair clinic or whatever and his his name plate says h boyle i don't know what his name is until later in the episode when you see the contract it looks like it says harry boyle so i think that is a season one style joke name yes so there you have it folks harry boyle does not even like return for a background appearance like as a random like extra on any scene so it's right up there with howard's flowers or something i guess you know in the future they just have a stock honestly at this point i'm surprised it wasn't marvin monroe that does it like they they already have their stock guy they don't have you know frank yet but i also just like lenny and carl is telling homer you know like just rip off your insurance who cares like i i and thanks to this episode i do think of things as you know, ivory back scratchers are just like a thousand bucks to me is a lot.

A thousand bucks to my boss is seemingly nothing. But I guess this episode's lesson is actually your boss counts every penny that is spent and they do care a lot. And he will buy that ivory back scratcher. I also, this is the first time I noticed like an extra gag in there too, is they're saying that Burns won't notice how much it costs. There's a sign on the coffee machine that says honor system coffee refills 25 cents, which seems to show like they actually do care a lot about money and waste. And also the way Lenny puts it, like some guy who loses a finger hits a jackpot. That's the type of thinking that is expanded upon in the King Size Homer episode. That's right.

As Homer tries to claim disability for money. Planning the seat for the workers' comp episode. Yes. And so, yeah, Homer then proposes insurance fraud to H. Boyle, Dr. H. Boyle. And I do think it's weird. There's a little shot of Homer in a reaction shot with missing his lower hair in the drawing, which I get, you know, there's always, you know, mistakes and retakes and stuff. But that is such like an unneeded shot.

You can just edit it out or like, I don't know. I'm surprised that was there in the broadcast version. He's rapidly losing hair even within the scene. It's an emergency. And also was like a runner in season two that if you needed to do something clandestine you turn on the radio and it would be to this mexican radio station just playing uh you know just uh mariachi music like this the same bits in war of the simpsons where marge and homer having a fight in the car and they turn up this music so the kids can't hear them fight. But so yes, Homer commits insurance fraud.

Phil sits out in the back alley, gets his de Moxonel. I like him going straight forward. He goes upside down and happily is massaging it into his scalp. That takes quite a lot of work, this de Moxonel treatment. Is he doing that every night with de Moxonel? I think he just uses it once. No, actually Marge is massaging it into his head later in the episode so i think maybe after that initial treatment you can just like just spray it on or slap it on though that seems counterintuitive if you're upside down like a bat won't it drip off of your head when your

head's upside down did they all just see batman is that why he's doing that it's gotta be yeah you totally you're right the michael keaton one they and that's also a very adr line where homer said praise like dear god give a bald guy a break and and also i noticed the background design of the bedroom is also still following the kind of season one or shorts rule that if you have two characters in the scene but not the other members of the family you need photos of the rest of the family on the wall homer wakes up the next morning takes his mouth wash and takes off his bonnet and sees boom he's got hair like uh like two feet of hair grew on him it's an amazing product vd brings it up himself on the commentary and they all agree it's like if in the reality of this world this exists and it's only a thousand bucks other times when homer

has spent a thousand dollars why can he not buy this again and have hair? And why can't Mr. Burns buy it either? We have to ignore all of these questions. I will say when Burns later says, I knew what demoxenelia is, Mr. Science. Like, yeah, I think that does mean he's tried it and it doesn't work. I think so, too. I caught that this time.

That's the that's the that I think they have a slight excuse for but for at any point in the last 30 years homer could buy this hair back i i like to think that they find out deboxanel if you use it for more than six months causes cancer and they took it off the market and so homer could he couldn't rebuy it if he wanted to but i also i remember the shock as a kid like the answer of what would Homer with hair look like? Because Marge has a different color hair than her body. But Bart and Lisa, the yellow just extends to their hairline. And it's the same for Abe too.

So you wonder like, would Homer just have yellow hair? But instead, he has this brown hair that pretty much just becomes the norm anytime you see dudes. I mean, they also, I think in season two, just set the rule. Nobody has hair like Bart and Lisa. You can't have yellow skin to hair. No, you're right. There were never any flashbacks to this point. What was Homer like when he was younger with hair?

What did he look like? They did not show that yet. So this establishes the brown hair for Homer. I do remember in the script for Bart the General, when we went over that, there was a joke that abe shows bart a photo of young homer and young homer looks like bart and has bart hair but obviously that wasn't done so it wasn't canon but the thought was there that bart homer with hair might have bart's hair so homer gets his hair and it becomes a lengthy wonderful life parody again i didn't get

it as a kid i i had not seen i only watched those movies so i could get simpsons references me too uh though i mean then i came to just appreciate wonderful life is a great film on its own it's fantastic yeah and rich more in his team again just great job they're told like parody wonderful life do a slow motion run like there's this amazing like tracking shot as homer's running down the street and everything on screen is moving like that's a complicated shot to do on tell on television animation moses open at dawn barney is there definitely when you see barney they're like here's the president barney has been downgraded quite a lot from season one barney already by

this point yeah he just isn't he's not the homer friend he is like just always at mose yeah possibly living above mose at this point season one barney it would have been totally normal for him in the same way that he told homer no you spent all this money at the racetrack like he would have he would have been the one to tell him to rip off burns like letty and carl this is the one of the first examples of letty and carl replacing barney and by replacing barney it is a full downgrade for barney and he becomes like a sad or drunk because of that and also homer runs by uh the early neighbors the winfields and i i did a quick count of it and i think if you just consider the first 17 episodes of the simpsons the winfields appear more than ned flander wow

they're in more scenes in that like it's it's crazy that they were in so much so they thought the the elderly married couple that yells at homer would be this like you know constant in the series they were the statler and waldorf of uh their time yeah i like that comparison i like i i mean i love them yelling at homer get a haircut you hippie that's uh it they did just give him that line to jasper the next year because jasper's funnier than the winfields like he's got a funny beard uh but yes homer's running down the street he even like shouts to a funeral and ever the people in the funeral just smile back good morning that's a good joke one of those early morning funerals you've heard about. Got to get him in the ground by eight.

And also, I love the design of the dark-haired dude who looks just like Homer, except he has curly black hair. And they're fun little dance together. I love that. And they have the ringing church bells on screen just like Wonderful Life, just to make it fully clear. And I love him just hugging his children and rolling in the grass together it's such a fun scene and uh and it was the first time i noticed like snowball too is is playing with oh yeah and it's a good little extra lot thing that's very cute and then homer heads to jake's unisex hair palace the return of jake the barber

first scene in bart's haircut uh and actually the same in this season he's in the deep deep trouble video but he basically appears once every three years after that point like he he cuts Lisa's hair in the uh 22 short films and Bart works for him briefly in season 12's Lisa the tree hugger that's right and he's just there for Dan Castaneda to do his Floyd the Barber impression from Indie Grinth show and also like lenny he is grandfathered in with the beard line uh deal like he gets to he gets to keep the shorts beard line but i think actually yeah jake jake the barber has the special he's one of the very few it's like him and crusty and abe i think they're the only three characters who appear in the shorts that got to graduate into the series.

And that goes back to Life in Hell, even, where Matt Groening's punishment as a kid was to get his head shaved. Yes. Which just seems like torture to me. Some kind of psychological torture. That Homer Groening, a harsh father, it sounds like. Also, the line of, like, I haven't seen you in 20 years, that does imply that Homer went bald right after high school, which they have that joke in the high school episode later this season.

But then in the season three flashback, they show that Homer does, I mean, he's losing hair by the time Bart is born, but he does still have it. Yes, as Homer comes home, Patty and Selma are rightly disgusted at first at the idea of Homer in this next clip. He's much happier at work. Well, just between us girls. Well, he hasn't been this frisky in years. I don't want to think about it. Daddy's home, sugar.

Here, it's coming to you. Whoa! Homie, my sisters are here ah dinner with three beautiful women i must be in heaven this is patty stop drooling look who's talking it's really weird to see them horny for homer like especially patty yes yeah it's the last time she was attracted to a man i think it's really funny i do enjoy how uh the the pda is just played on their faces we don't see it yeah that's a good it's a good gag i i mean especially like hearing daddy's home like like or just the sound marge makes the that is seemingly homer Homer like grabbing her in some area. It is disconcerting. And I love Homer's

like basically Lego hair is what his first haircut is. Homer is just reflecting on the last time he thought about what an adult should look like and that was the 70s which is why he looks like the 70s executive after he gets promoted by Burns. The 90s had a lot of leisure

suit comedy like it was uh like the mocking of the leisure suit guys of the 70s yeah like the uh the powder blue prom suit or whatever yeah like lime green business suit yeah these funny uh and of course polyester i mean there was even the entire video game series leisure leisure suit larry as well i i like that all of his friends don't understand like who uh how like why homer looks different when he comes into work like they're like oh a new tie he's made of solid gold and it's one of two times lenny doesn't know what's wrong uh and uh they they say this on the commentary track and i double checked it it is true this is another like big first in this episode it's the first time burns is looking at a wall of monitors and people he's never uh like in burns his first appearance in homer's odyssey he is

watching homer but like from a window and watching over homer or uh they definitely are like in previous episodes omnipresent with like the telecom but even even in the three-eyed fish episode that in production order precedes it even that does not have the wall monitors so this is a big first just just burns watching a wall of footage and remarking upon it is is such a of the character. It's hard to imagine him without it. It's a great way to transition between scenes because Homer is doing something you pull out, Burns is watching him do it, or vice versa. Though it would take Burns like five more years to invest in color monitors for these things.

It's still, in 1990, it was impressive enough that it was all in black and white. But yes, Burns, it has to give somebody a promotion hey there's something different about you homer do you know some white yeah you look like you got a tan i know what it is a new tie morons pathetic morons in my employ stealing my precious money this is hopeless none of these cretins deserves a promotion. It's in the union contract, sir. One token promotion from within per year. Wait, who is that young go-getter? Well, it sort of looks like Homer Simpson, only more dynamic and resourceful. Simpson?

An unspoiled lump of clay to mold in my own image. A new junior executive. Bring him to me. Attention, Homer Simpson. You have been promoted. You are now junior executive. Bring him to me. Attention, Homer Simpson. You have been promoted. You are now an executive. Take three minutes to say goodbye to your former friends and report to room 503 for reassignment to a better life.

I kept to that music there because that is a lot more filmic of a kind of music. Not really the tone of the show. And Smithers is setting up this cast system oh yes yeah even at this point this was the joke that burns who has had many interactions with homer already to this point doesn't recognize him and also only for plot purposes makes the random assessment like yeah you know what this guy i'll mold him in my own image like just to his i was his uh his patented unexpected change of heart that always happens uh and again had this aired in production order

it would have been uh that homer just ruined his his political campaign but he doesn't remember it and also i like uh i mean that's a pretty good union the power plant has, that they just give out a token promotion once a year. I never had that in any way. It feels like that's all they're offered, though. Yes, yeah. They got to fight for that dental plan later. Yeah, it was fun just watching Homer getting into this new world, and then you see his office, and then the guest star who i don't you guys can mention later but yeah just to see this whole different world of him uh working there was really really fun yeah i mean

and him being told like you're getting a whole nother life like just to a better life than telling homer that you're not friends with these people anymore you're done those are your former friends it did i mean this does reflect upon like 80s executive and business culture for sure. I mean, it is 1990, but we're still in the 80s. Homer is all 80s businessman. Part of the story of this episode is Homer becoming an 80s executive is what it is. Right down to the little ponytail. Oh, God, that ponytail.

Yeah, he finally grows into that ponytail. And it's fun seeing Homerer doing the um uh the fiddling with the gloves thing i kept he i always think he stopped doing that after season one but here he is doing it there too i i guess he'll start juggling it in like season 10 or so but uh yeah so homer now has a a tiny little office and uh i first time i caught that Homer calls a resume a resume. Yeah. That's good. And also I think it's funny. This woman is like really thirsty for Homer when he's like, you know, he does have hair, but like he's in a shitty green leisure suit.

Yeah. This dumpy guy in an ill-fitting suit. But yes, Mark, you mentioned him. The big guest of this episode who broke a lot of barriers in this episode of television. It's Harvey Fierstein, who I believe was the first credited guest star on The Simpsons who went by his actual name. Yes, yeah. In the episodes that follow, they would have James Earl Jones go by his own name, and they'd have Tony Bennett go by his own name. But Harvey was the first.

And in case you're wondering, his trademark gravelly voice, not a health problem. He has an overdeveloped vestibular fold in his throat. So he's got like a double voice. No one talks like Harvey Fierstein. It's amazing. Yeah. If you try to imitate it, you'll hurt yourself. So don't do it.

He's and I mean, he's been openly gay his entire career in the 80s he through the 80s he was a very well established like tony award-winning actor and writer for torch song trilogy and for what would become the birdcage la cage a fois or however it's pronounced and but it was the beginning in the 90s where i think they decided he could be on television like him being so openly gay they could put him on tv like he he did he did a one-off appearance on miami vice i saw on imdb before he did this but then after this he did like cheers and mrs doubtfire after mrs doubtfire he was just in every independence day was after that yeah this point in time, we were just two years out from the movie version of his play Torch Song Trilogy.

And he was in that as well. And yeah, so these commentaries, I honestly think we've talked about this before, Henry, that Al Jean is watching these episodes again in 2001, probably early 2001. So by the time season 14 rolls around, he's thinking about like, who can we bring back? What things have we not addressed yet? What scenes that we deleted earlier could we put in other episodes and in season 14 al jean tries to get harvey back for the episode three gays of the condo he sends harvey the script he doesn't like it so they get another very openly gay uh actor and comedian scott thompson from

kids in the hall and he plays a different character so carl was supposed to come back carl is one of the many things that aljean brought back to the show after watching these episodes again for commentaries but carl still has not returned to the show i'm i'm sad carl didn't come back for that but not now you know scott thompson's great he's fine i like him yeah and i don't know about you guys but it bothers me that there is a carl with a k in the same episode as our beloved carl with a c always bugged me yeah they could have given him a different name if you didn't know the man himself if you were watching snl you probably knew the the parody of him that john lovitz did which now seems very mean-spirited and homophobic yeah i guess so yeah that's all yeah that's the only thing i knew about him i i mean i didn't even know if he was a real a real

guy harvey firestein but lovitz would do the plug away sketch and then and the catchphrase was always like i just want to be loved is that so wrong my mom loved doing that impression like just it was but but now i think about it like so we're mocking a gay man for wanting to be loved like is that what this joke is it was it was from a movie it was actually he had something like that in a tv movie that he did and it wasn't exactly but it was a line that he he said um i yeah i forget what it is i believe it was like an after-school special about aids i think it was i uh yeah but it's it also though knowing what snl is was, the writer's room was about, I wonder, too, if those sketches were about mocking John Lovitz and making him play somebody gay. Like, if that was to be mean to him. I don't know.

But he's still kicking around at 66. Yes. Yeah. Knock on wood. I guess, actually. Henry, he's only 66. Oh, wow. There's a long future for Harvey.

Yes. Yeah. 66 oh wow there's a long future for harvey yes yeah and uh this character uh watching this in the 21st century it's very progressive in that they uh are getting as close as they can as saying that he is a gay character uh they really can't get away with that yet on you know broadcast tv uh so that's cool and i like it i like that harvey firestein uh is out and he's playing this character but he is also and they are aware of this like a very tokenized character who is there to help homer for no reason he is he is the magical uh gay man just like how there are magical black men in movies that in tv that serve similar roles like

i'm here to fix the white straight man's problems for no reason that is going to benefit me and i'll just disappear when your problems are solved i guess with with Carl, you are to assume he's in love with Homer and wants to help him, I guess. I mean, there's also a funny bit on the commentary. Like Brooke says, I wish I had an assistant this great. I mean, and they're aware of it because like just of how much of a like a sacrificing angel he is at the end. He he gives Homer's umbrella and walks away in the rain. When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance, I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care

about you. Home and auto insurance personalized to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part. Visit Desjardins.com slash care and get insurance that's really big on care. Did I mention that we care? Like they know the kind of character they're writing. They're aware of it. It doesn't really make it better, but I do like him. He takes the fall. I meaner's gonna get fired he takes the fall i mean yeah he he definitely was a fun character just to see how far he he would go just to uh please homer and in 1990 he was the first like one man queer eye for the straight guy yes he's turning around this straight slob into like a well-dressed uh you know metrosexual man if you want to use that word he's doing all that. Yeah. I mean, I guess they just let you,

obviously they can't say, I, they didn't feel in 1990, you could say, I am gay with this character, but every, beyond just the casting, everything about Carl screams gay man of 1990. Like that.

I, I, the last thing I, I saw about Harvey recently recently was unfortunately in the last like few years i'd seen him have to go on social media like it's harvey weinstein everybody that's who it is it's not me i'm not that guy i'm a good guy please i because i do think on some social media uh at first when all of the Weinstein stuff was happening that he had to go like don't say Harvey Fierstein it's not that's not who did these things please

and I believe they wanted to make Carl look like Harvey as he does in real life but he's like no no make me like a blonde Adonis I don't want to look like me in this show I demand that too when I get put on the show I want to look I want to look very different hey but well that was also how different the show was then like they well if you had a guest star the guest star played a person they didn't play themselves like which i guess they they still do it's kind of i'd say 50 50 a guest star is somebody like they just had on hannah burris to play a guest star not himself which yeah actually i was gonna ask mark have you have you have you watched the road to cincinnati episode which was the one for our table read i haven't i i i for

some reason i i you know it's so funny that that was the episode because i'm so i was so transfixed just on the actors doing their lines like everything the plot and everything i did like after it was done i was like what did they talk about i mean i was just so into the the process but i haven't seen it i should do that after this yeah i was the same way i just remember the broad strokes of like the road trip but i was it's just a surreal experience that i was not like pinning down the plot elements into my brain but watching it and sitting down like i remember that and that and that and that joke kill that joke slayed yeah it's a great episode yeah i should check it out. I just remember for them, a lot of the people that are there that are visiting

are just looking at the script almost all the time. And I'm like, and that's tempting. And you definitely, you know, look at the script sometimes, but I just, no matter what, try to focus on the actors and just watching them do their thing. Because I've seen people just like not, like fans of The Simpsons that have visited,

they're in their script almost the whole time and i'm like no people it is a novelty to get caught up in like wow they're actually saying everything that's in here yes yeah but then you realize like oh no i should actually watch the actors and it was such a treat to be like we i mean yeah it was hard to not be transfixed of like i am behind hank azaria right now like he is directly in front of me and i'm watching him him act out his chalmers for the entire episode yeah he was really nice kevin richardson was so so kind i mean they were all nice yes but i remember kevin richardson when he was leaving he was one of the last to live and i remember him waving to me when he was in his car and driving out but uh yeah that was definitely a fun time yeah he was everybody was nice to me when he was in his car and driving out. But yeah, that was definitely a fun time.

Yeah, he was. Everybody was nice to us, but he might have been the nicest. He was too humble. We went up to him. He's like, oh, you don't want to talk to me. Go talk to them before they leave. It's like, no, we want to talk to you. Yeah, I had to tell him, like, I know all the other stuff you've been a voice in.

I love your work. I hope he appreciated that because he is a voice acting legend in his own right even though he's like new to the simpsons he's been voice acting for over 20 years now and basically everything there is he's he's for him it's like i feel like when he gets cast as a ninja or a shredder it's just like beyond i'm shredder again i was batman last week i'm in all of the lead roles and everything uh but uh i also think it's funny that homer succeeds when he's given a gay assistant it feels like it is a dueling gay assistant to smithers like oh yeah yeah they haven't i they they did have the one line of smithers saying the feeling is more than mutual to burns but they haven't really made him

the um the font of gay jokes that smithers is smithers is not gay in this episode he's an asshole is what smithers is like this is the most sinister smithers has ever been he's a true villain in this episode yeah pure jealousy and you can just see it uh escalate and and uh he's not going to stand for it and and i have to say in some of these moments i of smithers being a jerk here like when he comes in and you can see he's already when he comes in and tells helmer just shut up in the in the meeting don't say anything that's him trying to control things you think like has he said this to every new executive to try to keep them in their place but it also makes me think of my personal fan theory that

smithers is a jeffrey katzenberg parody that i think and specifically when he was working for barry diller at paramount i but that's you know just my speculation but when i see him being this kind of political guy i i'm thinking this is the jeffrey katzenberg smithers i guess yeah he is at his most katzenberg in this episode uh but yes why don't we hear the wonderful voice of the guest star hello mr simpson i'm carl he sounds good hire him i'll call you back marge simpson meeting in the boardroom tomorrow at two just sit there and keep your mouth shut. Got it? Yes, Mr. Schmidler. He thinks he's so big. You don't belong here. Huh? You don't belong here. You're a fraud and a phony, and it's only a matter of time until they find you out. Who told you? You did. You told me with the way you slump your

shoulders, the way you talk into your chest, the way you smother yourself in bog and basement lime green polyester. I want you to say to yourself, I deserve this. I love it. I am nature's greatest miracle. Go ahead, say it. I... Trust me, Homer. I...

Take a step and say it. I deserve this. Louder. I deserve this. Shout it. I am nature's greatest miracle! I'll need three weeks vacation and moving expenses you got it buddy let's go shopping i love that's quite a trick by carl yes it's like i'm gonna pump you up

to actually give me all these benefits that's a pretty good a pretty good move on his part i also just love god the match cut of him going like let's go shopping and then it it goes from him in his seat to being in front of the store ah so good there are some like really cool match cuts in this episode rich moore is amazing yes yeah i mean there's there's a reason he went on to be an oscar winning director of of disney films like there's he's he would direct like two of the best looking episodes the show ever did. Marge versus the monorail in Cape Fear. Like, yeah, I got the I mean, the entire, you know, suit purchasing thing. When I see, you know, get two suits for ninety nine bucks, that does sound like a good deal to me.

Like I'd get one of those. Yeah. I mean, I don't know about you guys. I'm a failure as a man and that I've most been kept away from formal occasions. So don't actually have a suit yeah no me neither i have a tie oh that's hey that's all you need whenever i need to put it or nick pruer is the same way for a long time i don't know if he still has us if he has a suit but he didn't have it for like years and years like decades uh do you have a suit you can wear for special occasions mark or are you i do when I have to. It doesn't happen much, especially these days, of course. But yes, if Nick is listening and Nick Brewer needs a suit, he knows where to come.

Yeah, I have my one tie, and then every three years I'll need to put it on, I go to YouTube and say, how do I do this? Somebody teach me again. YouTube has replaced the carls of the world yeah i mean well the lesson carl is treating teaching homer here is that you don't buy off the rack you get it tailored like that that guy actually does do a good job of concealing it because every scene after this homer is drawn like he's lost a hundred pounds like he's he hasn't lost weight, but he must,

there must be some really good like girdle system in the, in that tailored suit. They got Homer, you know, our former president had the difference approach to concealing it and that you just like have more billowy fabric. So it's a mystery as to what shape is going on behind the scenes there. I also love the shot of Homer with the,

I am nature's greatest miracle shot like that's that's a really fun shot uh and yes uh homer i do also love marge's response just hearing a male voice she's like he sounds good hire him that's great but uh it comes to the next morning uh marge is happily making pancakes for breakfast it uh she's in as bart can identify she is very satisfied right now they've been smooching and i like that homer goes from like 70s businessman to a a slightly more grown-up hair though not the cool 80s hair yet he still kind of got the wet look going like the slicked back hair yeah yeah yeah i think then homer finds out that he forgot their anniversary and marge actually says he has a he has a reason for forgetting it this year uh but in comes a guy singing you are so beautiful to me the

uh song made famous by joe cocker which i think is what dan is trying to that's the version he's singing as it's it's a real over the top joe cocker which i like and yeah carl has set this up too he's fixing every element of homer's life i love that i i love his i i love dan's like over singing of it like to me you are so yeah again oh my goodness yeah when the anniversary when the he didn't get anything for uh marge and the doorbell rings and yeah that was so funny and then he sings it yeah yeah carl uh carl did think everything and that shot of the interior of his home like so good too like it's really again great background design like this this screams the home of cultured gay man like and and also i think the breakfast in bed thing he has tells

a story too like he either made that very nicely for himself or off screen is some partner of his who served him breakfast in bed. That's what I like to imagine. Anyway, mom and dad have been smooching again. Can't be late. Happy anniversary, Homer.

What? Our anniversary. Are you sure? Well, don't worry, homie. This year you have an excuse for not remembering what with your job and happy anniversary mrs homer simpson you are so beautiful to me

yeah you are so beautiful to me can't you see can't you see hello mr simpson it's calm ah it sounds like everything has arrived wonderful you did this yes sir i hope i didn't overstep my bounds you are so beautiful to me i love you homer i love you carl it marge i like commerce pronouncement of I love you too, Carl. Marge. But yes, we then get to meet an executive board that does not exist, I think, after this episode. Burns doesn't have any. They note it on the commentary. It's like Burns really slimmed down his executive boardroom after this.

They did use this kind of set piece for other boardrooms but the joke is like all of these college educated people have no practical ideas for the real world we'll see this later in uh the yunkee herb episode that's right yeah he's that's when he talks shit to all of them for going to harvard and uh which i always love a inter harvard bashing joke on the on such a harvardy show as the simpsons uh but yes burns is sick of hearing all these yes men proceed smithers our first issue sir is our low productivity and record high worker accident rate any suggestions a round of layoffs might wake up the idiots we could put caffeine in the water cooler well those are my ideas you people don't

think you regurgitate. That's why I promoted someone who's in touch with the workers. You. I think you mean him, sir. You, then. How would you improve the worker situation? Well, sir, for one thing, we had a problem every Tuesday

when the cafeteria would serve fish... Fish sticks? What in blazes are you talking about? Well, sir, they cut the head off the fish and chop up the rest into sticks and then put seasoned bread... I know what fish sticks are! Get to the point! Well, you only get this tiny little cup of tartar sauce to dip in them and I always run out...

Will you stop wasting our time, Simpson? Shut up, Smithers! Can't you see what he's saying? A happy worker is a busy worker. Three cents worth of tartar sauce could save us thousands of man hours in labor. I like the cut of your jib, Simpson. Let the fools have their tartar sauce could save us thousands of man hours in labor i like the cut of your jib simpson let the fools have their tartar sauce mr burns have clearly never heard of tartar sauce before i love a i i think he's lying that he's even heard of fish sticks before yeah but i i love that that writing is such like an snl standby to just like the boss who's like ah that stupid suggestion you made

i made all the it's exactly what he's saying i like the cut of your jib like that's i i recall the jeff martin telling that story of the in writer's room character that conan would play of the uh boss who's like oh do you like that idea, huh? Well, so do I. I forgot about that. Yeah, these things that Homer is winning for the workers are just like the cheapest and smallest gains, like just a big glob of mayonnaise and relish on your plate. That's what we've won for you. Ladle after ladle of it.

Yeah. Well, I also like, too, that the people are giving him bad ideas, but Burns is just mad that they're saying his ideas. Not that they're bad ideas, but they're being regurgitated to him. And I do. I often think when layoffs happen that they at jobs I worked at, I was like, what executive said that that would wake us up if they laid us off? But I did catch to the, the female executive. That design, she never returns, but skincare consultant Rowena is the same character design, but with changed skin color.

I spotted Rowena. Yeah. A short-lived character. I love skincare. I feel like if they just done it one more time, it'd have been three times. Maybe it was just hearing Phil Hartman say say skincare consultant rowena it's in my head yeah also did you notice next to the female exec is the giant forehead man who got the homer and cashmere photos oh yes yes that ridiculous like literal egghead that guy i think

he was cycled out of the of the production eventually may i could see the animators being like well what other character packs do we have of guys who work in offices well we got this big head guy what about him and i also like that the newsletter puts it as management caves into condiment outcry over under the picture of homer serving it up yeah uh did we mention the uh the health insurance newsletter yet did that joke pass by oh yeah no homer did say yeah He was asked what he got and he's like, oh, the newsletter. Yeah, that makes me think of, so I have health insurance that I

don't use and they punish me if I did use it. But every month they send me a newsletter. It's like, here are recipes. And I'm like, are you mocking me? You don't need to send me this. It's just a reminder that I really, this is too much money and if I use it, my premiums will go way up. And they go up anyways every year. But they at least they printed they spent the like probably 20 cents to send you that i'm paying for peace of mind uh and so yes things are improving though i actually think

smithers is correct when he says that all the improvements are just because homer is promoted and he's not bringing down the averages anymore i think i think history has proven that smithers is correct there and homer is that bad an employee he brought down everything uh but yeah but i mean that's failing upwards i uh into executive uh spot i i think they could have done a if they were looking for an extra scene to do there could have been one where homer it can't connect with lenny and carl anymore like Like he's management now and they don't like him. They could have done something with that. But I also like Burns' pronouncement of,

my dear child, old Smithers. But then it comes, yes, the, I've never used an executive washroom. Has anybody else here been invited into the fanciest of business bathrooms? All of my bosses over the course of history have used the same bathroom as me, and they probably hated it.

I hate talking to them, too. Well, Mark, you worked on Letterman, right? Was there a private secret exec bathroom for Letterman? I'm sure there was, but there's definitely a key, the bathroom key, to get in. You had to get past the receptionist to even, yeah, I guess to go out to get to the bathroom. But I'm sure Dave had had one.

I saw him, I don't think, any time that I worked there except for the holiday party and when we took a staff photo. But yeah, I'm sure Dave had that. Probably, he probably had two of them or at least at the cba at the at that new york office there had to be exact washrooms for like i don't know if less moonves ever comes to town perhaps no oh yeah that was that was an extra joke i didn't mean saying his name he should be isolated uh but yeah the i it's also you know i would think even a year later they'd make jokes about carl and smithers like knowing each other or something there's as far as they and they're strangers to each other and there's not even a joke that like they're both gay or anything

yeah they really played up more smithers was just like such a sycophant that he would even be gay for his boss he would be like sexually attracted to his boss but then they're like let's just broadly he's gay in general yeah no i guess too in season two there's in blood feud there is a cut line of smithers saying like just leave me enough blood to get me home to my wife so they yeah they i think season two smithers definitely is a straight man who is in love with uh burns but that's the only man he's in love with and then by season three he is a gay man who also among the men he is attracted to is attracted to charles montgomery burns for some reason but i like to imagine that

carl and smithers have a romantic history that they are ignoring in the workplace they're like let's let's pretend we don't know each other uh and yes homer is taken out of that gross bathroom i talked about before uh walked to the executive washroom apparently the i read on a that this is a reference to will success spoil rock hunter for uh that frank tashland movie when he's given a big management uh promotion but i i didn't watch the whole film i'll watch some clips from it online i mean it looks like a great film i probably should uh you know familiarize myself more with the works of the great frank tashlin but i i've not seen that film just though i do

know it's where uh jay manfield met uh that target a guy and all right that would birth the uh mariska hargitay we all know and love on svu but uh but yes homer now also just has gordon gecko hair as well yeah he is full like a wall street man i guess also trump hair if you want to say that i mean he's trump hair that is the look yes that's the look it's like that uh we've said it before but like donald trump has existed so long that he was a well established person both by the time the simpsons aired like every he was a nationally famous man at that point but uh i did also like hearing on the commentary vd point out that he's like he he wished rich moore was there because he could apologize to him for

all the crazy interiors they demanded they design and this washroom with like you know a three-piece uh symphony in there and that and a waterfall with exotic birds well he's also doing more than he needs to do the director because uh we didn't cover the whole scene yet but when the scene ends the tiles on the floor like transition to the windows in the building at night it's an amazing transition it's still very impressive 30 years later i really liked when um i think it was burns dropped um he washed his hands with with uh the pond water that was coming in through a statue from a statue and just dropped it and then like right away there was somebody that's job was just to take his paper towels off the floor yeah the way that little guy like just runs in off

screen yeah it was it was like the u.s open it was like a ball person like a ball boy or girl at the u.s open it reminded me they were really quick it reminded me of the alamo draft house when they deliver your food oh yes when there were movie theaters it was a long time ago those existed yes remember those times but uh but yes homer uh meets up with a very different burns in the bathroom. Stunning. Absolutely stunning. Oh, hey, old man. You know, I was watching the Dumont last night, and I happened to catch a fascinating documentary on Rommel, the Desert Fox.

Now, there's a man who could get things done. Towel, please, Simpson. Allow me, sir. I said Simpson. Sure thing, Mr. Burns. Well done well done simpson now walk behind me down the hallway can do sir uh yeah it's smithers just destroyed by this too yeah i really enjoy how just the high class nature of this place is immediately cut by the sound of a toilet flushing and then burns walking through these squeaky batwing doors just like this is this huge like low class moment just cutting through the high-class atmosphere.

That is a good joke, yeah. And also Burns calling TV the Dumont, which that's good. The Dumont Network, no one really knows when the last broadcast was, but it was probably in 1956. So Mr. Burns is really misremembering where he was. Though it does feel like when an executive would tell you, like, oh, I was watching a documentary on a nazi last night and that guy gets things done i i think it as uh the heightening of burns jokes would continue i think you could imagine him having

personal dealings with rommel like or that he would have met him in like 1938 at some business function uh as burns would say he he built bombs for the nazis and they worked damn it uh but yeah this the smithers here who gets so mad at this this is such a completely different smithers to me this is a smithers who wants to move up the ranks in a business like this is a smithers who's like he's toadying to get a promotion and to get more power like to me now thinking of waylon smithers as a guy who wants power or more success that that's not Smithers at all to me. He's also upset that these pathetic tasks that he used to do are being taken from him,

like trying his boss's hands. That really makes him mad. Like someone else is drying his hands. Yeah. Someone's walking closely behind him. And yeah, my God, that cross dissolve. Amazing. walking closely behind him uh and yeah my god that cross dissolve amazing like so ambitious to go from the tile floor to the to the tiles of the or the windows of the building just uh such a

lovely shot and when smithers pulls homer's file we get some non-canonical information about him including his date of birth which at this point in the series is may 10th 1955 so homer is 35 in this episode wow which now he'd be 65 if this the date of birth rang true still to this day but they they change it they change it it was funny on the commentary when you're talking about homer's age to hear gene at the time had recently gone through he's like i remember when i got older than homer and didn't like that feeling and now uh i we're close to is when we hit 40 we will be older than homer has canonically been in the series which uh it happens to all of us it's not just the big 40

it's aging past homer that's what it is i'm i'll always be older than george costanza at this point in my life so man don't like it no but yeah the the scheming shot of smithers like him shadowed and cackling like that's the closest in the show smithers ever got to being the evil arcade video game boss that really is true uh but yes uh they cut to the next day it's uh the happy backyard of the simpsons with all the fun toys bart's treehouse is now a tree castle which does get repossessed after homer loses his job i gotta think that i think so yeah and marge at least they're setting up the fall from grace already by saying like just because homer has this fancy job you have to let us know he has saved no money and so that's how he'll be screwed next and i

really like that line uh there isn't a cloud in the simpsons sky in the next scene it's cloudy yeah just to let you know things bad things are happening for homer visually even and lisa's line about an absence of mood swings and some stability in my life uh that also feels like another time where lisa is pointing out i'm in a sitcom and everything changes for me all the time and this is crazy uh and and aljean uh has a fun comment on there when homer says he's gonna buy her a pony that's when he was like oh gonna back pocket that that'll that'll that's an episode we can do which he would do the next season i do think in the the homer's last hair look right as he meets with burns for this last bit of scenes it's this weird like papador i can't really place what it's it's supposed to be i can't figure out what they're doing yeah it's this weird like papador i can't really place what it's it's supposed to be

i can't figure out what they're doing yeah it's kind of lumpy yes yeah he got rid of that ponytail pretty quickly but uh but yes he's assigned to give a big speech the second he leaves smithers enters and tells burns that uh that health insurance fraud has been committed by one of the executives smithers doesn't name Homer as it. It's weird that he doesn't say that. But I love that Burns sees it as like, I was going to buy that ivory back scratcher too. Seems like Homer is in a lot of trouble. One of your executives has built the company insurance plan out of $1,000.

What? Bless his high behedies. And I was going to buy that ivory back scratcher. How did he do it? He charged the company for demoxenil. It's a baldness cure. Thank you very much, Professor Science. I know what demoxenil is.

Now, go and make an example of this hooligan. With pleasure, sir. Carl, you gotta help me. Mr. Burns wants me to make some speech to his executives and... What do you want? Oh, just thought I'd drop by to tell you that you're fired. What? Our company does not look kindly upon $1,000 worth of insurance fraud.

Clean out your desk by noon, Simpson. Wait, Mr. Smithers. Homer Simpson is innocent. I did this. You did? What are you talking about? Mr. Simpson was unaware of any impropriety. I take full responsibility.

Really? Really. Oh. Well, then, you you're fired whoever you are here's a thousand dollars hey what do you care if this guy's bald my reasons are my own it's uh it's a bit of a cheat i will say in that uh i mean smithers has a vendetta against homer it's weird that he would just bend so quickly to be like oh i guess this is fine i don't care anymore he's like oh wait well yeah you could say like so you forged homer's signature you went to this guy like yeah smithers could dig for it more and prove that homer did it but he just kind of gives up yeah i

and that carl not only like uh accepts being fired but also gives a thousand dollars away too which though at that point i asked myself like homer should have asked carl for a thousand dollars to buy him more hair like he's like well you're giving away a thousand bucks carl he has just just become a guardian angel character at this point in the story yeah yeah it's uh i just love his delivery like that also not just his delivery, but the animation. He does kind of a dramatic turn when he says, my reasons are my own. That's great. And that Smithers says, whoever you are.

Again, I want to believe Smithers is pretending he doesn't know who Carl is. You would think the gay community in Springfield is a tight-knit one. Probably you know each other pretty well. Especially in 1990. And Smithers' tie is miscolored blue for some of this scene, too. So they're still, you know, the overseas ACOM, they're still figuring it out. I also think Carl's going to get another job very fast, seeing as how he is incredibly skilled at what he does. I think he doesn't need to worry about that. He's a great interviewee. Oh yeah uh but uh yes carl leaves uh he says he did it like

any soldier would do jumping on the grenade to save his commander and uh i also it's just so sweet how he throws homer his umbrella and gets wet it's like even sneezes oh yes yeah he's just sacrificing everything for this man for this idiot like yeah it's like even sneezes oh yes yeah you're just sacrificing everything for this man for this idiot like yeah it's uh homer and homer only kind of wipes away a tear but you only see it from the back but you can tell it did really touched him and then as homer's driving back home vd goofs on his own writing here saying that homer is like stating his motivations out loud and that's not the best writing i i like that uh but yeah i mean you need to let people know like you got your hair you got your hair oh man the big speech like you do you

you got to remind us of all the stakes so of course as it could only happen bart must destroy homer's life in the end it has to be bart's fault uh in bart's dream sequence i love his beatnik design it's a funny looking design i i also noticed that Milhouse and Lewis have their voices swapped in this. It's true. Yeah. Goof them up there. It's weird to see Lewis get a scene, you know, where he's doing something and not just sitting in the background, but still early.

Lewis is still one of Bart's best friends at this point. Milhouse is his number one best friend, but two years later, I don't know, probably be Nelson in the Stream Seeks or just Millhouse. Is Dancing Homer next in production? Yes. No, wait, it's Treehouse, then Dancing Homer. Okay, so yeah, and that episode is established that they're best friends. Yes, a spit brothers event. Actually, you know what?

Now I think about that Dancing Homer episode. Homer must have made $1,000 from that job. Like, buy more DeMox and LVAD. Again again it was taken off the market uh some monsterism was called caused uh but uh yes bart splashes some on his face and then honestly homer has to be blamed for this because he surprises bart and bart drops it then when homer could have picked it up off the floor and stopped it from all spilling out, he instead chases after Bart and lets it all spill. So if it's that important, just lock it up.

Yeah. Leaving it laying around. With all that money, buy more than one jug. Yeah. Buy more than a six month supply. Buy a three year supply, Homer. When you really care about someone, you shout it from the mountaintops. So on behalf of Desjardins Insurance,

I'm standing 20,000 feet above sea level to tell our clients that we really care about you. We care about you. Home and auto insurance personalized to your needs. Weird, I don't remember saying that part. Visit Desjardins.com slash care

and get insurance that's really big on care did i mention that we care but yes as homer chases after him he gets probably the closest to murdering bart for real he ever did in the show like and it's it i know it's supposed to be played for comedy but bart saying i love you to homer to prevent his murder is actually very dark it's a dirty trick yes uh but yes homer nearly kills bart in this next clip Ah! Ah! Ah! Boy must die! I love you, Dad! Oh! Dirty trick. Okay, I'm not gonna kill you, but I'm gonna tell you three things

that are gonna haunt you for the rest of your days. You ruined your father, you crippled your family, and baldness is hereditary! It is. Homer, why don't you just call the pharmacy I don't have a thousand bucks But you do don't you Marge You've been squirreling it away haven't you Saving it for a rainy day that's what you said right

Homer Dad is taking this in a less than heroic fashion Him sobbing as he rubs his head On the ground Dad is taking this in a less heroic fashion. Him sobbing as he rubs his head on the ground. Oh, God. Lisa is a great topper to that joke. Just like, yeah, this is incredibly sad to see your father do this. In all future versions of Bart, though, that we've seen, he has his hair. So he kept it.

He's not fully bald. At best, it's like a slight hairline you going back but otherwise yeah like in the future where bart is uh chief justice of the supreme court he still has his hair he's still though i guess maybe if you're at that level he can afford uh demoxenel all day long you know i i like the kind of like weird wall-eyed look on bart when he says it is that's uh that's a good little gag and and also a bit i noticed this time is like when homer's saying squirreling it away for a rainy day right right yeah yeah he's reaching into margie's hair where we saw that's where she keeps the money jar in the first episode to air so yeah like it's

really brief you can hear there's like foley of his hand going into the hair you can hear it even which you wouldn't i think in sound design in season three they wouldn't do that but uh it's uh i feel i wonder if that you know was intentional on the writer's side or if it was just on the artist's side they're like oh homer should be searching for the the jar of money in her hair while he's begging for on his knees like and it's just so broken uh but again it's all his fault like this and that demoxenil makes your hair fall out instantly if you don't if you miss one night your hair is gone seems like a real scam to me scam and flam there homer destroyed his hair's all gone the next morning he comes in wearing his fisherman cap smithers i think already knows homer has lost his hair and is is uh again just like cackling at homer being

suicidally depressed about this speech let's say don't don't hang yourself or yeah you're not gonna hang yourself are you yeah but uh but homer has another guard another guardian angel moment here. You are one of Springfield's very special creatures. Your obedient servant, Carl. Good luck, sir. Carl, so that wasn't just a sweet voice I heard inside my head. What are you doing here? I just came to say goodbye to the gals in the typing pool. Yeah, well, thanks for the speech, Carl.

But I can't give it. Look at me. I guess I haven't taught you anything what do you mean don't you see the tartar sauce the bathroom key drying your bosses hands you did it all it was never the hair you did it because you believed you could and you still can no I can't I'm just a big fool no you're not how do you know? Because my mother taught me never to kiss a fool. Now go get him, tiger. Nice butt slap.

Yeah, good. A very strong butt slap on Homer that you can hear it so loudly. So I guess this was an important moment in television that was really glossed over you know yeah historically it is a man-on-man kiss in a cartoon like which they joke on the commentary that they got away with it like bugs bunny kissed elmer fudd all the time so we could do it but yeah it is i do mark that on mission hill you know almost a decade later it's a bigger thing because it is two gay men kissing with romantic intent instead of like, and with consent, not like surprising a straight man with a kiss.

Yes. Like Carl does, which is intent matters in those kinds of things. But it is still, it is kind of a big moment that, that just goes by, you know, I,

I feel like lots of shows, so many shows say like they have the first man on man kiss. I, I had never seen a voiceover joke like that before too that you think you think the voice is in homer's head but he's reading it out loud to him the entire time it's one of the many ways they would play with that idea like a character is hearing a voice but the person is actually there in some way and like he he literally teleports into the office it's not a big office he's behind homer reading the letter there's no time for him to enter the office after smithers leaves so i like he is magic unless there's a secret door or some somewhere on the

like maybe on the fourth wall is another door but yes smithers honestly should have been like oh hey what are you doing here i fired you you're not allowed on the premises he should smithers should have seen carl when he was talking to homer i think they are just playing up how magical he is he can just appear because he is homer's guardian angel at this point it's a tyler durden kind of reveal actually like only homer and smithers can see him i like his little gals in the typing pool line too that's funny but the uh you know a year old me the term phonetically i didn't know that term and that it's a good joke that homer mispronounces phonetically because it wasn't spelled out to him phonetically oh i thought the joke was that it phonetically was spelled out phonetically oh so he says phonetically uh no he says it correctly all right yes listeners at home

settle this fight uh and uh but yes homer homer is given a big pep talk, but it actually turns out that Homer was right the entire time. Nobody listens to you if you don't look a certain way. They find other ways to do this in the future, but I always love an undercutting of it was you all along that did it. And that actually this ending is pretty similar to the dance in Homer one where you see Homer trying his hardest and this cuts to snide people saying stuff uh but in this case it's about how he's bald it's so great because he has so much confidence and is just speaking you know so that he pretty much takes the stage

and you really believe he he's saying these words and i mean it's like a plan that could actually save the company money. Yeah. That was just so funny. I was laughing so hard when people just because of the hair, even though he would have saved the company, it's tons of money. They just,

yeah, they had to leave. And Carl taught him all of these skills to exist in this world, but it ultimately doesn't matter because he needs to look to still fit into this world. And you know, his speech must be perfect because Carl wrote it. So it's though i guess

really if if if homer had succeeded on this day carl was gone from his life like this was the last gift of carl so it's like could homer have succeeded the next time he needed carl what happens then it's like if homer can't uh carl gives him this whole speech about like, it was never the hair. It was like, well, it was also Carl. And without Carl, Homer can't really do anything. But yes, here's Homer's big speech. What in blazes? Who is that old geezer?

And what has he done with Homer Simpson? He is Homer Simpson, sir. A lot of you would think I was crazy if I did this he's crazy we at this power plant are doing this every hour of every day bloated inventories outmoded production message i can save this company millions of dollars a year how through chico conry the japanese art of self-management this bald man has no idea this is is a joke. I'm not laughing. Some nerve telling us how to run the plant. He doesn't even have hair.

Inefficiently mining uranium that can be purchased quite cheaply on the foreign markets. The long-term benefits more than offsetting the one-time cost for net savings of 5,000... Mr. Burns office right now dead man coming through Jesus yeah man what a dick Smithers is much nicer to Homer after this I uh I guess after he's defeated him he's he isn't out to destroy Homer he's more just frustrated by him not actively you know trying to ruin his life but But yeah, Jigokanri is real. What it is is very boring and not important, but it's based on this thing Toyota did in the late 80s. Throughout the 80s, it was their management system that people were trying to copy because, you know, Japan was a major player in the world economy in the 80s before they had their own crash in the early 90s.

And what it was was that system was like visually representing the workflow on a giant chart with like index cards and that way workers knew like their place in the chain and it also involved letting them self-manage their work while still having them be held accountable to management so it's a lot of things it's all very boring but it is based on a real thing so that's like the early version of the org chart we all got yes yes yes exactly well bob i believe you because you have a lovely head of hair and i listen to every word you just said it's uh yeah you can trust me this is not going anywhere i'm yanking on it now uh but yeah they didn't they didn't make up jiko connery so uh i i i wonder if like what maybe vd read like a

forbes that was had recently been published explaining this whole thing i i or someone must have had to write like okay i actually have to write a good speech that could be presented as a manager like that's a challenge in and of itself and yeah the cuts to i especially love um rowena's i'll just call her that her thing like he doesn't even have hair like that's just it it's just over so poor Homer just like ruined he just uh walking away but you think he's gonna be fired only because he gave a bad speech like Burns is like you're done like that's it I I also love this is something they embellish much more in in our uh more in the Scully years we were talking about. But when somebody who's giving a presentation says something is like a very canned phrase,

like you'll think I'm crazy. And then having an audience member react as extremely as possible in the expected way, like he's crazy. Like that's such a great joke. That moon money is mine. Yeah. Or like he's got fever a bit dance fever yeah we get a last scene here with hallmark and burns as burns resets the status quo as he loves to do

and uh this has a bit of burns uh well continuity that then turns into discontinuity in this next clip well well well a dashing young junior executive you made a hollow mockery of our morning meeting simpson i should fire you on the spot but i'm not going to uh why simpson how old do you think i am i don't know 102. i'm only 81. You may find this hard to believe, but in my salad days, my crowning glory was a bright shock of strawberry blonde curls. Oh, I was big man on campus until my senior year when I became as bald as a plucked chicken.

You see, Simpson, I too know the sting of male pattern baldness. That's why I'm giving you your old job back. What? Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you. Now get out of here before I reconsider. Better hurry up. So yeah, Burns in this episode, he's a spry 81. And in maybe five years, he'd be 104.

Yep. And that for the rest of time. So hearing him say he's 81 i'm like wow burns is so young it's the youngest he's ever been it's a realistic age for someone you know in his position yeah for a guy in 19 for him to have been born in 1909 it made sense for the burns they've been writing to that point. But, you know, again, by season three, they're making jokes about how he had apparently seen Civil War baseball players play like it. 1909 doesn't really fit for Burns's age. That makes it even funnier that Homer, the joke already is Homer very insultingly guesses 102 on burns uh but actually homer's off by two years with what homers uh what burns's real age would be in who shot mr burns part one that's where it was established when skinner says to burns uh like he of course would recognize the city's most famous 104 year old man and i also

like his uh like his line about the sting and male pattern baldness also the great the great drawings of the photographs of what like 1900 photographs looks like of people especially that he's like in basically a dress as a little boy like with his his very long strawberry blonde curls uh though uh that doesn't burns in other flashbacks in his 40s, he at least has a comb-over in ones. In the flashback of him meeting Larry Burns' mother, he sort of has hair. Or at least he's doing the Giuliani comb-over thing. Well, they said he lost his hair in his senior year, right? Of college, I guess.

Yeah, that's true. And a very ADR line on Homer's like, better hurry up. Better leave. i guess yeah that's true yeah and a very adr line on homer's like better hurry up and it's yeah it's it's also the nicest burns ever has been of giving homer his job back and he only does it because it's like you gotta reset things like this is the end of the episode that's a similar empathy for burns and uh and yeah mark the the your favorite bit you were talking about the this very sweet scene uh i'll it's just singing, so I'll just insert it. Homer, are you still awake?

I've never been more awake in my life. What's wrong? Are you kidding? I'm stuck in that dead-end job again. The kids are going to hate me because I can't buy them all the stuff I promised them. And you're not going to love me as much because I'm ugly and bald.

Oh, Homer. Your job is always put food on our table. And the kids will get over it. And? And what about loving me? Oh, Homer. Come here. What?

Come here. Oh. You are so beautiful to me. You are so beautiful to me. Can't you see? You're everything that I hope for. I'm everything you need. You are so beautiful to me.

Having it be like Marge and Homer in bed talking about the story, that's also a very early years kind of thing for the show, but it's super touching. And I really feel like you can tell that dan and julie are together especially when marge is trying to comfort homer and he's really he doesn't want her to and she's like come here come here you could tell like they're together yeah it feels like they're together yeah and there's such great like real acting to how homer's like because i'm ugly and bald and like marge when marge wants him to come here, he won't look at her. You can see that, one, he was being so vulnerable to her.

And now even privately with his wife, he's actually kind of ashamed that he was that vulnerable. And he just is looking away. It's really touching. It just feels it is a realer relationship than the show often portrays in the show because you know it's funnier to be crazy and all that but this kind of like sweet moment of march singing homer the song back to let him know she loves him no matter how he looks like it's it's is really touching and there's a there's a bit of comedy because when homer joins in he's agreeing with her yes i am so beautiful to you yes he's not doing it when Homer joins in, he's agreeing with her. Yes, I am so beautiful to you.

Yes. He's not doing it as a typical duet. He's singing it from her perspective. It's like a level of stupidness, but also like selfishness on his part that he doesn't realize. But it's a very... He needs it. He needs this moment. He earned it, I guess.

And Marge only has to be a supportive wife in this episode, which he also has to be in Dance and Homer. This actually, this is all, this is kind of a Homer gets a new job episode too. It really is, yeah. Yeah, so I only categorize Dance and Homer in my mind as the Homer gets a new job episode of the season, but this really is that as well.

It's just, I guess I never thought of it that as well it's just i guess i never thought of it that way because it's within the same uh power plant but yeah they they're doing these pretty early then yeah uh but yeah very a very touching ending i like hearing like julie singing is just really sweet too i wish it was uh that going back to our table read mark it was so funny like uh julie cavner had humorous she was there and she did a great job but she was given almost nothing to do in the script of that day you know i couldn't believe she was there i mean i had been i think two other times and she wasn't there so i was really surprised and it was so cool that she was there but you're right it was a real treat for us maybe it was that like hank azaria was there

when he normally wasn't and it was like everybody wanted to be there just that like hank azaria was there when he normally wasn't and it was like everybody wanted to be there just to see hank when he was in town special occasion yeah and i'm happy to report that uh we did this five years ago and still i'm not looking into rogaine oh yeah still hanging on there uh up top yeah my uh my hair is uh it's a little thinner than it was a few years ago, but still, I don't need it yet. Yeah. Knock it on wood there. Play the death jingle for Henry's Harer. No, it's the anti-death jingle for him.

Maybe I should be investing in those hymns. You know, those ads sound pretty convincing on other podcasts. They should pay us some money. We're talking them up. Yeah, you know what? I shouldn't be saying their names. But, Mark, thank you for being on the show please talk about your podcast uh it's amazing again uh it's a part of like entertainment history i was barely alive for but i find it so fascinating

your guests are like you get some really big guests you get some really obscure guests who are actually like super important to the history of late night tv so please talk about it oh thank you yeah the carson podcast you can go to iTunes. It's been fun. Over 300 interviews. And yeah, some of the Simpsons people, Al Jean, and I talked to Mike Reese, as you mentioned, and then Patrick Verone, who's a former Carson writer. He wrote at least one Simpsons script. And so did Seth Green. He was on the podcast for that.

But it's pretty much, you know, taking years of uh carson show which was if you want to see that what hear about what the culture was the politics and just the entertainment uh of that era from 62 to 92 it really it really is an education i mean we've had a lot of famous people on like mel brooks carol burnett but a lot of times the best people are just the behind the scenes people and the writers and like the person who opened the curtain for Johnny. So I never imagined we'd be doing those 300 episodes. 300th episode, we had Bob Euchre. He went on 60 times with Carson. So yeah, it was a really, really good time. I want to ask you guys one thing. So I was one of the Simpsons table reads. I doesn't say this online, but I remember very vividly being at the table read and they introduced the director of the episode right before they started the table read.

And it was Richard Donner. But he is not listed in anything. And I it was definitely he was there. Maybe he was just visiting. But like they definitely introduced him. And there was applause. Everyone was applauding. But. Maybe he was just visiting, but they definitely introduced him, and there was applause. Everyone was applauding, but maybe he was just visiting. But I really thought that when they announced him, he was the guest director that week. But I didn't know if you had any insight.

No, no. I don't think he directed or appeared on an episode. That, to me, sounds like they were celebrating like the guest of honor who was there that day. Although I would like to see a Richard Donner directed Simpsons now. Yes, that would be interesting. Yeah, it was really, really strange. But I mean, it was so cool because like, I guess famous people go to those all the time.

But yeah, that was pretty, pretty cool. Just had to be the table reads cool I have some info for you so apparently Simpsons writer Tim Long is friends with Richard Donner so maybe that's why he was there it could absolutely be I'm not sure I just thought they said he was involved but I guess not

in there that story reminds me of our friend and previous guest on the show Alex Navarro. He could have gone to a Simpsons table read while he was in LA, but he, uh, he couldn't make it. He had to cancel on it. And so two of his friends went instead. And at that table read, the guest on the episode was Werner Herzog and he was there. And he, I think will forever regret that not only did he miss

the Simpsons table read but he also got to he didn't get to meet Werner Herzog the great director uh which uh yeah we I we got I mean yeah we got Hank Azari and Kevin Pollack the same day that was quite oh yeah I forgot Kevin Pollack was there and we we talked to him I totally forgot about that because he was he probably you've talked about this on the show. I'm sure. But he he got a phone call and he was who was he filling in for? And who was the one that called? Shearer.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. James L. Brooks was the one that because usually Harry is on the speaker phone and sometimes other people on. But yeah, that was big of Kevin Pollock just to stroll in just to do it as a favor yeah actually now i remember that selman at the start of it presented it as a big deal liking guys at today's special announcement no one's on speakerphone yay big round of applause because what normally happened when i that was i was there the other two times i guess ian maxton graham who was a writer for a while there,

I think he got a producer credit, would go around. And, you know, there's a sign about turning off your cell phones, and they mention it. But he would do a thing where he would go around the room and just emphasize phones off, phones off. And then they would have just the one phone that was on the table, and it was Harry Sheeran, usually, and two other people, something like that. So, yeah, that was on the table and it was Harry Sheeran usually to two other people something like that so um yeah that was that was that was huge it really really was and to have

Matt Grady in there because he wasn't there the other two times and I heard I guess he's going to them all now but when I mentioned it to him like oh it's so cool you're here he seemed um kind of like taken back he's like well of course it's like you know my name and I'm like you weren't there the two other times but um yeah it was so cool that he was there i think they all knew the world's biggest simpsons podcast was there so they had to be there for us that had to be it that had that explains everything uh but thank you so much for being on the show mark oh thank you for asking me i really really appreciate that and you guys do such a good job oh thank you so thanks again to mark malcooff for being on the show.

Be sure to check out the Carson podcast. It is excellent. But as for us, if you want to check out all of our other podcasts and get these episodes one week at a time and ad free, please go to patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. Sign up there for five bucks a month. You'll get just that, but also access to everything behind the $5 paywall. That includes all of the bonus podcasts we've made since the summer of 2017 that is too many to mention here in this plug section but the most recent miniseries we did

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Season 12's A Tale of Two Springfields. Homer Simpson, why you haven't been here 20 years? Hey, you got rid of the sideburns. Give me the usual.