Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - The Critic Pilot

Episode Date: May 3, 2017

Hachi machi! Yes, this week’s episode has chronologically arrived on the first ever episode to the closest thing to a Simpsons spin-off: The Critic! We discuss how the show came to be, how connected it is to The Simpsons, and how the first ever episode holds up, all in one podcast…

hey everybody this is bob mackie the host of talking simpsons here to introduce uh something a bit different than our normal thing uh this week we will be doing the first episode of the critic just titled pilot because it aired in this chronology that we're doing now so it aired in the middle of season five and we feel like it's so closely connected to the simpsons we need to talk about it yeah it was january 1994 the end of the month and it was time to move on to it i wanted to try doing a special episode like this because we talk about the critics so much we do in the show especially talking about all the season four people that left to work on the critic that i felt we had to at least do the first episode and since i was was not, I am not on this episode.

I'm just in the intro. You were voted off the Simpsons Island. But the critic is so good from the first episode, I think, because of every single lesson learned via The Simpsons. And also barring a lot of the same talent, like James L. Brooks, Rich Moore, Jay Sherman is designed by David Silverman, a great director. They set much sillier rules for themselves, but I think they knew that going in

that they wanted it to be a sillier show. And the show does, it's short-lived, but maintains, I don't know, a pretty perfect tone the whole time. It holds up really, really well. And it also doesn't hold up really, really well

in that it is a relic of that era. And it was supposed to live right now in 1994, and that was all it was meant to live right now in 1994 and that was all it was meant to do. It's a perfect time capsule. I mean, this is the time I was paying most attention

to movies because there's nothing else happening in the world so I know everything they're talking about. Now that I'm older, I get all the old movie references too so it's very valuable.

It's very rewarding and I'm also here to plug and this is not to no one's benefit but yours because this is a weird little experiment, the Laser Time TV project.

We don't use it that often. It usually just plays a bunch of our stuff occasionally some weird episodes but we're going to program every night from wednesday this episode airs to friday seven to ten o'clock will be all critic episodes and saturday and sunday will be uh all critic marathon in between all those will be movie trailers that the critic is referencing so it's beautiful you have no excuse not to get uh to get in the know and to understand every reference yeah if you don't remember this episode you don't recall it easily and you don't have the dvds which they're the dvds are a pretty good package but every episode of the show is on youtube as well or pretty much every episode really easy to find i think it is every episode so and you can watch it on the latest TV.

You can watch it there, but you can do it on your browser. So you can watch it on television and it'll autoplay and you don't know commercials. You'll be fine. Yeah, and if you want us to do more of these,

let us know and we might have more surprises for you later in this season of Talking Simpsons, so stay tuned. Welcome everybody and welcome to Talking Critic, our special one-off critic episode of Talking Simpsons. I am your host, Bob King-Dorkenheimer Mackey. Sorry, that's King-Dorkenheiser. I got that almost wrong. Who else is here with me today? I'm Henry Gilbert

and I envy you for not having me, Sandy. Who else? I'm Michael Raparas, host of Vigigame Apocalypse, and I had to defeat Chris in single combat for the right to be on this episode, so if I'm not as entertaining as him, you can blame my skills with a sword.

We should call an ambulance. And who else is here? And I'm Diana Goodman and my shrink was right. God does hate me. And today's episode is all about The Pilots, which aired on January 26, 1994. And Henry will tell us what movies were out at this point in real life

history. Buy my book! Buy my book! Buy my book! Buy my book! Oh my glory, Bob! Hey, in theaters this week, January was still a dumping ground for films in 1994, and the first movies were Blink, a... Time sleeper, right?

No, it was a Michael Apted-directed thriller about a woman who gains her eyesight again and is being stalked. And the other film was the unasked for remake of Car 54, Where Are You? Wait, who starred in that? Buster Poindexter. Ooh, no, no, no. So those are the films that premiered this week.

I feel like Buster Poindexter headlining a movie feels like a mistake to me. Somebody caught it. Oh, wait, wait. He's starring? Oh, God. We can't undo this. We got to put this out. I mean, after Hot, Hot, Hot, he could just be in anything.

He could write his own ticket. Years later. I think this movie was filmed in 1990 and then released in 1994. It was like something that was mandatory in terms of a contract. They had to release it. It was such that was mandatory in terms of a contract. They had to release it. It was such a bad movie. I never liked Car 54, Where Are You as a kid either. I'd watch Nick at Night all the time.

And when it would come out, I was like, this is Honeymooners but in a cop car. Well, I mean, once the great theme song is over, it's all downhill, right? Car 54, where are you? There's so many problems happening. Khrushchev's at Idlewild crying out loud. That reference will never get old. But it had Tootie and the dad from Munsters. That's true.

So Al Jean and Mike Reese, they were from The Simpsons from the very beginning, season one writers. They ran seasons three and four, and they left The Simpsons towards the end of season four to create The Critic with James L. Brooks. And Rich Moore is the supervising director. And also David Silverman has a stamp on this in which... Oh, yes. So the design for Jay Sherman, the first design, is something that basically David Silverman drew on a cocktail napkin. So

this is all just like basic Simpsons DNA coming together. And this show is very Simpsons-y in many, many ways. There's an amazing Uproxx oral history. Well, sort of. It's just short of an oral history but it is an interview about how the show came together and if it could ever come back and the critic began first as matt grating coming to alginery saying like i want to do a crusty show that's a spin-off show

there's about behind the scenes on crusty and they is a divorced dad, and he has a makeup lady, and then... Was it going to be Dan Castellaneta playing Krusty in live action? So then Matt Groening being the, you know, mercurial person he is, he says, you know what, no,

I don't want to make that anymore. What I want to make is a live action Krusty show where Dan plays Krusty. Oh, that's what happened, yeah. And so he pulled back his support from doing a Krusty spinoff with them. Then they decide, we want to do a live action show

about behind the set of a Good Morning America type show that James L. Brooks wanted to make. They were really interested in the idea of a film critic on that show, the Gene Schell type. And you need to know that at this time, film critics on TV were a big deal.

Like, they were major people who could sway opinions on stuff. This is a pre Metacritic world, a pre rotten tomatoes world, a pre comments world, a pre democratizing a film reviews when anybody could review a film. I mean, Cisco and Ebert were recognizable just by their very,

their features, Jean Shallot, Rex Reed, like all of them. And so they wanted to do a show where that would then focus a live action show which would focus on the film critic that would be on that morning show and they wrote it for john lovitz because they loved him in a league of their own and also he was a regular voice on the simpsons he was in multiple episodes in season two and three they write the script for him and

then they offer it up to him and that's not how you do it in hollywood you get agreements that they you will write a script for someone because they know he's got them over a barrel of like oh you can't make your expensive show without me well i say no but it's because john lovitz was like i'm gonna be a movie star now i can't be on a live action tv i mean he just he just made mom and dad save the world exactly he was only going up. But he would agree to do an animated show, which then they realized was better anyway because then they could do animated versions of film parodies, which would be way cheaper than trying to make them in live action. And so that's how the show was made, and it was sold to ABC in 1993. Al Jean and Mike Reese leave The Simpsons as they're working on the critic pilot.

They leave The Simpsons, but it's still produced by Gracie Films, the same production company. That's right. And Film Roman? Film Roman, well, Rough Draft is involved in this episode. Okay. But yes, same Film Roman too.

So it's a lot of shared people. Like you said, they got Rich Moore as a producer and supervising director. A great director in this episode i mean this episode looks great but so the genesis of this sort of came from barth the daredevil in a way in um they mentioned on the commentary when there's a clip of those uh motorbike riders slam dunking basketballs al gina microsoft like we can make good looking animation and this is where the critic sort of came from in a way the genesis where the critic looks really good it's animated well for the most part uh with way more flourishes than you would

ever see on the simpsons i was a big movie fan so i was of course gonna watch well i was gonna watch anything that if i ran a tv guide simpsons people worked on it i was gonna watch it not to mention i watched just about any prime time animated show i could see but there have been so many simpsons pretenders but they weren't made by simpsons people like so but the critic was i was the same way i was so pumped for this because it's like here diana this is for you even you know when was would you say 94 so i was like probably a junior senior in high school. January 26th. This was after you'd seen Jean Shallot for the first time and said, yes, that's what I wanted to be when I grow up. I'm still working on that mustache.

It's just not quite. I can't get the length. The length. I believe it's later on when this moves to Fox and they pair it with The Simpsons that my Sundays were all film all the time. It was the best thing ever. There was a PBS series on the history of film, which you could actually get college credit for as an introduction to film history show. I think it ran from like 6.30 to 7.30 or 6 to 7. Then I

watched Siskel and Ebert, yeah, 7, 7.30. Then Critic, Simpsons. My life is so wonderful. That's how, explaining why I am the giant film nerd that I am. Oh, it was good times. I mean, I had a somewhat similar background. I watched Siskel and Ebert from 1992 until probably, like, until Gene Siskel died, so Roger Ebert turned

me on to anime. He was like, go see my neighbor Totoro. It's really good. And I was like, oh, this Totoro it's really good and I was like oh this is really good thanks Roger Ebert because they have the firefly yeah for me their video pick of the week but yeah I was steeped in the world of film criticism because I was a young idiot that he thought he was smarter than everyone that interest in anime also led to his one video game review that he did for I think wired oh wow cosmology of Kyoto oh my god like a super obscure like hyper card style game for Mac that came out in the early 90s I must have missed this so yeah Wired on the cosmology of Kyoto. Oh my god. Which is like a super obscure, like, hypercard-style

game for Mac that came out in the early 90s. Jeez, I must have missed this. So yeah, I was steeped in this world, and just... Siskel and Ebert was just such a tradition, just every Sunday. And when this appeared on Fox a year later, there, I mean, I wasn't reading Variety, I wasn't reading the rags or whatever, so it was just like, oh, the critic is

back, and it's next to The Simpsons, and it's all new episodes, and it was just like, could my life get get better it didn't but uh at that moment yeah at that moment i was like this is the best thing ever you know i was just a middle class white dirt bag and uh hey i like simpsons hey this critic show is pretty good uh it looks pretty good and yeah it's just fantastic jokes and like we we re rewatched this episode that we're going to talk about. And it amazed me that like, I expected this to be really stale. And it holds up so beautifully. Like the jokes are still really sharp. The writing is amazing. And I remember thinking at the time, like, I hate most of what's on network tv but the critics really good like i'll watch

that whenever it's a really good pilot though it was also interesting to watch it now as an adult who did become a jay sherman type in my life and i don't just mean like a fat monster what i mean is we all did become critics. Yeah, yeah. We are critics and we are writers and we are people who wear free things. Yes. That really spoke to me. I know. More than ever. It stinks is something I've never said about a free t-shirt.

And as a 34-year-old currently hearing that Jay is 36, I'm like, holy shit. Yeah. Well, he's a mess for 36. He is. But as a 38-year 38 year old it really hurts he's like i thought he was somewhere in his late 40s come on based on the way he looks he should be but i mean do we want to hit the uh the opening which is beautiful opens with a shot of the twin towers that will never be dated or make you remember horrors in any way i know it's it's an amazing

gina reese talked about how they wanted to make make it different from The Simpsons in so many ways. But structurally, the opening is very Simpsons. It really is. They have two versions of couch gags. Their chalkboard joke is the phone call. And their couch gag is the movie parody. And in this one,

it is a mean phone call from his mom. The first phone call joke is so mean. And then you get the opening, which is, I did not capture the sound of the opening. You probably heard it when you listened to this episode. It is a very intentional music style choice. Yeah, I mean, it is directly sort of a sound alike to George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. As soon as you hear this, you'll be like, oh, it's a critic opening, right?

But it's not. It's such a perfect... I'm ready for my United flight to take off. Oh my god, you're right. Ooh, United Airlines. I got a lot of material ready for that. It's a dual reference because it's not just, it sounds like

Rhapsody in Blue. I know you're going to say it. But it sounds like Rhapsody in Blue because of the opening to Manhattan. That's right. In Manhattan.

The Woody Allen film. That movie is forever tainted because it's about Woody Allen dating a high schooler which is like, you can't go back to that anymore.

Except for that, it's a wonderful movie. Oh yeah, beautiful cinematography about a pedophile. But it opens with this montage. Excuse me,

it's called an ephephile. Oh jeez. The internet pedant strikes again. No, but it opens with this beautiful black and white montage of him doing a voiceover as he's writing something about New York City and it's just hits with, you know, it's edited

to the music really well and just like New York was his city and it always will be. Guggenheim! Met Stadium! And that shot of the bridge is very is borrowed in the critic opening right except the bridge collapses that could be a season two thing uh yeah that's that's he's on a date yeah same scene yeah with alice and the well let's let's save that season two talk for another day but also mentioned that the music is han zimmer. Before Hans Zimmer did every movie of all time. Before it was a big deal. Although he was a

regular size deal. He was a regular size deal. I'm sure he was, he probably had finished the music for Lion King at this point. Oh, wow. Did he do the incidental music

for the series or just the opening like Danny Elfman? I think it was just the opening. So was this Elf Clausen then maybe, right? I bet I do believe Claususen worked on it too i did see the richard sakai was a consulting producer on this deal you'll see a number of simpsons producer names in there it's also interesting that a lot of the character designs in it feel very based on

hirschfeld too of the that of that style especially Especially David Silverman did the original design of The Critic. Yeah, he loves Hirschfeld. He loves Hirschfeld. In fact, he got a Hirschfeld of himself before Hirschfeld died. Wow. A commission. It wasn't like he paid him for it. It wasn't just like he just got it in the mail or whatever.

But yeah, Alf Blossom did score The Critic. Not the opening song, but the music you hear throughout. So you have this combination. It's super New York. That's already a major difference it is from The Simpsons. The Simpsons is in any town USA, Springfield, wherever that is.

This is New York City in the early 90s. Yes. Specifically where it is. The World Trade Center, all that stuff. And the Rhapsody in Blue thing is also interesting to me because in Fantasia 2000, the best segment in it is the Rhapsody in Blue one animated in the style of Hirschfeld.

It's done in the, yeah, the Hirschfeld style. That's perfect. Yeah, it's beautiful. Look it up if you've never seen it. It's the best section of it. Listen in the commentary on the first episode. They talk about how the premise was the exact opposite of Simpsons. It's in a big city.

It's in New York. He's educated and like they expected that to be a hit in new york and it wasn't like it was it was sort of a hit out in the midwest like in small towns but uh new yorkers hated it i was watching in my shitty town in ohio but you're right michael i think the one distinction between this and almost every other animated show is that jay sherman is smart mean, he's occasionally distracted by his vices. That's when he becomes stupid, when he's hungry or horny or whatever.

But he's the smartest character in the show, usually. As the series goes on, he gets flanderized to be a stupid giant pig. But also, the show from the first episode is so mean, and the series is about getting less mean as the show goes on. I mean, the biggest jump is from at the start of season two, but even by the end of season one, you're like,

this is a little mean. Can we have a happier ending here? But this one is just like cruel to Jay from the beginning. And the idea that they're like, oh, we'll promote this by putting it with Home Improvement. Like the ultimate family sitcom. Well, they also talked about how sour single motherfucker hates everybody it's a cartoon the kids love it and i think at the end of one episode where something incredibly messed up

happens jay's like and stay tuned for home improvement coming up next well and they talk about how specifically this episode was disliked by the executives for its content scandal uh but this also just to connect it one more time to the simpsons that this show really let gene and reese get into their darker feelings about the simpsons that they did on the simpsons and also their love of like let's just have homer watch a cartoon or let's have them watch a movie then we can just do a movie i mean they became noted for have opening with parodies on their and on their episodes i think and this this episode has a lot of like mini parodies snuck in the the episode that's begin with like someone watching mcbain and like okay now it can start that is patterned very similar to how

a critic episode will work though it's so weird like they already get all the movie references they want from his job but then he'll just still walk by movies all the time of like lives in a movie reference yes exactly and i contend that family guy rips off the critic more than the simpson yeah well they're right the non-sequitur cutaways started here even more well i mean simpson started it critic indulged even more so. Perfected it in a way I think the family guy would later do. But let's, sorry, I want to hear the first joke of the show that sets the tone for everything. What's wrong?

I'm 36 years old. I'm lonely. My hair comes out of a spray can. No, I had to go on camera without this stuff. Let the world see me as I really am. It's empty. Oh, I'm bald and ugly. Get more.

And I discovered the origins of hair in a can. I had seen this infomercial and this commercial at the time, but I looked it up and it looks magical, but I imagine it sucks and doesn't work well. And your fake hair is constantly flaking off on your shoulders all day. seems to do nothing like i remember it does nothing it does not change his character at the time i was thinking like so is it that he's going gray and that's to keep it black because he still looks completely bald he has a very homer simpson like three hair kind of thing coming out the back of his head but this is basically for if your hair is thinning it fills in the color a bit to disguise your baldness but uh henry can play this and we'll hear all about ronco it's ronco glh means great looking hair just spray glh on and it instantly covers your bald spot leaving you with great

looking hair and ladies with thinning hair or bald spots glh solves the problem instantly it's so convincing everybody listening at home that It's an amazing powder that clings to the tiniest hairs on your head. It actually builds on itself, leaving you with great, great-looking hair. It looks like they're spray-painting a guy's head. It's pretty much. Wow. That's incredible.

This is the first time I've ever used this product. I saw it on the infomercials, and I was skeptical at first. I think it is $40 for a can of that, too. After I looked into the Consumer Reports article on it and weighed my options by shopping around. Which care in a can is right for me? I like to think that Jay started using that when he was beginning to go bald, and he just couldn't give it up. You can't just spray that on a scalp.

We should also mention that Doris Grau, one of the best voices, I think she died in like 1995. Yeah. Not long after. So all the jokes about cancer in The Critic are kind of painful now. They talk about how they asked her to do jokes of like, cough more in this joke. It's like, she's dying. She's an old woman who coughs all the time and sounds that way because she did smoke

all the time. Just like way because she did smoke all the time. Just like Doris, the character. I just love how she was a million incidental voices on The Simpsons, like, watch how fast I go. Things like that. Most famously, Lunch Lady Doris. Yeah, perfectly Lunch Lady Doris. But here she is like the perfect sour character with a little bit of heart to her. She's world-weary, but she's been around, and you know where it's coming from.

But I miss Doris Grau's voice so much. She's been dead and you know where it's coming from but I miss Doris Grau's voice so much she's been dead for like over 20 years I don't have a death jingle on this because I just would be playing like four times on this episode Death stalks you at every turn so she was like a script supervisor or something she was just a person

who just incidentally had an awesome voice yeah I mean she would just be there at script readings and she would give Al Jean and Mike Reese feedback like oh that's so sweet leave that in and they just would love I mean wouldn't you just be there at script readings, and she would give Algin and Mike Reese feedback, like, oh, that's so sweet. Leave that in. And they just would love... I mean, wouldn't you fall in love with that voice if you heard it? I would want her on a cartoon. It was supposed to be a puppy. And I would cast her in

everything after that. Yeah. We gotta have your voice. Then we get our first film parody in the series. Tonight, I'll be reviewing Home Alone 5. We left Kevin home alone, and he's only 23! So, I mean, watching... The stubble and the cigarette falls out of his mouth.

I love the cigarette and the great caricatures, but it struck me upon having researched The Simpsons and knowing what goes into making that show, the amount of work that goes into making a critic episode, you need new character designs for every parody. Not just one drawing. What does this character look like from the side, in the front, in the back? How do they move?

We need character designs for every caricature. For every 10 seconds of footage. Pretty much, yeah. Every time they have a new one. Now, there was a Fifth Home Alone film. So they got up number-wise to four, and then the actual Fifth Home Alone film. So they got up number-wise to four, and then the actual Fifth Home Alone film was a bullshit ABC family reboot

called Holiday Heist that was completely unrelated to any McAllister. No McAllister family. Not even French Stewart would touch this. Oh, God. I think Macaulay Culkin actually looks better than his aged-up caricature in that bit. He partied a bit.

He needs to put on a little weight. He's looking kind of gaunt. Maybe put down the needles, perhaps. Fellow child actor Seth Green says that Macaulay Culkin is one of the best adjusted people he knows. I feel like he has a vested interest in saying that things are fine for Macaulay Culkin. But I think he was only 14 when this episode aired. No way! He was, like, even 12 at best.

Like, he was still pretty young when the first Home Alone came out. And then the second film parody comes straight after that, and it is honestly a bunch of cheap Arnold jokes. I don't know. And yet timeless. Yeah. Because I love you people, I won't force you to watch the musical number. Well, maybe just a little.

Ah, dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, I made you out of clay. Fah. I just love that. Fah. Rabbi P.I. So, I mean, they got some great ringers in terms of doing their voice characterizations. There's Morilus Lamarche,

just a great voice actor guy, and Nick Jameson, who you don't hear his name as much, but he a lot of stuff he was he was actually max in the same max video game he was the original max so like they do most of the heavy hitting in terms of the impressions but they also play people like jeremy hawk and vlada and things like that so they got some great voice guys when they need any actor when they need any famous person they're like well i guess we can get uh maurice he can just do that maurice can do that character maurice can maurice can do any where they need any famous person. They're like, well, I guess we can get Maurice. He can just do that. Maurice can do that character.

Maurice can do any voice if we need it. But it ended up going the other way around. There's like, well, Maurice is good at Orson Welles. Well, then let's write an Orson Welles. Yeah, I mean, we should say Maurice Lamarche best known for being the brain in Pinky and the Brain, but also being a million other characters. And also, I think he started in voice acting

by playing Egon on The Real Ghostbusters, him doing a pretty good Harold Ramis. And we get our first meeting in the Shermomator, and then we get to meet Duke Phillips, another dead voice already. Charles Napier. Again, I mean, I feel like they're borrowing from their past work. This is sort of their Mr. Burns,

an all-powerful, enigmatic weirdo. Except he's Ted Turner. He's Ted Turner. Not Barry he's Ted Turner, yeah. Not Barry Diller, but it's amazing. I love Charles Napier's voice so much. He was so great on Squidbillies, first season. Yes. Why the hell do you have to be so critical?

I'm a critic. No, your job is to write movies on a scale from good to excellent. What if I don't like them? That's what good's for. Mr. Phillips, we go on in five seconds. I own this network, boy. Just put up that picture of me on a horse. I gotta say, that feels painfully familiar.

Yes, as game reviewers, we've all heard that. Perhaps. Your job is to score games on a scale of seven to ten. That's what seven is for. If it's nine or below, that means you think it's garbage, and we have the right to dox you and find out where you live. I mean, I have like a billion Duke Phillips lines in my head. They don't just watch it. They send it money.

You just seem to like the sound of my voice. Charles Napier, unironically, is one of my favorite actors of all time. He's in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls of all things. He's in a lot of Russ Meyer movies, like Faster Pussycat. Is he in that one? I don't remember if he's in Faster Pussycat. He was usually in there to be the conservative dude or the cop who beats people. He's also one of the heavies in Rambo, First Blood Part II. He's in Silence of the Lambs.

I think he's the guy who gets his face stolen. He gets his face ripped off. And he's the head of the Good Ol' and the blues brothers that's right uh he's he's an amazing actor who i think it shows you like if he's in all these things and he's not the characters he played in real life he's not the guy he plays so well yeah but he's so great and but it is a ted turner character that's who it is i just i really wish that he had gotten to write an autobiography because the longest... I've read a couple of long interviews with him. I think the AV Club did a really good one.

Oh, yeah, random roles. He just randomly runs into people. He's like, so you auditioned for Hitchcock? And he's like, well, yeah, I was kind of homeless, so I was living at this car lot. And Hunter S. Thompson and me were hanging out. What a life then we went to Mardi Gras

and I'm like Mardi Gras with those two oh my god where is my time machine I mean the critic had such great southern voices we have Charles Napier and then the next season Park Overall which is the greatest southern voice in the world we're the bear season but Ted Turner in case you didn't know ted

turner has not been in power of he hasn't been a media mogul in over 15 years like ever since he got bought out by aol in the time warner merger post-critic right i mean yeah in the late 90s but he was the show destroyed him he was so ted turner was so ahead of his time like he was an atlanta-based media mogul was like cable is where it's at and i should own content people are always renting these mgm films screw that i'm buying the whole library people oh i have to bargain with major league baseball for for games no i own the atlanta braves and they're gonna be on my channel another simpsons joke and and also baseball exactly he he invested he bought a pro wrestling company so he could get the pro wrestling stuff on his channel he bought the

entire hannah barbara library so he could have that on his channel he knew the content was king so they could be on all his channels starting with the superstation wtbs atlanta georgia followed by cnn then tnt right yeah but then into cartoon network um a channel classic movies that's still the only movie channel that still plays movies yeah he caught so much flack for that but it was really just like look people aren't watching these old movies because they're in black and white and that's stupid if if it takes colorization to get people to watch it i will do that and nobody liked it i kind of wonder if they get some sort of charitable write-off for tcm because it's a channel that only runs old movies

and has no ads whatsoever it's just it's just a public service it's beautiful it's a channel that only runs old movies and has no ads whatsoever. It's just a public service. It's beautiful. Well, I mean, other than running the channel, they're not paying for new programming, really. I mean, Ben Mankiewicz gets paid in sandwiches, I think. We'll pay for your cab right here. That's it, buddy. I do that for free.

Oh, I'm kidding. But Turner, he also famously married Jane Fondaa which should uh not work out they're no longer together oh and they're so happy together if you want to find a picture of ted turner riding a horse like duke phillips talks about google that and you will find about eight dozen photos different photos of him riding horses i believe he became a rancher like after he sold i was like i'm just gonna ranch buffalo like out, he's like, I'm just going to ranch Buffalo. He bought half of Montana. Yes.

That's what he's up to these days. This isn't art. It's just mindless pablum for losers who can barely read. Oh, that reminds me. I've got an interview with People Magazine. Mr. Phillips, you're fabulously wealthy. You're a world-class athlete. You were great in bed last night.

How does that feel? I have no one to envy. I envy you having me to envy. The critic will be right back, you TV-addicted couch monkeys. Thank you guys so much for listening and if you like listening and stuff it's a good thing this episode is brought to you by audible and before i tell you more about it know that you can go to audible trial.com slash laser time and get started with a free audiobook and a free 30-day trial of all audible is what is audible they've got over 180,000

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Watch my new show, The Critic, from the producers of The Simpsons. Only this time, they're sober. The Critic, coming soon. You like Lazer Time shows? Then you might like Bonus Time Laser Time's weekly bonus show exclusively On Patreon.com slash Lasertime

Here's a taste of what you've been missing This weekend On Friday I went My girlfriend had a Groupon for archery Really thought that was a lame excuse To get out of doing work No I literally had and it was like this is the last day she could do it And it was like it's always weird to go to like,

this is like an archery kind of superstore. So one half of it is like doing archery. I told you that shit with Dolly Parton. I'm stepping into a fan base that I know nothing about

that's existed all around me for years. Yeah, there's like four guys at the counter. Two guys working the counter. Two guys. You got to get a compound bow. Yeah, two regulars

who are like, they're wearing their archery jackets, and they got their pro-level bows. You're talking Mickey Arch Deluxe Antonio. There's so many different bows in the background. There's posters like, oh, look, the top bowman of 1997. Look at him. He signed the poster.

Isn't that cool? It's like, this is a world I know nothing about. What the fuck? Every time I see something like that, now all I think of like, oh, like oh there's still jobs out there man i could be the guy who mats the poster for the archer especially since like oh a bow is will cost you 700 yeah uh but yeah that was that was super fun get bonus time laser times weekly full-length uncensored and ad-free patreon exclusive podcasts as well as full-length movie commentaries wrestling and cartoon video commentaries the first season cartoon video commentaries,

the first season of Talking Simpson, and more at patreon.com slash laser time, starting at just five bucks. You'll help us live and we'll do our best to help you never be bored again. This episode has to do so much, and part of that is introducing every single major character, and they kind of just have to... They find novel ways to have them explain themselves to other people for set-up purposes.

They do a really great job, I think, especially with Duke. Yeah, they introduce so many... I didn't even realize that this was the pilot. Because they just... Yeah, they introduced so many. I didn't even realize that this was the pilot. Because all the characters just sort of naturally seem to pop up. Yeah, I don't think Jay's any different here than he is in season two, aside from his looks. Or anyone else, really. Well, I mean, his head gets flatter just as this season goes on.

Really, we're not into how flat David Silverman made his head. They prefer the redesign. It's such a fun design. I just love his weird springy head hairs. He's like a weird squishdown Homer almost. But something about the way that they animate

just the seriousness of Duke looking off in the distance thinking about how he has no one to envy. It's just a throwaway I mean it's not a visual joke. It's entirely an auditory joke and mean, it's not a visual joke. It's entirely an auditory joke. And they still somehow make it a visual joke. Yeah, the visuals really pop on this show more than The Simpsons, I think, in general.

And it's also interesting on a pilot that they introduce a new character, a guest character. But in a pilot, she's been in as much of the show as any other character. So I think part of the trick of this episode is you're supposed to think, oh, is she a regular too? Is she going to be his girlfriend the rest of the series? But when we first meet her, I also like the recurring joke that no one watches Jay except people who mock him. I'm your biggest fan. Oh, I have no fans. Most of my viewers are drunken frat boys who like to make fun of me.

Hey, look, he's picking his nose. It's really simple. I find smart men very sexy. And you are the most intelligent man on television. So that is Valerie Fox, who is sort of the Sharon Stone-ish character of this. I mean, she even does the

leg uncrossing thing in this segment. Can we get a shot of that? That tells you it's the early 90s with Sharon Stone. No one had ever seen a vagina before. It blew all our minds. Invented the vagina. I didn't realize that the voice is Jennifer Lean.

Yes. Who I'd never questioned. And it's Kes from Star Trek Voyager. That is what she is most famous for. But she also was in SLC Punk as Sandy. And she is Davina in American History X. So she played some punky slash angry characters in the 90s.

And she's extremely young in this. I think she's like 20 playing this character. But she does that classic smoky voice so well. Kathleen Turner. It's very good. So knowing how this episode ends, I wanted to ask everybody here, do you think that Valerie Fox, from the beginning,

is interested in Jay? Or if it all was just a ruse to get a good review and then she was going to leave? That's kind of the eternal question that I have after seeing this show that I kind of think it might have been genuine because she doesn't get at all

annoyed or worried when he's like, oh, I can't go to your premiere. Although she may have masterminded the delivery of the videotape. You see, I kind of think that she actually does care for him because she doesn't have to go that far

to get a good review. I mean, just based on his reaction and she has him wrapped around her little finger immediately. Like, you don't have to sleep with him and meet his parents. You can just throw him a bone. Just like, oh, I really care about you. That's it. If you want a bribe, come on.

I think the intent is yes, she really does like him, but I feel like it's not handled very well. And I feel I get some flashbacks to Learn Lean Lumpkin. I mean, Algena Mike Reese ran that season and I feel like she wasn't really explored that much. It was more like, oh, she likes Homer. And that's that's the main focus. But there's never a why.

If they could have just had a line at the end where she says, you were too mean to me or I thought we I thought we were cool with this, or just something that explained it. It could also be like, it's trying to make the point he can't keep a relationship because on top of all his other obvious flaws, he's kind of an asshole. Yeah. But he's so nice. Well, this is getting curious. Yeah, I mean, yeah. He's very detail-y about it.

I was curious about it. So then we get some new more regulars they go to leon richer lane reach lane reach which means wealthy ass the wealthy ass and we get to meet another regular oh mr sherman i have side for you the very best devil in the house just perfect for the schmoozing. Conan O'Brien! Oh, great. They sat us in the critics section.

That would be brief. More like turkey too long. Even Satan himself would love this angel hair pasta. It's a goodbye. And so goodbye from Mr. Good Guy, Gene guy gene shallots that's really him yes so uh two things vlada is gabor right he is i am certainly is gabor chupo of classic chupo fame who dr nick is kind of based on in its own way s is a character on hey arnold who is a a deadbeat jerk in in hey arnold the guys are like oh what i i just need to borrow the money oh no gabor really gets around it makes you feel like in the animation industry gabor is very well

known and and not particularly loved no no so i'm in the first in what was supposed to be the first episode the simpsons they joke about him delivering a thing they didn't like and him saying, maybe script is shit. Yeah. And the famous guy board delivery. But thing number two, if you look at the credits of this in early Simpsons, guess who's a character designer? Everett Peck, creator of Duckman. This is a

Duckman-ass looking character. His head can never turn. It's just stuck in one expression. But I feel like he could be on Duckman, this character. He could be, yes. Duckman premiering in two months. He's always in semi-profile to the camera, no matter which direction he's looking,

and always tilted upward. So I feel like Everett Peck did draw him. He has these long, weird features that are just not like... You try to imagine what he looks like face-on, and it's impossible. He's very cubist-looking. And profile guy. And his son son who we meet

later in the series has the same head exactly it's a very strange head but yeah everett peck uh character designer on the critic so there you go i like your theory i think but i definitely feel like that is them mocking gabriel but in my life duckman unites everything so i must bring it back but the vlada i mean vlada is a jerk who constantly takes advantage of Jay and just likes, I like your money. You come here. And it just lets them do every mean joke. Oh, I just thought thing three.

The joke is no one cares who Conan O'Brien is, especially when this is being written. The fact that Jay will get bumped for Conan is the joke. Yes. Well, and it is Conan's friends slash former bosses making fun of Conan. Who is probably assumed to would be canceled by now. Oh, yeah. They were all certain the show would be canceled. There's Conan jokes in the episode where Jay goes to L.A. in the first season.

There's tons of Conan jokes in there, too. And also, I love that the critic section of a restaurant is just every miserable fucker. Just like, everything sucks. My job is to see movies. I hate everything. Except for Gene Shalit. He's always been very upbeat. A good guy.

And very punny. So we get one of two Donald Trump jokes. Very relevant. I hated this show so much. It really took me out of the episode. You were a model, weren't you? Don't pigeonhole me. Yes, I was a model.

Yes, I was a beauty queen yes i dated donald trump oh i hated that so much it's like i didn't want there's also there's a trump town it's visual we've got no audio of it but there's a trump tower foreclosure joke in there too like kissing in front of it you're so happy but it's there's so many jokes in here just like like Donald Trump was. Donald Trump was old news in 1994. Yeah. People lived through 10 years of, no, more than 10 years of Donald Trump being famous at that point.

And they were already, he was already a joke then. Just like a national joke for 40 years until he became president. You can tell them when they were writing this script, like, you're making fun of the president now. Yeah. And the fact that he dates all these models and everything. It's just like, ugh, yuck. This is pre-Melania.

Yeah. And she said dated with quotes on it. Uh-oh. Yeah. If that's sweet. But they seem to have a pretty good time together, the two of them. This door's going to close soon, and whether I'm inside or outside could change our lives forever say what do you do in your movie i play a woman who seduces chubby men and kills them in their

sleep interesting nothing goes anywhere with that, but I like that one. That's more of an episode two thing. Oh, you seem to have a psychotic obsession with me. Though having her there also allows him to explain himself more, like setting up that he's a Pulitzer Prize

winning writer. So he's unlike, say, Homer Simpson, Jay Sherman is very good at his job he is very well educated he's not an underachiever no and not proud of it either no overachiever and proud of it he's no bart simpson we learned about a salary later in this episode too it's pretty high but that he's also he is still a food pig even in the first episode like oh he he's like more more he can't and of course there is a dances with wolves gag just to again make yes the early 90s when nobody has thought of dances with wolves since then it's i'm glad

to be good fellas because uh it's the more timeless movie oh totally that but that just showed me how many cutaways they did all the time it's just like they did back-to-back cutaways there and that they already had the excuse of movie cut movie clips he's gonna watch but they still like no no jay also has to remember things and cut back to them here's another dead actor dad you're out of doritos what are you doing here we were gonna go shopping for usky pants together excuse Excuse us. Then you were going to take me to that ice cream place and tell them it's my birthday again. Shh. What? Shut up.

Now, son, you may just have noticed there was a beautiful woman in my bed. I won't tell anyone. Actually, I wish you would tell everyone, particularly your mother and her personal trainer, Alberto. He says I should call him Uncle Al now. So, Christine Cavanaugh... Because he's so great and I love trainer, Alberto. He says I should call him Uncle Al now. So, Christine Cavanaugh... Because he's so great and I love him so much!

It can't go by without saying, Christine Cavanaugh, just a lovely voice actress, and she's not with us anymore. She died in 2014. She retired mysteriously in 2000. I think she had some sort of debilitating illness or something. Yeah, it's unfortunate. She was most famously Chucky Finster and Dexter

on Dexter's War. And also Gosselin on Darkwing Duck. I feel like her voice is so distinct. It just says 90s cartoons to me, her voice. And she also is Ugg's love interest on Salute Your Shorts. That's right. One of her few live action appearances. Yeah, she was a park ranger, I believe. And so she's great as Marty.

What I love about the relationship of Marty. Oh, and she's babe, the first babe. She is babe, yes. I love her. Marty's relationship with Jay is really nice because Marty loves and respects his dad. And they're more like friends of just like, well, we're both fat guys. And I listen to you and love you, dad. Unlike Bart, who's just mean.

Or Lisa, who loves Homer, but is still just like, you're just mean or lisa who loves homer but it's still just like you're not as smart as me marty sees none of jay's flaws yeah i think a fun day out is lying to the ice cream parlor and buying husky friends yeah so i mean we never see jay lecturing him or anything or like getting mad at him they're they're on the same level almost it's really it's really refreshing to see in a show like this it really is like jay has a mini me kind of is yeah yeah a major difference too uh from the simpsons is that he's divorced and to see in a show like this. It really is like Jay has a mini-me. It kind of is, yeah. Yeah. A major difference, too, from The Simpsons is that he's divorced, and that this is a very different thing than of like, oh, the main character is a divorced single father, and I do feel like some people on the staff there, baby Al Jean, have been going through

some marriage issues, and so made a character who was going through a divorce. And it's an excuse for a lot of alimony payments and Uncle Albertos who spend your money. His ex-wife, Ardith, is not viewed in the kindest light. No. Ardith is pretty bad. And the fact that he's divorced and is sleeping with a woman he's not married to was a big deal in the early 90s. It just was. It wasn't done, especially not on sitcoms. Not on a cartoon.

And on ABC, the channel of Home Improvement and TGIF. I like when he's talking to Marty and he's like, actually, I wish you would tell everyone. I won't tell anyone, Dad. It's interesting that this episode, I kept waiting for a gay joke at some point in this episode. It was one of the few. You get a for a gay joke at some point in this episode. It was one of the few.

You get kind of an icky joke later in the episode. But they don't have a joke that Jay Sherman is gay. Yeah. It's because. Later you would get a lot of those. Yeah. The bald gay man. When you hear Al Jean and Mike Reese on commentaries with John Lewis. Oh my God.

Which is not on the Critics DVDs, but on the Simpsons DVDs. Yeah, gay. But they are constantly throwing gay jokes at each other, like, you're gay. No, you're gay. No, you're gay. Did you come up with that joke when you were in bed together?

That's my bad, John Lovitz. I'm sorry. Speaking of, I think that's like the one sticking point of this episode, that like, I don't think it was at all intended this way, but it's possible to read it,

like the whole romance in a very misogynistic light. Like, like oh she's a beautiful woman who's attracted to the nerdy fat guy and then you know with what happens at the end like oh maybe she was stringing them along the whole time women are all whores it could be handled better it's unclear i mean i see the intent and they didn't probably didn't mean that but but they didn't really address it the right way. The ambiguity opens up bad interpretations, unfortunately. And I want to go with the better angels on that, that they'd be like, no, no, we're not saying that all women use men. Well, I think the bottom line is we find out she's a bad actress.

So how could she pull it off in real life? Exactly. Yes, you're right there. I mean, that could be, I think that's a statement about her character, though, too, that Valerie Fox is great at faking people in one-on-one, but acting on camera, she's not good at. That could be it too.

I'm trying to bring the most misogynist reading I can. It could just be a really good bookend with the Jean-Paul DePaupe episode where it's like, I guess there must be a pretty good actor there. Why couldn't they just make fun of Jean-Claude Van Damme? Why'd they have to make it Jean-Paul LePauw? That's weird. Some kind of lawsuit issue. But we meet next Jay's best friend, Jeremy Hawk, a clear Paul Hogan alike, played by

Maurice LaMarche. Maurice LaMarche in a regular role. And it's fun that he's friends with an attractive actor. It's an interesting best friend to work with. I just wish that Crocodile Gandhi for a recurring joke in the show is really kind of a cheap parody. A little too late too.

Mr. Hawk, could I have your autograph? I just loved you in Crocodile Gandhi. You see, people did like that picture. I'm sorry, I just didn't think you made a very convincing Mahatma. I will bring peace between the Hindu and the Muslim. picture. I'm sorry, I just didn't think you made a very convincing Mahatma. I will bring peace between the Hindu and the Muslim. But first, a tasteful glimpse

of me bottom for the ladies. Don't look so smug. I've got my fans too. Excuse me, could I rub your hump for luck? I don't have a hump. You hunchbacks are so selfish. Get away from me!

I think Maurice Lamar's Australian accent is pretty accurate. We work with an Australian person, and it doesn't really sound off to me. I think he's got it. They were saying in the commentary that people, like Australians, assumed he was Australian. As a kid, I thought... It's as high a compliment, I think, as you can give to an accent.

Yeah, I mean, as a kid, I assumed they just had Paul Hogan do this voice. Just like, oh yeah, the Crocodile Dundee guy. He's in the show. I love that there's one thing about him that we... We have actually everything about Jeremy established. That they're best friends. That Jay has slammed his movies before, but they're okay with it. That he makes pretty stupid stuff that's meant to just work on his looks,

and then he throws Yiddish around for no reason. Yes. A lot of characters do. Like, later, his season two girlfriend, Alice, with the deepest southern accent says, my daddy always says, be a mensch, not a Sirmendric. So everyone is just naturally Yiddish, naturally knows Yiddish expressions in this universe.

I like that bit about it, though. It's also funny because mike reese talks about how he is like he is ethnically i've heard him in interviews joke that he is ethnically jewish but not he wasn't a practicing jew at all like a very secular family but he jokes he said that he he made money in college posing for anti-semitic because of how he looks well i mean if you look at marty sherman you'll be like oh that's mike reese even though he's 60 now and is older you can immediately see that's mike reese it's childhood mike reese which i'd love

to interview mike reese and that joke the it's another of the so many jokes of just people saying like jay you're a hideous monster like i just i just think you're a hunchback just looking at you. He always was made out to be much more hideous than he actually was. I thought. When Valerie wakes up to see his face, we get the benefit of that fisheye lens view.

Like, oh my god. Even if you're in love with him, after a one night stand waking up to that, I feel like even someone who loves him would have a reaction. So I don't think that's revealing her true feelings. She doesn't react to Jeremy. She's not into Jeremy or his charm. Yeah, I love the line, take your genitalia right back to Australia.

I remember my mom laughing at that a lot because we did watch The Critic together. And there's a callback. If you don't understand why Jeremy would say say don't do blackface very recent no don't do blackface at the naacp awards yes very specific learned from experience that is a reference to ted danson at the friars club in october of the 1993 ted danson who at the time was dating Whoopi Goldberg they were a famous Hollywood couple that it was Whoopi Goldberg's Friars Club roast and so part of his parody was he appears in blackface and then in like minstrelsy blackface and then does his routine which look the Friars Club is about being as inappropriate as possible and but also I watched more of his routine from that.

The shock of the blackface is one thing, but then the rest of his jokes are like, this is very funny. These photos are still online. I feel like if he did this 20 years later, he could never work again. No, never. But I think he said later that the blackface was actually Whoopi Goldberg's idea, although that might have just been a way

of saving face. Saving blackface. My black girlfriend said it was cool. idea although that might have just been a way of saving face i could uh no pun saving black face my black girlfriend said it was cool so i mean i could totally see she's the mayor of all black i would absolutely believe whoopi would think that was funny but i don't want to put words in her mouth i'd want to get that directly from her but so so if you're wondering why he's there's a bunch of there's many jokes across the entire series of Critic. If you weren't alive in 1994, it will make absolutely no sense. The show is so contemporary. It's not timeless in the least.

The opening bit movie parody is Alien 3. You're right. I just loved Alien. Though that's the best scene of it, of the alien basically getting all up in her personal space and getting right up to her. That is the best shot from it. Don't think about what it represents. One single iconic shot from that entire trilogy, it's that one.

Pretty much. I mean, I see that memed the most. And Maurice can't not do a Bullwinkle voice in this episode. Don't even try talking like this. Jinx. Sorry. And so then... Oh, every character is great in this film. I love this. I don't Sorry. And so then... Oh, every character

is great in this family. I love this. I don't think any of these actors are... No, I think that father is... Garrett Graham is still alive. Okay, so every actor is still alive.

He played Bud the Chud. I saw your show the other night, son. Doing the weather now, are you? No, Dad. That was the shermometer. So, my boy,

do you think it'll snow tomorrow? I don't know. Yeah, we sure could use some snow. Had the chains on since July. My father had a stroke a few years ago. He didn't really. We just say that to explain his personality.

The peanut is neither a pea nor a nut. Edit. So, I hear you're an actress. wait it is or not yes my first movie comes out next week oh i see you're just dating my son till he gives you a good review then you'll drop him and he'll be back here with one of those nice girls from the escort service i mean franklin sherman is sort of the ralph wiggum of the critic in a way. That's him at his most subdued. He's very subdued. He'll be flying planes later

and stealing Guernica. It's planned to rise within minutes on the show. Quick draw McGraw parodies. Popeye. Garrett Graham it blew my mind years after watching the critic sing Phantom of the Paradise. He is beef in that who's like this bizarre like glam rock character and like i can't believe it's

the same guy my my favorite franklin line is is uh milk narf you can say your name backwards milk darf what's your favorite food milk darf he's justARF. If I could be any vegetable, I'd be a carrot. Is that him too? I have to do my favorite though. As the first black female head of the KKK, I say, America

sucks. That was when he was running for president. I forgot that he was the mayor of New York. Or he had been that he was the mayor of New York. Or he had been a mayor and governor of New York in his background. That's why Ed Koch is the only eligible bachelor that his daughter knows. That's right. They talked about how, so the idea that Jay is adopted by obscenely waspy people.

Oh, God. That's great. It's a great character background. And they talk about how to create the characters of Franklin and his mother. I was going people. That's great. It's a great character background. And they talk about how to create the characters of Franklin and his mother, that Algina Reese went to Harvard. They got out of their Harvard yearbook

and found those exact people in the collection of blue bloods in the Harvard yearbook. They live on forever through the critic. And I mean, Eleanor is basically Katharine Hepburn, right? Yes. She's so good. Just so

cruel. Acidic. She's like a template for the mom in Arrested Development, almost. Her and Lucille have more than a little bit in common. She's less drinky than Lucille. Not that Eleanor doesn't drink. No, no. But Franklin is more of the drinky type. So what is his deal, by the way? I mean, is he

just an alcoholic? Did he lose his mind? Does he have dementia? I think it was sort of explained. Like, it is alcoholism. Yeah. Because there's that episode later where they get lost on the desert island and he stops drinking. You're right. That's right.

He's very intelligent, like Superman, gets immediately physically fit. But he's still talking to animals. Well, yeah. He's still talking to a penguin. Penguins can't fly. Because the penguin was trying to fly the plane.'s true penguins can't a penguin and he's been drinking oh that's so good though the mother's cruelty i i love eleanor just as much as franklin and that that just to jay's face she's just like those nice girls in the escort

service so acidic like the running guy's prostitutes to meet his parents yeah just the running guy no one believes she's really dating yeah nobody single person they meet it's like yeah she's using you margo kind of investigates her try to like kind of interrogates her rather margo's the closest thing to a normal person in this world yeah played by n Nancy Cartwright. That's right. Normal woman. Like her playing someone who's probably about 15 years younger

than she is at the time of recording. Yeah. She's a teenager, right? Or like late teens. Late teens. I mean, she has her debutante ball

which would put her at, I believe, 17. Well, she goes to, they say the name of her school, Miss Something School. Finishing School? Miss Something School for Untouched Girls.

Oh, right. I think they even say on the commentary that they went for so many different women, and they eventually just were like, eh, Nancy. Yeah, it's a good voice. I like Nancy's natural voice. Well, okay, I'm going to do my line of the show, because I love this, but it's also one of the darkest jokes in the whole show, too. Ah! I love this, but it's also one of the darkest jokes in the whole show, too. I just made that up!

That's the line of the show jingle, everybody. It's from the cruise control. Valerie, how would you like to go for a ride? Sure. Jay, are you coming? Sorry. I had a very bad experience with a horse once. Now, before I let you ride the pony,

are you sure you weigh less than 80 pounds? Yeah. Patches. No! I think Patches is great. I can just see the celery being snapped. Yes. The audio on that is perfect.

Yeah, especially without the visuals. You just, oh, terrible. Crunch, but that was a very Simpsony moment, too, of just looking to the sky and screaming, no! That's true. We just saw that in Homer the Vigilante, actually. And also, I think of this line all the time. Anytime I bend over and knock something over with my butt.

Why does everyone have such a hard time believing I love Jay? How can I put this? For one thing, his butt sticks out like an air conditioner. Ooh, a daffodil. That was the one that was all over the commercials, too. Before this show aired, I remember seeing that. Uh-huh, fat man butt on ABC. Can I tell you my line of the show?

Because we just went past it. The end of the dinner scene. I'm going to work this into my discussions way more often. Can't one dinner go by without you talking about your rotting corpse. That's great. You have to imagine what happened before. How many times? So we see another Simpsons device

in which they're doing social commentary through a fake video game. Is that Escape from New York? Is that what it's called? Escape from New York. The Big Apple. The Big Apple, yeah. Blah, blah, blah.

So this is Larry the Looter joke, except with more New York specifics. Yeah. Hurry up, Scott. You've only got ten seconds to get to Long Island. Uh-oh, Yankee Stadium is emptying out. And it's nickel beer day! Oh, no, the Reverend Al Sharpton!

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Wow. Al Sharpton! and started running for president, he dressed a little differently before than when he was a guest star on the Morton Downey. Oh, shit. If you only knew him from the Morton Downey Jr. show. He was even worse. He was more crass than Dill O'Reilly. That's for sure. Yeah, no, Morton Downey Jr. But Al Sharpton was on... More like an early Alex Jones.

But that Morton Downey Jr. had on Al Sharpton many times because he could count on him like we're going to scream at each other a lot and everybody's going to love it you can draw

a direct line of him to Bill O'Reilly to Glenn Beck to Sean Hannity he is this guy and Morton Downey Jr. will live on forever as Morton Koopa Jr.

in the Mario series can you believe they have to live with that reference well then Morton Downey Jr. chain smoked on every show and he was just like I'm healthy I'm goingey jr chain smoked on every show and he was just like i'm healthy i'm gonna live forever like cancer within a decade and he was like no actually

smoking's bad i'm sorry he did that like smoking cessation thing it's like am i paid of course i am they gave me my life back oh god oh landmark moments coming up right well so they introduced the kind of a sloppy adr line they set up up that Jay doesn't want to review her movie because he doesn't want to not like it. Which, honestly, as a critic who has not reviewed something because I know people involved in it, that's all you do. You just say, well, I'm too close to this thing. I'm not going to review it. Yeah, but Duke probably would not buy that. I guess in Jay's world that you don't get away with it. We we don't have that conversation which is a little bit odd like he doesn't actually

ever go to duke and say i can't do this he's just like i guess sending him the tape is duke insisting yeah but uh yes as he explains why he is trying to get out of it we get another landmark first in the show honey i heard you were sick, I am. Much too sick to see your movie. Ah-ah! Achem! And I like how later Achem becomes his eating sound. Achem, Achem, Achem! Oh, no! I'm allergic to shellfish!

I mean, that was a John Lovitz thing in The Simpsons. You hear it in The Simpsons' appearance. That was just a Lovitzism that snuck in. I mean, I think he's making everything he does just more Jewish. Is that like a more Jewish way of clearing your throat? Clean it up just a tiny bit. Yeah. I mean, it's great for clearing your throat. Try it at home.

Achm. I prefer achm as his catchphrase than the more labored catchphrase. We'll get to it in a little bit. But then we get, I think, to the standout moment in the episode. Oh, yeah. Let's just listen to the whole thing. Oh, it's beautiful. A story told through time

Happening in New York He's a lemon, she's a lime Beauty and King Dog A lemon, she's a lime. Beauty and King Dog. He's Adam to her Eve. She's Mindy to his Morg. Her hair's like silk,'s had a wave Beauty and King Dork What did you say?

Oh, I said how useful is the spork? You know, that spoon-fork thing you get at Kentucky Fried Chicken? I covered that up pretty well. That is such an Al Jean, Mike Reese thing. The singing Dustbuster and Toilet. Whenever they cut to his face singing Beauty and

King Dork, that final line, my heart breaks every time. It's so well animated. That scene touches me so much because it's him. How we use electricity can be smarter, cleaner, and greener. At Electric Ireland, we can help

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brighter find our net zero hub at electricireland.ie you know that it's all in his head but just he's like beauty yeah and just him going like finally i have a beautiful like the i i'm in love i'm so in love i'm with this beautiful person. And I finally feel happy as this, like, ugly loser. That's what it does. It does touch me in a certain way. And that's his dream of it. Yeah, and we missed earlier, like, teenagers were spray painting King Dork on his car. That's where that reference comes from.

But I wanted to point out that Rich Moore started the company Rough Draft, an animation studio. They were pioneers in computer animation for television. They in fact animated the Max on MTV which was like a sort of a breakout show in terms of doing things with computers. Animated is a loose term. They moved around shapes with computers. But this scene is definitely just like

just an amazing scene for TV in 94. Approximating the Beauty and the Beast camera pullout with CGI. I mean it is for TV. It looks aximating the Beauty and the Beast camera pullout with CGI. I mean, it is for TV. It looks a little more primitive, but the fact that they were able to do that, that ambition in the pilot is amazing. When you see how in later episodes,

especially with clip shows, you're like, did you run out of money? When you see this at first episode, you're like, well, I'd see how you ran out of money if that was, this was Rough Draft who, and this is credited specifically to scott vanzo brother scott vanzo and uh and richard moore i think started the company yeah and that along with greg vanzo and that rough draft is based in korea and rough draft would be the primary

animators on futurama that's right lots of cgi and that yeah this is them testing out their futurama chops of cgi yeah this I didn't realize how much CGI, and then putting it into historical context. I mean, they used CGI in the same shot in Beauty and the Beast in 91, but Toy Story's not out yet. There has not been a feature-length computer. Well, it was still like, you know, we'd see like Disney Channel featurettes at the time,

back when Disney Channel didn't have commercials, about like, here's how computers are helping animation. It was like this scene from The Great Mouse Detective in this giant clock. But I just wanted to point out additional historical context. The Critic began with great, for the era, computer animation and ended with terrible computer animation. What did it end with?

The Flash series on Atom Films. Oh, you're right. Technically, that was computer animation oh which one what did it end with the flash series on adam films oh you're right technically that was computer animation that doesn't have that that is non-canonical in my memories of the critic he should never not be with alice but they couldn't get her back it's it's it was just him so i was like i don't like that just him and like some other uh female character some new character yeah but the kid and uh doris grouse was dead and park overall was too expensive so yeah so it's just a bummer but i wonder if if rough draft also handled it too when he goes beauty and king dork because that felt like fuller animation it looked like disney just like a custom you know a custom mouth chart or something for that line or some guy just sat down and was like, I want to make this beautiful.

Because when it cuts to the next camera angle of that scene, it's like, oh, no, this is normal critic animation now. And then you get a very John Lovet-y talk to the camera. I covered that up pretty well. Which, Byrne says that exact line in Treehouse of Fire 3. He's like, the bathing beauty, the bathing beauty. I covered that up pretty well. I was wondering which episode it was, but I remember that being a Byron's line. Frankie-ack.

I was able to just look it up. You put in those exact words. Thank you, Frankie-ack. So the things he tricked her is not to be. They send a VHS tape to him. And that he is wearing one of many jokes they have of him wearing promotional clothes in bed. Even though he makes a lot of money. A My Own Private Idaho t-shirt, which I guess the joke is that they would even make that.

And then backdraft watchers, which make more sense. That is funnier. I think my favorite one of those is like For the Boys. It's For the Boys underwear. I wonder if the My Own is a is meant to be a gay joke it was a gay film it was yeah but i mean i do sleep in promotional clothing a lot yeah because i'm not gonna wear it outside yeah it's perfect for that i finally have cycled through all my promotional clothing i don't have promotional i don't want to say i would

definite but i definitely don't wear it outside anymore i I do sleep in a Phoenix Wright t-shirt a lot. So then, when he's forced to watch the film, Kiss of Death, we get the first use of his real catchphrase, which even Mike Reese admits was a very sweaty use to give a guy a catchphrase. Later used by Milhouse in The Simpsons. Another very quotable line, I will say it every now and then. Not Hachi Machi, but something else. Ah, come on.

How bad could she be? She's wonderful. Come on, baby. Give me a kiss. Oh, I'll give you a kiss, all right. A kiss of death! Hachi Machi! She's awful! I'll give you a kiss, all right? A kiss of death! I can't match it. She's awful. But yeah, how is it like a kiss of death? Michael is my husband, so he can vouch for me.

Was that your wedding ceremony? Yes. You may not kiss the bride. I'll give you a kiss. When Diana and I first met, our love of the critic was one of the things that we bonded over and like we kept quoting that line at each other i'll give you a kiss all right of death we did miss my favorite line of the show actually in the in the pre beauty and king dork scene i love jay saying we men have petals too, you know. That's creepy. I don't want to think about that.

I've really opened up, yeah. I love how creepy it is. I don't want to think about where the petals are. I don't want to think about Jay Sherman's petals. I had to play that line in the show Jingle Games. I just made that up! His petals are just very large skin tags. You made it worse, Michael.

You made it worse. Oh, oh, thinking about that. Well, so then we hear about Jay has a real dilemma now. Oh, Doris, I'm about to do a review that could cost me the woman I love. Gee, that's tough. Sometimes I think this job isn't worth $271,000 a year. $271,000? Ah. $271,000? Ah! Ah! Put it out!

Put out my head! You did that on purpose! So what if I did? I'm Union. That's a lot of money for a film critic. I mean, the world was smaller. In 1993, when was this? Well, written in pre, this is January 94. But pre-internet the price of criticism

was much higher has anyone done what that is for inflation? no I did not it's like 400k or something 271k take a quick step back, Hachimanchi they talk about this was our attempt to manufacture a catchphrase

and it never caught on no it really didn't but I say it sometimes I say it sometimes to manufacture a catchphrase and it never caught on. No, it really didn't. And that he said he got it from like a... But I say it sometimes. I say it sometimes, yeah. And I never say that. I got way more catchphrases. I would much sooner say,

Crows, you know you want me, baby. I say, Bucca Bucca or Woozzle Wuzzle. Woozzle Wuzzle. So if you want to know, $271,000 in January 94 is $450,000 today. I assume it was over $400,000. Honestly, to be a television personality who films a weekly show seemingly without break, as Jay does.

Presumably with nationwide coverage. Yeah, on cable, that's kind of low honestly i had heard through the grapevine the type of stuff that say adam sessler and olivia mudd were making on g4 now when you would think like what did people make on g4 nobody watches that they made a lot more than that a year on that show i i don't want to talk out of school but so just think about that like cable personalities despite being useless and only used for clips on youtube, like they get paid a lot of money. And Jay has a really nice apartment. Oh, yeah.

Not as nice as Doris's though, as we'd see. Oh, you're right. Yeah. Because it's rent controlled since 1947. I love that he's just so ready to bash her head in. But yeah, here's a reference to kind of lost the time. This is really lost the time. I mean, I feel like the Butler show we all know more than this is Mr. Belvedere, probably.

That has gone on to be better remembered than a family affair. Mr. Belvedere ate family affairs lunch. But I mean, so the critic was obsessed with Brando. Yes. Well, Maurice Lamar was obsessed. No, they were all obsessed with Brando. Yeah, I mean. So they just couldn't stop doing it.

It was an easy way to make fat jokes. Well, you get easy fat jokes, and you can make jokes about somebody being paid a lot to do a bad job, which was Marlon Brando's job at that time. Tonight, we'll be reviewing Family Affair, the motion picture. Just look who got $8 million to play Mr. French. Buffy, Zody, for your lunch, I have made peanut butter and banana sandwiches. Will you make a sandwich for my doll, Mrs. Beasley? Yeah, sure.

That's exactly what I feel like doing. Of course I can get together a little sandwich for your stupid little doll. Hang on a second. I mean, this is not too outlandish because we just had the opening of Car 54, Where Are You, the movie. So this is not too crazy. Yeah, I mean, that feels like a parody in and of itself although to this day the only thing i know about a family affair is comes from like an onion column from gene teasdale where she like spends a crazy amount of time and money trying to track down a mrs

beasley but that seemed very of her character yeah uh gene teasdale is one of my all-time favorites she's great i need to buy that book The book of Gene's own is so great. Oh, wow. And Family Fair never did get a film version. The closest thing it got was a 2002 UPN reboot. Oh, no. And the man playing Mr. French was Tim Curry. Oh, really? He's better

than that. He deserves so much better. It lasted half a season. I mean, he would literally do anything. I think he was in most CD-ROM games in the 90s. And the show was produced, both the original and the remake, by Sid and Marty Croft. Oh! History's greatest monsters. They're purveyor of child nightmares.

They tried to make fun. They wanted to make fun things. They wanted to make live-action cartoons that were insanely creepy nightmares. That inspire creepypasta internet memes to this day. I've destroyed my mind with acid. Time to make children's programming. Whenever I say their names, I want to say the Mr. Show parody of Sid and Criminy Craft.

Back then, eating an orange was like taking a drive through a citrus mountain. So Jay gives her a bad review, a nice review oh he's so he's so polite yeah he's like oh she tried her best but yeah plenty of actors that got better over time sally field did not start out a great actress this does not make valerie look good i'll say like she's not treated very well by the show and i do love the i love the visual joke of franklin saying his nose is as big as my foot. See? Which I thought was a joke from a later episode. Isn't that incredible?

So the way she acts in this scene is so different from how she acts in every other scene that it does make you think she really was just sleeping with him for the review. I mean, the intent is just like, we have to have her leave the show now. Oh, and also we get another celebrity that can't stop popping up because one actor wants to do it.

Oh, you're right. You're short, you're fat, and even for a film critic, you're ugly. That's a good actor. Oh, I see. You want me to beg. Well, there's one thing you didn't count on. I have no pride. Please, please, please, please, please.

Please. Please, please, please, please, please. Denise, if you come back to me, I'll give up gambling for good. What a loser. Sun Yi, I swear I didn't know she was your sister. Oh, man. That's a dark, dark, dark joke. In case you don't know, this was my introduction to Woody Allen. In 1994, I had never seen a Woody Allen movie.

Even when Marge, I didn't know the name of that person was Woody Allen. I didn't know who Soon-Yi was. I think it was until after Marge makes the joke of like, did you see the new Woodsy Allen movie? I just don't like that nervous fella who's always in them

but in case you didn't know Woody Allen was with Mia Farrow who adopted many children and in a totally not creepy way he started dating one of her adopted daughters while he was married to her which he tries to play

off as like I never even saw her as a father. Which also just says like, oh, so you were a horrible father who was just like, fuck you kids. I mean, he had children or at least one child with Mia Farrow. So this is your kid's sister.

And then there's also some stuff with Mia Farrow's biological children, too. Yeah. But so in 1992, publicly, he was like, fine, I'm just with her. And he married her. And ever since then, it's just been like, it's just this very disgusting fact of a guy who is like, separate. In the artist is dead scenario, he makes great films.

He's made many great films that are just like what a great filmmaker but when you know the man who's just like you're a piece of shit you should be in jail I mean view all of his films through that lens Manhattan is hard to watch now especially Manhattan

it generated one of my favorite King of the Hill lines where Nancy is trying to find a way to continue cheating on Dale and she tells Peggy like the wants what it wants, Woody Allen and she turns away and Peggy's like, Nancy! He married his daughter! To his credit, they're still together. They are. All these 20 years later.

I'm sure it's a very equal relationship between two people. It's really interesting that if you've ever seen a documentary where they are interacting together, she bosses the shit out of him. And then he says really cruel things about her behind her back. Oof. Yeah. He'll just look at the camera and be like, when she was a kid, she was eating garbage in Korea.

Jesus Christ. This is weird, guys. That's not cool. This is weird. Was that in his clarinet movie? Yes. Jesus Christ. This is weird, guys. That's not cool. This is weird. Was that in his clarinet movie? Yes. Barfo. It was interesting.

I can't go to the Oscars because I have to play my clarinet at a club like eat shit. Steve Allen show ended, Woody. If I can bring it back to a slightly more pleasant topic, which is actually going to be much more horrible,

is that in the very next shot after her bus leaves and Woody Allen walks by, he follows her to the airport, to the gate of her airport. And for those of you who have never been in airports before 9-11 happened, you used to be able to go right up to the gate without a ticket. You do that all the time. That's where you would meet people when they'd be playing. Post 9-11

ruined the don't get on that plane scene from romantic comedy. I think they're playing off of that in which Jay is not arriving at the last minute. He's begging her all the way up until she leaves on the plane. He won't let go, but that also feels like a very Simpson, Gene and

Reese Simpson-y thing of that is a very dark ending the dark ending is just like no you're alone and crying alone at the airport and then they have to give like okay 30 seconds of sweetness because we can't leave you on that and he's saying like you'll be back to the plane as it's flying away also is it weird that a movie actress has to take the bus to the airport? Well, her movie sucks. Well, it's not a famous movie actress. Well, she should have taken the cab that we went past with the driver that says, Look at sign!

The driver speaks only three words of English. I love that. That is the recurring cab driver, but I just love the look at sign. Yeah, the cyclical nature of look at sign. The driver only speaks three words of english later jay teaches english for cab drivers i get through every day with lithium oh man i want to i want to do all these critic episodes don't give our audience any ideas listening to howard stern and howard stern says something about a toilet. He's like, ha ha, toilet. So in 1994, it seems really weird to do a shot at Seinfeld.

This isn't particularly nice to Seinfeld. It could be crueler, I suppose. I think they're making fun of the voice of Seinfeld and the natural, not the voice of Jerry Seinfeld, but the voice of the show and the naturalistic dialogue. Marty's comment to me makes it sound like that is writers saying they think this is naturalistic but it isn't it sounds false yeah but i guess i guess the the joke is that they're fooling america into thinking like yeah but it's just weird to see a sitcom take a shot at seinfeld of all things even the simpsons

kind of laid off you know yeah i thought you were taking kathy out tonight why do they call it taking out i took her to a restaurant. It wasn't out, it was in. I would say I'm taking her in, but then she sounds like a pair of pants. Why aren't you laughing, Dad? This is how people actually talk. And speaking of Woody Allen, I believe Jerry Seinfeld. It's Marisa Marsh's Seinfeld, right?

Yeah, and Nick Jameson doing George Costanza. But speaking of Woody Allen, I believe Seinfeld was dating a 17-year-old at the time. Ah, yes. And again, he would not live that down like today. Which became the plot of the Married with Children episode. You're right. Like the Seinfeld analog is dating... Kelly?

Kelly Bundy, yeah. That's right. Jesus. Man, he lived that down. It's amazing. But when Marty just says like... Marty laughs too hard to tell you that, like, this isn't funny. I love the joke of Kramer busting into the wall.

Whoa. That could be a joke on Seinfeld, to be fair. It could be. It's 80% as good as Seinfeld. Yeah, there'd be a little more to it, I think. Slightly more. But, yeah, it was a weird direct joke at Seinfeld. it's it's 80 as good as yeah there'll be there'll be a little more to it i think slightly more but yeah it was it was a weird direct joke at seinfeld and then they just go see a stallone movie it's a joke about they they had some sacred cows i think that was like future-proofing them

like okay who's been in bad movies you can make fun of for like the last decade. Schwarzenegger, Stallone, William Shatner. Yep. They could do everyone. Rhinestone. He survived Rhinestone. He is unkillable. In this unnamed Stallone movie, he plays a concert pianist

who, to the multiblocks. Yep, that's how Jay gets his groove back. Yeah. Dumping on a shitty movie. I feel you, buddy. That's true.

That's true. I do love the little sting. It's a very heartwarming sting every episode ends with. It's like bum, bum, bum. Yeah. I don't know where it comes from or if it's just, you know, made by Alf Clausen. Is it from the theme song? No.

It just kind of mirrors the theme song. A bit, yeah. But it leaves you with more of a upbeat thing than just the Simpsons like... It's a more strong feeling. It brings you out with a better mood, I think. And so there's one recurring joke they do every episode that the Simpsons doesn't do, which is a post-credit stinger. Well, not even stinger, but it's like a post-credits joke that changes out each time.

It's very MST3K almost with the way the credits run. This is the first one of them. I think, honestly, the weakest one they ever did. Excuse me, sir. The show's over. Get away, zit face. Yeah. But that is their squeaky voice team. I feel like they did different ones for a while,

but then didn't they start recycling them after a while? I think they maybe had like ten total. But I have nowhere to go. I'm stuck in the chair. I have nowhere else to go. Do we see the Gracie Films logo after we see Jay's back of his head in the movie theater? I think we do. We cut from a movie theater to another movie theater.

And also that Jay in a very moment-breaking scene that he has to say all celebrity voices were impersonated. No celebrities were harmed in the filming of this episode. They have to, even though it's all over the screen, too, just to be so lawyer-proof, like,

these are all impersonations. They're not the real people. Beavis and Butthead are cartoons. I think the no celebrities were harmed thing were them trying to bury the legality of it. Like, no, it's a joke, see? Well, I mean mean south park has been doing that since the first episode that's true that's true yeah it was a really good first

episode the show would get me it would get slightly less mean though i think like the fat little pig episode is just oh yeah or the episode where he's just canceled because everyone hates him it's like man this is me abc was not ready for this, but I feel like everyone but Franklin is sort of who they will always be. Franklin would get turned up maybe like three notches, his dad, but I feel like they kind of established everybody very strongly from the beginning. Well, Duke gets to be nicer to him

as the show goes on. And they also talk about how they would flanderize Duke, too, of like, it'd be funny if your character cried here or sang a song to a cat. Yeah. They did that shit all the time with Duke. He runs a KFC-style chain and just keeps biscuits in his pockets.

And now it's like, you keep biscuits in your pants? And Jay's like, yes. Oh, you were talking to him. Well, isn't his network called Duke's blah, blah, blah in House of Waffles? Yeah. You see that on the establishing shot all the time wait till you see the muffin shoot there's so many there's there are a million great critic jokes i think this episode as a pilot in their first one it holds up really well i think even on the commentary aljean says that for animation which he has a ton of experiences, he sees the first season as an entire pilot.

You learn everything in the first season because nobody sees it until the whole season is done in animation or close to it. So then the second season is really your reaction to that. And so that's the critic, too, that they made Critic in a Vacuum. Oh, also, I didn't even mention Judd Apatow it was another hire on the show oh wow he i think only wrote a script in the second season but he's listed as a producer he's a consulting producer he's on the end there but he also when there's going to be a jay leno impersonation on the show that's apatow he's he did jay leno on the ben Stiller show as well. Yeah, I remember because I saw Ben Stiller show and then

noticed the name, you know, at the end. And then when I saw this and noticed the same name, I was like, Apatow, huh? I think this young man might be going somewhere. And some writers like Ken Keeler would start on The Critic, jump to The Simpsons and then go to Futurama. So, like, this is sort of a, I don't know,

they're crossbreeding a lot with different shows. It's very incestuous, for sure. But, I mean, Ken Keeler, you listen to him on commentary, he's like, you were born to do Futurama. You are the dorkiest math nerd in the world. He's the nerdiest guy on any Simpsons or Futurama commentary. Nerdier than David X. Cohen.

Nerdier than Al Jean. He is, like, beyond nerdy. It's incredible how nerdy Ken Keeler is and he's right and day you're a cool guy if you're listening to this ken keeler he is great anyway yeah i think this uh pilot holds up pretty well i wouldn't mind doing more critiquing critics in the future but i just wanted us to like we had approached the premiere of the critic and we talked about the critics so much in the in talking simpsons up to this point that I felt like we had to do the first episode. We got 90

minutes out of it and spoilers we may be talking about another show that premiered shortly afterwards in another special so if I have my way do let us know in the comments nicely please if you like this and wouldn't mind us because you know there is

easily a half dozen shows that are tangentially related to The Simpsons or somewhat spun off to The Simpsons that when, in chronological order, we get to their premiere, we could do, like, King of the Hill, Futurama, Mission Hill. Behind the scenes info. We talked about it. We only have so many really good episodes of The Simpsons left. Probably maybe two years of our time left of the show that we really like. We've got to pad it out then with other shows, maybe. These specials help us extend that time a bit.

But I hope you guys liked it. How do you guys... Well, Michael, you've never been on a Talking Simpsons before. I guess this officially isn't one, but did you enjoy your time, Michael? I did quite a bit. I can't wait to see the comments. I actually think with this show, we're less likely to see comments saying,

I can't stand Bob and Henry's politics, and also Michael's dead-on impersonation of my voice. Who are these fandom creeps on my laser time? They should make their own show. I don't get that at all. But yeah, if you want more of these kind of things, give us more money. Buy my book. Buy my book. I have to say, also, re-watching this, going in, I was like, did I even see the pilot?

Do I remember this? And then it was like, I thought all this stuff happened much later in the series in a bunch of different episodes. Yeah, me too. Beauty and King, Dork, the whole thing with Valerie. A lot of this is in the series in a bunch of different episodes like Beauty and King Dork the whole thing with Valerie and a lot of this is in the clip shows they use several seasons in the clip shows probably the strongest animated pilot for a

primetime show I've seen how useful is the spork I'll spork your ass so yeah this has been Talking Critic I guess temporarily and I've been your host Bob Mackie you can find me on Twitter as Bob Servo I also write about video games every damn day for fandom

go to fandom.com to read that every other Thursday for the past decade plus I've been writing a comedy article for something awful go to somethingawful.com to read those and my other podcast is Retronauts every Monday at retronauts.com there is a new episode about a new topic we've been doing it forever

so if you want to listen to the show, just find a topic you like and listen to that episode. I guarantee you'll enjoy it. Go to retronauts.com or search for RetroNauts in your podcast machine or iTunes or whatever the hell you use to listen to podcasts. Everybody else. I'm H-E-N-E-R-E-Y-G on Twitter. Keep checking me there. I also write for

fandom.com like Bob. And of course, this was all brought to you by patreon.com slash lasertime. And of course, this was all brought to you by patrion.com slash laser time. And it is what supports this show. It keeps this home studio open where we can record this. And it is the home of the first season of talking Simpsons, as well as our three season two, three and four wrap up specials.

So much great stuff there. Just $5 a month gets you access to it and it helps support us. And there's tons of more exclusive things there. and plus, if you want to see more videos and listen to more Lazer Time podcasts, check out LazerTimePodcast.com. I'm doing this all on Chris's behalf here since he isn't here, but I know two podcasts in particular that you guys want to plug, right, Michael? Yes. Well, I mean, if you're a regular listener of talking simpsons

and you usually download this from uh your iphone or android device and don't go to laser time podcast.com it's entirely possible that you've never heard of my filthy stupid podcast about video games vidya game apocalypse which has me and chris antista and dave rudden and a cycling fourth chair that changes from week to week. I've done it several times. That's true. And hopefully soon again. We start out every week with a top five about some esoteric topic

that I usually think up the day before and talk about new releases and other stuff. It's a fun time if you like the vidya games. And I'm also on a podcast but not about video games because i don't know shit about video games but i do know shit about old stuff because i am one uh i am on 30 2010 i'm an old stuff i'm an old stuff yes it's not quite it's like double stuff is that

like your dungeons and dragons race old stuff yes old stuff i'm one of the elder gods uh i live beneath the sea dreaming. About 302010, a podcast about this particular week in pop culture history, 30 years ago, 20 years ago, and 10 years ago. So if you want to hear about what was going on heading into summer 1987, 97, and 07, we will talk about it. If you liked all our references or explanations of dated references in this episode, then you will love that show. That's like the whole thing.

That's just all we do. What the fuck is this movie? Well, we'll find out. And seriously, if you like this one or you want to hear more critic episodes, maybe tell a friend at Tell Us About It on Twitter. Or if you're like, we only want Simpsons, I subscribe this for Simpsons, nicely

say that, I guess. But how can you like the Simpsons and not like the critic? I don't understand. I wouldn't watch the critic for half an hour. I'm not going to listen to. But how can you like The Simpsons and not like The Critic? I don't understand. I wouldn't watch The Critic for half an hour. I'm not going to listen to your show for three times that long. Sony, who owns it, doesn't seemingly give a shit about it. It's all on YouTube. It's all on YouTube, yeah. I got all these

clips from YouTube. Every episode. I didn't have to dig up my DVDs. They're not even shrunken backwards and in German. They're just all up on YouTube. Just straight to the show. Don't even have to hide it. It's probably been there since 2007. Thank you so much for joining us on this special episode of Talking Simpsons. We'll be back next week with the Simpsons episode.

Bart visits the box factory, everybody. See you then. Excuse me, sir. The show's over. But I have nowhere to go.