Talking Simpsons - Talking Simpsons - The Old Man And The Lisa With Botchamania's Maffew

Episode Date: December 12, 2018

Burns loses all his money and learns all about recycling, plus pro wrestling legend Bret Hart appears, meaning we needed a guest that was an expert in Simpsons AND wrasslin'! Joining us is Maffew, creator of the fantastic Botchamania videos, and we chat with him all about Bret Hart's interesting history in this classic episode. Plus recycling, slurry, ethical quandaries, old men at grocery stores, and Catsup versus Ketchup! Listen and enjoy, you pencil-necked geeks! Support this podcast and get hundreds of bonus ad-free episodes by visiting Patreon.com/TalkingSimpsons and becoming a patron!

hey everybody right before the show wanted to let you know we have an update to our patreon a brand new monthly movie podcast is available now for ten dollar and up patrons at patreon.com slash talking simpsons you want to hear me and bob talk all about mask of the phantasm the best batman movie of all time you can hear all about that in our long almost three hours long podcast patreon.com slash talking simpsons hey everybody real quick up top just wanted to mention if you're confused about the hour mark in this episode where we talk a bit about george hw bush and you're like why aren't you guys mentioning that he recently passed away that's because we recorded

this a whole month ago so just saying that to clear up any confusion back to the show i hardly endorse this event or product Ahoy, ahoy, everybody! Welcome to Talking Simpsons, where we tell Mother Nature hard cheese. I'm your host, enchanting must-haver Bob Mackie, and this is our chronological exploration of The Simpsons. Who else is here with me today? Delightful little ragamuffin, Henry Gilbert. And who do we have on the line? It's just a bunch of yes men, mafu. And today's episode is

The Old Man and the Lisa. Dad, you're not supposed to have fun recycling. This is serious. Oh, okay. Today's episode aired on April 20th. That's right 420 1997 and as always henry will tell us what happened on this mythical day in real world history oh my god happy 420 bobby sideburns lover don mattingly turns 36 nickelodeon debuts the angry beavers and the very same night as this episode the wwf has their pay-per-view in your house 14 revenge of the taker which has stone cold steve austin facing off

against brett hitman hart in a match that ends in a bullshit dq wow so i'll just let you guys talk about that i'm gonna use the bathroom wait wait revenge of Taker, is that the Undertaker? Yes. And did he come back to life at this point? Well, this was him, he won the championship at the previous pay-per-view, WrestleMania 13, so this was his defense of that against mankind. And was Kane part of the picture at this point? The evil, darker Undertaker. We're about six months away from Kane. Okay, okay, I want to know when Kane enters the picture. But Angry Beavers, though, I always wanted to watch it. My friends Nick and

Chris, who have been on What a Cartoon, they are big fans of this show, but I never got around to really getting into it. What's the report on Angry Beavers? Is it good? Is it bad? It was fine for me. It was late. Anything post-Rocko as a Nick tune, I was like, I'm feeling slightly too old for this now. It's better than Cat Talk. I'd watch before Cat Talk. Yeah, that is true. Most things are. And it features the voice of the cat from Sabrina.

Nick Bacai. Nick Bacai, yes. He was in a lot of failed, I think, pilots. Yeah, they were trying to make Nick Bacai a thing, and it never really took. They're like, we'll put you off camera. You can voice fuzzy animals. So on the line, our special guest, Mafu. Can you tell us who exactly you are

and where you're from and what is your relationship with The Simpsons? I'm just trying to recover from all The Simpsons references we've had so far. As well as the Angry Beavers being brought up, which is amazing. As soon as you're conjuring up all these old things, I'm thinking back to, yeah, Angry Beavers being brought up, which is amazing. Because as soon as you're conjuring up all these old things, I'm thinking back to, yeah, Angry Beavers.

And that was, you know, in the block that would get the ill-fated Dumb and Dumber cartoon. We'd have that. We'd have, you know... Actually, you know what? Yeah, we'll go into that in another podcast, perhaps.

But even you just saying, what a cartoon, I've got the riff in my head. Oh, excellent. That's what it's for. I am a wrestling guy, I guess. Oh, Matthew, are you a wrestler? No, no no i am one of those how did someone say it i'm a critic in the sense that critics are like eunuchs in bathhouses they can tell you what you're doing wrong but they can't

do it themselves and i'm much happier that way uh regards to wrestling i do a video series called botchamania which features wrestlers messing up. And you would think that wrestlers would hate me with every inch of their being. No, wrestlers are a funny bunch. They're a very angry beaver. And they enjoy it when they mess up most of the time, surprisingly, because this is an industry based on putting on spandex

and getting people to boo you. I have to say, I'm not a major wrestling fan. I watched it when I was a kid and a little when I was a teen, but I do love Botchamania. It's something that I think anyone can get into because it's just a bunch of goofs, goof-em-ups, and fun video game music.

Can you explain more in detail what that is so people can check it out? I love it. Yeah, when you try McClure's Sleeps Hour, if that's what they cut out, then what they leave in must be pure gold. Yes, it's all the stuff that goes wrong in wrestling. How can something go wrong in wrestling, Matthew, if it's all predetermined?

Well, you'd be surprised. Yeah, some of them are more obvious than others. Always done or attended with the intention of laughing at it rather than laughing with. Sometimes that line is a bit blurred, to be honest with you. But yes, I decided to feature video game music very early on when I started doing it because it's what I was listening to. Very into the chiptunes and video game cover music scene. Still doesn't have a really catchy term. That's what I thought I'd put it in because it's what i was listening to very into the chip tunes and video game cover music scene still doesn't have a really catchy term that's what i thought i'll put it in because

it's youtube why the hell not you can get away with that type of thing and it's stuck people used to hate it i've used simpsons arcade music for example yeah that's our opening tune too yeah it's up for grabs oh wonderful which which one is it the first stage one stage one yeah stuff like that and it went from people going what is this bully bloop shit to oh please put in you know uh captain bucky o'hare nez great soundtrack yeah there's sort of reference something obscure and i am a hardcore wrestling fan and i also oh no i yeah i know i and i and i love boccia mania i also really enjoy how much you get in Simpsons reference in there, including like, especially the endings on Boccia Mania

have some of the best like Simpsons shit posting I've seen, either from you or from folks in the Boccia Mania community. Like you must be a real, what are you, a Simpsons fan first or a wrestling fan first? I think they went hand in hand, to be honest with you. I always watched Simpsons as a kid because my dad had it may have been the first vhs simpsons release i don't know they'll quote me on that maybe you'll know better but i'm pretty sure it's one of them it was uh simpsons in in the wild or goes wild oh christ you think i know the name of it by now but

um season one episode where oh call the simpsons they can call it god damn it it's season one so unless you know it's it's it's all right but there's so many of the better secrets i normally forget that name too yeah it's that one that had like the that and treehouse of horror one which is amazing uh you look looking bad nick so much they're going okay i don't get any of these jokes but it's animated but my dad thinks it's funny so i'll watch it and in UK, Simpsons has gone from network to network. It was on syndicated TV. Syndicated, sorry, that's an American term.

It was on threshold TV on BBC Two, but it was at 6 p.m., so there was some stuff cut out, noticeably, but it then went to Sky One, which is on cable, Rupert Murdoch and all that. And basically, on the weekdays, was it 6 p.m.? Yeah, pretty sure it was 6 p.m. There would be a double bill of The Simpsons every night, and I'm pretty sure it was a very rare night

that me and my brother did not watch both episodes for years. Wow, that's... I feel I've grown up watching The Simpsons up to a point. I mean, come on. Hey, season 30 is coming out soon, guys. But yeah,

it's still the best TV show of all time. You know, there'll be things like Sopranos, The Wire, Twin Peaks, season one. But yeah, still The Simpsons from season two to season nine and a bit.

The best, the best, the best, the best. It's great to hear that that kind of indoctrination happened in other countries, too. We had the same sort of thing where it was, of course,

we fell in love with it in America every Sunday and sometimes Thursday. And then once syndication started, it was often twice a day, sometimes more, four years. And that's how it's all etched into our brains forever. So we have the same sort of phenomenon happening here. It's really good seeing the rise of these Simpsonship posts and Facebook pages and the remixing going on. It's just like, oh yeah, I get every single thing that's happening in these and and some of them are really out there and you go yeah that's that from that episode that's that reference from that that's that and it's it's like I don't even need to think it's like I imagine you know um you know an actor who's had to do you know Macbeth

500 times in a row you know that's a good shakespeare shit posty i love wow that is a great comparison do you do you have a favorite uh one you've used on boccia mania the current one uh there's actually a few ones that i've made i'm happy with the homer listing all his jobs doing it that was happy because that that went into you know mind saying you should use your powers that can make you be your job. You can help people. It cuts to the Neighborhood Watch, but it's the APA Titantron, but I've, you know,

obviously edited it with the amazing skill to say the APU. Apu. Ah, that's hilarious. I know, again, it's something that makes me laugh. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it is what it is. That one, and recently the one where Roman Reigns has been avoiding Braun Strowman, and it's the audio of Homer taunting the opposing crowd losers losers you know and they start throwing stuff at him he goes ha ha I am invincible invincible then Braun Strowman throws a chair

at him and it's the same audio as someone throwing the keg at him oh that was so painful on the show but so Mafu is here because obviously he's wrestling fan, and Bret Hart is the guest star on this episode. He's not in it for very long, but I have to tell you that the Wikipedia summary of this episode, the one-line Wikipedia summary of this episode, posits that Bret Hart is the center of this story. I want to read it all to you. This is an everything's coming up Simpsons thing,

but I found it last night, and it tickled me so much. So, the Wikipedia synopsis is Brett Hitman Hart attempts to buy bankrupt Mr. Burns's house until Lisa helps rebuild his fortune. So obviously, Brett is the villain. He is probably shoved into a pool at the end of the episode. And, you know, it's a great it's a big fundraising against Brett Hart story. Obviously, a wrestling fan wrote this. Yeah, absolutely. It was actually Bret Hart also featuring The Simpsons.

Yes. Were you a big Bret Mark or is he one of your favorites? I mean, we all respect him as a legend and all that. But was he a personal favorite of yours in the 90s? As a kid, my three heroes growing up were Jesus Christ, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Bret Hart. Wow. My mom, being a very devoted Christian, was not happy when I told her that.

That was the son, the ghost, and the Holy Spirit. But yeah, absolutely. Bret Hart, his promos would go, My opponent may be bigger than me. He may be stronger than me, but I will bring a fight to him because I'm a fighting man. I fight for all the family men,

the lumberjacks out there. I have family values. I will go out to be the best there is, the best there was. And he would make his opponent, like this would be the toughest fight he's ever had. You know, Bret Hart may die

in the ring tonight. The Iron Yuppie, he's challenging him later on. The Iron Yuppie, he's challenging him later on. The Iron Yuppie, he's a great man, seven foot tall, made of steel, he shits bricks,

and you know all this. And Bret Hart would make it, even if he was wrestling, you know, Duke of the Dupes of Drossey, you think, oh man, Duke could beat Bret Hart tonight.

So then when Bret would beat him, because of Bret Hart, he would always be like, wow, Bret triumphed over the odds yet again. What a man. Just like Jesus. That's the opposite Triple H of just saying, like, my opponent's terrible.

He's the worst. I'm the greatest. I'll always remember Bret Hart. My opponent's half the size of me. I will always remember Bret Hart for just having wet hair all the time. Just a big fan of the wet, drippy hair. This came out at a very interesting time for Bret Hart as well in 97. He was at a crossroads in his career

that would ultimately lead him to the montreal screw job which is so famous even bob has heard of it that's true that's right he was had to choose between springfield and sheffield that came up on another podcast you fucking idiot shelbyville shelby sheffield is a town in the uk i was confused. I'm sorry, guys. I don't know what context it came up, but I think we explained the Montreal Screwjob in full on a podcast at some point. Yeah. On one of our podcasts. I cannot recall why exactly, but yeah.

Until a recent-ish wrestling episode of The Simpsons, this is the most wrestling the show had ever really had and the first actual wrestling yes star they had because i don't especially from listening to the commentary i don't think the writers were particularly big wrestling fans uh based on especially one story i'll get to later when we get to the brett scene but they at least they drew brett correctly though and have you ever met brett matthew in all your travels yes He did a tour of the UK two years ago. He came at the same time WD was in town, in the town he was running. It had nothing to do with WD that night. He just happened to be in the same town as it.

So he was there. He was drunk. And he was just like, I don't know why everyone thinks I'm miserable. I just like wrestling how it used to be. He'd have like a Guinness and be like, Seth Rollins is so risky. I can't believe he broke Cena's nose. He was shit on everybody. He was like three miles away.

If he said it a bit louder, they would have stopped resting on it. Is Bret Hart talking shit about me? And I was very happy to ask him about this episode. So I'm very pissed, actually, because I checked Wikipedia, like any sane individual would go to a podcast about a subject. And yeah, the story's going to tell of the one he told, so I thought it was exclusive.

It's a good story, though. It is is great this episode's title is a parody of the ernest hemingway story the old man in the sea and i'll tell you what the simpsons were a big fan of parodying this title because we have the old man in the lisa the old man in the sea students and the old man in the key three and all within like five years too come on come on guys yeah but let's think the commentary i didn't realize this they said that the names of the episodes were more for the writers to know which episode was which because they would have the production codes it took me a while to get used to fans knowing the episodes by the names i think by this point bill oakley and josh weinstein would at least know these would be on the internet because all of the previous titles in like seasons one to five are like Homer the blank Bart the blank Marge does this Lisa does

this this episode writing directing team is a major one because you have John Swarzwelder oh yeah has more writing by credits than any other writer in Simpsons history that maybe Matt Selman has passed him now but I don't respect that. And then you have Mark Kirkland as the director who has directed more episodes of The Simpsons than anybody. So you have them teaming up for an episode. So John Schwarzwalder also wrote Wacking Day, and that won a Genesis Award, pitched by George Meyer, not his idea.

Schwarzwalder is a libertarian. I don't think he's an environmentalist at all. And this episode was pitched by David X. Cohen and Schwarzwalwell to write it and it won another award an environmental media award so he probably just like melted it i think in both those cases it was the writers trolling john schwartzwelder to be like oh you hate the environment well we gave you the environmentalism episode and also as we found out from mike reese's book, John Schwarzwalder doesn't often write jokes for Lisa and Marge and just kind of forgets them. So like, OK, then this is an environmentalism episode starring Lisa. Go for it, John.

I guess. I mean, I love this episode, but I think the Environmental Media Awards were desperate that year for anything because there's no message other than pollution is bad and being like Mr. Burns is bad. There's nothing deeper than that. And it's also saying, oh, and also, you know, environmentalism is a lot of work and not fun. I think with those awards, it's mainly you just go with the most famous thing to get the award,

not really the most impactful. Well, this episode starts out with some rooting around in the trash. And now, the thrilling conclusion of Colonel Dracula joins the Navy. And now, the thrilling conclusion of Colonel Dracula Joins the Navy. Uh, Colonel? Blair! Lisa, what in the heck are you doing?

Oh, it's for my Junior Achievers Club. We're trying to earn money by recycling. Well, recycling is useless, Lisa. Once the sun burns out, this planet is doomed. You're just making sure we spend our last days using inferior products. Well, I think it's a great idea. Mom, Mom, you're mixing polyethylene with polyurethane. Marge!

Well, I'm sorry. And you have to cut these up first. Otherwise, animals get caught in them. Only the stupid ones. All of the dissenting voices against recycling, I feel, are just John Schwarzwalder's actual opinions. I think so, yeah. I love the cynicism here.

Basically, it's almost a parody of people that you hear about recycling. It's one of the reasons I like this episode. I'm very glad you chose it because my mom was

really into recycling. She's the first person to introduce me because she is a hippie, vegan, Buddhist, whatever. She still eats fish. It's cool to see this type of thing

where she's like, it's really important. And you like and bart's bart's line is very dear to me because i have heard many people say things like that non-ironically and mean it oh what's the point we're all gonna die anyway well we're recording this after a bunch of scientists decided that we only have what like a good 12 years left they say 2040 we're kind of fucked yeah you can't change it by then it's over that's what the un just said i'm cashing in my chips godspeed everyone with new children i'm kind of with bart too i'm just like you know what let's just have nice products who cares it's a hell of a toboggan ride and uh yeah no lisa is really cast as quite a scold here but i mean

she is correct you want this to be recycled properly but it's also what happens to march here is why some people don't like recycling is because all they they think that they're helping like march thinks she's helping and then it's so no you're doing it wrong and then march like come on i feel so much pressure when i'm in front of the three trash cans at a restaurant and there's compost there's recycling there's landfill there's often a fourth one the mystery can i don't want to mess up and then i look in there and recycling, there's landfill, there's often a fourth one, the mystery can. I don't want to mess up. And then I look in there and I say,

well, no one followed any of the rules. Right, and you have to check the thing that you're eating and going, oh, wait, wait, is this recyclable? Yeah, the mental image that you'll put it in the bin and then it just goes along in the pack. It's like, oh, we could recycle all the... Oh, no way, somebody put the wrong thing in, right? It can also be thrown out and turned to slurry.

And we get a special mention of the six-pack rings, which were in the 70s was when that, I looked up a good history on the history of six-pack rings as pollution. In the 70s, they were a major, major thing because everybody in America, at least, they were, when they get a six-pack of beer or cola, it's so conveniently kept together in those little plastic wraps on top and they were not very degradable at all like

they never fell apart since 1994 in america at least the epa regulations say they have to be at least degradable to a certain level so they don't just stay together forever but you're still going to choke wildlife with it before it degrades though according to a september 2018 national geographic article sick pack rings aren't as big a part of ocean garbage as they used to be they should still cut them up plastic straws are the new big enemy of ocean oh my god i'm drinking from a straw right now Though apparently Apparently the worst part of Ocean garbage right now The most tonnage of plastic

Comes from cigarette butts That is the biggest one right now That's pretty disgusting I think that a lot of places I go to now Replace their straws with paper straws and they're fine And I say go for it I mean I think straws are also a big thing for people with disabilities So you know don't get rid of straws completely, because some people need

straws to drink, and drinking is essential for life. But yeah, paper straws, that's my soapbox for this episode. It's our plastic soapbox. Listening to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing colossal podcast makes me appreciate the very opening line of, Colonel Dracula joins the Navy.

I love that. I'm a huge fan of that podcast too and if that was a real movie he would know every line. He would have a 94 year old man who was in the movie on his podcast. That's exactly what the podcast is. I love that.

You are in I remember. I love that opening joke too. It reminds me of Bart gets an F when homer and bart watch the all the ape movies together right it's it's just a great i like a nice moment of bart and homer having a good time together and so the idea that they'd stay up all night on like a friday night and fall asleep on the couch watching terrible movies it's heartwarming to

me there's lots of dipping into earlier simpsons moments on this episode and we'll get into more of them later no homer should really be like sell those to those books to a bookstore or to the library that's the better place to recycle them but i love his reserved laughter of like i'm destroyed books it's a good joke i'm surprised lisa let that slide though him throwing away all of those books that she would probably love yeah yeah if you look at it that's a bit bad he's like he's he's bidding the books he's he's half a nazi but it's all right it's recycling and even better we talk about like it is a very cynical look at recycling and also the views against recycling so i think it's pretty that they're looking at both sides of spectrum making fun of them

but again lisa saying it's not supposed to be fun yeah again like every man okay i'll try to make the most of this it's like no it's not it's very serious supposed to be fun how dare you you know i had forgotten skinner's small part of this episode is is so great i these are some classic skinner nerdy isms here especially this his first line here is one of my favorites all right what a load of garbage i'm ecstatic i feel like they cut to the load of garbage too quickly though in that in that shot i do i do like the joke and they're saving up for a trip to albany i want to say that skinner wants to actually see if steam hams are real and they are real yeah i also love those boring pro business posters behind him like i'm high on capitalism

and great aren't they just everything about it and that is just the entrepreneurs club it's such a nice lame thing that skinner would be into these like i need to inspire these kids into entrepreneurialism they need it but with a very boring business plan just just recycling things it's recycling things and he's it just is he's ecstatic over that pile of garbage and so skinner invited burns to meet the kids too and this is a great moment too where i i love that you have skinner's dreams of what a businessman is of just then meeting the realities of this cruel monster that mr burns and this is the first of many great burns monologues in this episode now let's give a big junior achievers welcome to our guest speaker i know he can teach us a lot about business mr c montgomery burns

i'll keep it short and sweet. Family, religion, friendship. These are the three demons you must slay if you wish to succeed in business. When opportunity knocks, you don't want to be driving to the maternity hospital or sitting in some phony baloney church. Or synagogue. Questions? Well, I'm going to take advantage of this rare opportunity, even if you children aren't interested. Which do you think is more important, hard work or stick-to-itiveness?

Are there any real questions? Yes. Did your plant have a recycling program? Recycling? I like how he's introduced as C. Montgomery Burns. I only noticed in this clip. I didn't notice while watching the show. They rarely ever reference the fact that he is Charles Montgomery Burns

because he would just awkwardly name that in a season two episode to make it more like Citizen Kane. Yes, yeah. You're right. That is where that's from. The only reason he has that name is because of that. He was Montgomery Burns in season one, but then they're like, no, we need it to be Charles

to make this a better line here. And even in the show, he calls himself Monty Burns. It's just not subtle enough. The massive backdrop and Burns font. We need it more obvious. Gotta be Daniel. Who was it who said that you could probably remake Citizen Kane just with the Simpsons references alone?

I think at least half of it. Yeah. I think at least half. They need to make more episodes that are just Citizen Kane parodies so they can complete it to get it up to 100%. I think we're past the point where people have seen that movie enough to recognize references. In the 90s, sure. Okay, so I also quote unquote enjoy the light anti-Semitism with the suspicions, which he says, synagogue. It's so loaded how he says synagogue.

It's just you can follow from there what Mr. Burns means. Yeah, you get it. But it's also what you say about watching things from The Simpsons and then watching the thing it's making fun of. Oh, that's what that's from. That was one of the reasons I watched Twin peaks it was only like was it last year two years ago wow so go oh that's what oh right yes okay i've seen this show before i've seen it thanks the simpsons it's always in a magic moment where i still think i have that even today if i watch a movie that i put off for the longest time and just didn't bother seeing like say the

right stuff and then i see i'm like ah okay got it that simpsons reference finally clicks for me though at least in his anti-semitism he also he says phony baloney church yeah but a synagogue is even worse i also just love how the kids just stare at him they don't care skinner tries i it's a very real moment of skinner trying to be like well children my enthusiasm will lift all of you like so here i'll ask a question and it's a very loaded question you have to pick one of these inspirational qualities to tell the children to have and it's right it's a very relatable things here you know trying to have enthusiasm when no one else has it's a very wonderful skinner trade and and his questions of

stick-to-itiveness and hard work are just like these things are meaningless to monty burns like he's just been rich for like 80 years so he has no clue what any of this stuff he of skinner is talking about same with recycling going into his brain it feels like bill and josh literally opening up the thesaurus bill oakley and josh we josh literally opening up the thesaurus bill oakley and josh weinstein literally opening up this thesaurus that they used to find mr burns isms yeah and i think at that time uh a dictionary in the writer's room was very popular and people would often draw in it when they were bored and josh weinstein's been posting lots of pictures of the inside of that dictionary just people drawing jokes on the drawings in the in the

dictionary because they couldn't just look at their phones in 1997 i mean they could but it would just have numbers on it i was pausing that dictionary looking for more jokes there's not a ton except for i just saw one well there's referring to skin yes smithers is a lackey it pauses on red skin yeah so that red skin one that's uh i'm saying that in quotes i did not use that term but it's it's funny that in 1997 even in burns's brain dictionary he knew that was it's called offensive in his term book and yet here we are 21 years later and that still is the name of the american washington football team yuck and then we get back to that ragamuffin line too i just love ragamuffin which also bart gets an f burns calls homer a ragamuffin line too. I just love ragamuffin, which also Bart gets an F.

Burns calls Homer a ragamuffin. So this is several Bart gets an F moments in this episode. Any time they went inside someone's head in The Simpsons from season two to season nine, you know something great was coming. That's the kind of thing you can't do on even a good live action sitcom. You can't just vanish into a character's head and see the inside of their minds right the medium making the most of the medium that's why herman's head was so ahead of its time it was too smart that's why it was canceled oh but here is mr burns just

doesn't know nothing about recycling i'm afraid i'm not familiar with that term you adorable little ragamuffin you You never heard of recycling? It means to reuse things to conserve our natural resources. Oh, so Mother Nature needs a favor. Well, maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts and floods and poison monkeys. Nature started the fight for survival, and now she wants to quit because she's losing, well, I say, hard cheese. But nature's not our enemy. Well, surely you agree we can do without her?

No, I don't agree. No? How dare you question Mr. Burns? I'll handle it, Smithers. Shut up, little girl. If I had spent my life listening to dismal Doras like you, I wouldn't be worth $200 million today. But according to your most recent biography,

you only have $100 million today. I've... I've... Um... Actually, sir, it's considerably less than that. I have to go. Money burns, everybody. His incredibly outlandish proposition to Lisa that he expects her to agree to, you think we could do without nature?

Yeah. I mean, what does that even mean, number one? But I love how shocked both Burns and Smithers are. Well, that shows you how insulated from reality Burns has become as a rich guy. Even hearing a disagreement is just like he can't take it. He's like, what? Do you get to see how smithers constantly protects him from any type of reality or someone disagreeing with him we also see a

revised edition i'm taking it of will there ever be a rainbow from blood feud i love that yeah i love seeing that according to your most recent autobiography when you pause and look about you like where were it of course they even fit the character because of course lisa would do research on the person who's going for a guest host the junior achievers club because she's lisa she would read an entire autobiography about burns for sure yeah and only your most your most recent one yeah yeah yeah so did he write one in the 70s too and then see he had to update it he's been a lot i mean how many autobiographies does bruce campbell have he's not even 60 yeah it's true uh-huh will there ever be a chin but also the ever be a rainbow callback it it also feels like the 100 million valuation also feels like almost a reference back

because that was the amount of money he sold the plant for from the germans that's right oh that's what i wanted to reference actually that and also this is 97 and 20 plus years later our modern robber baron tyrants are so much richer like we assume that 200 million dollars was a lot of money and it is but boy like mr burns would not be invited to a jeff bezos party yeah doing whatever he does with like the lizard people he creates for sexual purposes i gather now 100 million is pretty low well it's also interesting i look i so i did a little franciac research too of when is mr burns called a billionaire officially because he's not a billionaire in this episode and so he the next time he is officially called a billionaire and he

keeps referring to himself as a billionaire is in season 10's monty can't buy me love the loch ness monster okay and there's a rich Branson. Is that his name, parody? Yes, he's the Richard Branson Virgin Megastore episode opening that's connected to that one. Though he was also called a billionaire in season five's Lady Bouvier's Lover. So he sometimes was a billionaire. That's the only other time he was referred to as a billionaire. It reminds me of how in the 90s as I grew up,

I got to see them stop calling Bruce Wayne a millionaire the time he was referred to as a billionaire this it reminds me of how in the 90s as i grew up i got to see them stop calling bruce wayne a millionaire and call him a billionaire because like millionaires just not rich enough anymore for a batman type secret identity it's like when they changed the amount of people served on the mcdonald's sign oh yeah yeah billions well isn't it american billion is different to a million elsewhere in the world or it used to be this is a thing i read as a kid i'm not sure it was one of those incredibly outdated terms so maybe it'll work this mr burns episode where it was like a hundred million used to be a billion but then it's a thousand million elsewhere in the world so i didn't maybe depended on what part of the hemisphere he was in yeah i didn't know that yeah i mean for us it is a thousand million though right it's like oh maybe

maybe you guys change after people complain or maybe i'm talking complete another crap people are just getting too rich we had to add another zero we resisted the metric system for that long though but but so here's burns looking at his stocks i also there are some really great great jokes in this video they come so fast confederated slave holdings how's that that doing? It's, uh, steady. Steady. I'm sure all your stocks are doing well, sir. After all, you chose them. Well, let's get out the old stock ticker and have a look.

Here's where I stopped checking it last time. September 1929. Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no. Smithers no. Oh, no. Smithers, why didn't you tell me about this market crash? Um, well, sir, it happened 25 years before I was born.

Oh, that's your excuse for everything. I've got to do something to get my money back quickly. This calls for an aggressive trading strategy. Good idea, sir. Take 50% of my money and put it in the blue chips. Transatlantic zeppelin, amalgamated spats, congreaves, inflammable powders, U.S. hay, and sink the rest into that up-and-coming Baltimore Opera Hat Company.

That should set things right again, eh, boys? Absolutely. Genius. Can't go wrong with Congreve's. So you can't go wrong with Congreve's. That's the one thing I wanted to look up for this episode. What is that? Congreve's inflammable powders, presumably used in the Congreve's, that's the one thing I wanted to look up for this episode. What is that? Congreve's Inflammable Powder is presumably used in

the Congreve Rocket, which was a rocket made and used by the British military in the early 19th century. I looked it up and I read about it, and I don't believe it was used beyond the 1870s. It was used in British military conquest. It was an early form

of a rocket weapon. Wow. They would be made out of iron. I think they were first made out of cardboard, but then they would be made out of iron and, um, iron. Iron. How do we say that word? Iron butterfly. Iron butterfly. But yes, that is the one super, super deep reference.

And I knew it was a reference to something the first time I had to look it up for this show. And yes, congreaves and flammable powders. U.S. hay. Zeppelin blimp. I get that, I think most people would get that one but yeah, the rest of them, I mean, there's one negative of this episode, and God, I hate saying that but just to be fair, yeah, there is a lot of ye olde, Mr. Burns'

old ancient stuff so if you know your stuff, it's great, but if not it's just like, it might as well just play the piano music, it's Malcolm Move That is my favorite stuff of this episode, though. And I love Harry Shearer's excited reading and the great pause, U.S. Hey! Yeah, he goes, Hey!

U.S. Hey! is my favorite, I think, because... It reminds me of Allied Biscuit. Yeah, but what I love about it is that mostly the appealing in the 90s was, The Simpsons did a ton of jokes about this, like, Made in USA, no thank you like you wouldn't you wouldn't invest in american production of anything so then if he's going to invest in anything us then that is a bad idea stock wise and then hey of all things hey i just got that us hey is pun. It's a pun. That's good. U.S. Hay. Not U.S.A.

U.S. Hay. Wow. I never got that. Wow. We're exploring so much. I'm learning. We learned about Congreaves and U.S. Hay. And Confederate.

And Hay, the Wall Street crush of 1929. Yeah. And that's his confederated slave holdings. That's so great that he he still owned. He still owned that in the 20s. It was wrong to own that in the 20s. But he he didn't seem to even know that was wrong. And just how his yes men have to be like, it's good. I mean, I guess even if he is 104 at this point, slavery did end before he was born.

Well, I see it as an international slave but in the 20s perhaps in some territories it was still legal and he it was a normal business for a businessman to own uh he's not too picky about where he gets his money from i mean he him and schindler they both made chills the nazis but his work damn it that's right he's he doesn't really care burns he's he's pretty amoral in in all respects that stock ticker joke too i guess that puts uh that puts smithers at 43 in this since he says if it's 97 anyway he'd be born in 45 44 yeah okay oh wait no then that would put him at 53 yeah this episode aired you're right yes troy mccl was wrong. He's not in his 40s. It's 1929.

Stock crash. So then 25 years after that would be 1954. Okay, we're learning how to do math on the air live together. So he would be 43. Yes, we did it.

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popsicle, but with the word shirt, or you can go to tiny. CC slash talking shirts. And you can see our two t-shirts, both designed by the amazing Nina Matsumoto, our artist friend. One is in the style of the eye on Springfield logo, and the other is a

tribute to our amazing Death Jingle. Both of those available $19.99, ships somewhat internationally, tax and shipping, all that included. They are great gifts both for yourself or for others, so check it out at shirtsickle.com or at tiny.cc slash talking shirt. I love those yes men too, because they, this was, this is what happens with so many executives. This is the Henry and Bob complain about old executives yeah but this is what happens with executives and a lot of businesses

that they they don't want to hear bad news it's not that they search i don't think even they search out naturally yes men to always agree with them but they certainly don't want to be told no they don't want to be told no or that an idea is bad so then you end up with a bunch of yes men who are only going to tell you that you're making the right moves and any boss that tells you they want the truth or honesty they're full of bullshit we had one of those and it was like i'm a no bullshit boss i'm a straight shooter you know you can tell me anything well you're making a lot of mistakes how dare you dare you i'll put you in your place come to my office. Yeah, it's the simile of the great and powerful beast.

I believe God's long time student philosophy was it. You know what? I won't even guess because I'll get one of them wrong. But yeah, it was the politician's way of dealing with the public that was criticized by philosophers thousands of years ago saying, well, you just want to give them what they want because they're a great and powerful beast. So the great and powerful beast wants chocolate all the time. You're going to give them chocolate,

even if it could really do with some you know vegetables and water so i want chocolate all right well i'll just give you what you want then even if it's gonna be bad for you and i think i love it there's so much in this thing um when i was a kid i was like uh doing english lit my uh teacher was very well spoken at the theater was doing world war one poetry and stuff like that and he was there going going like, one day they will study The Simpsons. The amount of Americana and literature you can get in 30 minutes. And God damn, he was right.

We're doing it now. Speaking of high-minded references, we've got a Dickensian one here in the next scene with Uriah's Heap, which is a reference to the Charles Dickens villain, Uriah Heap, who was quite a bad... I haven't read that book. I haven't read it either.

Before we move on, though, I thought... Oh, I thought it was the Bund, because he's a hippie. Oh, yeah. Before we move on, I thought of another season two, three pull. The panel of useless yes-men is a very season two and three sort of idea, where they'd usually be like Harvard yes-men. Like if you thought about Powell Motors, you know, like we want to hear what you have to say, sir. so if you want to see the yes men problem in action i recommend everyone go out

and look up the uh episode one documentary for star wars george lucas is mr burns and the yes men are everyone working with him so i think this jar jar thing is pretty cool huh and they're like yes sir he's really good he's really cool i like him everybody loves this guy it's so uncomfortable watching those clips from that of just seeing the people just looking at their shoes and just going like, They're like, he's just making all this up on the spot. All right, but the next scene involves a wonderful hippie surrounded by trash. A half ton of newspaper and all we get is 75 cents? That won't even cover the gas I used to go to the store to buy the twine to tie up the bundles. It sounds like

you're working for your car. Simplify, man. Sorry, kids. The trip to Albany is off and there's to be no more recycling. Well, we didn't do that badly. We collected enough paper to save one whole

tree. Oh, Mommy! I think that mommy is from Itchy and Scratching a Poochie Show. Yeah, in season eight, mommy and crying is kind of Ralph's catchphrase this year. I just love his confusion. Anytime Ralph is confused, he just goes, mommy. And Miss Hoover isn't there. It's always good seeing Skinner very motivated. Then something happens like, well, get all the check for the school.

And he's given one eraser. One eraser? That was a dog of death with the lottery. I love that. I love angry. I love actual angry Skinner. I better not. My service. And also, yeah, Araya My server. And also, yeah,

Araya's heap. So obviously, yeah, he's a hippie. It's a good pun. I'm sorry if you said that before, but just go to the side of the break. I have not read David Copperfield, but I do know my hippie music.

And yeah, I like on the audio commentary, they were talking about how the character is based on Dennis Hopper's character from Apocalypse Now. That makes sense. That's a good Hopper imitation.

Yeah. And again, this scene is really selling in this universe the futility of recycling. You could save one whole tree with an entire car's worth of newspapers. Obviously, the joke is you don't get any money for a cycling newspaper. And it's not a great amount,

but it's not as low. It's a comical amount in this episode. According to a 2016 article article for a ton of newspapers you will get 50 to 75 dollars so i see enough to pay for the gas and the twine and the bundles but not still not money not good money at all i think cans and bottles are more lucrative and that's why i see so these people aren't homeless but when i moved out here i noticed this phenomenon of really tiny old ladies who they just collect cans and bottles are more lucrative. And that's why I see, so these people aren't homeless. But when I moved out here, I noticed this phenomenon of really tiny old ladies who they just collect cans and bottles all day. They're not homeless people.

They just, well, I guess I'll just do this. So, you know, keep yourself busy. When I went to Germany, they said that they give money. I'm sure it's a government thing or some sort of state thing over there. But there are people that would ride the trains, wouldn't go with money, but they would just pick up enough cans and trash to get the money there and that's how they get to places man that's a great way to clean your trains man that's smart so speaking with the recycling theme is this episode and what's it like recycling in america because just watching from tv shows and

films there's obviously stuff like this where people are incredibly cynical the idea of it i mean is it easy for you guys or people like right recycling smuggling well we live in a very horrible i do apologize we live in a very liberal part of the country uh so you have to i mean you don't have to but there's the opportunity to recycle everywhere every restaurant has a recycling bin uh where i'm from and it's a less enlightened place we tried recycling for about a decade but then no one was doing it so the recycling program was recalled there was no more recycling there was no more leaving your recycling actually i just throw it in the garbage who cares in berkeley california yeah it's pretty it's pretty pro recycling you have a lot of most like restaurants have multiple trash cans for trash recycling and compost and you can throw

out compost here too where i grew up in suburban florida there were recycling programs but also i think in america there's always there's at least always some political element of going like recycling doesn't matter why we wasted money you're this is just hippie bullshit to hurt businesses like that they're there and there is definitely still that feeling now in in america but they're still recycling programs and i think it's usually implemented more on a local and state level though than on a national level how how is it in england one more place is having it where one week will be recycling and the next will be normal rubbish so basically you'd better recycle or your

bin is going to be full as fuck i like the idea of punishing people it's a good punishment it's the only way to make it work yeah so many people are really motivated to recycle the kirkland and his team they do a great job here so many great animation moments i i also love the just the speed at which skinner not only just pulls out and knocks down a tree but also he just throws there's no comment on it but he throws away the check like it's not even worth cashing that check for 75 cents i wish skinner would come back in this episode yeah i do kind of miss him after this he's so funny but uh then we get Burns at probably his most pitiful. Are you saying my money's all gone? But I made all the right moves, didn't I?

Oh, yes, sir. Every move a right one. I see it all now. You're just a bunch of yes men. I was making the wrong moves and you were too gutless to tell me. Isn't that right? Yes, sir. Then I'll fix this myself.

Smithers, take out another mortgage on the plant. Well, the bank is already foreclosed on a plant. And your house, sir. But what will I do? Well, the first thing you'll have to do is move out of the bank's house. I'll help you pack. They really make you feel for Burns.

Yeah, I like that Smithers is mixed in with the yes men because he does naturally become a yes man but not because it's his job but because he loves mr burns so much he can't he just wants to please him he can't tell him bad information until it's too late and like literally too late and like no you have no plant or house anymore mr burns this is gone like yeah and it's such it because he's that obsessed with me it's like oh yeah i meant to tell you have to move your house and the plant are gone now it's the bank's house now first thing you have to do is move out of the bank's house like that's he thinks he's being helpful but it's also

just so cruel and just like well it's the bank's house now it's not your house anymore and this is really reusing uh some early ideas on the simpsons where in seasons two and three burns did lose the plant or at least was threatened so i believe in the one where he runs for governor it started with him losing the plant potentially right it was that it would cost a hundred million dollars to fix the plant right or i think it was like in the 80 million range i remember him getting drunk and singing brother can you spare a dime and then for some reason that never by the end of the episode they kind of forgot that that was why he wanted to be governor but it was a great and then burns for coffin to craft work was he did lose the plants but i think he happily sold it off to just you know sold it he bought it back from the germans

that oh a fraction of what he we paid you as the best the Germans should have taken over again not Lenny yeah yeah and another great moment here is it's not often you see the moments when you do get them in the Simpsons when they're at the peak it really does shine the bit here where he's leading Mr Burns away like from his place to the door

and the lawyers are just watching him as he goes past like they're not even human and he's yeah the shots him going like further and further away out with shots we've sworn smaller so it's basically his world is now empty is it's a quite beautiful bit of cinematography or he's on set if you will for the simpsons and again when they do it there's a bit later on in the episode as well where you don't i don't think you appreciate it unless you're a nerdy bastard that did film media i'm gonna be honest in it but when you go back and notice that is a really good shot yeah it's really played for emotion too yeah it's it's moments like this that make you really see the difference between a a great simpsons episode and a lesser one or

just a lesser animated series that moment could play out a million different ways but it's the the posing of the characters and the angles of the shot that really that really go to this the theme they're trying to express here and in this case it is that mr burns is like he's diminished so much it's just it's over for mr burns and uh okay so now we get into our big time guest yeah brett the hitman heart and i'm sure a pro wrestler such as yourself will appreciate all the closet space, Hitman. Ooh, this place has got old man stink. Don't listen to him, sir. You've got an enchanting musk. And you wouldn't even be the only wrestler in the neighborhood.

The Shrieking Sheik lives just three doors away. I'll take it. Would it be all right if I kept this portrait to remind me of better times? Why would I want a picture of a pitiful pencil neck geek? Yeah, why indeed. It's great that they actually got Bret Hart,

but this sounds a lot like hank azaria they could have just had hank azaria dude it's not him obviously but it's just like wow that sounds a lot like hank azaria right right right here's my bret hart story so i asked bret hart and i was very happy to ask him again good as jesus as fast as like the hedgehog to me as a kid um in newcastle so brett what was it like doing the simpsons? And he went, oh, great. And he suddenly lit up like, great, no other question about the fucking screwjob. So that's how happy he was. And he started going on and going, yeah, he went in to do it.

And the character was just a generic wrestler, according to him. And so he went and did it. And because it wasn't going to be him, he doesn't use his normal voice or his wrestling voice or whatever. So even though that line, wow, what I want. Yeah, it is like wait why are you talking like an american like hillbilly type where's that from i want the title hbk it's like that's not very hard um so his story was he went and did it and say all right great

and then when he was waiting for the limo to come pick him up uh people had heard in the studios that brett hart was there so lots of people came out with stuff to sign or like oh my god Brett can I get a photo so whoever was in charge of doing the voice acting at the time was like oh my god I had no idea you were you know popular you know spoke like a real non-wrestling fan it's like wow I had no idea people knew who you were Mr. Guest Host and uh so they said well we're gonna get the character changed so it looks just like you so you'll be Brett Hart rather than Junk Wrestler rather than the Iron Yuppie. And Bret Hart was like, that's great, but I've just done it and it sounds nothing like me.

And even in the audio commentary, they go, hey, it's Bret Hart that's doing it. They go, really? It's not just Tank Nell's area doing an impression of a wrestler? It's like, yeah, because it doesn't sound that much like Bret Hart, but obviously it is Bret Hart.

Yeah, it's very, it was always, even when I never knew that backstory and just saw that first scene of it in 97 that's really an it's especially pencil neck geek is such like a 50s heel line it's Bret Hart would never say even when he's in heel mode he would never call somebody that so yeah obviously referencing the Fred Blassie song yes on that geek which is a very old wrestling thing you're right henry wow i hate to say that bret hart would be better if he wasn't this episode but i think actually with this reading it would have been funnier as the iron yuppie you know just the fictional and it'd also be a deep simpsons reference too yeah to season

two right yeah it was uh bartha daredevil they'll both be unmasked and killed in the ring now i that's it only one of them could appear because then clearly he's won that match he was so successful from that one match he can now buy mr burns's mansion well the other one's dead i love that story though that's great yeah it's i think it's on i you know so here's my theory on how they ended up with brett there is that like on a casting side so they recorded this in 1996 and in 1996 as any bret hart super fan will know of course he was trying to extend his work into real acting like i believe he was on the television series version not the mini series the television series lonesome dove for like yes he

was for very short scenes but that would have got him an acting agent so i think it's possible that they would be like well if this guy is acting now let's fire an acting wrestler even though they have no clue also like 1996 when they would have cast him nwo was the hottest thing in the world wcw was wwf meanwhile which brett was the poster boy of was at a real low point and so he might not have been as he definitely wasn't known to guys like simpsons writers as they would have known say hulk hogan a generation previous right as you said there well also by a wrestling fan yeah it is weird in the context of wrestling at the time that brett hart was chosen because wf was on the upswing at that point but was still absolutely number two behind wcw so it's almost like oh

well done simpsons you finally have a wrestler and it's not the most successful one at the time yeah the the champ on the other channel on this and also so i i reopened up the copy of bret hart's biography which i hadn't read in a long time that book is so fucking long it's the longest wrestler biography i've ever read though i mean brett brett has an amazing career and he took very good notes of his life so hey share it but uh though in that entire book which is almost 600 pages long wow there are three pages about this in there and none of that story that that he's now sharing the the only interesting bit in it is that he said it took him five minutes to record his three lines and then he did it the

trip to la to record it september 25th 1996 which is also the first time he met in person with eric bischoff to negotiate going to wcw so in a way that's right i forgot about that god you're good at this so so in a way the simpsons kind of helped speed up his exit to wcw by paying for his flight to la to record and then also have a meeting with eric bishop but that's really the only the only other times the simpsons is referenced in his book is when he's telling a story about how him and his brother owen thought they were lost at sea and then he tried to joke with him like hey it's like in that episode of the simpsons where bart and homer and the flanders and the flanders get lost at sea oh that's cute i like it no one's like i didn't see that episode and that's like oh we're gonna die

and actually though brett brett is more fun than he comes off as he is a grumpy old man he is that too but he has more fun than you would think and i think it's unfortunate that he is now known as like the old crank of wrestling just because he that's what he's kind of aged into and also that he has lost everyone in his life and all of his well he's he's a happily married man i don't want to say he's like a depressing dude and i was reading his wikipedia entry he's got like 35 brothers or yes probably down to like 34 now but because we're a very large family doesn't speak to any of them yeah no he's oh matthew said like he's if a brother is still alive they probably had a falling out over something and uh yeah you're right it's a shame brad has been painted with

his brush that he's this miserable bastard that just talks about how everything went wrong but at the same time you have to empathize with them every interview he's done for the past 20 years has been what was it like when you got screwed what was like when your brother died what was it like when he got kicked in the head by goldberg like he's had this constantly and then people oh brett hart is always on about the screw job i was he's always asked about it i think neil armstrong wasn't asked about the moon as much as brett hart's been asked about the montreal screw job so it's a shame when that's why i was very glad to ask him like hey brett here's something happy you know answer this question you know someone else says what was it like you still hate sean michaels i'd be like i'm like do you still watch new simpsons that probably would have been

thought about over the age of 99 would have made him cry but what do you think of new simpsons that would have made him cry last thing about brett and the simpsons is in 2017 he actually made a cute little silly video oh cool talking about his time on the sims yes he did i'll let me play it right here for you hey brock lesnar you got one of these what about you rick flair oh yeah i forgot you weren't even onpsons. Bet you don't have one of these bad boys either. Show me the Simpsons. Why would I want a picture of a pitiful pencil neck geek? Yeah, indeed. Don't feel sorry for him.

Clearly Canadian, very Canadian. Doesn't feel sorry. Onlytt and his promo voice yeah well but you flare oh yeah you were never on the simpsons love you brett love you i love that that's such a great moment i there weren't many of the um wrestlers and animated shows i know steve austin made an appearance on dilbert i was gonna say yeah say, that's the one I know, Dilbert. Arsenic and licorice, Jesus. And way later in the King of the Hill, like 10 years after this, Macho Man Randy Savage will be on King of the Hill. Oh, that's a great episode. That's right.

Where Bill gets buffed. No agony, no braggany. Yeah. Oh, man. God. Though it's still pretty rare. You would think they would get used more because so many pro wrestlers are they are defined by their voices like even one that bugs me too is like they just did a whole

anime that is the wrestling it was tiger mask the new tiger mask anime and they barely even had any even though they had the real wrestlers from new japan in there they barely had any of them do their own voices is this uh it's an odd choice i i never really understand it but that so that's the brad hart and also uh still some call steve austin listed in the credits to at the poke of zoro as time traveler number one what oh that's great oh that's right yes yeah here come the ninjas okay so mr burns is out and it's Lenny's time to shine. I normally don't laugh at other people's misfortunes, but on behalf of the recycling community, couldn't happen to anyone more deserving. They're not going to close the plant, are they?

No, the bank put Lenny in charge. Attention, everybody. Attention, everybody. Work harder. Bye. attention everybody work harder bye I like Lenny as a boss it's what you would think if you were handed the reins of the place you work at work harder bye it's just

it's the great idea of the person at that level in business it's like well where would i be as a boss i'd just be me in a boss position that's all it requires anyone can do the boss position that's why i should be in he's immediately confident after saying that he's like yep i did my job crack my knuckles and lean back and i'm with lisa i like celebrating the downfall of an evil rich person it's it's we shouldn't i mean we don't value schadenfreude enough in this country it's so good so we cut to smithers apartment is this the first time we've seen the malibu stacy apartment in a while it's been a while yeah i think it might have been where

lisa visits him was the last time we saw his apartment yeah we'll see in five we'll see it again in the trouble with trillions but uh yeah this and i like to even draw in his shelf of malibu stacy's in in the background too but burns is so cute in his buttoned down shirt it's just like is just domestic and that it shows too i wonder if smithers is like well at least mr burns has moved in with me like i wonder if he's at least excited about that it's probably an upgrade for smithers yeah yeah he can keep his burns love inside the house too you'd think there'd be some with like you know oh finally i've got the man i want but he's that focused on it he's that devoted you know he's like no no don't do anything just stay here and maintain your dignity

yeah don't move it's so sad though though also knowing that smithers is having like he has a relationship with john the uh the only other gay man in springfield not no more he don't yeah that's true so i wonder if this is getting in the way of his like outside of burns dating life too having having burns at home all the time or there could have been a funny bit where smithers hides all of his gay paraphernalia and things from mr. Burns. Though maybe Mr. Burns wouldn't even get it. Perhaps. Here's Mr. Burns trying to help out. No, no.

You just stay here and maintain your dignity. Mm-hmm. Here's a chance to win my keep they will go out and get these items from the food jobber grocery store please i am riding on the bus hi Aren't you that guy everybody hates? Oh, man, no. I'm Monty Burns. I love Independent Burns when he decides to do things on his own. Out of my way, I'm a motorist! But I do want to talk about the context for this whole grocery store scene.

So it is a reference to a... Before that, can we say like the 19th possibly shot of the random trolley coming out of the shopping mall? Yeah, it's a good establishing shot because it never hits anything. You're wondering what's going to happen, but it never does. But this entire grocery store scene is a reference to an infamous moment in the President George H.W. Bush campaign of 1992 when he visited an Orlando's grocers convention while on the campaign trail. And it was spun by the bias media that he was out of touch. And he didn't know, you know, what the common experience of the common person was because he was amazed by this scanner, this scanner that was scanning groceries. And scanning groceries had been put into practice since 1980.

I believe that was the first introduction of scanners, scanning barcodes at grocery stores. But go on to Snopes and find the truth is that he was actually being shown a new scanner that was not being put into stores yet. It was on the way. And it was a scanner that could weigh items and also read torn barcodes. And he's like, oh, this is amazing. What do they think of next? Things like that. And he was really just doing small talk about things he didn't care about, you know, because he was a politician. But people took that. They ran with it. I'm sure there's SNL sketches about it where it's like, oh, this old man is out of touch.

He doesn't even know how a grocery store works. And let me tell you, he is out of touch. And he always was. He was from an incredibly wealthy family. But that is not the reason he was out of touch. Man, that is some successful political maneuvering there on that messaging to just get. I'd always just heard it as, oh, yeah, there was a one time H.W. Bush went to a grocery store and didn't know what it was and was just confused. Like, wow. Yeah, I did not know that.

I mean, he is the son of George H.W. Bush, the son of a Wall Street banker. I mean, the Bush family is like a rich mega monster legacy. He is out of he doesn't know how the common man lives, but it's not because he doesn't know how a grocery scanner works. He does. He just was like, wow, this is so exciting. Look at this grocery scanner. Wow.

Yeah, that's exactly what this is all a parody of. And in the first draft of the script, Burns was going to meet Bush in the grocery store. Because he still lives in Springfield. I think so. But yes, so that is what this is referencing. Burns not really understanding how groceries work. See, I would have been pissed at that. I would have been annoyed at this if George Bush had shown up. Because I'd be like, George Bush is still in Springfield? He could go literally anywhere as an ex-president and stay in the same place that he had a horrible experience with.

He was just really there so no one would know who he was because of low voter turnout. Though this joke actually, he would reappear when they went to the unemployment office in season nine that's right yeah it's easier every week yeah that's right and realty bites right yes yeah they'll the final appearance of lionel hutz in a speaking role that's it not to bring everybody down it's a comment it's such a happy bread heart got screwed george bush senior had to stay in springfield but keep a very low profile it's all happy i i also love the burns's old-timey way of thinking of just that like he he thinks you don't touch dirty dishes with your hands you you need a proper claw to pick it up it's not proper to It's just so silly that he just gets a reaching claw.

This is the first time I caught it as a joke that when he steps onto the bus, he does not pay anything. He does not pay a fare. He's just like, I'm on the bus. Thank you. And the bus driver sneers at him. He says, grocer, please. And another of my favorite darting points for a Simpsons shit post is, hey, aren't you that guy everybody hates? That's such a great one.

I've seen it used for everybody's least favorite character in an anime, everybody's least favorite wrestler. It's a great... Lisa. Yeah, exactly. I enjoy out-of-touch doddering Burns as much as I love evil Burns. Like, no, I'm Monty Burns. Nobody hates me.

And it's weird in a way because he's not going around going oh i'm evil i mean sometimes he doesn't previous episodes i guess but here he's it's even more terrifying i mean it's actually terrifying me what i mean that he doesn't even intend on being like this it's just the way he is he doesn't even realize he's being evil that's it's out of touch it's uh which yeah i think is way more scarier than him going like i'm skeletor or something it's his mentality and just out of touchness and even sociopathy later in this that really shows you how he's evil without even intending to be i love the cereal aisle jokes i i love a good cereal joke but it's extra funny to me that crusty who should be just sent his own cereal,

instead goes to the grocery store in full costume to buy his cereal off the shelf. Again, being picky because the rest of the episode is so good. Yeah. Why is Krusty by himself dressed as Krusty buying his own cereal? It's a great joke, though. First of all, the cereal's got to have, you know, like dead dog's heads in it or something. It's a Krusty brand thing. He knows it's a great joke though cereal's gonna have you know like dead dog's heads in it or something because it's a crusty brand thing he knows it's dog shit and he's still it's a it's a really awkward setup for the joke oh that's not like count chocula but then again i know that americans

take their cereal very seriously oh yeah i've seen your aisles and the bigger the some streets in the uk so the count chocula payoff is amazing i do have that does look a bit like me well you're right bob that is that has a dangerous jagged metal o in it even yeah i think they discontinued that uh after the lawsuit yeah i i did actually want to ask about the comparisons of cereal culture in america versus the uk mafia especially with the like is count chocula even a thing there it's barely a thing here pretty much monster cereals like count chocula go on sale during the month of october and then they go away again no you can't sell anything with uh chocolate in all e-numbers to kids nowadays which is probably for the best it was amazing go to the when i go to america i love to find a walmart or walgreens

or whatever just to look at the aisles because they're just so amazing to me because you'll have like at waist level height count chocula and then above you in a bigger box count chocula's extra chocolatey chocolatey choc chocs or whatever now with 25 more diabetes you know because to show the other kids you're rich get this one you know the deluxe edition and all the stuff and then you go to like they're all got like mascots you know there's all like characters and all this and then you go to like they're all got like mascots you know there's all like characters and all this and then you go to like the healthy cereal aisle it's all just life and it's a picture of like a white woman smiling and that's it it's just completely horrible it's completely different to what we have here which is this is what's in this cereal it'll make you good it's full of roughage so it's good for you because it'll make you run to the toilet we have a cereal here called i think just called best friends and it's just like two smiling friends on the cover yeah that's

it's uh but i'm pretty sure all cereal is bad for you no matter how many marshmallows that aren't in it but i i love cereal it's one of my favorite things i have transitioned more to the adult boring cereals they're not we to bix i'm not a constable crunch constable crunch why can't adults have these mascots i'm that's bullshit the only kids get the cuddle crunch or whatever like why can't we get a mascot that's you know healthy dave's colon i don't i don't recall there being a simpsons cereal ever though there had to be you know i don't think there ever was surely There had to be, surely. Let's Google.

They should just make Crusty-Os. That is the cereal in the Simpsons universe. You know what, boy? Yeah, let's make a pitch to General Mills to sell Crusty-Os at, like, the next San Diego Comic-Con. They got desperate enough to make Mario cereal, so anything's possible. If the new day gets... Ah, here we go.

Breaking news. There were No Problemo cereal sold very briefly in the UK in 2003 those were just off brand cheerios let's be honest frosted multi-grain cereal loops interesting wow i that's uh that reminds me of the cereal i got from pro wrestling teas when i bought i i bought the parody version of a New Day cereal from Kenny Omega. And the cereal it came with was just Cheerios. It was just as simple as that. And I did eat it.

But it's got a new ad. It has such a great new ad. Chex Mix is good, I'll say that. That's my last thing on cereal. We get to see Burns' many goof-ups in the grocery store. I wonder if they were inspired to do the Frostilicus bit by having Burns trapped in the dairy aisle, too. Right, was this a popular culture thing where old people getting stuck?

There's really not enough room. Milk aisles in supermarkets in America. There's really not enough room to get into the freezer or the cooler or whatever you're exploring. The idea of getting trapped in one is funny, but now I think it might be slightly to do with how much people were talking about disney freezing him walt disney freezing himself but that's that's at best i can think where that could come from culturally

meanwhile burns is caught up in the eternal question ketchup ketchup ketchup ketchup Ketchup. Ketchup. Ketchup. Ketchup. I'm in way over my head. He's talking to the ketchup now. Burns is sure acting nutty. Maybe going broke and losing his plans destroyed his brain. Could you come along with us, sir? Are you here to solve my ketchup problem? Yes, that's right wiggum is there where are you taking me what's happening relax you've gone off your nut so we're stuffing you into an old folks home those uh store guys signed the commitment papers but i'm shopping

i never really read one of the clerk's lines as a joke before but this time it really made me laugh rewatching it's like maybe going broke and losing his plant destroyed his brain. It's just so blunt and it doesn't really make a lot of sense. Good job. This is the only time I've ever heard of ketchup. I don't know what it is

and googling it brings up this episode. It's just a different spelling. Some brands... Oh oh it is just ketchup yeah yeah oh okay some brands in america they wanted to stand out from say the popular heinz or hunts brand of ketchup that they say like no we're cats up here i don't see that anymore whenever i'm in the condiment aisle i want to do the joke with myself but there's never cats up yeah it's pretty rare to see i i've only really experienced cats up and i grew up in the south but i've only really experienced it like

western style like barbecues and stuff like here's the cats up in little packets i catch up is where it's at for me and how we use electricity can be smarter cleaner and greener. At Electric Ireland, we can help guide you there. You see, our new Net Zero Hub has all you need to know about smart meter plans, EV tariffs, solar panels, and much more. Making your usage clearer,

your trips greener, your home cozier, and your world brighter. Find our Net Zero Hub at electricireland.ie as an american it is the number one condom you just slather it on everything and it tastes it tastes well it makes it all taste just put tomato jam and all the things you put in your mouth in the uh but yeah also that they have the ability to commit him and then he's just so sad of like but but but i'm shopping yes yeah that's uh they're really humanizing him i don't

know humanizing just point out like outside the the plan with no money he's a completely weak old person with three liver spots on his head like a uk plug and yeah just but i'm shopping is very oh they're taking away his independence he's confused without all of his money he has like no respect people don't even seem other than the grocers like wigum and everyone else just be like shut up old man they don't even recognize him as mr burns the old famous man in in the town he's lost george bush yeah and his uh they mentioned on the commentary too they to soften burns they take away his scowl like okay often in previous scenes like he always in normally they animate him always with the scowl and his eyes only become

circles when he's like surprised or for acting purposes but once he loses everything they stop drawing the scowl and when the scowl comes back in this episode that's when you know he's evil again i think the casual wear also makes him seem more of a nice guy. Not the harsh suit that he usually wears. He seems more like the owner of Jurassic Park than Mr. Burns. Yeah, that's right. Real John Hammond cosplay. And also, one day I'll do an intro,

an ending for the video that's just got Mr. Burns looking at the thing and going, Monday Night Raw, Monday Nitro. Monday Night Raw, Monday Night Raw. I'm in over my head. And I will laugh, three other people will laugh, and no one else will care. You got two right here. We cut to Homer helping Lisa by getting drunk, and it's not my favorite Homer drunk animation. Like, he's just so

all over the place like i i like when homer is feeling the discomfort of being drunk normally he's just a happy drunk but this is like i don't feel good it's not a pleasant drunk it's a painful drunk yeah in his bloodshot eyes it's great because again this is the commentary there's a bit of a goof here because you know i'm wanting to pick one of those out his eyes are shadowed he's supposed to have the under the eye shadowed by like he's tired but they they did them wrong at the animation stage they left it in so it's almost like the beer is sucking into his brain yeah i think it sells it even more to have that on his eyelids instead of under his eyes just like he's so hammered it is a new level of drunkenness for homer but what a great dad getting himself mortaled recycling yeah it's very sweet of him

and it is suggestion to lisa here in this clip i also love it's it's a great acting by dan there's gotta be more trash around here somewhere hey why don't you try the old folks home they practically live in their own filth thanks dad you're welcome that's the activity room we're not allowed in there that's the library not allowed in there either and don't even think about going in the game room hey gad man how are we supposed to pass the time best bet is to stake yourself out a good spot at the staring window yeah that thing about homer talking about how they live in their own filth he's not giving her advice he's just being a dick yeah just like yeah old people are dirty it's almost like a scene from a prison movie with abe and monty where he's just like oh you can't

like they're sitting with their trades in front of them and they're like here's the rules of the prison you don't go in there you don't go in there it's like one flow of the cuckoo's nest yeah old people and it is it's very miserable these scenes because again there's but it seems about its best it could be funny and cynical but there's also very real life moments here have you ever been to a retirement home it's not far off this mr burns has it to be honest with you the staring window is a new depressing touch at the retirement castle. Just one leaf on a dead tree. A reference to O. Henry's The Last Leaf. You're right, yeah.

Which... Just wasn't depressing enough. Yeah, just in case it wasn't sad enough. I wonder, too, if Abe's discussion with Burns was prefaced by him saying, Hey, remember you just tried to kill me not too long ago over the over the hellfish bonanza ape can't remember that no it's true his great adventure i love the dance and structure animation like his hands going back we're like come on getting the fun that shot of burns just looking furious uh i actually used that way way back in the day on my live journal

i captured that as one of my live journal avatars that kind of aggressive non-fun while other people are having fun is definitely it's a mood and he's off a big mood he's off in his own corner too and the scowl is there in that in that shot it is yeah and great use of achy breaky heart it was a comedy song at that point who's billy ray cyrus to turn down money even if it's mocking him as an annoying song it seems it's all over for mr mearns so this is how the monty burns saga ends if i hadn't surrounded myself with those spineless yes men what do you mean you don't have anything to recycle you must have some magazines or newspapers. That voice. That shrill, disagreeable voice. It's her.

Sorry, we're not allowed to read newspapers. They angry up the blood. You, the troublemaking girl. My name is Lisa, Mr. Burns. Lisa Simpson. It doesn't matter what your name is, you idiot. What I want to know is, will you help me get my money back? Ha, I'd never help you.

You're the worst man in the world. Yes, that's the kind of moxie i'm looking for you're hired no i'm not sir i'm so sorry my grocer committed you well never shop there again not now smithers i've got an empire to rebuild and the person who's going to help me is that girl okay so this is one of several That Girl opening parodies that confused the hell out of me as a kid until I saw the actual opening much, much later. So in case you don't know, this is a parody of the opening song and scene of the sitcom That Girl. It was a 1966 to 1971 sitcom. And let me tell you guys, sitcom plots and premises were outlandish in the 60s.

Like what if hillbillies found gold? What if there was a genie? What if a horse could talk? This one is what if a woman went to the city now i know what you're thinking where's her husband she doesn't have a husband she's going to the city just a woman in the city and she's got good hair how about that it's gold it's gold five seasons that's amazing but yes uh it's sort of like mary tyler more like what if a woman went to the city i could work it could work uh so i have the opening of that girl and the music is used in this parody or to sound alike and actually the doorbell that ends this that girl parody is the dun dun is the that girl sort of i love that guy yeah so uh family guy did a much more shot for shot parody of this opening so if you watch it online, you'll see that.

I believe Animaniacs did too, and something else did. It was all over in the 90s, but Henry, please, we can hear all. Everybody who grew up watching it as a kid, who then went to work in the animation industry, did a parody of Michael. Yeah, it is just the song. She's in the big city. That's good so yeah some of the gags we see in that parody are from the opening which um marlo thomas the actress who plays that girl looks in the window at a mannequin in a wedding dress and then it's suddenly it's her and the mannequin winks at her and could that be me could

i be married one day in the city as a woman that's my ultimate goal uh so yes that's that girl i'm sure it sucks and it just had a fun opening people remember and everybody had the hairstyle it was the rachel hairstyle of the day which is why they cast marlo thomas as rachel's mother in france i'm into the that girl hairstyle i say bring it back i want fiberglass hair well and in that in that parody sequence too when lisa sees burns in the window he is standing next to that mannequin they threw the mannequin in there too and and the kite with the that girl logo on it is now lisa's head drawn in a similar style i only got this that girl reference because before this episode i think a year before on space goes coast to coast they do a that reference

as well it's insane i mean the opening is kind of iconic but i don't i don't really get why so many people parodied it i mean there are funnier openings from this era and things that are a little more iconic to use that word again it feels a little like filler it feels like we need another minute in this episode well and family guy they did a parody of the entire opening oh yeah peter in drag well i mean family guys got tried i remember though family guys got simpsons beat on filler free creations but it was like we can't win an emmy unless we have a that girl reference i mean the old dinosaurs at the emmys would know hey yeah they'll get any of the jokes oh oh i get that uh also right before the that girl thing angers up the blood i say that all the time i forgot it

was from this episode bob has heard me say that about any time i'm mad at something on twitter i'd be like i really angered up my blood and i love that burns his inability to talk to lisa he's like it doesn't matter what your name is idiot you work for me now shut up little girl shut up it's it's so sweet and yeah so the burns though finally does convince lisa to work with him sir we've never met before but my name is mr burns and i want your daughter to help make me rich again you mean maggie ah the baby who shot me. No, I was referring to your other daughter. Lisa! You have a guest.

So, um... How's life in the gutter? You again. I've realized the error of my ways, Lisa. I need someone with your integrity to help me. Please, don't refuse this poor old man. Well, if I did agree to help you, you could only earn money by doing good, socially responsible things.

Nothing evil. Nothing evil. That's exactly the kind of radical thinking I need. It's a deal. So wasn't Don't Be Evil Google's catchphrase and they slyly just got rid of that? Oh, wow. I completely forgot. Yeah, it's like, you know what?

Evil's pretty cool. We can't promise that anymore. Define evil. What even is evil? It's way easy to be evil. We're sorry. Some more great cinematography. I get the wrong term for it, but whatever i think they're doing a good effort so i'll use that term and big it up uh yeah lisa up the stairs

she has the power over mr burns here that is really good yeah and then and then it's her walking down the stairs to come to his level too and i like burns slightly looking up at lisa to see if she's buying it because he doesn't mean it he pretty much doesn't and i just also love that he sees nothing evil is the radical thinking he's like well but and it's you get a nice double shot of continuity bits here two of one burns is back to not remembering who homer is and which i apologies to listeners i had previously said that in homer the smithers when he learned who homer was he would never forget who homer is but clearly that is reverted back uh and then just the baby who shot me no like and just the

finger guns that maggie does to him is so great it's like maggie remembers shooting him and likes that and he's literally coming to the simpsons hat in hands yeah i like his nice his jaunty fedora he wears throughout the rest of the show right And I think Simpsons at this point was just on the boundary of self-parody whilst it will be able to be very funny by itself. It's just on the cutting point of, remember when the baby shot me? I don't know. So again, it's definitely not the last hurdle of the good Simpsons race,

but it does work here. And so now they're working together and lisa is finally explaining recycling to mr burns you mean there are actually people who will pay good money for garbage not good money really each can i'll get you a nickel oh don't poopoo a nickel lisa a nickel will buy you a steak and kidney pie a cup of coffee a slice of cheesecake and a newsreel. With enough change left over to ride the trolley from Battery Park to the polo grounds. There's a can.

Clearly reflecting on his childhood. I love that line because it feels like a math challenge. Because he lists five things that you can do with a nickel. It would imply that each of those is one penny. And so you can buy one of those things for a penny each. And ride the trolley. And then the trolley is the, so you do those four things, and then the change you have left over is the penny for the trolley.

Oh, very nice. And we also get to get a call back to the six-pack holder, just to remind viewers of that, since it's been a while since we heard about the dangers of the six-packs. And it gives Burns an idea that we'll see much later. as usual in schwarzwelder's world of very cynical world no good deed goes unpunished when they save the fish it is immediately eaten by shark and nelson is there nelson is just there to laugh just to let you know like yeah this is fucked up haha and so they start collecting cans it's uh it is you know i thought this montage was

really cool because earlier in the episode burns laughed at the idea of stick-to-itiveness and hard work as a way to get rich and yet here he is working really hard and there's this just cool scene of him getting a nickel for the can turning that nickel in to buy a nail to get a better thing to pick up more cans and start making more money like that is classic industriousness and stick-to-itiveness there are no real jokes in that scene it's just there for you to want to be on mr burns aside like yeah he's doing it he's actually working for himself yeah the episode does a good job of making you go all right we've got seven minutes call it my dvd that i'm watching at the same time as this

and right mr burns is good now we know how it my DVD that I'm watching at the same time as this. Right, Mr Burns is good now. We know how The Simpsons works. Everything's resolved at the end. But how exactly are we going to get there with him still being nice to Lisa? It's one of these quandaries. You go, how is this going to work? So it is nice with a bit of pausing

to not necessarily have jokes for 10 seconds so I could show him, yeah, okay, well, this. As he just said to Lisa, well, don't balk on a nickel. This nickel can get me this. And with that, I can use to get more. And pretty soon, this is basically how the tapped out minigame works. I played for a solid year and a half before I had to get rid of it because I was literally setting my watch to wake up in the morning

to coincide with when the rewards were coming in. Oh, that game is sick. That's why I don't install it. I've had similar addictions though the little lisa recycling plant is available in that game oh don't i've gotta go now oh no i'm sorry it begins uh but burns has already made his first dollar my first dollar thanks to you lisa, and our hemp-smoking friend. Shine on, you crazy diamond.

Sounds like somebody's living in the past. Contemporize, man. Well, Lisa, as my advisor, you're entitled to 10%. Oh, I'm not doing this for the money. I'm just happy knowing that future generations will enjoy unspoiled median strips and pristine highway embankments. There's a can. I like in this episode how we see Mr. Burns' morality is just in the terms of pure capitalism. Like he will give Lisa money because they have an agreement.

And we'll see that much later. And we'll see other things motivated by pure capitalism in the end of this episode. But I do like how they're exploring his morality, like how morality works you're my partner you get 10 even if it's a dime which is a meaningless amount of money he's like well that's yours i share it that's how it is also lisa's dream of unspoiled median strips is such a luring she doesn't dream of like clean rivers or anything just like just nice strips of grass in the middle of asphalt can we at least have that and a nice uh a nice return of there's a can yeah get someone to shut up or change the subject in reality no one would actually get this rich recycling so it's a good they kind of have to

keep doing montages just be like and then burns is able to do this well all right i just just accept it but i love this scene marge never gets to be funny and she rarely gets respected as funny by her family so i really love this scene with her me too and from our it's funny when it happens to them file remember millionaire c montgomery burns the man who blocked out our son ran over a local boy and stole christmas from 1981 to 1985 well guess who's flat broke and picking up trash for a living? Please be Flanders. Please be Flanders. Please be Flanders. Excuse me, Mr. Burns. Now that you're completely ruined, how do you feel? Excellent. I'm on my way back to the top.

I've turned these cans into can-do. Well, you smell terrible. Good luck to you, sir. Wow, he went from stinking rich to just plain stinking good one mom you guys shouldn't laugh at him mr burns has changed he's different now yeah he's broke march's first singer was a lot better yeah she should have called it quits after that she was on a roll I think it's made by homers

two in a row Marge so many times there's a joke where Marge is told like mom but in this time they're all supporting her it's like you're so funny because they all hate Mr. Burns it's happy when it

happens when it happens to him and it helps to dump on lisa that not even marge is on her side and this and that was also some more history there too of him actually blotting out the sun and him running over bart it's only the stealing christmas's thing is a new reference in there which i'd love to know why he did that for those three years. Although he was the Grinch in Last Exit to Springfield. That is true. Mark Kirkland and John Sportswater were on that one too. Holy crap. Yep.

You're on fire. And I like the way it's done. It's like, remember him? The guy who blocked the sun. Oh, yeah. And the drawing of him in the gutter, him saying, I'm turning these cans into can do that still looks pitiful and it as the way it's presented on television is like this poor crazy person is going through

garbage and thinks he's getting rich again haha i love how perfectly patronizing camp rock was well you smell terrible good luck to you sir incredibly exploitable media uh well and speaking of exploitable i like i like how burns right it knows like this is untapped workers for him at the old folks home they're not doing anything else so why not help him sift through trash seemingly for free all he's gonna do is take him to a pond and even that he had to be coaxed into doing by lisa yeah he's not doing anything positive he's like wow the old people can really benefit i guess these just go along with seeing it that perspective he's like oh you're gonna see some ducks yeah uh and lyndon and then we get our second lyndon larouche reference ever in

simpsons history as previously heard in the citizen kang clip where he says like lyndon larouche was right yes so you really don't need to know much about him. He's a crazy conspiracy theorist. The Alex Jones of his day. But he ran for president. Yeah. Hey, Alex Jones hasn't not done that yet. He will be in in 2024, right? Bob, come on.

You're bringing me down, man. But so Burns is finally time to open up his brand new plant. Yes, thank you, everyone. But 10% of your applause should go to my little partner lisa simpson for if it were not for her infectious moralizing we would not be here today to witness the unveiling of the little lisa recycling plant oh ain't that cute makes little debbie look like a pile of puke that's a great that's a great line yeah no makes x like a pile of puke or something i say all the time it's a good one and then mo can't be

complimentary without being disgusting too even when he wants to say a little girl is cute or a design is cute he's like he has to bring in a pile of puke in his description and i wonder matt matthew do you know about little debbie is that in the uk little debbie the the snack treat brand uh no i know who you mean because usa is everywhere gotcha i wasn't sure if that reference was lost on you or not i haven't seen little debbie stuff in a while i think it's only because i go to trader joe's and nowhere else uh little debbie's not really the brand here in our town it's it's hostess this is a hostess town not a debbie town and dolly madison is dead i gotta tell you it's a terrifying looking kid on the box though oh yeah oh yeah

i she'd i'd take a pile of people puke over her some weird norman rockwell creation i don't know but it is quite a jump though that burns his business with the old folks could at best make him hundreds of dollars a week i would say not enough to open his own recycling plant but to make this more convincing they would have need to introduce us in like the second act and have him grow his empire but it's not that's not very interesting and i kind of like the speed it feels like a very swartzwellian thing i've just like the speed of a spinning newspaper says he bought a plant so let's just go to it yeah let's just get there and the great design on the plant like it's such a real looking plant and from the beginning in the background you see the the coastline you know it's at the coastline like and it's not so to make it not a big surprise when the fishing finally goes into it it's a really

good smart setup it's something i feel like some later simpsons episodes wouldn't take the care to introduce that kind of specific to pay off a plot point later but they they take the care and the design here and it's like i present the mcguffin factory but no it is great and is luring you in you're like all right okay everything seems okay where's this going it's made of old liquor bottles all right in my first viewing as a kid well as a kid i mean 13 year old i probably still was thinking like when's this shoe dropping here where's this coming he can't be good forever that's not this show but uh yeah lisa is at first very impressed and the windows are from the old liquor bottles we collected hey i thought i told you to stop licking my windows i know you told me when i

woke up this morning i said marty you're not gonna lick that i'm so proud of you mr burns you're getting your fortune back and you're doing it without endangering the planet or cozying up to the aspen crowd oh hold your accolades to the end of the tour you haven't seen the best part i couldn't watch your demonstration of the fish caught in the plastic rings without getting an idea look out over the water i i really like that barney's team because that's a side of alcoholism the show has not made fun of or explore just like the sad reasoning as to why he's doing such a depraved thing i love that i really want to hear the end of his sentence too the end of his story this speech that barney has been telling himself like i know you told me i

told myself it's like you don't yeah an alcoholic just giving you a speech trying to justify why they are licking garbage to get more alcohol off. Those bottles have to be washed clean. Very much so. When that Aspen crowd joke. So when I took it to. How we use electricity can be smarter, cleaner and greener. At Electric Ireland, we can help guide you there. You see, our new Net Zero Hub has all you need to know about smart meter plans,

EV tariffs, solar panels, and much more. Making your usage clearer, your trips greener, your home cozier, and your world brighter. Find our Net Zero Hub at electricarland.ie. Maybe I'm wrong here, but I took it to mean as a very insider comedy reference that in the late 90s, a lot of comedians were being discovered through the Aspen Comedy Festival. And so cozying up to the Aspen crowd meant that's how you got up in your comedy career was by cozying up to the Aspen crowd meant that's how you got it up in your comedy career was by cozying up to the

aspen film festival i assume i mean i think i i thought of that too i just assume in general she meant like uh limousine liberals that sort of thing like super rich liberals that would really fit with the recycling plant thing too yeah the limousine liberals would have financed it man there should have been a scene of that of some rich liberal guy like clintonian type investing in burns's plant that would have been even that would have been funny so i assumed it was the film festival yeah and you didn't forget that information burns reveals his what he was the the evilness of his plan the whole time and one thing i want to point out from the commentary that i really like is this podcast we've talked about often the intersection of anime fandom with simpsons fandom and on the commentary mark kirkland specifically brings up an artist tomi yamaguchi or tomi hiro yamaguchi an artist on

the simpsons team who came from the anime industry in japan and had moved to america and was working on the team he is who kirkland specifically calls out as the guy who figured out how to make the net work in animation he's like tommy brought in his experience from anime figuring out complicated sequences like that to make that scene work so this is anime simpsons right here the the sea sweeper anime is so good at just drawing complex machinery before computers did all of that stuff so i can totally see that and there's a good shot for something like the simpsons which obviously isn't a limited animation uh thing or anything like that but yeah so we had to hand draw that multiple whales being pulled in by a

net design and you have to like that's a lot of pencil mileage as the term goes yeah and those whales are swimming way too close to the shore i think those poor whales the whales i feel like it's drawn it's so funny but in the darkest way possible when you see those whales it's just like it's one thing for, but there's multiple giant whales in here. I mean, isn't that ridiculous? Like, oh, a million fish, including whales. Yeah. And then the slurry production animation is also... Just like a swinging blade.

Wonderfully reprehensible and as violent and horrible as possible. Poor Lisa has to see it all, the production of the slurry slurry such a good word too i love slurry this episode taught me the word slurry and i love it i think i use it all the time now right and the thing he goes you start describing the usage of slurry like it's a feed for animals insulation for low income housing it's funny but grim when it was the stories of american subways the stuff they were putting inside the sandwiches was the same stuff they were putting in a gym mat yeah now that's very little meat in these gym mats now the slurry yeah i i love the idea of the slurry being packed into low-income housing as insulation,

even though it's also highly explosive by Burns' description. That's also true, yeah. So this speech by Burns here. Oh, boy, it's perfect. This is what I think. This informed my belief in what businessmen think and how evil businessmen justify anything to themselves. And this shows you it's just the way Burns is, I think. think and how they how evil businessmen justify anything to themselves and this this shows you it's just the way burns is i think oh dear god i call our product little

lisa's patented animal slurry it's a high protein feed for farm animals insulation for low-income housing a powerful explosive and the top-notch engine coolant and best of all it's made from 100% recycled animals i think i'm gonna be sick oh a spoonful of slurry will cure what ails you oh you haven't changed at all you're still evil and when you're trying to be good you're even more evil i don't understand pigs need food engines need coolant Dynamiters need dynamite. I'm supplying it to them at a tidy profit. Not a single sea creature was wasted. You inspired it all, little Lisa.

It really is such a good exploration of the amorality of this kind of hyper capitalism where the only good is something that makes a profit. It's like, well, I'm making money. How could this be bad? People have these needs and I fulfilled them. And to ask someone to do something that would cost them money, like give people health insurance,

like, well, no, why would I spend my money on that? Why would I want to make less money? That's weird. That's bad. Do you know how business works? That stands for a tidy profit. Yeah. And again, it's shot beautifully

because suddenly the colors have turned dark. Suddenly they're in like the basement for some reason, but whatever. Yeah. You know, beforehand where Lisa was on the top of the stairs, uh, overshadowing Mr.

Burns, she's in the bottom right hand corner and he's in the, he's got the slightly bigger eyes than usual, which was, you'd see a few episodes, uh, seasons ago when the animation was a bit like that. But now here he's almost like he's possessed

and he sees absolutely nothing and literally cannot comprehend what Lisa is saying as he walks more towards, I guess, the camera and then he's overpowering. It's brilliantly shot. Again, I'm sorry to sound like... No, no, you're totally right. There's a great shot of Burns. He's on the left side of the screen. Lisa is sort of like kind of pinned against the

wall and it's a great, you know, showing how creepy the scene is and Burns is much larger than her, but also Lisa against the wall and it's a great you know showing how creepy the scene is and burns is much larger than her but also lisa the wall behind her is just like gross there's like a leaky pipe this is a new factory nothing should be this decrepit but it's just like a very disgusting wall behind her it's like the nightmare world is falling apart within her and she's getting closed in it's it's it looks so great and the i also love burns's stance of like it's made from 100 recycled animals like recycling good right i recycled it like he he's even turned recycling into like

just the idea of taking a bunch of animal living things out of the sea and then mashing them into a slurry is like it's recycling right it's like i made your idea better it It's great. And he's using her image. She's little Lisa. Yeah. Personifying everything she hates. Capitalism, dead fish, everything like that. And again, he's like, I don't understand. He's not being evil. And he bends over and it's just his creepy ass.

Looks like Gary Oldman in Bram Stoker's Dracula face. It's brilliant. Awesome. And then as I said, the shoes drop. You're like, oh, right. Just the silence. And yeah, as a viewer, you're waiting for Lisa. You're waiting just the same as Lisa for the shoe to drop.

And so when Lisa says, oh, God, you're like, ah, there we go. And leave it to John Schwarzwalder to write when he's given the environmental episode to write a scene where lisa the conscience of the show is screaming at people to not recycle but you told us to lisa but you told us to recycle you You convinced us it was good. No, it's evil. Please stop recycling. Stop.

You can't mix plastic with paper. So obviously that's a scene from the 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Very, very, very good movie. I watched it recently a few Halllloweens ago it's it's fantastic and i believe in the movie scene people are carrying the pods ah for the for the pod people in the back of the i was gonna say and also a bit of solid green here she's trying to convince people like no no you don't understand and just it keeps her going on and on and she's right in the middle of the street it pans out and there's everybody doing it and she realizes how futile it is and she breaks down and it's a horror film for a few seconds yeah i it's great acting on yardley just

the crying from lisa of like no no and actually the you know from the soylent green film the factory is a bit like the soylent green factory that charlton heston comes across too it's unfortunately the soylent green like i could never i only watched it after every thing was revealed about it i actually didn't have the twist for planet of the apes ruined for me as a kid but soily green i think in part thanks to jokes like this on the simpsons the uh the twist was ruined for me before i saw it i only really i'm very impressed that you didn't avoid the You managed to avoid the ape spoiler considering it's on the DVD cover now. Well, this was back on the VHS cover. I think it was not there.

Just monkeys on a horse. Just as someone's written on pen in the front, it's a sled. So Lisa is broken and destroyed by trying to do good. I love Homer's lesson in all that is never help anyone. Never help anyone never help anyone

uh but good advice uh burns and smithers arrive and it almost feels like there's a joke missing there when so you hear the doorbell ring you see marge open the door and burns and smithers is there and then they just walk in it's like shouldn't they're the simpsons never misses a chance for a joke so it's just so weird that it's like for a couple seconds there's no joke it's just they arrive and walk in it was kind of flat it was odd i haven't checked the dvd for see if there's any deleted scenes from this episode damn it probably should have done that but i think it's more to do the fact that ah mr burns has got his suit back his skulls there he's got his groove back it's like oh all right back to normal so i think maybe just it works as

a reaction shot you know what you're right. It does establish before he walks into the room, it establishes that Burns is back to what he was before. That's a good point. He doesn't even need to say hello. He just walks in. You're right. I stand corrected. But Burns is here with quite an offer for little Lisa.

Oh, never mind that. Wait, wait, wait. I'm watching this. Smithers says, Lenny's reign of terror is over. Reign of terror was in Burns' dictionary. Oh, it was. Okay, wait. I'm watching this. Smithers says, Lenny's reign of terror is over. Reign of terror was in Burns' dictionary. Oh, it was. Okay, awesome. Oh, my God. I forgot that Lenny sent Homer home to think about what he did, but he forgot.

That justified my entire appearance on this podcast. Simpson, what are you doing here? Why aren't you at work? I made a bad mistake and Lenny sent me home to think about what I did. But I don't remember what it was. So I'm watching TV. Well, Lenny's reign of terror is over. Mr. Burns bought the plant back this morning. Enough chit-chat.

I need to see Lisa. I don't want to talk to you, Mr. Burns. Oh, I think you will. You see, I just sold the little Lisa recycling plant for $120 million. Congratulations. No, don't congratulate me. Congratulate Bay State Fish Sticks. As my advisor, you're entitled to 10%

of the proceeds. Lise, have I told you lately that I love you? Wow, I've never seen so much money. Oh, but I can't accept that. Knowing where it came from can i mom i like it's very cute that in a kid way she's like can i mom it's good that marge believes in

her and lets her make her own decision i think in a lesser episode marge would be shitty yeah kind of you know they would sell out guilt trip about you know they would sell out a guilt trip about it yeah they would sell out her character a little a little bit at least also in no real world with a parent actually let their child turn down 12 million dollars they'd be like i'm a parent you know what no you we take your 12 million dollars you're not a uh legal adult i have power of attorney this is our money now all right we'll let your dad work for minimum wage at the plant until he dies but don't take that money from him because that's bad money wow you know what that is a really good point on the ethics i never thought of that yeah that homer their entire home is paid

for with evil burns money so yeah i mean ethically that's good money this would be bad money philosophically this is a good moment in a simple way this is a good moment for lisa to show that she's turning down uh like a deal with the devil in a way but personally yeah i think that she probably should just take it obviously the show and yeah they need a way to not have this affect the continuity of the show. But it's $12 million that will be spent evilly no matter what by Mr. Burns. So why not have those? Even you could just donate the $12 million entirely to a good cause. That's better than tearing up a check. Right.

It's out of the bad man's hands and the good person's hands. Or maybe Lisa's realizing because her plan worked so badly the first time that if she tried something else, she'd probably just start World War Three. Humans versus the dolphins. Or maybe John Schwarzwalder is a libertarian, just fucking hated Lisa and wanted to make sure that after he was dead, people would still hate Lisa for this one moment. I think you're right on that one yeah that's right yes don't take the money from the capitalist that would be wrong it's the type of choice a child would make and that it's very black and white morality for sure that it's like well this is bad money but boy you when you mentioned yeah when you brought up that homer gets burns money his entire life life, that really throws into question this turning down Burns' money this time. Or when they got the stuff from...

Your dad has two strings of hair left. He's going to die eventually. But, you know, go back to Monday at the school and save up that trip to Albany by collecting cans, Lisa. But Lisa does the right thing. We did the right thing, sweetheart. Yeah, she threw a trash can through the window. Well, that's the first case I've ever seen

of a man suffering four simultaneous heart attacks. I'm sorry, Dad. It's all right. I understand. But we really could have used that $12,000. Um, Dad, 10% of $120 million isn't $12,000.

It's... Code Blue! Code Blue! Killing Homer at the end of this episode. By the way, start your fan theories right now. Homer dies, and the old man and Elisa, and then everything else is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Buzzfeed, whatever. Who cares? You know, Simpsons predicted at first that Homer would eventually die.

But yeah, what a great, a very good way of ending the episode. Something that you took for granted how well majority of this period of Simpsons ended episodes on a funny end joke or it worked really well. That's one thing that a lot of the newer ones and i say newer i mean quite old newer or new newer you know what i mean a lot of them just fizzle out they're like and that's the end but this is a hell of an ending here homer's dead the cruelty of this reminds me more of the david murkin era or actually a lot more of the mike scully era to follow the cruelty of this ending i'm not saying that's bad it just feels off the tone for the bill oakley and josh weinstein i think homer passing out is a it was a good shot but they're like we can double down on this like it's and let homer even they get to do it twice because you

think homer passes out just over over what he thinks is the amount of money though then you get a stupid homer joke in there too that he did math poorly. Come on, Lisa. You should know better to not correct him over something that almost killed him. Yeah, and again, making you hate Lisa even more. She couldn't have gone, yes, you're right. $12,000 was the exact amount Mr. Burns offered me, Dad. That's right. Now, I'm going to inform you. And also that the mixed plastic with polystyrene is very bad for recycling.

That's right. Notably, they did get the eye shadowing right yes ah boy like yeah her pedantry almost killed her father that's true yeah and the bill for homer's quadruple heart attacks coincidentally was 12 million dollars it would not be cheap that yeah and also yeah those four heart attacks on a man who's already had bypass surgery it's like he's dead hom Homer is dead. He's going to need to call a doctor. But yes, this episode, I was surprised going back into it.

It's not one I feel that stands out in my head, but going back into it, it's like, oh, there's all these good burn speeches I've memorized, all these good lines I've memorized. I don't know why it never screams out to me as one of the greatest of season eight, but it really is. I think I just love burns so much. Yeah. i also don't remember it as the bret hart episode but it's it is a really it's a really good one with tons of great burns isms lisa is always a great moral anchor for it and giving her you've seen so many episodes that are like bart and lisa team up bart and homer team up but lisa never gets a random team up with a character outside of the family. So it was cool to see that. And I also did, when talking about the Bret Hart stuff,

forgot to mention, I actually, thanks to a gift from friend of the show, Eric Nagel, I have a signed Bret Hart figure from the NECA Toys line of the Simpsons celebrities. And this apartment does not have old man stinks, so congratulations. Thank you. Wait, is that the Eric Nagel? Yeah, from the It's Eric Nagel show.

E-Rock? Yep. Oh, wow, great. I don't know who that is. Friend of the show. Friend of the show, good guy. Just casually dropping names there, and good for you. I would do, too.

I'm a Chuli, does that count? Well, so any final thoughts on the episode matthew yeah one of the reasons why simpsons i believe is so replayable is the fact that yeah slowing down and going and going this was good because of this and this was good because it was a reference to my girl and over and yeah that my girl sorry that girl whatever i'm called um my girl is macaulay colgan um yeah is there's so much. There's so many layers to this. And also, when you go back and appreciate what makes these bits good.

I mean, the pace in season eight, I mean, it's so good with the Prohibition episode, as you were talking about, the Mary Poppins episode and whatever. Yeah, there's so much stuff. The pace is so fast with these jokes and the plot and everything else like that. It's sometimes almost like watching it in fast forward

because there's so much to take in. So when you replay it and you go, I this bit oh yeah the little leaf the one little leaf on the tree outside the window he's staring at and all the other things like oh yeah the baby that shot me and all the things it's great watching back of this season eight thank thank christ you asked me for season eight if you said we're gonna be looking at the the grandpa as a wrestler episode of like i'm sorry i'm washing my hair but um But thank you very much for letting me go back and go, yes, this is great because of this, and learn something about Americana,

about Debbies, George Bush Sr., and libertarianism. Well, thank you very much for doing the show, Matthew. And what would you like to plug? Yeah. Nothing of note. I'm going to plug OSW, because they're such a lovely bunch of fellas osw if you like hearing people do something very similar to this i guess but with old wrestling

um so it's like watching wrestling but you don't have to admit you're watching it you're watching other people watching it and being very funny uh please follow them at osw i'll just google it now the osw review is great but i i, I, well, I will say I, I am a huge fan of Bunchmanny. I give to your Patreon as well. One of my favorite things on your Patreon is you're the funny passwords you make up for the exclusive you put up there. One,

you actually, my husband was very insulted by your FF8 sucks. Oh, God damn it. Yeah. As soon as I put that up, I went and checked Twitter and i had three people one of whom's a wrestler go uh i already don't like this video because the password

and for in fact i i was talking about final fantasy 8 because it brought up again the fact that the announcement final fantasy games for the switch and it was seven ten nine all your favorites coming out and it was conspicuous by its absence and so i actually went and downloaded it for steam to see if final fantasy 8 is as bad as i remember it being and it would not work so i got the refund immediately from steam uh so thank you very much i i honestly think both the final fantasy 8 is fantastic and final fantasy 8 is bad people are weirdos the real answer everybody's a weirdo the real answer is in the middle everybody remember that but thank you so much matthew for being on the show so thanks again to matthew check

out botchamania it's great even if you aren't a wrestling fan like me it's still so much fun to watch and so much work goes into all the editing and stuff it's really cool to check out so yes botchamania but as for us all of our shows are brought to you by the talking simpsons network and if you want to help support all of our shows, go to patreon.com slash Talking Simpsons. And if you subscribe at the $5 level, you'll get so many bonus podcasts, exclusive series, and you'll get every episode of this podcast a week ahead of time and ad free. And the same goes for What a Cartoon. If you subscribe at the $5 level, there's so much happening there. You get to talk in our community. You'll get to get so many bonus podcasts every week. And if you sign up, you will get a nice little code you drop that into whatever you use to listen

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great secrets of working on the simpsons and one of our most recent ones our interview with bill morrison where he talks about how dp was in the world of simpsons comic books and also his little bone effect on the design of futurama again it is all happening on the talking simpsons network and go to patreon.com slash talking simpsons to join. And we'd love to have you listen to all of our bonus podcasts there. As for me, you can find me on Twitter as Bob Servo. I have another podcast

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almost 13. And there's like 400 episodes folks go out there and listen to a few of them subscribe if you like it and we have a patreon too if you want to subscribe to that as well there's cool stuff happening there so yes uh retronauts.com thank you henry i am h-e-n-e-r-e-y-g on twitter follow me there for updates on the talking simpsons network as well as when new episodes go live, and me sharing the exclusives that we do, too. Plus, if you liked a little bit of this wrestling talk on here, you'll hear even more of it on my Twitter, H-E-N-E-R-U-I-G. Thank you so much for listening, folks. We'll see you

next week for In Marge We Trust. Goodbye. People, if we meet this week's quota, I'll take you to the most duck-filled pond you ever sat by. Oh, hot diggity, that's how they got me to vote for Lyndon LaRouche.