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The Simpsons: My Fair Laddy
I
can't remember exactly when, but it's been a while since the last new episode of The
Simpsons, and I don't know about you, but I've been missing it terribly. Last night's episode was about the
often-overlooked Grounds-keeper Willie; he's used for punch-lines a lot like Moe is, showing just how pitiful his life
is, but normally only shows up every couple of episodes. In fact, I can't remember if Willie's ever had an entire
episode where he was the main-plot before. After 17 years, it's about time, they've got all kinds of characters just
laying around waiting for rich interesting stories to be told about them: Bumble Bee Man, Ms. Botz, Grounds-keeper
Willie... wait... On with the show!I really enjoyed the show, but it seemed to have a lot more "adult" jokes than normal. The one about there
being more "wood" in the shop class, Willie writing down "Boink Slut" in his date book, stuff like
that. Then I remembered seeing Bob Odenkirk's name in the credits as a supervising producer. Yes, our favorite Mr. Show castoff this side of David Cross, Jack Black, Sarah Silverman or many many
others, had his hand in the pot for last night's episode and that connected a lot of the dots.
The sideplot
where Homer's iconic blue pants were destroyed and he had to get new ones was kind of funny, but as with a lot of there
side-plots this year, seemed to be dropped near the end. I watched it a second time this morning, and it really doesn't
have an end to it. I thought I had just been forgetting it. I did like them poking fun of the fact that there's a lot of
stupid people doing this dumb "body for advertising" stuff lately, but all in all, Homer's story fell a little
flat for me.
The actual story revolved around Lisa turning Willie into a fine upstanding gentleman for her
science fair project. The story is a play off of Pretty Woman, which is a play off of My Fair Lady, which is actually a play off of Pygmalion and Galatea (look out folks, he's
educated). It was funny, but compared to those stories, it was missing something. When Willie has his new life, he
doesn't gain anything that he would miss if he went back to his old means of living. In all the other references,
someone would normally lose someone they loved if they went back to their old style of life. Here, the only person that
Willie loves is himself, (yes, that's a joke) and because of that I think it lacks a little of the emotional punch, that
the others have. Yes, it's just The Simpsons, but that doesn't mean I can't
demand quality! As Principal Skinner pointed out, at the end, it had a nice way of ending up exactly as it had started.
Let me know what you think.
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