dvd season 3 no commentaries?

Amazon lists no extras for the season 3 DVD. Are there really no commentaries this time?

Some Guy said:

Season 3 has been released??

"Opinicus" wrote in message news:[email]...

The Simpsons - The Complete Third Season (1991)

List Price:   $49.98
Price:   $32.49 & This item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping. See
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You Save:   $17.49 (35%)

Availability: This item will be released on July 29, 2003. You may order it now and we will ship it to you when it arrives.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B000067DNE/qid=1053986567/sr=8 -3/ref=sr_8_3/103-2599351-8084669?v=glance&s=dvd&n=507846

Woohoo! But at this rate it will be 2015 before we get season 14.

Do you really want to own Season 14???

I have six locks on my door all in a row. When I go out, I lock every other one. I figure no matter how long somebody stands there picking the locks, they are always locking three. - Elayne Boosler

Remove "bination" to reply.

[email] (Sydney Assbasket ) wrote in news:[email]:

I do. I rather enjoyed Season 14. Now season 11-13 would be more questionable, but I'll still buy them for the few good episodes (and commentaries about why so many episodes suck).

Lenny said:

I'm in Zone 2. I just checked amazon.co.uk and no release date has even been announced yet.

By which time the show will be up to, what, season 26? ;-)

"Opinicus" wrote in message news:...

A modern incarnation of Russell's 'Tristram Shandy' philosophical puzzle, perhaps (if it takes Shandy two years to write two days' worth of his autobiography, will he ever finish it, even if he lives forever?).

Or something.

Rich

Some Guy who may or may not be named tom_ungvarsky wrote:

When Mike Reiss had his show at Davis, CA earlier this year, he said they had just finished recording the commentaries for Season 3, which was one of the reasons Season 3 would be released late.

I find the commentaries to be the best special feature.

I would rather them be released faster than have the commentaries IMHO.

ZR

In alt.tv.simpsons, on the "Re: dvd season 3 no commentaries?" thread, Yertle wrote:

I'd rather wait and get the commentaries, myself. I've seen the episodes the "regular" way hundreds of times, so having them in exactly the same form on DVD isn't buying me much. I suppose it would be nice to have the episodes in a durable format, but then I could just wait until the DVDs end up on the discount shelf. Having extras like commentaries makes the DVDs more of a "gotta have" item.

Don't be so certain. Videotape has been around for at least 23 years (my parents bought a VCR in 1980) and it's still a viable format. If the next new format also uses some kind of disc for storage, then its players will probably be backwards-compatible with your "Simpsons" DVDs, anyway.

I think that for season 4 they should just have commentaries on certain eps (ie, maybe matt groenings fav eps from that season). Dont get me wrong, i LOVE the commentary but i dont want to wait so long just to get a complete set of simpsons eps.

i say as fans we do want comentary on all the eps! a lot of tv shows are coming out on dvd which is good but most are extraless and comentaryless. why is everone in such a hurry? the eps are show and reshown over and over, we have online capsals and the 3 to date very detailed ep guides. i say let them release the dvd's as fast as possible but not to lose the extra that we all love the comentaries/the scripts with the notes/doodles ect.........

So, I guess that answers the question as to when the season ends.

Roger

[The long of it]

I've been resisting it, but I'm starting to agree with the people who claim the "Treehouse of Horror" series has transmuted into something other than a Halloween special. The "trick or treat" framing stories fell by the wayside more than a decade ago. Premises nowadays owe more to science fiction than to horror. The air date has been drifting ever closer to Thanksgiving than Halloween. (In fact, this year is the latest a "TOH" has ever debuted.) Today, "Treehouse of Horror" is more of a showcase for dark humor, twisted premises, and the occasional bloody wound.

It's also been getting better as of late. After an uninspiring 12th outing, the writers came back with two strong installments. Would "Treehouse of Horror XV" continue the trend?

The opening segment certainly made it look that way. It took a premise we've seen before (aliens Kang and Kodos try to make a meal of the Simpsons) and married it to a cheesy 80's-style sitcom called, "Keeping it Kodos." The contrast between the seriousness of the family's situation and the lighthearted alien-centered comedy got to me, even though Fox's crack promotion department gave away most of it in the ads. The theme even carries through the "credits," which come complete with the theme song to some sitcom whose name escapes me right now.

The first proper story, "The Ned Zone," is also the only one that could be classified as a "horror" story, based as it is on Stephen King's "The Dead Zone." Ned recovers from a head injury and discovers that he has a disturbing new power: If he touches someone, he sees how that person will die. When Ned touches Homer, he sees himself in the future, shooting Homer in the back with a pistol. In a way, the story becomes a bit predictable as soon as Ned has his vision. We know that he'll take steps to avoid killing his friend, but that increasingly improbably circumstances will lead him to do it. The fun is in guessing just how it will happen. Unfortunately, the short running time of "The Ned Zone" works against it. The writers don't have time for a truly elaborate fulfillment of the prophecy, so the climactic scene plays out a little too quickly for my taste. The segment's ending is a little flat, too. On the whole, it's a pretty good sketch, though, with a malfunctioning intercom system being my favorite joke.

The middle story, "Four Beheadings and a Funeral," puts the cast in Victorian-era London, with Lisa as a Sherlock Holmes type, and Bart as the tagalong assistant. This skit plays like an outtake from "Margical History Tour (FABF06)" (and yes, I know Holmes is a fictional character). Like that episode, part of the fun here is seeing familiar characters dressed up in elaborate period costume, and watching their personas mesh with a different era. The major players in the story inhabit almost the same roles in London as they do in real life: Wiggum and the cops are inspectors at Scotland Yard, Moe is the owner of an opium den, and Otto is one of his stoner customers. There are some surprises, though. Burns is one of Moe's dissolute customers, and Springfield Elementary's teachers are ladies of the evening. I also liked Comic Book Guy's incarnation as the owner of a curiosity shop (where he also tries to peddle a proto-comic book). It's a pretty good tale, but once again the ending's a bit rushed, and the final joke is a bit flat.

By the way is this the first alternate-reality sketch where the family members appear, but aren't related to one another in the new reality? You can point this out to your friends and family if you want to prove that you have no life.

The final sketch of the night, "In the Belly of the Boss," takes us where no man has gone since that episode of "Futurama" with the parasites. Maggie is accidentally shrunk down to microscopic size, and Burns ingests her. With Frink's help, the rest of the family mounts a rescue mission, "Fantastic Voyage" style. The satire owes more to the movie than to the book, with a lot of the humor centering around the costuming. There's one scene where everyone gets a cool title and a logo for their jumpsuit. Imagination-challenged Marge's title is "Marge," and her logo is a little vacuum cleaner. (Yet later, she's given a revealing extra-vehicular suit that, in Homer's words, turns a mediocre voyage into a fantastic voyage.) The ending for this sketch is the strongest of the three; a little derivative of "Treehouse of Horror II (8F02)," but with excellent callbacks to the night's earlier sketches.

After last year's move toward more of a "Halloween" feel, "TOH 15" heads back toward the other way, away from traditional spookiness and toward science fiction and more generally macabre, off-kilter stories. It also seems like a backward step in quality compared with "TOH 14," but that's more because last year's special was a particularly good one, not that this one was bad. Taken on its own merits, the 15th special provides solid humor with no clinkers or things to make me wince. That's the third time in a row, which is a trend I can live with.

[The short of it]

What people have been saying is true: "TOH" is less of a Halloween special and more of a showcase for macabre and off-kilter stories. The opening sketch, a funny cross between dire straits and syrupy sitcoms, is a good example, and starts the show well. It's fun seeing Ned's misguided attempts to alter the future in "The Ned Zone." "Four Beheadings" does well with its period costumes and alter egos for the "Simpsons" crew. "Belly of the Boss" is by a small margin my favorite skit, thanks to good satire of the source movie, and an ending with "callbacks" to the earlier skits. The material didn't feel as fresh as last year's, and there wasn't that one knockout joke that propels a show to greatness, but this is the third good "TOH" in a row. (B)

[DYNs]

...	despite the title, nobody was beheaded in "Four Beheadings and a
	Funeral?"
...	for that matter, there wasn't a funeral, either?
...	Bart finally has a legitimate excuse to use his Cockney accent?
...	it's never explained how Wiggum came into possession of the
	Swords of Osiris?
...	Burns reads "Premiere" magazine while the family is inserted in
	his body?
...	when Homer says he "flies from the gut" he is literally flying
	in Burns's gut?
...	the dancing partners all recall characters from tonight's
	stories?
...	"Eliza" Simpson dances on Inspector Wiggum's shoes?

[References]

James L. Brooks (producer) - "Keeping it Kodos" episode written by Glekknor L. Brooks (perhaps a future descendant?)

Botany 500 (clothing maker) - Botany 5 million provides wardrobe for "Keeping it Kodos"

Mark V (or perhaps VII) (production company) - their logo is two hands with a stamp and a hammer chiseling "Mark V" into a stone; the TOH XV title is done similarly

"The Dead Zone" (novel; movie; TV series) - title "The Ned Zone" a spoof - the main character can see people's imminent demise when he touches them, like Ned in his story

"Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" (movie) - one of the staffers credited as, "Faster, Michael Price! Kill! Kill!"

"Last Comic Standing" (on-again, off-again TV series) - another staff member is, "The Last Goblin Standing"

"The Telltale Heart" (short story) - animator "The Tell-Tale Silverman"

"Four Weddings and a Funeral" (movie) - title of second story is, "Four Beheadings and a Funeral"

"A Christmas Story" - Burns becomes C. Ebenezer Burns (cf. Scrooge) in second story

Las Vegas Tourism slogan - "What happens here stays here" applied to London's opium dens

"Happiness is a Warm Puppy" (book) - Mao's slogan: Happiness is a warm poppy [the flower that is the source of opium]

"Into the Belly of the Beast" - title of third story, "Into the Belly of the Boss" a spoof

Keep On Truckin' logo - retro-virus drawing is eerily similar - Frink even credits it to R. Crumb, who did the original

"Fantastic Voyage" (book; movie)
-	to save a life, a team of scientists must be shrunk down and
	inserted in someone's body
-	Homer mentions that Marge's revealing costume changes a mediocre
	voyage into a fantastic voyage
-	one of the scientists is attacked by giant white blood cells
-	the Simpsons' costumes for their voyage resemble the ones in the
	movie

"I Was a Teenaged Werewolf" (movie) - Dan C's Halloween name is, "I was a teenaged Dan Castellaneta"

"C. H. U. D." (movie) - staff writer David C. H. U. D.

"SpongeBob SquarePants" (TV series) - one staff member is, "Happy Birthday Fun-Sponge Bob"

Beelzebub - Danny Elfman becomes, "Daniel Beilzebelsman"

"think outside the box" (business slogan/clich�) - casting by, "Think Outside the Boxcutter"

"Psycho" - Norman "Bates" MacLeod

[Previous Episode References]

[1F08] Burns seen physically disheveled, with long hair and fingernails [8F02] Burns and Homer must share a body [CABF17] Scenes from the episode played under closing credits

[FFF]

Credits for "Keeping it Kodos":

          Directed by
        Slarg Silverman

           Written by
       Glekknor L. Brooks

       Kodos' Wardrobe By
        Botany 5,000,000

      Audience Provided By
    Slave Colony of Rebulon 7

Theater marquee:

    The
    ROSIE O'DONNELL
            MUSICAL

Theater banner:

    CLOSED AFTER 3
     PERFORMANCES

Flanders's wood (and pistol) chipper:

     lil'
    chipper

Plaque at Scotland Yard:

               SCOTLAND
                 YARD

"WHAT'S ALL THIS ABOUT, THEN?"

CBG's shoppe:

          EMPORIUM
          -- OF --
          EXOTICA

WE HAVE STUFF IN JARS

Proto-comic book:

      DAUNTING
       DEEDS

    ALONE AGAINST
    THE DODO KING

Life-restoration potion:

    PROFESSOR LAZARUS'S
       DEAD-NO-MORE
        E L I X I R

Opium-district sign:

          OPIUM
         DISTRICT

    "WHAT HAPPENS HERE,
        STAYS HERE"

Moe's opium den:

         MAO'S
    DEN OF INIQUITY

Opium den sign:

       HAPPINESS
    IS A WARM POPPY
       [flower]

Another opium den sign:

      NO
    TOSSING
    ADDICTS

Expo center sign:

       NEW INVENTION DAY
       -----------------

     SEE THE INVENTIONS OF
           TOMORROW!

-- TODAY AND TOMORROW --

Translator sign:

     VAGRANT
    TRANSLATOR

Family members' jumpsuit logos:

    Homer:  Rocket ship
    Lisa:   Bohr atom logo
    Bart:   Ray gun
    Marge:  Vacuum cleaner

Dancing partners:

"Muttonchop" Kang & Kodos Homer & Burns Frink & Cat Lady

Moe & Animated Footstool "Eliza" Simpson & Inspector Wiggum

Alligator & Hans Moleman Boss Alien & "Vomit" Bart

Maggie & A White Blood Cell

[Personal Comments & Observations]

When the family is trapped in Burns's stomach, Lisa says it's the worst Halloween Horror ever. Appropriate, given that "TOH" is thought of as the Halloween special.

R. Crumb -- Famous counter-culture cartoonist.  The famous 60's hippie
	icon, the "Keep on Truckin'" guy, is one of his creations.  So
	is "Fritz the Cat," also referenced on "The Simpsons" (although
	not in this episode).  I think the "R" stands for Robert,
	although he was almost exclusively known as just "R".  [Curse
	alert:  Mr. Crumb passed away a few years ago.]

Harvey Pekar -- Another famous "alternative" cartoonist.  His primary
	subject is none other than Harvey Pekar, and he has a comic
	strip that is entirely about his own life.  The strip and the
	man were the subject of a recent movie, "American Splendor."
	I'm not aware of any Pekar-Crumb collaborations, though.

Television promos for this episode showed Homer complaining that his "Fantastic Voyage" jumpsuit would ride up his butt and highlight his "bosoms". I guess the wardrobe department found a relaxed-fit suit, because this line wasn't in the episode.

It's been years since I read the book, but I'm pretty certain the movie came first. Isaac Asimov wrote the book, but it just doesn't fit the rest of his work. More important, I'm sure there was an intro or some comment on the cover about how he wrote the book from the script.

And as is often the case when a movie is made out of the book, more people will be familiar with the movie than the book, hence it makes sense to parody the movie rather than the book.

But the book is called "A Christmas Carol" as is the movies that follow the book (as opposed to the many who merely use the story line). "A Christmas Story" is the Peter Billingsly movie from the early eighties based on the book by Jean Shepard.

If course, Mao said "Religion is the opiate of the masses".

I'm pretty sure he's still alive. The fact that there was a movie about him, "Crumb" ten years back is not an indication of his death. I don't remember seeing anything about him dying, and a quick search doesn't show anything immediately. He apparently caused Pekar to do comics commercially, or something like that.

Michael

[email] (Michael Black) wrote in message news:...

Yes, they hired Isaac Asimov to write the novelization. In his rewrite, he closed up some of the plot holes and tried to make everything scientifically plausible.

Right, the book was the novelization of the script. However, because (1) in order to get Asimov to do it, they had to agree that he could make any changes he felt necessary to try to make it scientifically reasonable (within the constaint of not junking the whole story, of course!), and (2) he wrote so damned fast that the book actually came out quite a while before the movie, most people thought that the movie was made from the book.

On Wed, 10 Nov 2004 05:43:39 GMT, Tim Smith wrote:

Asimov must have had a bigger budget than Prof. Farnsworth. One change he made was using very tiny atoms.

If my memory serves me correctly, on Tue, 09 Nov 2004 03:34:37 GMT, Benjamin Robinson issued the following challenge to face my invincible Iron Chefs:

:

Wizard. (g)

... Bart(!) made it to Heaven?

[email] done made some lettery things in message news:...

Along with Buddhist Lisa and atheist garage.

In article , [email] (Benjamin Robinson) wrote:

it's Mark VII Productions, the company owned by Jack Webb which produced _Dragnet_, _Adam-12_ and [address]

uh, Robert Crumb is still very much alive and living in France.

Daniel Dreibelbis wrote in news:[email]:

A new curse!

-ENH

In alt.tv.simpsons, on the "Re: (long) A review of "Treehouse of Horror XV (FABF23)"" thread, Daniel Dreibelbis wrote:

My mistake, then. I must have gotten him confused with another family member, or perhaps another cartoonist.

[email] (Benjamin Robinson) wrote in message news:...

Yes it is. Ebenezer Burns sold it to "a fat man with side Burns _like_ that one over there" (Homer) for opium. He never said he sold it to Homer, just that whoever bought it resembled him (which Wiggum did).

It's actually "In the Belly of the Beast/Boss", not "Into".

One pair that you're missing: Angel Ned Flanders and Angel Marge.

Joe Klemm

Benjamin Robinson wrote:

Not to be nitpicky, but in the interest of ensuring an accurate capsule, there's no "about."

[email] (Benjamin Robinson) wrote in message news:...

"Perfect Strangers," as I'm sure plenty of other people have pointed out by now.

Do it! Kill everybody!

He sure IS! Rrroowwwr!

In the last "Simpsons Tall Tales" sketch, Bart was Tom Sawyer, and Lisa was Becky Thatcher. Since they had different last names, I guess they weren't supposed to be related. On the other hand, they DID change it so that it was Huck, not Tom, who had a crush on Becky, because, well, even if Bart and Lisa AREN'T related in this sketch, it would still be weird to see them as an item.

Nathan

Nathan wrote:

I was thinking about this too (take note, O Benjamin of the Capsules)...

With the Tom Sawyer thing, Homer, Marge, and Lisa were all related. I don't know if what we're going for is "someone out of the main 4 or 5 isn't related to the rest" or "none are related at all," but this is something to consider.

The Raven (7F04) also has unrelated family members. The only characters that are related are Homer and Marge/Lenore (by law if not by blood, but that's the case with them anyway), and maybe the Lisa/Maggie characters, but that part's a stretch.

And King Homer (9F04) has Homer and Marge meeting...but do they ever marry? This one is easily the weakest of my list, but it's got something.

Matt Garvey wrote in message news:...

Yeah, they get married at the end, and Homer eats Mr. Bouvier.

Nathan

Nathan wrote:

And he does coke! You wouldn't say Sherlock Holmes is stupid, would you?

T Chong

Sparky wrote in message news:...

It's probably not verbatim, but the conversation went something like this.

cheech: hey, man, how come everytime we do coke you go and do something really stupid like that? man: hey! how come everytime we do coke, you go into your "how come everytime we do coke" speech? cheech: you need to quit doing that coke man, it does something to your brain. you're not gonna have a brain no more, man. man: hey, man! lotsa smart people snort coke. cheech: oh yeah? lotsa smart people snort coke, huh? like who? man: like, like, sherlock holmes snorts coke and he isn't so stupid.

Tieus Albert wrote:

From: http://members.aol.com/VWware/oindex.html

"Man everytime you do coke this happens. I swear, Everytime you do coke you screw something up. I can't believe you gave our money away."

"Woe. Hold on man, everytime I do coke you go on about this 'everytime I do coke' bit. I'm getting sick of it."

"That's cause evertime you do coke you screw something up. You need to chill on that shit man. That shit will give you brain damage."

"Woe. Hold on man. There's alot of smart guys who do coke, man."

"Oh yeah like who?"

"Uh, like, Sherlock Holmes does coke, man, and he's not so stupid."

"Sherlock Holmes?"

[IIRC: "let's go get our money, Holmes"]

I haven't posted in this group in a long time, but figured I like to give my two cents over this episode (which I still haven't seen).

On Tue, Nov 9, 2004, 3:34am (EST+5), [email]

Are these segments or "acts" usually 7 minutes in length? I do like to think that it's rather short when it does come to how they do try to write these things. The producers on the commentaries do tend to say that these are the HARDEST episodes to do and they usually work on them a year in advance or something like that so they could focus on the other for a season or whatever.

(SNIPPED)

Sometimes I wonder if 11 minutes would suffice if they wanted to expand these episodes to an hour or such? At least that way it might give the writers some good spare time to develop these endings better.

Too bad I haven't paid attention to the Simpsons for years so much of this is new to me (not having see this episode).

Sometimes I wonder if they should allocate the episodes to around December and retool it into some sort of an "end of year" type event where they would do this sort of thing? They always did tend to be more of whatever the writers and other people could come up with that wouldn't be used anywhere else in the series anyway. The Halloween part of them seems to have fallen flat and nothing can probably make it better if the remaining episodes yet to be seen will always be shown in November anyway.

I do like to agree a lot with what Ben has to say about the switch from the spooky to sci-fi that they're doing on these specials. If there was a better thought given to this, I'd rather they push these to sometime in December and create a kind of "end-of-year" type episode where they would do off this kind of stuff they would normally not use for the series regularly. Given that the Halloween deal has fallen flat for a while now, I'd rather that they do something better with the remaining years they have left instead of playing this into November as usual (no thanks to Fox).

[email] (Chris Sobieniak) wrote in message news:...

They are doing a Christmas trilogy in Season 17, according to Mike Reiss, but not in place of Treehouse of Horror XVI.

In alt.tv.simpsons, on the "Re: (long) A review of "Treehouse of Horror XV (FABF23)"" thread, Chris Sobieniak wrote:

Problem is, December (and especially the *end* of December) usually sees a slowdown in TV ratings as people become preoccupied with their own end-of-the-year celebrations. November is a sweeps month with more people watching, so Fox and the other networks like to air their "special" episodes that month.

They often don't provide a full list of extras till closer to release dates - but rest assured, part of the very reason they're taking so long is that it's hard to coordinate people's schedules to do all the commentaries (which Fox Home Video would rather see less of to get them out quicker)...

Some Guy wrote:

Much like the Family Guy DVD which only has 2 commentatries per disc (total of 8) and it sounds like they were all recorded at the same time.

"Matt Garvey" wrote in message news:[email]...