Just some thoughts:
~~ Thought Number One: No one ages
Thank God the characters do not age. It used to be a holdback on the show's creativity, but now that The Simpsons is as hackneyed as any two-bit sitcom, just image what the show would be like if the characters aged. Every other episode would be about Bart, Lisa, or Maggie's love lives, because tangled love webs are the only thing modern sitcoms know how to do. Further in the vein of catering to the mentality of the mob, there would doubtless be a special episode where one of the Simpsons kids turns gay, and another special episode where old Mr. Burns finally dies off.
~~ Thought Number Two: Jumping the shark
The show has indeed jumped the shark, but it did so very subtly and well before most people noticed. This moment occurred in the cider house scene of "Burns Baby Burns." Just watch it. You will see a scene that is full of dead airtime, where in earlier episodes there had been either humor or thought-provocation. Of course, this scene did have plenty of jokes, but most of them fell flat on the ground. So.the question now is whether the show can jump the shark again. No sitcom has ever succeeded in this, but then again how many sitcoms have lasted this many years? It may yet be possible.
~~ Thought Number Three: We'll have a gay old time
Just what is the deal with everyone's obsession about gay characters on The Simpsons? The fans, writers, and producers all seem intent on throwing in as many gay references as possible. Is it funny somehow to pretend that heterosexual characters on The Simpsons are in fact gay? Yeah, sure.maybe once or even twice. But time and again? The writers have thrown insinuation after insinuation at poor blokes like Bart, Lenny, Carl, Skinner, Homer, MacAllister, and more! In Season 13 the writers even had the gall to follow through on these insinuations and declare Patty gay, all from one comment she made in passing almost a decade ago after seeing Homer run naked through the living room. And, if you will recall, it used to be that her lack of interest in men was due to an oath of celibacy, not a homosexual preference for women. This kind of childish behavior by the writers and producers not only detracts from character integrity, but also upsets the gay rights movement.
~~ Thought Number Four: Cool your jets
A cool show manufactures its own cool. A wannabe cool show imitates popular culture. The Simpsons used to be a factory where things became cool, but now it is a welfare recipient that props its image up by devouring the emblems of what our culture presently considers as cool. This is evident across the show, but especially so in the style of vernacular the characters now employ.
~~ Thought Number Five: Show and no tell
Those of you who do art may be familiar with the rule of showing and not telling. Showing is more engaging to the viewer (or reader, listener, etc.) because it paints a story with the help of the viewer's own mind and imagination, whereas telling lays out the story in flat, dictatorial terms that leave open no possibility of artistic interpretation. It is as flat as the endless plains of the Midwest, and just as uninteresting. A good case in point is the opening sequence of Tree House of Horror XI, a parody of "The Munsters." That intro was the highlight of an otherwise bland episode, but they kicked it in the butt by having Lisa "Marilyn" Munster walk out carrying a book entitled "Copyright Law." Well, duh, Simpsons producers! We know you went to a lot of trouble to make a nice parody-you've shown us! You didn't have to tell us.
~~ Thought Number Six: The difference between satire, parody, and allusion
One thing that gets my goat is how, anytime the writers put a reference into the show, people here on the newsgroup hail it as a brilliant parody. "Oh, look at me! I'm drinking out of a mug just like they do on Larry King! What a parody! Man, the King must really be stinging right about now! I sure wouldn't want to be his life insurance company!" Well, I'm sorry folks. That is not a parody. That is just plain pathetic. The Simpsons is rife with allusion-but an allusion is just a synonym for reference. It's nothing special. A good example of an allusion (one that is non-parody, non-satire) is in the couch gag on "The Old Man and the Key," where Homer comes up to the couch and sees the Blue Man Group playing there. There is nothing funny about this at all; it is just an allusion and, methinks, an allusion that was meant to be a parody.
So, let's talk about satire and parody. These two words are not interchangeable when placed under the microscope.
Satire takes allusion and goes a step further: it uses the allusion to attack some stupidity or inanity through literary techniques such as irony, derision, or wit. Satire is evident in Kodos' "I am Clin-Ton." This is satire because it makes fun of the tendency of science fiction movies to give their alien villains exotic names that all happen to have similar suffixes, like "-ton."
Parody, meanwhile, is different from satire. It begins with an allusion and then attacks something or someone by making fun of it. Parody is evident in Chief Wiggum's announcement, made in front of Old Springfield Library, that the dogs have picked up the scent of books. Mistaking these for the stolen books, he then orders the battering ram, which crashes through the doors. This is a parody of the police system. It makes fun of policy stupidity, and police use of excessive force.
The difference between satire and parody is that satire pokes its fun by using subtle literary techniques as mentioned above, while parody pokes its fun by explicitly poking fun.
~~ That'll do it for now.
~Josh