I loved last night's episode. Hopefully more political satire is in the works. When we're watching it on DVD ten years from now, we'll all laugh at unilateral military invasions backed up by zany lies and mass delusion.
Best episode ever!
May 17, 2004, 2:57 PM ET10 posts by 9 postersalt.tv.simpsons
10 posts
On Mon, 17 May 2004 11:57:31 -0700, Digital Puer wrote:
It struck me as rather heavy-handed. Are the American population in such a frenzy of patriotism that such a blunt instrument is needed?
Maybe so. Here in the UK, for months after that car crash I suspect you could have been lynched for suggesting Lady Di was anything short of a saint :-)
Laurence Payne wrote in message news:...
Yeah, it is. It's not so much by the general public that acts like that, but the media. One way of looking at it is that our "elected" officials have basically used September 11 as a means of pushing their agendas. That is, if you disagree with us then you are un-American. Michael Moore was going to discuss this in his most recent movie, Fahrenheit 911, until Disney pulled the plug on it.
No, it's not.
Which segments of it are you referring to? Certainly not ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, the NY Times, the Washington Post, PBS, NPR...
Oh, right. Lots and lots of that. Maybe you could find and cite a couple of quotes?
Sigh...
Michael Moore did and has and is discussing it in his latest "documentary". Which has not been released yet, but will be. Which Disney notified Moore over a year ago that they'd not be releasing. Which Moore lied about Disney "blocking" in a publicity stunt leading up to the Cannes film festival. There has been no "plug" pulled. There are a couple of different companies vying to distribute it in the US - one of them will when it's done.
Gosh. Do you really think so? </sarcasm>
To each his own. One can make satire that's funny. One can even make heavy-handed satire that's funny. But there's got to be some kind of connection to reality for satire to work, and there wasn't any in that episode...
Nothing remotely close to it...
Yes.
"Laurence Payne" wrote in message news:[email]...
OH YES! They are insane, one think I noticed from a brief visit to California this months was that in what is supposed to be a 'free' society, there is a strange reluctance to criticise their 'elected' president. I heard of a guy having a go at him at a university speech, and he was boo-ed off stage for being 'unpatriotic. To me as an Englishman I find it very strange, politicians here (who are actually elected, a strange concept I know) are under constant scrutiny.
Pete.
Maybe as an Englishman, you're getting a distorted view of events. As an American, I can say that criticizm of the president is alive and well, even rampant, in the media and in the population at large. The person who was "booed" off that stage wasn't because he was "unpatriotic", he was booed because he chose an inappropriate forum (college graduation ceremony) to do so. The "audience" chose to excercize their right to free speech by booing.
Please know what you're talking about before opening your mouth.
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right on my man
Digital Puer wrote:
Well, the show is getting really stale. I mean, how many more "Ralph is retarted" gags can be recycled? I wouldnt mind a short-lived but well-done period of lots of political satire, especially as a check on the pseudo-patriots and bad goverment we've had here in the US for the last four years.
I've always been on the opinion that the Simpsons should have just stopped and Futurama should have taken up their slot. They are really in their twilight and even a mediocre episode makes us happy because there are just so many bad new ones. Its hard to blame the Simpsons people, like I said, there are only so many gags. Unless they want to bring in new characters and lots of change it going to remain this way, but adding some politics might make it more of a cultural force, like it was in the early 90s as it was one of the first tv shows to really tackle middle-america. Well, there's Archie Bunker and Married with Children too.