I'm on Setanta Sports is, as you may have guessed, a Setanta Sports programme voiced by Mario Rosenstock of Gift Grub fame, which has puppet representations of Jose Mourinho, Sven Goran Eriksson, Wayne Rooney and Fabio Capello hosting a football phone-in review show. The show began shortly after Jose was sacked from his job at Chelsea, with the idea in mind that this was his new job. As of now there are 40 episodes online, with a new episode usually each week on Saturdays after the weekends Premiership fixtures. I had originally read about it in the Metro, but without a subscription to Setanta Sports I couldn't watch it. However, as faith would have it I stumbled across a video on Youtube to find that the whole back catalogue of episodes was available.
Over the months, the show has undergone minor changes such as different featurettes like "My thoughts for this week..." or "Wayne's Word", with the addition of Sven (aka "It"), Wayne (aka "The Boy") and Fabio (aka "Cabbage Man Capello") to the roster being the only significant changes.
With 40 episodes to choose from, it's been rather difficult to come up with a Top Ten of the best, especially given that the quality of the episodes is very subjective.
Nevertheless, I have a list, but first, some special honourable mentions....
Episode 1: Jose is Back!
Episode 8: Jose's first signing
Episode 14: Shock new signing!
AND NOW TO THE LIST!!!
10. Episode 30: Jose Makes a Shock Revelation
9. Episode 21: Roman Taps Up The Boy
8. Episode 32: Halloween Party
7. Episode 34: Jose accuses the Voyeur of Spying
6. Episode 35: Jose Investigates the Mysterious Illnesses
5. Episode 31: Jose and Fabio: The Great Debate
4. Episode 18: Jose's Got Talent
3. Episode 26: The Battle for Berba
2. Episode 15: The Boy is Gifted
1. Episode 6: Jose on Keegan's Return
Be Champions!!
~The Damo
Showing posts with label TV. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TV. Show all posts
Tuesday 6 January 2009
Saturday 22 November 2008
Thursday 20 March 2008
LOST...On its last legs??
You may recall that last year I wrote a blog entitled Lost...What the hell is going on? where I criticised the show for its direction in Season 3, and sadly I find myself today writing a blog on a similar topic.
I'll be honest with you, I haven't "watched" Season 4. I owe this primarily to the fact that I am out every Monday night. For me, watching Seasons 2 and 3 of LOST was somewhat of a routine, so when I found I couldn't watch it at the time I was accustomed to, well it put me off a bit. Nevertheless, I made the effort to watch the first episode online and quite frankly, I was disappointed. Perhaps the most telling fact that I was (and still am) disappointed is that I've made no such effort since to watch the show, rather I read about it on Lostpedia, but even then, its more so to just see what's happening rather than attempting to satisfy the unquenchable thirst I had for the show in the previous 3 seasons.
If you read the previous post http://smoke-me-a-kipper-back-for-breakfast.blogspot.com/2007/04/lostwhat-hell-is-going-on.html you'd have found that I was critical of the shows new direction, particularly how it was entering a phase of "unreality" and after watching and reading about Season 4 so far, I regretfully must admit that this statement still holds, and I fear it has gotten worse. Most notably, the episode which was focused on Desmond reaching the ship at sea seemed to involve some out-of-this-world kind of time travel. Now again, I haven't watched it nor did I take the time to read it carefully on Lostpedia, but that definitely seemed to be the case. The meteorite in the previous season pissed me off greatly, and what I enjoyed most about the first 2 seasons was while there was still a mystery to everything that was going on, the show still had a touch of "It's possible". Season 3 brought that point to the line...and crossed it, and I fear Season 4 is going even further. For instance in the episode I watched, Hurley has visions of Charlie: now ok, that's fine, we've been shown Hurley has mental illnesses, but there was something about how the vision was done, it almost made it feel like Charlie was there, as himself.
In hindsight, I think the biggest mistake the writers made was the closing scene in the finale of Season 3. Showing us that (at the very least) Jack and Kate made it off the Island had a touch of Star Wars about it, if you'll indulge me to explain....
Episodes I, II and III are deemed by hardcore fans as "failures" and I attribute this fact to order of the films. The problem with episode III was that people knew what had to happen, they just wanted to see how it happened - i.e. Anakin becomes Vader, Jedi get killed, etc... Episode II built up to that point, and the start Episode IV was the conclusion, all that was left was to fill in the gap inbetween. So when people left the cinema after seeing it, sure they were blown away by the action and fight scenes and so on, but they were left hollow in that (a) the story was over (or at least the story of the Prequels) and (b) they felt that they had learned nothing from last film (in that all the stuff that happened was widely known since the end of episode II). So how does LOST fit in? Well, since we now know that 6 people get off the Island, of which we know Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sahid are 4 of, then it means that the "gap", like the one that was between Episodes II and IV, now has to be filled. AKA, people know these people get off the Island, now they have to see how it happens.
The other key thing, which I think is why I've become so disappointed with the show as a whole is the actual way the story has evolved in Season 4. For Seasons 1 & 2, The Others were a huge part of the show, so much so that anything that revolved around them left you on the edge of your seat. It would seem to me that after the end of Season 3, which effectively has cut The Others out of the show completely (since a lot of the main characters were killed at the beach and the rest of them bogged off to the second island), that Season 4 is almost like a whole new story line involving the crew members of the ship. It feels like Prisonbreak all of a sudden (which I too feel is on its last legs). It almost feels somewhat like a soap opera, where new stories are drawn up for each of the characters just to try and keep things interesting. Furthermore, the mysteries which in my opinion made Seasons 1 & 2 so fabulous, have become rather gimmicky or more like novelties. While it was great to speculate what the Monster was, or how the hatch exploded or whatever, the question to answer ratio in LOST has reached the 20:1 point, where there's just so many different things happening and almost ludricous connections between one character's mother's mother's husband's sister and her ex-boyfriend's new wife's third son's best friend's cousin. (Okay that was an exaggeration but you see what I mean). Like I said before, the meteorite in the previous season just left me saying "WHAT THE FUCK?!?!" instead of, "Oh , deadly, I can't wait to see what the truth behind it is". Bringing back the point I made about the new direction of Season 4, the writers (IMO) have cleverly avoided any of the tough questions raised in the previous 3 seasons (eg. the Monster, the virus etc) by focusing this season on the ship, and the conflict between the two "camps" on the Island, directing everything to the point I made about Star Wars; "filling in the gaps."
As I said at the start, the most evident point that I've lost (no pun intended) almost all interest in LOST is that I haven't (and don't intend to) made the effort to watch the episodes, despite some of the free time I have to myself to do so. I know ratings were down in the transistion between Seasons 2 & 3, and it wouldn't surprise me if that trend had continued into this new phase. Equally, a new ad on RTE seems to take the piss out of the ridiculousness of all the questions in LOST by making an ad entirely comprised of questions. I mean seriously, when RTE starts taking the piss out of you you know you've got a big problem!
~The Damo
I'll be honest with you, I haven't "watched" Season 4. I owe this primarily to the fact that I am out every Monday night. For me, watching Seasons 2 and 3 of LOST was somewhat of a routine, so when I found I couldn't watch it at the time I was accustomed to, well it put me off a bit. Nevertheless, I made the effort to watch the first episode online and quite frankly, I was disappointed. Perhaps the most telling fact that I was (and still am) disappointed is that I've made no such effort since to watch the show, rather I read about it on Lostpedia, but even then, its more so to just see what's happening rather than attempting to satisfy the unquenchable thirst I had for the show in the previous 3 seasons.
If you read the previous post http://smoke-me-a-kipper-back-for-breakfast.blogspot.com/2007/04/lostwhat-hell-is-going-on.html you'd have found that I was critical of the shows new direction, particularly how it was entering a phase of "unreality" and after watching and reading about Season 4 so far, I regretfully must admit that this statement still holds, and I fear it has gotten worse. Most notably, the episode which was focused on Desmond reaching the ship at sea seemed to involve some out-of-this-world kind of time travel. Now again, I haven't watched it nor did I take the time to read it carefully on Lostpedia, but that definitely seemed to be the case. The meteorite in the previous season pissed me off greatly, and what I enjoyed most about the first 2 seasons was while there was still a mystery to everything that was going on, the show still had a touch of "It's possible". Season 3 brought that point to the line...and crossed it, and I fear Season 4 is going even further. For instance in the episode I watched, Hurley has visions of Charlie: now ok, that's fine, we've been shown Hurley has mental illnesses, but there was something about how the vision was done, it almost made it feel like Charlie was there, as himself.
In hindsight, I think the biggest mistake the writers made was the closing scene in the finale of Season 3. Showing us that (at the very least) Jack and Kate made it off the Island had a touch of Star Wars about it, if you'll indulge me to explain....
Episodes I, II and III are deemed by hardcore fans as "failures" and I attribute this fact to order of the films. The problem with episode III was that people knew what had to happen, they just wanted to see how it happened - i.e. Anakin becomes Vader, Jedi get killed, etc... Episode II built up to that point, and the start Episode IV was the conclusion, all that was left was to fill in the gap inbetween. So when people left the cinema after seeing it, sure they were blown away by the action and fight scenes and so on, but they were left hollow in that (a) the story was over (or at least the story of the Prequels) and (b) they felt that they had learned nothing from last film (in that all the stuff that happened was widely known since the end of episode II). So how does LOST fit in? Well, since we now know that 6 people get off the Island, of which we know Jack, Kate, Hurley, Sahid are 4 of, then it means that the "gap", like the one that was between Episodes II and IV, now has to be filled. AKA, people know these people get off the Island, now they have to see how it happens.
The other key thing, which I think is why I've become so disappointed with the show as a whole is the actual way the story has evolved in Season 4. For Seasons 1 & 2, The Others were a huge part of the show, so much so that anything that revolved around them left you on the edge of your seat. It would seem to me that after the end of Season 3, which effectively has cut The Others out of the show completely (since a lot of the main characters were killed at the beach and the rest of them bogged off to the second island), that Season 4 is almost like a whole new story line involving the crew members of the ship. It feels like Prisonbreak all of a sudden (which I too feel is on its last legs). It almost feels somewhat like a soap opera, where new stories are drawn up for each of the characters just to try and keep things interesting. Furthermore, the mysteries which in my opinion made Seasons 1 & 2 so fabulous, have become rather gimmicky or more like novelties. While it was great to speculate what the Monster was, or how the hatch exploded or whatever, the question to answer ratio in LOST has reached the 20:1 point, where there's just so many different things happening and almost ludricous connections between one character's mother's mother's husband's sister and her ex-boyfriend's new wife's third son's best friend's cousin. (Okay that was an exaggeration but you see what I mean). Like I said before, the meteorite in the previous season just left me saying "WHAT THE FUCK?!?!" instead of, "Oh , deadly, I can't wait to see what the truth behind it is". Bringing back the point I made about the new direction of Season 4, the writers (IMO) have cleverly avoided any of the tough questions raised in the previous 3 seasons (eg. the Monster, the virus etc) by focusing this season on the ship, and the conflict between the two "camps" on the Island, directing everything to the point I made about Star Wars; "filling in the gaps."
As I said at the start, the most evident point that I've lost (no pun intended) almost all interest in LOST is that I haven't (and don't intend to) made the effort to watch the episodes, despite some of the free time I have to myself to do so. I know ratings were down in the transistion between Seasons 2 & 3, and it wouldn't surprise me if that trend had continued into this new phase. Equally, a new ad on RTE seems to take the piss out of the ridiculousness of all the questions in LOST by making an ad entirely comprised of questions. I mean seriously, when RTE starts taking the piss out of you you know you've got a big problem!
~The Damo
Thursday 4 October 2007
The English Class???? Eh.....
Those of you who have followed my blog from Day 1, will know that I'm rarely impressed by RTE drama, ala Grinds My Gears Issue 2:
The English Class.....more like Mechanics Class...aka BOR-ING
When I saw the ads for "The English Class", I'll admit I was excited. Comedy-based drama, I figured it would be pretty decent. Sadly, I was mistaken.....
The English Class is a 6 part drama, focusing on a group of immigrants attending a late night english class in "Dublin City College", actually filmed in Ballyfermot College of Further Education. The class is trying to get to grips with the language after recently arriving to the country. The thing is however, that Myles (their teacher played by William Morgan) is more focussed on the members of the class filling in gaps in his life rather than teaching them the language.
Whilst there has only been one episode broadcast so far, I can already draw some unfortunate conclusions. The series features an ensemble cast from Poland, Russia, Spain and China. Myles Brennan, is a tragic soul, and his part-time teaching job in a night school quite literally is his life. He is completely oblivious to his student's frustration towards his haphazard teaching style, as he is far too self-absorbed in the misery of his own life to even notice. At the beginning of the episode, we see him sending in a request form to work permanently as a teacher.
In the first episode we meet Myles and get our introduction to his class. A new student arrives this evening, but the Belarusian is feeling like a fish out of water. To help her settle in, Myles encourages her to tell her story so the class can get to know her a bit better - the 'Myles Brennan Method' of teaching in action.
It's quite hard to describe the style of this programme unless you've seen it, but for a "comedy-based" drama, I could find no evidence of anything worthy of a laugh, not even a "heh". As far as I was concerned, there was nothing funny at all. I guess some people could laugh at both Myles' tragic existence and the dissatisfaction of the class....but even then you're struggling.
For what it's worth, Morgan's performance is really the driving force, as the cast representing the class have little or nothing to say at any time. Morgan plays the part to perfection though I must say. He really puts out the image of a helpless and lonely man who almost hears only what he wants to hear. Again, the rest of the class are ok, they don't play their parts wrong, but I think the failure of the show must come from the writing. The characters are ok again, and the cast seems to be well suited to their characters....but they just need more and funnier things to say if this programme is intended to survive as a comedy!
There's really nothing more to be said. To be frank, I only really watched it because The Panel was on afterwards. I did have fairly high expectations, and perhaps that's why I'm so disappointed with it now. But to be fair it was the first episode, so maybe its successors will be more impressive. Should things develop, I'll post another blog.
The English Class - Mondays, RTE 2, 9.30pm
The English Class.....more like Mechanics Class...aka BOR-ING
~The Damo
Friday 31 August 2007
What it Does and Doesn't Do
This debate has accelerated in prominence over the last three or four years and can only increase in the years to come. "What it Does and Doesn't Do". I'm talking about all the gadgets and gizmos, the nicks and nacks that we cherish in our modern society. Everything is affected, from TV's to cuddly toys, all the way to the humble home telephone.
Let's take a trip back to the age of the mobile phone. In the beginning, as Saved By the Bell fans will remember, mobile phones were as far from mobile as I am getting up for college at 6am. They were huge, brick-like demons, which ran on single cell battery power and had an antenna as long as a Pepperami. Then, the device was cut down, to just larger than todays modern phones, still keeping in touch with the basic funtionality of the phone, which was to make phone calls. This was fine. It was simply improving the functionality and robustness of a device to make it more convenient for the user. Great. Text messages were introduced. Still great. Why? As text messages were (and still are) a form of communication, and it seemed appropriate that such a communication add-on was related to the mobile phone.
The years past and the basic premise of phone calls and text messaging remained the same. So what changed? The thing that changed, and is still the forerunner in deciding on a mobile phone today is what my phone does that the other ones don't do. Whether its taking a 5 million pixel photo, or being able to hold 100 songs is now the prominent decision in phone shopping. How is it that those things, which aren't related to the premise of making a phone call, decide how one should buy a mobile phone? As I see it presently, Apple are the main criminals on this front, thanks to the introduction of the iPhone.
Let's move on to music. We all had either a Walkman or a Discman back in the day. Hell it was great, we could go for a walk and listen to music at the same time....music that we didn't have to make up or try to remember in our heads!! Then came a revelation! The mp3, or at the time, the iPod. As many of you will know, I don't like Apple, but nevertheless, the iPod was a mastercraft in music playing technology. Now we could hold thousands of songs on this pocket-sized device, as opposed to a single cd's worth on a cd player as large as my hand. Things changed soon after. Apple decided: "Why don't we let people put photos on our iPod, so they can have something to look at?". Why oh why would someone incorporate photos to a music playing device. MY own mp3, a Creative Zen, plays only music, and that's all I ever wanted it to do, I've had it for 2 years now and not once have I considered to replace it.
Apple didn't stop there though. Then they decided to introduce videos to a music playing device. Nice isn't it. Instead of listening to your favourite band, you can now not only look at photos of last nights party, but you can also watch music videos of the band you used to just listen to. Move over music player, now I can watch, listen and reminisce. What's next, a vibrate function when the battery is low, or when its time to change songs?
For me, things like the Camera and Video Camera have managed to hold true to their purpose. They both still do what they're supposed to, and all the recent technological breakthroughs have only improved this functionality, changing tapes to flash cards or discs etc. TV's are a funny one, on one hand they've improved thanks to LCD, HD and all that, but why then do Philips advertise a TV with back lights, that change at the touch of a button? When did TV's become responsible for room lighting effects in such a way?
The gaming industry is also guilty of this 'What it Does and Doesn't Do' disaster, though it's more hidden and secret than the others. For me, this starts right after the release of the PS2. With the PS2, for the first time ever, people could watch DVD's on a gaming system. This wasn't so bad at the time, because DVD players were quite expensive, and in the PS2 there was a convenitent alternative to forking out big money for a DVD player which didn't also play games. Then the Xbox and its successor the Xbox 360 hit the shelves, and things changed. The premise behind the hype over the 360 was what it could do more than the PS2 could, namely a very impressive online gaming function and the ability for wireless controllers. Sony's response with the PS3 was equally as bad as the 360. With the PS3 you now had up to 7 wireless players at once as standard, the ability to browse the net, play DVDs and BRDVDs, not to mention the ability to hook up your camera and upload photos to the PS3 browser and set security settings. Even look at the Wii! Nintendo figured they'd go all out and throw a whole online community into their console, not to mention deciding they'd be totally different than everyone else and make controllers that you can juggle, throw over your head, swing like skipping ropes, all so you can play the damn thing!!
Currently, both the 360 and the PS3 share these features. What was once a gaming system is now a DVD player, a music player, a photo album, a video collection, an internet browser, a text messager and god knows what else I haven't found on it yet.
With all these extra functionalities being introduced, as well as more and more devices being subject to these add-ons...in time, how will we distinguish one thing from the other. At present, both the 360 and the PS3 can do almost everything a PC can do, at much faster speeds. The only thing that we recognise as a PC is the classic tower CPU and large monitor with keyboard and mouse. Consoles have replaced all these with the X button and an analog. Where will we draw the line between mobile phones and music devices? Will my TV eventually be able to make me a cup of tea or a bag of popcorn so I don't even have to leave the room? Will the toilet wipe us clean for us? Or how long will it be until my watch can make video phone calls like in Thunderbirds???
Your thoughts?
~The Damo
Let's take a trip back to the age of the mobile phone. In the beginning, as Saved By the Bell fans will remember, mobile phones were as far from mobile as I am getting up for college at 6am. They were huge, brick-like demons, which ran on single cell battery power and had an antenna as long as a Pepperami. Then, the device was cut down, to just larger than todays modern phones, still keeping in touch with the basic funtionality of the phone, which was to make phone calls. This was fine. It was simply improving the functionality and robustness of a device to make it more convenient for the user. Great. Text messages were introduced. Still great. Why? As text messages were (and still are) a form of communication, and it seemed appropriate that such a communication add-on was related to the mobile phone.
The years past and the basic premise of phone calls and text messaging remained the same. So what changed? The thing that changed, and is still the forerunner in deciding on a mobile phone today is what my phone does that the other ones don't do. Whether its taking a 5 million pixel photo, or being able to hold 100 songs is now the prominent decision in phone shopping. How is it that those things, which aren't related to the premise of making a phone call, decide how one should buy a mobile phone? As I see it presently, Apple are the main criminals on this front, thanks to the introduction of the iPhone.
Let's move on to music. We all had either a Walkman or a Discman back in the day. Hell it was great, we could go for a walk and listen to music at the same time....music that we didn't have to make up or try to remember in our heads!! Then came a revelation! The mp3, or at the time, the iPod. As many of you will know, I don't like Apple, but nevertheless, the iPod was a mastercraft in music playing technology. Now we could hold thousands of songs on this pocket-sized device, as opposed to a single cd's worth on a cd player as large as my hand. Things changed soon after. Apple decided: "Why don't we let people put photos on our iPod, so they can have something to look at?". Why oh why would someone incorporate photos to a music playing device. MY own mp3, a Creative Zen, plays only music, and that's all I ever wanted it to do, I've had it for 2 years now and not once have I considered to replace it.
Apple didn't stop there though. Then they decided to introduce videos to a music playing device. Nice isn't it. Instead of listening to your favourite band, you can now not only look at photos of last nights party, but you can also watch music videos of the band you used to just listen to. Move over music player, now I can watch, listen and reminisce. What's next, a vibrate function when the battery is low, or when its time to change songs?
For me, things like the Camera and Video Camera have managed to hold true to their purpose. They both still do what they're supposed to, and all the recent technological breakthroughs have only improved this functionality, changing tapes to flash cards or discs etc. TV's are a funny one, on one hand they've improved thanks to LCD, HD and all that, but why then do Philips advertise a TV with back lights, that change at the touch of a button? When did TV's become responsible for room lighting effects in such a way?
The gaming industry is also guilty of this 'What it Does and Doesn't Do' disaster, though it's more hidden and secret than the others. For me, this starts right after the release of the PS2. With the PS2, for the first time ever, people could watch DVD's on a gaming system. This wasn't so bad at the time, because DVD players were quite expensive, and in the PS2 there was a convenitent alternative to forking out big money for a DVD player which didn't also play games. Then the Xbox and its successor the Xbox 360 hit the shelves, and things changed. The premise behind the hype over the 360 was what it could do more than the PS2 could, namely a very impressive online gaming function and the ability for wireless controllers. Sony's response with the PS3 was equally as bad as the 360. With the PS3 you now had up to 7 wireless players at once as standard, the ability to browse the net, play DVDs and BRDVDs, not to mention the ability to hook up your camera and upload photos to the PS3 browser and set security settings. Even look at the Wii! Nintendo figured they'd go all out and throw a whole online community into their console, not to mention deciding they'd be totally different than everyone else and make controllers that you can juggle, throw over your head, swing like skipping ropes, all so you can play the damn thing!!
Currently, both the 360 and the PS3 share these features. What was once a gaming system is now a DVD player, a music player, a photo album, a video collection, an internet browser, a text messager and god knows what else I haven't found on it yet.
With all these extra functionalities being introduced, as well as more and more devices being subject to these add-ons...in time, how will we distinguish one thing from the other. At present, both the 360 and the PS3 can do almost everything a PC can do, at much faster speeds. The only thing that we recognise as a PC is the classic tower CPU and large monitor with keyboard and mouse. Consoles have replaced all these with the X button and an analog. Where will we draw the line between mobile phones and music devices? Will my TV eventually be able to make me a cup of tea or a bag of popcorn so I don't even have to leave the room? Will the toilet wipe us clean for us? Or how long will it be until my watch can make video phone calls like in Thunderbirds???
Your thoughts?
~The Damo
Thursday 10 May 2007
The Simpsons....Possible Solution?
The Simpsons...a solution? What are you talking about? Well really, that's asking two questions.
One: You could be saying, what's wrong with the Simpsons that they need a solution?
Or
Two: What...you mean you have a solution!!!!!
One: You could be saying, what's wrong with the Simpsons that they need a solution?
Or
Two: What...you mean you have a solution!!!!!
If you are of question 'One' above, then you will no doubt be unhappy with the direction of this blog. Or, if you are from question 'Two' then you may find this interesting.
The Simpsons hold a hallowed place in everyones' heart. I don't know anyone that doesn't watch them, and I'm certain that anyone and everyone stuck for something to watch would gladly sit down and flick to one of the Sky channels and watch an old classic episode of America's favourite family.
That's the catch isn't it. "Old classic episode". If you are from my clique of sorts, you will know that we highly disapprove of the Simpsons "new" episodes. I can remember when I was smaller, waiting until 6.00 (or 6.30 depending) every Sunday to watch the 'new' episode of the Simpsons. I even remember the landmark 300th episode, the build up, the hype, the excitement. That was when the Simpsons were funny, so many jokes that you would laugh for ages afterwards.
Then we heard that the Simpsons were going to come to an end. Yes we were sad and we'd hoped for more. Little did we know what the Simpsons would become afterwards.
In case you haven't got it by now, I don't don't find the new Simpsons to be funny at all. It has become a kids programme. Rarely will we hear nowadays words such as 'bastard' or 'sex' in the Simpsons. Why did we used to? Because the Simpsons when they began were aimed at an older age group, kindof like what Family Guy is aimed at. All in all I don't like the Simpsons anymore really. They rely now on celebrities to make the show interesting. For instance, word had spread as early as 6 months in advance that Metallica (my fav band) would appear in the Simpsons. Now naturally I assumed they would have a role similar to what U2 had in their episode. No. Not the case. Instead we get a lame scene with Otto driving by, seeing that their tour bus has broken down, and some suck ass joke about Lars' mother dating Moleman or something like that. Absolutely shocking. What happened to funny moments like the ones we had with N'Sync. The hype to that episode was that Bart would be in a boyband, not that N'Sync would feature.
The biggest sign of how bad things have gotten for the Sim
psons is that we are going to have a movie this summer. Quite possibly the most obvious commercial money hoarding ploy EVER. I don't have to watch it to know how much ass it's going to suck. If the new episodes are anything to go by, I can safely say I won't be going to see it....unless I'm dragged along by Donal, Chrissy and co. to check it out, then get pissed and bitch about how bad it was.
So what do I think can be done to make it better? Well the idea occured to me when I was watching one of my favourite programmes of all time - Red Dwarf. Between the end of Season 2 and the beginning of Season 3, the show "Red Dwarf" went under a major overhaul. The sets were redesigned, characters costumes (namely Rimmer) were changed and an old character who was originally not intended to be a permanent character - Kryten - joined the show on a permanent basis. They also replaced male Holly (that's the computer) with the female Holly which we met in the final episode of Season 2. The same happened from Season 5 to 6 and from 7 to 8. From Season 5 to 6, we learn that they had actually LOST the Red Dwarf ship and were now stranded on Starbug (that's a drastically smaller shuttle type craft). In Season 7, they were still on Starbug, except Rimmer left and was replaced by Lister's love icon Kristine Kochanski. Then from Season 7 to 8, the Red Dwarf was rebuilt, along with the original crew (including Rimmer) which allowed for a whole host of new plot lines and character development.
It was this change that allowed Red Dwarf to grow in popularity, and ultimately the addition of both Kryten and Kochanski were the right way to go. Needless to say the jokes got better with each series, and arguably when Rimmer returned in Season 8, that was by far the most hilarious series of the lot.
The same can be said for South Park. As a bloke, I find South Park to be one of the funniest programmes ever, though it seems to be a male thing, as a lot of women don't like South Park for whatever reason. They too changed the scene and characters, namely with the exit of Kenny and the introduction of characters like Butters, Timmy and Jimmy. Like Red Dwarf, Kenny came back in the same manner as Rimmer and the programme only got better.
So how does this solution apply to the Simpsons. Well programmes such as Red Dwarf and South Park have shown that both change and progression in the timeline make the shows better. This is what I believe the Simpsons need to do. Look at it, we have had over 300 episodes of the exact same characters, in the exact same time period (and by time peroid I mean where they are in school. I'm aware that the years change). Would it hurt them to move them on a few years, have Bart get out of 4th grade, Lisa move up, Maggie go to Kindergarden (sp?) etc. That opens up for new characters and places. It's at a point where we can nearly predict what each of the main characters will do or say. Let's face it, the episode when Lisa sees into the future was interesting and entertaining because we were seeing Springfield several years on, yet we had no new characters. The introduction of 'Roy' in the Poochie episode could've gone places in my opinion. Why not introduce new kids to the class? We get one episode with Alison, and then we only see her in subsequent episodes thereafter. Killing Maude off was the right way to go, it added a whole new aspect to the Flanders' lives.
That's the only thing they've been consistent with. Lisa's change to Buddhism didn't really have any kind of effect on the whole thing. Why not give Bart a (permanent) girlfriend or something? Have Maggie talk now and then? Some new corporate tyrant to match Mr Byrnes? Simply anything to give outselves a change. A change which I know would be for the better.
Am I being too harsh on the matter? Is the Simpsons still as funny as it used to be? What's your solution?
Leave it in the comments if you have a chance, I'd greatly appreciate other peoples' insights!
Holy water is made of J2O, Jesus Dioxide!
~The Damo
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