What went wrong

For a little over seven years, The Simpsons was the best show on TV. More than that: the best show that had ever been on TV. Now—not so much. Last season was barely watchable, and this year is worse. The Simpsons is now so far from funny that light leaving Homer today will not hit funny until well after the heat death of the universe.

So what went wrong?

I used to date the decline of The Simpsons from “Homer’s Enemy,” the season 8 episode in which Homer torments the inoffensive Frank Grimes until (and after!) Grimes accidentally electrocutes himself. Ha ha!

“Homer’s Enemy” is as humorless as anything since, and certainly marks the full monty debut of the robotic characterization and random-walk plotting that have made the last 5 or so seasons so bad. But “Homer’s Enemy” is a symptom of decline, not evidence of the cause. Watching the repeats tonight, the message finally got through my think skull. It’s all Poochie’s fault.

Unlike “Homer’s Enemy,” “The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show” (also from season 8) is a great episode. It’s hilarious, and includes one of my favorite lines of all time. But its underside drips with whining arrogance. The message of Poochie is: we are above criticism. You’re lucky we’re still making this show. Take what we give you and like it. This is not subtly delivered: Bart’s “winning” argument in his debate with the Comic Book Guy over the lousiness of Poochie is: ”[We’ve] given you hundreds of hours of entertainment for free. If anything, you owe [us]!” Oh really?

Granted that there are smelly internet nerds who think, wrongly, that Matt Groening personally owes them a funny show every week. These people are idiots. They could not be more wrong. And taking whacks at them could not be more beside the point.

The rest of us don’t think anybody owes us anything. Indeed we are quite grateful for and appreciative of the hundreds of hours of entertainment that we once got for free and are now paying for on DVD. But we don’t therefore owe the creators of The Simpsons—or any other creators of anything—our unconditional approval of their creations. My gratitude for the good years does not require me to shut off my mind and pretend to enjoy a show that has lost its heart and its sense of humor.

Creativity is something like reproduction. When you believe, as the creators of The Simpsons seem to, that all criticism is invalid—more than invalid, that criticism is evidence of bad character and ingratitude in the critic—the result is inbreeding. Created without external input of any kind, each generation is weaker than the last. In the royal families of Europe, that once meant giant chins and haemophilia. In this case, it has caused steadily declining quality, as exemplified by decreasing empathy for the show’s characters, increasing focus on the nonsense gag over real humor, and ever crazier plotting.

Maybe someday The Simpsons will get the injection of new blood that it needs. Maybe Ian Maxtone-Graham, who has run the show through most of the bad years, will quit. Maybe young writers now coming up who were raised on Homer the pleasant buffoon will find their way to the show and put Homer the psychotic non-sequitur hose in the cold, cold ground. I doubt it will happen soon. But I’ll keep watching, because I live in hope.

Filed under: culture/tv/simpsons