Whistler's Father (S29, E03-621)

Recap: Maggie inherits Grampa's ability to whistle exceptionally and becomes a baby diva before she even hits it big.  Meanwhile, the mafia asks the style-'conscious' Marge to 'redecorate' the old post office into a whore house.

Review: Overall, its a dull episode.  A few jokes worked, a few jokes didn't.  Maggie's plotline was borderline ridiculous which didn't help matters.  Episode could've fared better with more mafia gags as they were the best part of the episode.  Better than the other two episodes of this season, of course that's not saying much.

Final Score: 6.2

The Nightmare After Krustmas (S28, E10-606)

Well, I was going to watch but not if I'm going to
hear treason!  Thanks for the warning, that was close!

Plot Summary
It's Christmas, which means Krusty gets his annual week to spend with Sophie, his daughter from that one episode.  Its also a distressing time for Reverend Lovejoy, who hasn't had much luck getting any converts and the pews are looking empty as well.  As evidence, Springfield is hosting a Pagan festival, one exhibit of which runs amok and injures Krusty.  Worried that his brief stay in the hospital will use up his time with his Christian daughter, Krusty accepts Marge's offer to spend Christmas Eve with the Simpson family.

Krusty, ever the opportunist, makes the visit a televised - and heavily sponsored - Christmas special.  Sophie has enough eventually and kicks Krusty and the TV crew - but especially Krusty - out of the house.

Meanwhile, Marge sets up for Maggie an Elf on th- er, Gnome in the Home, a mockup of a relatively recent (and subsequently odd) Christmas tradition where the, uh, Gnome, spies on kids to report back to Santa on their goodness.  Maggie gets freaked out by the Gnome, resulting in an odd nightmare where she hears Wayne Gretzky speak his one single line in the episode.  Waking up, Maggie is further frustrated when Marge reveals not just that the Gnome will stick around all year but that she got a female variant for Christmas as well.  Maggie just decides to decapitate the both of them to regain her sanity.

Lovejoy is out of luck converting anyone until he comes across a dejected Krusty, and uses the chance to convert him to Christianity, made easier by Krusty's desire to appease his Christian daughter.  For awhile all is good - even though Krusty turns his show into a full blown feel-good Christian hour - but Lovejoy is pressured by his deacon to baptize him as soon as possible with Krusty's condition that he'll do it at the lake.

Since it's still winter, the baptism is held at a frozen lake.  Krusty attempts to dunk his head into a hole but the ice underneath him collapses and he's forced under.  Drowning, Krusty has a vision where his father tells him religion doesn't matter when it comes to spending time with his daughter.  Lovejoy pulls off a minor miracle in rescuing Krusty.  In the end, Krusty reverts back to Judaism, but Sophie loves him all the same, while Lovejoy's heroics gets people back in church somehow.

Quick Review
This episode is a mess.  Bringing back a one time character from sixteen seasons ago was an odd and perhaps even desperate move (despite there already being precedence for such a move from NINE seasons ago, for crying out loud), and mixing of storylines with Lovejoy and Krusty was far, far from seamless.  The bit with Maggie was okay for awhile, but it ended early and the whole "lol Maggie is more ruthless than you think! XD" bit got tiring immediately for me.  The guest voices - of which there were several - were mostly wasted aside from Sophie's.  Gretzky had just one line in Maggie's dream, Jackie Mason voiced Rabbi Krustofski but only in a vision where Krusty imagined him as a knockoff Olaf, and I don't even know or care who the third guy was.

It just seemed like the "team" here wanted to make a Christmas episode, and had the budget to make a decent one (some of the animation in the episode looked pretty decent given what it is nowadays), but didn't really know what to do it about so they just slapped together some half-assed ideas and payed a bunch of celebrities money to voice singular lines to call it a holiday special.

Final Score: 5.8

Fland Canyon (S27, E19-593)

Hehe, mule.  (I'm gonna get a laugh out of this episode somehow)

Plot Summary
In an attempt to get Maggie to fall asleep, Homer tells the baby a story.  Trying to recall a boring story, Homer eventually recalls a memory from two years prior.  In it, the Flanders' family is rewarded for their charity work with a trip to the Grand Canyon, but its a two-family trip.  Reverend Lovejoy, whose wife definitely does not want to go with the Flanders', suggests they take the Simpsons, who reluctantly agree.

At the Canyon, the Simpson family and the Flanders family find their own ways to annoy one another.  However, on a trek through the inner part of the canyon, the families lose their guide, and lose their way.  Stranded, Homer and Ned make the decision to set out and find help.  Eventually, the two stumble upon a "campsite" full of rich media elites who have an extravagant setup despite the locale.  The two agree to steal some of their bountiful food and supplies, escaping via a raft.  With that, the two families are eventually rescued and Homer and Ned form a friendship, supposedly.

Having finished his story (and putting both Maggie and Lisa - who came in halfway through - to sleep), Ned reveals through the window that he'd been listening in as well.  Homer decides to be a good pal to Ned and take him on a trip: to the postcard museum, which Ned deeply enjoys.

Quick Review
Well, its not offensively bad, nor is it reference heavy.  Its just boring and overall unfunny.  So, it could be worse, but it could've been good and its not.  (I guess you could say it was 'Bland Canyon' but you probably shouldn't, its too corny).

Final Score: 6.3

How Lisa Got Her Marge Back (S27, E18-592)

She's just jealous the dog's got better beats than her.

Plot Summary
Bart comes to realize that his pranks are no longer effective - everyone knows Bart's behind them, even Ralph.  Discouraged, Bart gives up the prank game for good.  Meanwhile, after a lengthy session of Lisa playing jazz, Marge is left somewhat worn out.  Later in the day, Marge admits to Homer she's never been particularly fond of jazz, and Lisa playing it does no favors for her.  Unfortunately for Marge, Lisa overhears this and confronts Marge over it that night, feeling betrayed that Marge lied to her in regards to Lisa's passion.  The two are left at odds.

In an attempt to reconcile, Marge takes Lisa on a trip to Capital City.  Homer leaves Bart with Maggie for some reason, but Bart comes to realize that Maggie is an excellent ally in pranking, and as such Bart is back in the game.  It doesn't last too long, as after Homer falls victim, he absolutely won't allow a second Bart in the family and tells Bart to leave Maggie be.

Meanwhile, Marge's attempts to gain Lisa's favor fail miserably, and the two are worse off.  The attempts include two tickets to a musical of Bad News Bears, a show Marge loves but Lisa hates.  Afterward, the two meet the 'star' of the show: Andrew Rannells (who is an actual person, not a character the show made up, much to my surprise!).  The three go to dinner together.  As Marge takes her leave for a moment, Lisa rants about Marge to Rannells, who calls Lisa out for her behavior and total disrespect towards Marge and her feelings.  Lisa haphazardly realizes her error and makes up with Marge when the latter returns, and the two enjoy the rest of their trip together.

Quick Review
There were quite a few good jokes and bits in the episode, particularly with Bart and his prank sidestory which I enjoyed.  The main storyline with Marge and Lisa started off okay, and Rannells provided a couple of laughs here and there but the main plot was too reference-heavy for it too be actually funny and most of the Lisa-heavy segments didn't provide any comedy at all.  That prevented the episode from reaching any level of decency, sadly because I did get a few good laughs out of it.

Final Score: 6.8

Puffless (S27, E03-577)

That's some quality bonding, that bleach to the men's retinas I mean.

Plot Summary
Its the 80th birthday of Marge's mother, Jacqueline Bouvier, and the family reluctantly goes, including Maggie who befriends a cartoonish squirrel just before they leave.  At the birthday party, after some shenanigans Marge, Patty and Selma finally learn how their father died: lung cancer, presumably from smoking.  The news unnerves Patty and Selma and the two decide to quit smoking before they suffer a similar fate.

The process of quitting is a difficult one for Patty both because it seems like Selma's doing okay and Patty is having symptoms similar to that of a stroke.  However, at the hospital she figures out that Selma is, still, smoking.  Unable to patch their differences in this difficult time, Patty leaves Selma to try and quit on her own, living with the Simpsons in the interim.  Selma is willing to accept things as they are, but with her visualizing her cigarette as a woo-ing, Jon Lovitz-voiced tempter, Selma realizes her error, and reunites with Patty.  The two attempt to quit together, but upon realizing how awful their apartment smells without cigarette smoke filtering everything, the two quickly return to their habit, with a montage of their smoking to finish the episode.

Meanwhile, Maggie's squirrel friend introduces her to other animal friends, including a possum whom Maggie gets particularly attached to.  One night, however, the possum disappears, but Maggie notices Cletus and his family going home with it with the intention of cooking it.  Maggie rallies up the animals and concocts a plan of rescue, however she is unable to go because she's too slow, that is until a pig (the "Spider-Pig", from the movie) arrives to give Maggie a lift.  Maggie, with the animals, defeat a guard dog and a hillbilly baby to free the possum.  The group disbands before the credits.

Quick Review
This episode, actually, was very funny.  Maggie's animal sideplot was much funnier than I anticipated, thanks in large part to the use of Cletus and his family.  The main plot has lots of funny moments as well, particularly the parts with the bleach, call me silly but I liked that gag a lot.  The episode has a few too many references against it (namely the Spider-Pig and a whole segment that looks like it was from the cutting floor of Lady Bouvier's Lover), and the ending was pretty stupid (oh our place smells lets smoke again so we don't have to smell it LOL), but overall, this is the funniest episode I've watched that wasn't a crossover or cross promotion of something in a couple of seasons.  What a pleasant surprise.

Final Score: 8.3

Simpsorama (S26, E06-558)

Imagine if Homer learned robots needed alcohol to function.  Would he yearn to be a
robot for that perk, or would he lament that in order to be "drunk" as a robot, he'd
have to NOT drink?  Thankfully, Homer's ultimate conundrum will never be.

Plot Summary
In a seemingly unrelated open, the elementary school is setting up a time capsule, and an otherwise unprepared Bart puts a half-eaten sandwich, which he blows his nose into, into it.  The capsule is then buried right above nuclear waste.

That night, an odd electrical storm coincides with something falling nearby, which the Simpson family believes to be space satellite junk.  That night, however, Homer and Marge hear someone downstairs drinking heavily, and its not Homer.  Homer and Bart go into the basement to find out the cause, and the culprit reveals himself: Futurama's Bender!  After lethargically and flimsily proving he's from the future, Homer decides to befriend the robot by taking him out for beer and bowling.  Lisa, of course, is skeptical about Bender's presence and takes the robot to Professor Frink, who realizes that Bender will remember his reasons for coming to the past after a system reboot, and he does: to kill Homer Simpson.

However, Bender can't kill his new friend, which prompts a holographic message to come from out of his shiny metal ass, its Leela, who is angry that Bender hasn't killed Homer yet, as its revealed that the New New York of the year 3014 is being overrun by man-eating rabbits, who have Homer's DNA plastered on them.  Leela decides to go to the past via an internal time machine built in Bender to kill Homer herself, with Fry and Professor Farnsworth tagging along, but Bender stops her.  Lisa and Frink convince the future crew to hold off on killing Homer until it can be determined how the rabbits came to be in the first place.  As Homer takes Bender, Fry and Leela back to his house, the professors and Lisa find a second DNA strand on the killer rabbits, belonging to Marge.

Farnsworth figures out that the rabbits are actually spawned from one of Homer and Marge's children.  Just then, Bender gets a holographic news report that the rabbits have begun to mutate into demonic little creatures with a strong resemblance to Bart.  Bart then recalls the sandwich he put into the time capsule probably mixing with the nuclear waste (and a rabbit's foot Milhouse put in) to create those monstrosities.  Realizing they came back too late in the past to kill anyone, the Planet Express crew team up with the Simpsons to retrieve and put an end to Bart's mutating sandwich.  Before they can, however, they get another report from the future, this time via Amy, that the Barts have found their way to the time machine and have begun destroying it.  Just then, a portal within Bender opens up, sucking in the Planet Express crew save Bender, and the Simpson family save Maggie.

Bender decides to spend time with Maggie by using his knowledge of horse race results to win some quick money.  Meanwhile, in the year 3014, its agreed that while Fry and Homer, of all people, fix the time machine, everyone else will work on ridding New New York of the Bart demons.  Lisa leads the way by corralling the Barts using the things she knows Bart hates into the Madison Cube Garden, which Farnsworth then picks up and throws into space, ending the threat.  As New New York rebuilds, Fry and Homer somehow successfully fix the time machine, and the Simpsons are sucked back into their own time.  Bender is back at the Simpson house, and Maggie is both safe and a little richer.  Lisa wonders how Bender will go back to the future now that everything has concluded, and Bender states he'll do it the ol' fashioned way: by shutting down and laying dormant for 1000 years.  Homer drags the robot to the basement for storage, but not before giving the robot one more beer for the road.

Meanwhile, Madison Cube Garden lands on Omicron Persei 8, and while the demon Barts prove a delicious snack for Emperor Lrrr, it ruins a meeting with the Rigelians, upsetting Lrrr's wife Ndnd.

Quick Review
This marks the second straight season with at least one 8+ rated episode, and the last two such episodes were both shameless crossovers.

I think the reason why this episode (as well as the similarly good Brick Like Me) fare so well is because these episode stick the basics: good jokes.  These types of episodes could easily derail into simple "look at this" reference borefests, but thankfully it didn't happen in the lego episode, and it didn't happen here.

The use of the Futurama cast was, I guess, okay.  Most of the action from the Futurama side came from Bender, with Farnsworth (my personal favorite) and Leela had solid airtime as well.  Fry didn't get that much, unfortunately, and everyone else was limited to a single line or so (which Zoidberg was well aware of).  Its been awhile since I've even watched Futurama, let alone Comedy Central Futurama, so I can't say how "intact" each character was for this episode but for the most part, I don't have any complaints.

As I've said, the jokes are plentiful and for the most part very funny.  The Futurama side of things was the episode's strong point, the Simpsons-only humor had its moments but was otherwise not that impressive, and again features a little too much "know it all" Lisa for my liking.  Still, this is by far the best episode of the season, and has the highest score of any episode since Treehouse of Horror XX.  I liked it that much.

Final Score: 8.3

Labor Pains (S25, E05-535)

Such dirty thoughts, and with his girl right there too.

Plot Summary
Homer goes to a poker game at Carl's apartment one night, telling Marge he's going to be working late instead.  After exploiting Lenny's reflective shades to win the night, Homer quits while he's ahead.  Upon taking the elevator, a pregnant woman steps in as she's going through convulsions.  As luck would have it, the power goes out in the elevator, leaving Homer and the pregnant woman (and an unseen, uncaring third person) trapped.  The woman, who hasn't seen her boyfriend in months, starts going into labor, and Homer recalls his past experiences to the best of his ability to help deliver the baby.  The woman, Gretchen, decides to name the baby after Homer.

After a poker night where the others find out Homer's been exploiting Lenny's reflective shades, Homer realizes that Gretchen lives in the apartment right next to Carl's, and pays her and Homer Jr. a visit.  With nobody else around to help take care of the baby, Homer agrees to help Gretchen look after Homer Jr.  Homer devotes more and more time to the baby, which draws some suspicions from Marge, especially when she catches Homer buying tons of baby supplies at the store knowing full well he doesn't do that for Maggie.  Aware that Homer's been playing poker rather than go to work, Marge visits Carl's apartment but doesn't find Homer there.  However, she does hear Homer in the next apartment over and sees him playing with the baby, assuming the worst.

Homer quickly clears up the confusion, telling Marge about the elevator delivery (and the third man is around to confirm the story), and Marge does allow Homer to spend more time with the baby.  Homer tries to make amends by taking the baby along with his own three kids to the zoo.  However, Maggie and Homer Jr. just do not get along in the dual-stroller, and Homer Jr. slips out and pushes Maggie away.  Maggie ends up stopping herself, but Marge is there to witness this and decides enough is enough and forces Homer to stop seeing Homer Jr.  Homer relents, and prepares himself to never see the baby again.  Upon returning to Gretchen's apartment, it turns out Gretchen's boyfriend has returned, because he had spent the last few months in the military.  Homer gives the baby back to his real father and departs in a sad state.  Upon returning home, Homer is met by Maggie, who is willing to forgive her father for spending more time with that other baby, and Homer gladly embraces Maggie's forgiveness (these are things that actually happen).

In the sidestory, Lisa for some reason takes up an interest in, as she calls it, American football, and goes to a game with Milhouse (whose father is working as a peanut vendor at the stadium).  There, the cheerleading squad brings Lisa down to be an honorary junior cheerleader or something and Lisa fully enjoys the moment.  Afterwards, though, Lisa learns that the cheerleaders get paid very little for what they do and for how badly they're exploited.  She's able to rally the cheerleaders into going on strike until they get a raise and/or better benefits.  With apparently no other attractive women in town left to replace the cheerleaders, the team's owner is left with no other option but to cave in and give the cheerleaders a raise - at the expense of the peanut vendor's salary of course.

Quick Review
I enjoyed this episode more than I probably should have, really.  I mean, the episode's basic premise sounds pretty boring and having a Lisa-heavy sidestory never makes for good times, either.  Still, there were quite a few jokes and gags that worked in the episode for both storylines and there wasn't really anything that dragged the episode down any.  It's about as good an episode as one can expect nowadays though of course its nothing special.

Final Score: 7.5

Hardly Kirk-ing (S24, E13-521)

Kirk is so unnoteworthy, someone with stubby arms and a stiff walking motion can pass as him.

Plot Summary
Marge stops Homer from letting Maggie watch an "educational" DVD that's even less effective as doing nothing.  To help turn Maggie around, Marge takes her, Lisa and Homer to a kid's library.  Homer comes across a "find the hidden items" book he becomes addicted to.  Meanwhile, Bart - who stayed behind - is spending time at Milhouse's place.  In an attempt to make things not so boring, Bart sprays some epoxy into Milhouse's hair, then promises to get it out.  Eventually, the entire top of Milhouse's hair has to be cut off, leaving him with hair that looks very similar to that of his father, Kirk Van Houten.  Bart realizes this, and has Milhouse try on one of Kirk's suits.  With the tie straightened, Milhouse's voice is fixed to sound just like Kirk and Bart determines that he can pass Milhouse off as an adult to acquire adult things.

Bart puts Milhouse on paint cans so he can appear as tall as Kirk.  Quickly, both Bart and even Milhouse take advantage of Milhouse's portrayal of Kirk by doing all sorts of adult things: buying beer, learning where babies come from, voting, that kind of stuff.  Later, Lisa is upset that Marge won't take her to a jazz show because it's in dangerous downtown Springfield.  Bart decides to help his sister out by using Milhouse to provide adult supervision.  Lisa's jazz show has a cover cost, but is aware that the company that made the aforementioned DVD has lost a lawsuit over its product and that people can go to its office to get money.  "Kirk" takes Bart and Lisa to a bus station to get a ride to that office, but it turns out they only got back $20, which isn't enough to get into the jazz show.  Upset, Lisa just wants to get breakfast, when the three see a Condo Sales Presentation which offers free breakfast.  With "Kirk" around, the three decide to get some grub.

Marge learns that their kids aren't at the Van Houtens as she was led to believe, so she gets Homer, now a searching expert thanks to the "find the item" books he's solved, to help find the three.  At the presentation, Bart, Lisa and "Kirk" are the only ones left, but the saleswoman comes on to "Kirk", and takes him to a back room.  Homer and Marge arrive just in time and quickly spot Milhouse, whose hair has begun to grow back.  Later, Milhouse confesses to his father the things he did under his name, but reveals he had a great time pretending to be him and hopes to become his father when he becomes older.  Kirk takes pride in this and lets Milhouse represent himself at the parent-teacher conferences while the Simpsons just take these developments in stride, I guess.

Quick Review
An episode where Bart gets Milhouse to pretend to be his own father is a fun idea for an episode, but its a shame this episode doesn't provide a good enough level of comedy to back it up.

Also, in this episode's initial airing, Maggie Simpson in: The Longest Daycare was broadcasted for the first time, so the episode's running time is a little low.  In future airings, the time is made up with the extra long Game of Thrones couch gag which transitions into this episode's couch gag, which did seem kinda rushed.

Final Score: 6.5

Holidays of Future Passed (S23, E09-495)

I don't think Grampa was this out of place ever again.

Plot Summary
The family just finished Thanksgiving dinner, so now its officially Christmas season.  Marge hurries everyone to take their annual Christmas photo.  Bart and Lisa find it difficult to understand why they need to do this, but Marge insists they'll understand once they have kids, which Lisa wonders if that will even happen.

A montage of Christmas photos then begin, each year for the following 30 years showing that Bart flunks out of college, Lisa 'experiments' while at college before graduating and eventually marrying Milhouse and having a kid with him, Maggie getting into electric guitar before leaving to become a popular rock singer, and Bart eventually kicked out of the house for being a bum.  The last few years see Homer and Marge, finally empty-nesters, visiting all sorts of places, but in the final photo Homer and Marge are back home holding up photos from their other kids: Milhouse and Lisa with their daughter; Maggie performing at a concert, and Bart and his ex-wife Jenda along with their two boys.

In a Christmas season 30 years from now, the elementary school becomes an apartment complex, which Bart lives in.  Jenda teleports the two boys over to Bart to spend time with him during the holiday, but Bart decides to just drop the two off at his parents' place in part because he and his kids don't get along.  Meanwhile, Lisa laments the attitude of her daughter, Zia, who spends all of her time hooking herself into the "Ultranet".  Milhouse has come down with Christmas-related allergies so Lisa decides to go to her parents' place with Zia in hopes that Marge can help the two become closer as Milhouse goes to the now Sharia Michigan to avoid his allergies.  Lastly, Maggie has become pregnant, though nobody is quite sure who the father is, and decides to go to her parents' place for Christmas.

As Bart and Lisa arrive with their respective kids, Maggie isn't able to use a teleporter in her condition, and has to go back through the lawless skies.  Homer, who has stopped drinking, spends time with Bart's boys and the three have fun.  As Zia continues to jack onto the Ultranet, Lisa asks for help from Marge, but Marge's advice to simply relax only angers Lisa further.  One night, Lisa and Bart go up to the old treehouse for a talk.  Both somewhat drunk on whine, the two decide to find a way to connect with their kids.  Lisa apologizes to Marge for her behavior and decides to adopt her passive parenting techniques for Zia.  Bart tries to spend time with his boys, but Homer has taken them elsewhere again.

Maggie is on her way, but is forced to the hospital when her contractions begin, and Marge at least is able to make it to see her younger child go into labor.  Meanwhile, Lisa can no longer be idle and decides to log onto the Ultranet herself to see what Zia is doing.  Finding Zia's personal space within, Lisa finds a small room dedicated to Zia's upstanding role models, including her mother.  Zia has always looked up to her mother and the two reconcile, though Zia has less noble intentions going on nearby.  Homer takes his grandsons to a cryogenics lab in the graveyard, where ol' Grampa has been frozen for most of these last 30 years because of an illness that hadn't been cured at the time, but now has but Homer hasn't told Grampa because this method is cheaper than the retirement home.  After waking Grampa just to be yelled at for a minute, Homer serves a message to the young boys: fathers always seem like a jerk to their sons, but when you get older you realize how much you love him.  Bart finally catches up with them, and promises to be a better father to them, and they reconcile.  Then Homer unfreezes his father again and they reconcile.

Maggie finally arrives home with her new baby girl, and they along with Homer, Marge, Grampa, Lisa, Zia, Bart and his boys take their annual Christmas photo.

Quick Review
I had missed watching this episode in its initial airing but I was aware that it was met with wonderful reviews, calling it the best the show has been in a long time.  I had worried that these reviews were glowing over the episode's emotional factors and not its humorous ones, and after watching I can say that those fears I had were realized.  Its not that funny of an episode.  Its decent, I'll give it that, but once again the "storytelling or comedy" method shows up to prevent the episode from really hitting a comedic stride.  Its the best episode of the season thus far, but that's not saying much at all.

Final Score: 7.0

500 Keys (S22, E21-485)

How did they even get some of those keys, like the school key?

Plot Summary
Homer takes the kids out to buy a returned wedding cake for cheap, but after returning home he accidentally leaves Maggie in the car, locked, with the keys.  Marge empties out a drawer full of keys hoping to find the car's spare, but Maggie is somehow able to exit the car on her own and return inside the house.  With panic subsided, the family takes a look at all the keys they have, and decide to do whatever with them.  Bart takes a handful of keys in hopes of committing pranks, but every attempt of his ends up doing the community good, which he hates.  Homer has the keys to the Duff Brewery somehow, so he and Barney sneak in, going to the back of the brewery where the blimp is.  Barney tricks Homer into thinking the blimp wants him inside, and Homer quickly steals the blimp and flies off into the sky.

Lisa finds a key to the school, and runs off to return it.  She's stopped by Nelson, who convinces her to live a little, and figure out what the key opens before returning it.  Lisa looks around the building, and sees three odd door side by side: Banned Books, Band Books, and Banned Band Books.  Lisa's key ends up opening the latter door, and she goes inside to find a strange sight: a large classroom that seems impressive at first, but none of the materials within are actually legitimate.  Lisa talks to Principal Skinner about the room, but when the two, along with a bunch of kids, go to the door, the path to the room is replaced by a bookcase, leaving Lisa stunned.

With Superintendent Chalmers apparently part of the cover up, Skinner is able to grab Lisa's key, and Lisa is left unable to solve the mystery.  Luckily, the school paper took a photo of Lisa holding the key, so she uses it to have a duplicate key made to reopen that door.  She busts down the bookcase and re-enters the room, where a mysterious stranger writes on the chalkboard about "the children of bus 23".  Bart, whose tired of his key adventure, teams up with Lisa at this point and has her talk to someone who has been at the school for a long time: the often held back Nelson.  Nelson does recall a bus 23, where on a wintry morning Chalmers forces Skinner to send off that bus through an ice bridge for the sake of time even though it'd likely be too heavy to cross.  Homer arrives in the blimp on coincidence, and the two decide to have Homer take them there.

Homer, of course, can't really operate blimps, so as they reach the river where bus 23 supposedly met its fate, Lisa ends up falling out of the blimp, and into the water where she finds the bus with the kids still inside.  Homer jumps in after her, but he knocks the bus on its side, allowing the bodies to float up through the window.  Quickly, the two realize that these aren't dead kids, but actually mannequins.  However, the two are quickly swarmed by the mannequins and are forced underwater.  Thankfully, another key side story where Marge puts a wind-up key in a moving flatulence toy comes to fruition, as the "Pooter Toot Express" hits an old tree which falls and creates a bridge Homer and Lisa can grab onto.

With the demise of the toy, Marge and Maggie meet up with the rest of the family.  Across the river, Lisa spies the mysterious man she had seen earlier, which turns out to be Otto, who drove the bus to its grave.  Otto is relieved upon learning the kids were only mannequins, and the family decides to bring the mystery to an end.  Skinner and Chalmers attempt to escape, but Bart is able to steal Skinner's car keys, forcing the two to reveal the truth.  Years ago, the school was given a government grant to improve the school.  Skinner cashed the check but the money he put in his pocket was lost when his mother washed his jeans.  Fearing the feds would go after them, the two along with Willie set up a fake classroom with mannequins to fool the feds into thinking they did spend the money wisely.  However, they were only renting the mannequins, so they had to return them quickly, which is why Chalmers risked using the ice bridge route.  Of course, the two never counted on the future Simpsons locking their baby in the car which would lead to them uncovering the keys to the mystery.  Later, Otto, still relieved he didn't kill any kids, now is under the delusion the current group of kids he's carrying are also mannequins as the bus falls into the river.

Quick Review
With a heavy emphasis on storytelling, the episode doesn't have much of a chance to build on comedy, though early on it looked like it would with Bart's and Homer's stories before the focus is put on Lisa's conspiracy story which, mostly, was unfunny.  This ends up as one of the weakest entries to the season.

As an aside, I want to take a moment to mention the character of Superintendent Chalmers.  Originally, the guy was played as a straight man to Skinner's tomfoolery, whom Chalmers tolerated none of.  His main role back in the day would be to critique the scared Principal and his school, which would usually go wrong once Bart pulls off a prank, leaving Skinner in Chalmers' dog house.  It was a gag that worked well, but since then Chalmers' character has changed tremendously.  Nowadays, he's a shell of his former self.  Him yelling out "Skinner!" isn't used as an angry yell to shake up an already shaken Principal, but rather yet another catchphrase that's used only for that purpose.  Further, Chalmers is now often used as Skinner's partner-in-crime in many instances.  It first become really noticeable a few seasons ago, where "Chalmskin" productions hurt the episode more than helped, and that combination didn't help this episode any either.  Chalmers is at his best when he's actually angry at Skinner for one reason or another, not to team up with Skinner to cover up something or working together to earn the school money.

Final Score: 6.2

The Fight Before Christmas (S22, E08-472)

Homer is joyous at what he sees.  The others... are more stunned, really.

Plot Summary
Its the night before Christmas, and all through the house, nobody had any Christmas spirit, except Homer's spouse.  Homer is just watching TV, Lisa has shifted her agenda to the plight of cut down trees, and Bart has a weapon ready for Santa Claus because he's failed to give Bart a dirt bike the last three years.  Marge has enough and just goes to bed.  Bart tries to wait for Santa in the living room, but dozes off.

Bart's Dream
When he comes to, the polar express arrives.  Under Otto's care, the train is fueled by lots and lots of hemp.  Bart eventually reaches the north pole where he's met by an elf supervisor (Moe), who tells Bart he's gotta work his way up the ranks to meet Santa, and sends Bart to the wrapping center.  While Santa's workshops seem to be in the dumps, Bart comes up with several cost-cutting measures, and in no time he is promoted to Vice President.  Another elf executive (Lisa) gets wise to Bart's plan, and tries to stop him, but Bart melts the snowmen guards, and meets Santa (Krusty).  With his office run down as well, Santa explains to Bart that, since his business model only gives him cookies as a financial reward.  Bart gives up on his quest for vengeance, and makes up with Santa.  After Bart leaves, Santa reveals the ruse; he's actually very successful and rich, not that Bart will ever know.
Individual Score: +0.3

Lisa's Dream
Still angry about all the poor trees being cut down, Lisa goes to sleep, dreaming about an alternate version of her family in 1944, as the Allies have invaded France.  Marge is part of the invasion force, with Homer working as a riveter because he's too fat to be an adequate soldier.  He brings home a Christmas tree, but Lisa refuses to accept it, recalling a year ago when she and Marge tried to buy a Christmas tree only for Marge to be called into active duty immediately.  Sure enough, this time around a message comes in which states that Marge has gone MIA.  Lisa runs off in tears.  She winds up at the tree shop where she last saw Marge last year, but the shopkeep reveals a tree Marge paid for last year but never picked up.  The shopkeep had maintained the tree over the past year, and trims it to look kinda like Marge.  Lisa takes it as a sign Marge is still alive, and joyfully brings it home.  In France, Marge is on her own, but is able to infiltrate a Nazi-controlled theatre currently housing Hitler, and she's able to kill every Nazi inside to win the war.  Lisa wakes up, wondering what the hell just happened.
Individual Score: +0.4

Marge's Dream
Marge is still upset over the lack of Christmas spirit, and writes a letter to someone pleading with them to help fix her Christmas.  The letter flies out the window, but reaches its intended recipient: Martha Stewart!  Martha immediately goes to Marge's house to help and quickly spruces everything up.  At the same time, she also "fixes" Bart and Milhouse by wrapping them up into soldiers and forcing them to march.  She also frowns upon Lisa's attempt at crafts and sends her out to half-assedly make a snow angel.  Worse yet, Martha creates a wonderful Christmas scene - over Homer's sleeping body, giving him 'medicine' to ensure he stays asleep.  By the end, Marge simply wants Martha to put everything back to normal, and Martha begrudgingly does.  Marge wakes up at this point, and finds everyone walking into the bedroom wishing Marge a Merry Christmas.  They plan on making breakfast in the bedroom, but after a mess Homer decides to just take everyone out, and Marge is more than happy that everyone else is happy.
Individual Score: +0.4

Maggie's Dream
Back to the night of Christmas Eve, Maggie goes to sleep holding her Muppe- er, "Fluppets" book.  In her dream, everything's been reimagined as puppets.  Puppet Moe comes in to house sit for the puppet Simpsons, who are going to Hawaii for the week.  Puppet Moe calls a woman over, claiming the Simpson house to be his bachelor pad, and nobody around seems to mind.  However, Puppet Homer is paid a visit by Puppet Mr. Burns, which worries Homer as he had told Burns he broke his neck and had to stay home for a week.  Puppet Homer quickly tries to cover his ass, and Puppet Burns seems to buy it.  However, the cover is blown when real life Katey Perry walks in, as she is the woman Puppet Moe was talking to on the phone.  Puppet Homer can't keep a secret anymore, and tells Puppet Burns the truth.  Puppet Burns tries to release the hounds, but the budget was spent on Perry, who decides to hug and kiss Puppet Burns to cool him off.  Puppet Burns forgives Homer, and all the puppets sing the original 39 Days of Christmas song.  Puppet Grampa and Puppet Jasper, playing the roles of Statler and Waldorf, pretty much call this act the thing that kills Christmas.
Individual Score: +0.5

Quick Review
Well, this is another four-story anthology, and like the last time a setup such as this was tried, opportunities for comedy were limited was priority was given toward telling each of the four rushed tales.  The final one with the puppets ends up slightly ahead of the others, but that's mostly from the use of Grampa and Jasper as Statler and Waldorf, otherwise the segment - as well as the appearance from Katey Perry - wasn't much.  Martha Stewart's appearance was alright as well, I didn't have much of problem with that.  Still, none of it was really good, and all the segments combine to make a subpar episode.

Final Score: 6.7

Lisa Simpson, This Isn't Your Life (S22, E05-469)

There aren't large quantities of kids that do that anymore... are there?

Plot Summary
A gas station is hosting a promotion where its giving away a series of toys that Maggie really likes, and she already has every one except for the rarest one.  Homer decides to get Maggie that last toy, but the nearest gas station involved in the promotion is way out of town.  Homer and the family go there, but Homer is unable to win the toy despite spending way too much money on gas to win several more chances.  Homer eventually gives up and drives back in defeat.  He takes an odd route back, but Marge recognizes the area as the one she grew up in as a child.  She visits her old house, now occupied by a shut in or something, and retrieves a box full of her old stuff.  Lisa notices lots of tests, quizzes and assignments done by Marge that have high marks, leaving Lisa to wonder how Marge could've ended up like she did if she had such high grades.

Lisa looks into the matter further and notices Marge's grade plummeted in 12th grade, right when she met Homer.  Lisa talks to Homer about this and Homer says that even if he hadn't met Marge, some other distraction - either a boy or some kind of hobby - would've come along to take Marge off the academic path, and that it'll happen to Lisa as well.  Refusing to accept the possibility of getting bad grades, Lisa rids herself of her distractions, including her saxophone.  Homer tells Marge about the conversation, which really gets to Marge.  The next morning, Marge confronts Lisa over her attitude, and Lisa does admit that she doesn't want to end up like Marge, leaving her mother scorned.

Meanwhile, Bart runs afoul of Nelson, but thanks to some luck Nelson mostly incapacitates himself, but the kids in school see it as though Bart beat Nelson up, taking over as the school's bully.  The next few encounters with Nelson end up in similar fashion, but Nelson gets so angered with these events he promises to annihilate Bart at some point.  Bart talks to Marge about it, who advises him to compliment Nelson to end his rage.  Bart tries it out, and he's able to make it work after complimenting Nelson's punching skill, and the two walk away as friends again.

Lisa may be able to avoid distractions at home, but she definitely can't do anything about the distractions at school.  On the bus ride home, she sees a bus coming from a gifted private school, and Lisa wants her parents to get her into that.  It's too expensive of course, but when Homer, Marge and Lisa talk to the school's head, Marge demands a private word with the guy.  A short time later, the head agrees to let Lisa attend on a full scholarship.  Lisa is thrilled to attend the school of her dreams, but learns soon afterward that there is no scholarship; Marge agreed to wash every school uniform so that Lisa can attend.  Marge tells Lisa that she doesn't want Lisa to end up like her.  Lisa, feeling bad for what's happened, comes up with a flimsy excuse to not go to her new school anymore, and admits that she'd be honored to end up like Marge.  The two hug, but Lisa worries about herself still.  Just then, Bart and Nelson walk in after some kind of binge, and Homer reveals he got Maggie her toy, if only because he broke into the gas station and stole it.

Quick Review
Season 22 has been very heavy with Lisa-related plotlines so far.  The first four non-Halloween episodes all have storylines that have a focus on Lisa, but they've mostly been okay to this point.  This episode is also okay, though that's mostly because of Homer's involvement in the episode, jokes around him were pretty good, and Bart's sidestory had some good humor as well.  Lisa's main story with Marge is, perhaps predictably, not that funny outside of Homer's bits, but its nice to see Lisa come in conflict with Marge instead of Homer for a change of pace.

Final Score: 7.1

Four Great Women and a Manicure (S20, E20-440)

"Curse the producers for giving me Jodie Foster's voice", she was probably thinking.

Plot Summary
Marge takes Lisa to get her first manicure.  Lisa, in her stubborn manner, tries to tell Marge that its more important that a woman be smart and powerful rather than look pretty, but Marge counters that a woman can be all three, telling her about Queen Elizabeth I as an example.

Queen Elizabeth I
The Queen (Selma) is taking in suitors to be her husband.  She turns down multiple suitors, including the King of Spain (Julio).  However, she takes a liking to Walter Raleigh (Homer), who offers the Queen tobacco as a gift.  However, Walter takes a liking to the Queen's Lady in Waiting (Marge), and Elizabeth quickly finds out, sending the two to be executed.  However, before that order can be carried out, she learns that Spain has gone to war against England.  She sends a ship to fight against it.  Unwittingly, Walter sets the ship on fire; as its crew goes overboard the blazing ship sets aflame the entire Spanish armada, winning the war for England.  Elizabeth allows Walter to marry the Lady in Waiting, admitted that she doesn't need a man as long as she has England.
Individual Score: -0.1

The Version of Snow White That Doesn't Belong to Disney
Lisa retorts about the dangers of obsessing over beauty, deciding to retell the story about Snow White.  To avoid legal troubles, the tale also features seven untrademarked dwarves: Crabby (Moe), Drunky (Barney), Hungry (Homer), Greedy (Burns), Lenny, Kearney, and Doc(tor Hibbert) who sing an original yet familiar sounding song as they operate a gem mine.  Nearby, a wicked queen (Lindsey Naegle, I guess) asks her HDTV in the wall who the prettiest woman is.  Angrily, she learns that person to be Snow White (Lisa).  She has someone (Willie) attempt to assassinate Snow White, but he can't go through with it and prompts Snow White to flee.  She hides at the seven Dwarves' house, and they let her stay.  One day, with the dwarves at work, the wicked queen uses her shapeshifting abilities to turn into an old hag, who ambushes Snow White and forces her to eat a poisoned apple.  Though the woodland animals take care of the queen, Snow White falls into a coma.

Then Lisa explains that Snow White eventually was cured by a woman doctor and lived a pedestrian life from then on.
Individual Score: +0.2

Lady MacBeth in the Real World Which is Actually Just an Alternate Ficticious Reality
Bothered by Homer, Marge decides to tell Lisa about a retelling of Lady MacBeth, but with Simpsons characters being themselves.  In this lengthy tale that feels like a rejected Treehouse of Horror segment, Marge is upset that the only role Homer could get in an upcoming Lady MacBeth play is that of a tree.  She is further upset that the lead role is filled by Sideshow Mel, and orders Homer to kill him so Homer can take his role.  Homer reluctantly does so and sure enough Homer now is given the lead role in the play.  The next day, though, reviews are in that proclaim Dr. Hibbert as the star of the show.  Angered, Marge has Homer kill him as well.  The next day, reviews of the previous nights play has Homer in dead last compared to five other actors, so Marge has Homer kill all of them as well.  Marge is only upset at this point because Homer killed those actors in costume, which she has to clean.  However, the ghosts of those killed haunt Marge, fully aware that her intent to kill is the true malice of the situation.  Marge is unable to handle it and dies from a heart attack.  Homer mourns Marge's death, but is relieved he can stop acting until Marge's ghost comes and forces Homer to keep going.  Its the final showing of the play, there are no other actors, and nobody is there to watch it, but Homer finally provides a stunning performance of his part.  Ghost Marge is proud of Homer, and gives him several more plays for him to try out, but Homer has enough and shoots himself so that his ghost self doesn't have to worry about acting anymore.
Individual Score: +0.2

Maggie Roark
As the show now breaks things up into four segments, there's still enough time for one more story, so Marge tells another one based around Maggie (and Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead for some reason).  In it, Maggie is in a preschool run by a guy who actively diminishes creative thinking.  Leaving the babies blocks to mess around with, the teacher is continuously forced to destroy Maggie's creations in an attempt to dull her creative sense.  It comes to a head when Maggie showcases another blocked beauty during a showcase to parents.  As a result, the teacher takes Maggie to trial, with the other babies as the jury.  After the teacher makes his case, Maggie defends herself.  Suddenly being guest voiced by Jodie Foster, Maggie tells everyone that like others in the past, she refuses to let her creative talent go to waste for anyone.  Marge then explains that Maggie grows up to be a successful architect and builds a day care which encourages creativity, but before Marge can finish the story she stops Maggie from messing up a wall with nail polish, ironically ignoring that Maggie had repainted a famous work of art in the process.
Individual Score: -0.1

Quick Review
This was a pretty bad episode.  Telling four stories really puts a cramp in each of them, not really letting any of them hit a stride.  Its made worse with the Lady MacBeth story line being nearly twice as long as the others ones yet that one still wasn't funny.  Really, none of these stories - some of which were peppered with Lisa's annoying self-service - were any good, and they all combine to make the worst episode of the season.

Final Score: 4.4

Eeny Teeny Maya Moe (S20, E16-436)

She doesn't want people to care about her height, yet she wears those heels.

Plot Summary
Marge forces Homer to spend more time with Maggie.  After a brief stroll, Homer takes Maggie to Moe's.  Moe is cleaning the bar for some odd reason, revealing that underneath the deep layers of dust there is a window showing a playground for babies.  Homer decides to leave Maggie there while he keeps an eye on her, or so is the theory, anyway.  Moe then gives an explanation for why he's cleaning the bar in the first place.  About a week ago, Moe was at a public library using its internet to chat to a local woman on the internet, Maya, who actually finds him charming.  The two eventually shared photos, and while Maya looked pretty hot, he was amazed to learn the woman found him cute as well, and the two agreed to meet at the bar tonight.  Soon enough, Moe meets Maya, but it turns out that Maya is several feet shorter than what he was expecting.

Maya tells Moe that in the picture she sent him, she was actually standing near a lego building but regardless the two hit it off and have lots of fun together, even if Moe stumbles to refrain from offensiveness.  Soon, though, Maya wants to meet some of Moe's friends.  Moe realizes that most of his bar mates would take advantage of Maya's height, except for maybe Homer, so he has Homer and Marge go with him and Maya on a double date, which is mostly successful.  Soon, Moe finally gathers the courage to ask Maya to marry him, at which point his tensions ease so much he casually lets loose all of the short jokes he had built up to that point, offending Maya who sternly asks him to leave.

While this is all happening, Maggie is having a tough time at the playground Homer is leaving her at as she is being bullied by other, stronger babies, though Homer usually picks her back up before anything serious happens.  Maggie starts freaking out at home as well, leaving Marge to suspect Homer is neglecting his duties.  She sets up a spy camera in Maggie's bow and gets a day's worth of footage, but she doesn't have time to watch the footage.  Eventually, she makes time and sees that Homer goes to the bar while Maggie is advanced upon by the bully babies.  However, the footage then shows Homer coming in to save Maggie, only to get beaten up by a bully baby instead, forcing Maggie to save Homer.  Homer then openly blesses Maggie as well as Marge for birthing her.  Marge praises an unwitting Homer for his heart, and the two make out, I guess.

Moe gets advice to undergo a crazy scheme to win back Maya's heart, going to Dr. Nick to make himself short.  Maya intervenes, telling Moe that if the first then he's reminded of when seeing her is her height, not her beauty, then the relationship just won't work out, and she breaks up with him.  Later, a rather joyous Homer gives the saddened Moe advice that, hey, he's back in his game, and if he had modest success with one woman, then chances are decent he'll have similar success with another woman.  Moe takes the advice to heart and moves on.

Quick Review
This was another decent episode.  In fact, this is the first episode in awhile where nothing within it really bothered me (other than the usual lack of joke quantity I've mentioned in previous reviews).  The Maggie subplot was pretty nice, and the main plot was your typical Moe episode, but it had several pretty good moments to make this one of the better episodes of the season.

Final Score: 7.4

Gone Maggie Gone (S20, E13-433)

Yeah, uh huh, sure, whatever.

Plot Summary
Springfield is a recipient of the ever-rare solar eclipse, and the Simpson family builds makeshift boxes to see the event safely.  Homer's is ruined, though, so Marge gives him hers.  The eclipse occurs, and the family is greatly enjoying this occasion.  Marge can't deal with being left out, and decides to see the eclipse dead on, just as sunlight begins to peek back out.  Marge's eyes suffer tremendous damage as a result, and so Marge is blinded, being forced to wear bandages over her eye for two weeks and must avoid all stress at any cost.

To make matters difficult, rats decide to infest the Simpson kitchen right then.  Homer goes to buy some poison, bringing Maggie and the dog along for no apparent reason.  Homer later laments his decision to bring the two as both cause chaos for him within the car on the way back.  Homer drives off a bridge and lands on a spot near a river he needs to cross.  There's a boat nearby, however it can't support him, Maggie, the dog and the rat poison all at once.  Homer comes up with a solution to his puzzle, and decides to row Maggie first to the other side, leaving her at a nearby convent so he can continue his puzzle solving.  However, the convent quickly takes Maggie in while Homer is rowing back.  Homer tries to get the nuns there to give her back, but they refuse.

Back home, Homer tells the kids what happened, and agree not to stress out Marge with this information.  Lisa decides that someone has to disguise themselves as a nun and infiltrate the convent to find Maggie.  Lisa agrees to be that person.  She's admitted in as a nun, but she can't seem to find Maggie anywhere.  A rather withered nun tells Lisa that the mystery of Maggie's location is linked to the mystery of a jewel, and Lisa decides the undergo the challenge of determining where this mystical jewel is located so that she can find Maggie.

As Homer and Bart try to keep the blinded Marge unaware of both Maggie's and Lisa's unavailability, Lisa goes across town as she continues to figure out the puzzles she's come across, the latest one asking her to find the biggest 'ring' in Springfield.  Lisa is interrupted by the comic book guy and Principal Skinner, both of whom have also taken an interest in the jewel.  The comic book guy expands on the history of the jewel, which includes nuns going overseas to find it, and even a staged revolutionary war by Freemasons to find the jewel, which will bring peace to Springfield on the first full moon after a solar eclipse.  As that happens to be the current night, Lisa realizes that the biggest ring in Springfield is the giant SpRINGfield sign nearby.  Mr. Burns stops them there, informing them that as a member of the Freemasons he, too, is interested in the jewel.  Lisa finds another puzzle, an anagram, and from it deducts that the jewel is actually her.

The group returns to the convent where a cocky Lisa reveals herself to everyone.  However, it turns out the crowd is praising someone else: Maggie!  Lisa solved the anagram incorrectly, and the correct solution reveals the jewel is actually Maggie.  A beam of light filters into the church and hits Maggie, sending rays of peace across Springfield.  It seems like a new age is about to begin.  However, a still-blind Marge barges in demanding her baby.  Though she's willing to let Maggie go if the first thing she sees is world peace, Maggie unwraps Marge's bandages, and Marge finally sees her baby, and decides to take her away anyway.  Marge feels a bit selfish afterwards, but Homer tells her he left another 'chosen one' at the convent: the ever devilish Bart.

Quick Review
In my review of the previous episode, I commented that the biggest problem with the show nowadays is that comedy is tossed aside at times in order to advance the plot or tell a story, elements that were once workable together in the past but I guess not so much now.  This fact was once again apparent in this episode, where the obvious parody of The Da Vinci Code took full precedence over the episode providing a steady stream of jokes and humor.  It didn't help that I never cared for that book turned movie so the references were lost on me, but even so the parody wasn't all that funny.

Final Score: 6.6

Midnight Towboy (S19, E03-403)

Tow trucking seemed like a thing Homer could've stuck with, shame it didn't stay.

Plot Summary
Maggie is being particularly clingy and fussy one night, and an accident leaves Marge with no milk.  As Homer goes out to find some, Marge is convinced by Bart and Lisa to try out a service intended to help babies become more independent of their mothers.  Meanwhile, on what seems to be during an unfortunate milk shortage, Homer eventually goes all the way to "Guidopolis" which is as stereotypical as the name implies.  Homer finally gets some milk, but his car is about to be towed away after parking it improperly.  Homer is able to convince the tow truck driver, Louie, to come along at least to recover his car, when Homer discovers the easy, wonderful life of the tow truck driver.  Louie offers Homer to take over the Springfield duties, including a tow truck of his own, but has one simple declaration: don't even think about doing work in Guidopolis.

Marge does get help from the baby service, C.R.I.E., which immediately helps Maggie become independent, which Marge has some difficulty adjusting to, using a sack of potatoes to hold instead of her newly independent baby.  Meanwhile, Homer quickly makes a killing in the towing business, making life miserable for everyone in town.  Eventually, the townspeople have enough of Homer's civic duty and hatch a plan to rid themselves of him.  Agnes Skinner is aware of how territorial tow truckers are, and leads a plan where an illegally parked car is left just within Guidopolis, but with the town's sign covered up to imply its still part of Springfield.  Homer falls for the ruse, and as he goes to tow the car, Louie appears and, angered Homer has invaded his turf, knocks him out.

Louie locks Homer away in his basement, where several other tow truckers are imprisoned for daring to tow in Guidopolis.  With Homer gone, chaos returns to Springfield parking lots and streets, just the way they like it.  Louie forces Homer to call home to inform, well, Lisa, he's supposedly alright, but four days have passed now, and Marge can't help but worried.  Maggie sees the fearful Marge, and decides to put her new independence to full use, escaping the house and riding on Santa's Little Helper in a full-blown rescue operation.  Following leads and the dog's nose, she's able to locate Homer in Guidopolis, and frees him from his prison.  Homer, Maggie and the dog all return home to a relieved Marge, where Maggie agrees to return to her old clingy self to allow Marge to be comfortable again.

Quick Review
This episode was really going strong for most of it.  Homer's towing storyline was really going well up through the second act, and his interactions with the other imprisoned truckers were good for a few laughs anyway.

Unfortunately, the side plot regarding Maggie, which wasn't providing much humor to begin with, takes full focus in the episode's final minutes where Maggie alone stages her rescue operation.  People including myself have been critical of using Maggie in this fashion, particularly in the Season 13 finale where she gained the mocking moniker "sniper baby".  I understand that, in this context, Maggie's newfound abilities are a direct result of Marge allowing the baby to be more independent, but come on.  Like with the Season 13 finale, this seems like a cop out way to conclude an otherwise desperate situation and it really hampered what was going to be a shining moment of these later seasons.  Its a shame, really.

Final Score: 7.6

The Simpsons Movie

Notice
Movies are a different game than television episodes.  Even though its now been about six years since the movie's release, I still have to warn those who still haven't seen it that there will be SPOILERS within this article.  Do not click on it unless you want to be spoiled, don't care, or like most people who like the show, have already seen it by now.

I'm using the reviewer program I wrote up last year to review this movie; but it was intended to review 20 minute episodes, not full feature movies.  However, the movie is basically four episodes fused into one, so I will be breaking this down into four segments (each with their own score) before getting into my final review score at the end.

Crook and Ladder (S18, E19-397)

Don't mess around with these guys, they will tear you apart.

Plot Summary
Marge takes advice from a Larry Flint-owned baby magazine to get Maggie to stop sucking on a pacifier.  This backfires, as Maggie goes on a destructive tear throughout the house.  With Maggie's brand of pacifier out of stock, the family starts to go nuts over her, until the dog saves the day and gives her a chew toy to suck on.  Her loud sucking on the toy, though, leaves Homer awake late at night.  He goes to watch TV when he sees a commercial for Nappien, a sleeping aid.  Homer quickly acquires some, and gets some sleep, but then finds out the the Nappien makes Homer sleep walk and do all sorts of crap while he's unconscious.  While Homer tries to remedy this by locking his door, Bart realizes the implications of having a suggestive zombie father, and lets him free to mess with during the night.  As Bart and Milhouse have zombie Homer drive them around, Homer wakes up and, in a panic, drives into a fire station, where after a series of accidents, the entire corp of firefighters are left injured and unable to do their job.

A call goes out for volunteers to fire fight.  Homer decides to join to make up for what he did.  Alongside him are Principal Skinner, Apu, and Moe, who is made the new fire chief.  After a short time of waiting, the four are tasked with saving Luigi's restaurant.  They do so, and as a reward, Luigi lets them have some of his food for free.  The four realize that their heroics earn them a little compensation for their volunteer work, and this holds true for the next few instances they receive a call for help.  However, when the four go and put out a large fire at Burns' mansion, Mr. Burns thanks them without any physical reward.  Upset, Moe decides to use a flimsy line of reasoning to justify taking some of Burns' loot.  The group does so again at Costington's, but Skinner begins to regret what's going on and, after being unable to convince the others to stop, decides to simply look away.  Things complicate further and Marge and the kids rush to see Homer put out a fire, only to arrive just in time to see him, Apu and Moe enjoy the rush of theft.

Marge confronts Homer about the thievery, using the kids as a guilt trip to get Homer to finally relent.  During the next fire, Homer talks to Moe about what's been going on, but in his greed, Moe traps himself.  Homer rescues him as well as a fallen Apu and is heralded as a hero.  Homer tells his kids this story later on, concluding that the four took the stuff they stole and donated it to the homeless.

Quick Review
This was a fun episode for the most part, though the first half of the episode is kind of everywhere before it finally settles on the firefighter story for the second half.  It was also sort of odd how the episode tries to set up Skinner as the moral high ground for a minute before that whole idea dissolves and its up to Marge and the kids to provide that role.  In fact, after Skinner decides to simply look the other way, he has very little to do with the rest of the episode.  That was odd.  Still, despite that, this turns out be a fairly decent episode.

Final Score: 7.5

Milhouse of Sand and Fog (S17, E03-359)

He did come back, most probably indeed.

Plot Summary
Maggie gets the chicken pox.  Homer, who hasn't had gotten chicken pox yet, gets the idea to hold a pox party (for profit, of course) to get other kids across town infected.  Milhouse is one such kid, who is dropped off by his dad, Kirk Van Houten.  Marge insists Kirk stick around and have one of her alcoholic slushes, and Milhouse's mom Luann comes by (she was to pick up Milhouse later).  Kirk learns that Luann isn't seeing anyone and, with the two a bit drunk, begin to finally reconcile their differences, much to Milhouse's initial joy.

Homer ends up getting the chicken pox, and so Marge goes through the effort to nurse him back to health (as chicken pox can be trouble for adults).  Meanwhile, Milhouse's joy is lessened when he sees his parents spending more time with one another than with him.  Milhouse starts to worry that now his parents won't shower him with love and presents like they used to, even when separated.  Bart, who also benefitted from Milhouse's parents, decides to spring into action and decides to get Milhouse's parents separated again so they can pay attention only to Milhouse.  After a few initial attempts fail, the two get an idea from TV to plant a bra in Kirk's room.  They do so, but when Luann notices it, she finds that the bra belongs to Marge, concluding that she's been sleeping with Kirk.  Luann confronts Homer about it, showing him the bra, and he's devastated.  Homer confronts Marge over it, and though she is adamant she hasn't done anything, Homer doesn't trust her, and the two separate for a time.  Bart's plan to separate Milhouse's parents ends up separating his own instead.

Lisa figures this out and forces Bart to confess his ill deed to Marge.  Even so, Marge is still upset that Homer didn't trust her, and continues to refuse Homer back in.  Bart and Milhouse try to concoct another crazy scheme to get Homer and Marge back together, despite Lisa's interference.  The two force Homer and Marge to meet up at a river bank, and Bart plans to send a dummy of him falling into the river.  He tasks Milhouse to push the dummy in, but Milhouse's sight fails him and he pushes Bart in instead.  Homer rushes in to save Bart, but doesn't do a good job at it and the two continue to head toward a waterfall.  Marge comes in to help, forcing Homer to trust she can save them, and save them she does.  Homer and Marge reconcile yet again, and though Milhouse jumps into the river over Bart supposedly dying, Bart doesn't particularly care.

Quick Review
So ends the nine year saga of the separation of Kirk and Luann Van Houten.  Sure, things don't look too good after the bra incident, but a later episode marries them again so its all good.  What this episode ends up being is yet another marriage episode, though this was wasn't too bad by any means.  Oddly, the episode starts off slowly but picks up near the end (during the main marriage plot line), and is able to salvage a decent score because of its last act.

Final Score: 7.5

Smart and Smarter (S15, E13-326)

This episode contends Maggie is just a tiny Lisa with firearms experience.

Plot Summary
When the family goes out for pancakes, Homer practically dares himself into having Maggie enrolled into a pre-nursery school.  The process of having a student accepted is simple: have Simon Cowell be impressed with the kid, which he isn't upon learning Maggie can't even talk.  Later, Lisa decides to help Maggie learn, when she learns that Maggie really is gifted.  They go back to Cowell and this time Maggie is able to display her intelligence.  Maggie's IQ is stated as 167, which is even higher than Lisa's 159, which really bugs Lisa immensely.

Lisa comes to realize that she is no longer the 'smart' kid, and decides to adopt a new persona, but attempts at doing so fail miserably.  Incensed, a jealous Lisa attempts to teach Maggie the wrong information, but Marge catches Lisa and chides her for it.  After having a nightmare, Lisa decides she can't stay in the same house as Maggie anymore, and runs away.  Lisa ends up at a museum, and decides to hide out there.  Her family tasks the police with finding Lisa, and they do actually find some of Lisa's stuff at the museum but aren't able to find Lisa herself.

The family decides to go to the museum to find Lisa, investigating a giant model of the human body where Lisa's belongings were located.  However, Maggie gets a hold of the model's digestive controls, and accidentally sends the other three Simpsons inside.  She's told that the red "Evacuate" button will free them, but Maggie is unable to discern what that means.  Lisa returns just in time to see this, and is able to help cue Maggie in on what color red is, and she presses the button just in time to free the family.

Later, Cowell goes to the house to inform everyone that Maggie is, in fact, not gifted; she actually picked up subconscious clues from Lisa during the testing that helped her answer most of the questions.  Lisa and Maggie share a closer bond, but not too close as Maggie's saxophone abilities scare Lisa just a bit too much.

Quick Review
Meh, it was an average episode.  Simon Cowell's appearance was actually pretty good for the most part, and his appearance during the credits had its moments as well.  The main plot, well, the only plot of the episode didn't have that much going for it in terms of comedy, but the episode holds up okay otherwise.

Final Score: 7.0