Moho House (S28, E21-617)

"Hey we have another important black character with a course voice
that we need to cast."  "Should we find a guest star or wh-"
"GET ME KEVIN MICHAEL RICHARDSON RIGHT NOW!"

Plot Summary
Marge and Homer are having marital difficulties, again.  They attempt to patch things up at the nuclear plant, an attempts which is going well.  Its witnessed by Mr. Burns and a wealthy friend of his, Nigel.  The two are at odds at whether "true love" exists, with Nigel claiming that the "true love" they're witnessing on the security camera isn't real.  He bets $5 million that he can break Homer and Marge up, which Burns accepts.

That afternoon, Nigel forces Homer to go drinking with him under the veiled threat of punishment.  At the bar, Nigel notices that Moe is attracted to Marge and decides to use this to his advantage by hiring Moe to head his new classy bar.  Homer doesn't get home until late, and Marge refuses to hear his side of the story, putting their marriage on the brink (again). 

Nigel invites the Simpson couple to the new bar (Moho House), and the two immediately go their separate ways once inside.  Moe catches up with Marge, who is more than open to even his advances.  Still, at the end Moe is unwilling to go all the way and sheepishly retreats.  Nigel, eyeing a victory, sweetens the bet: his own fortune to Burns, or Burns forfeits Smithers.  Realizing his peril, Smithers attempts to force Homer to reconcile by giving him a gift to give Marge, but Marge realizes the ploy right away and runs off in tears.

Moe, realizing his part in this story, invites Marge and Homer separately to Moho House and gets the two to reconcile at his own sacrifice.  This, coupled with Homer's last-second callback to nostalgia, and Marge decides to forgive Homer (again).  Burns wins his bet (though Smithers gets his revenge by tricking Burns into believing Nigel was never there, thus saving Nigel's fortune), and all is back to what it was.

Quick Review
Its a marriage episode whose final act was a sloppy mess.  That said, many of the gags in this episode worked in its favor despite the retreaded theme, leaving it as (sadly) one of the stronger episodes of the season.

Final Score: 7.3

Simprovised (S27, E21-595)

"End it."  He thinks.  No, not the bit.  Not the series.
Not even his life.  No, everything.  Everything must end.

Plot Summary
Chief Wiggum throws an extravagant birthday party for Ralph which includes a brand new, state-of-the-art treehouse, which makes Bart jealous.  He quickly coerces Marge into rebuilding his treehouse but, afterward, tells Milhouse not to bother thanking Marge as things such as major remodeling is only her "job" as a mom.  Marge overhears this and gets upset at Bart, but Bart gets help from Homer in making up to her and the two reconcile.

Meanwhile, Homer bombs on a speech at the plant thanks to his fear of public speaking.  To get his mind off the incident, Marge takes Homer to an improv show, where he's impressed with the group's ability to think and act on the fly.  He and a few others decide to take an improv class offered by the group and soon start up their own group, of which Homer is the star.  Lisa advises Homer to try his luck at a French festival coming up, but Homer psyches himself out leading up to the day.

Fearful of failure, Moe offers to become an improv plant for Homer, but Lisa overhears and pleads with Homer not to cheat.  Eventually, Homer agrees and does his improv show wonderfully.

The last few minutes are spent on a segment called "Homer Live", where Dan Castellaneta voice acts as Homer while the show digitally shows Homer on a desk (with a bunch of nonsense references flying around him to keep things interesting) moving his mouth as Dan talks.  The segment is just Dan answering (I'm sure) heavily screened questions which amount to a waste of time, honestly.

Quick Review
The episode itself was another bore, with barely anything of comedic note and with both stories wrapping up quickly and all too neatly for it be of any worth.

The "live" segment was interesting of course.  Perhaps with intention, an episode about improv then features a segment in which Dan has to improvise Homer's dialogue on the fly, and he threw out a few decent things that were limited by the rather punchless questions that made it through screening.  While the episode was beyond saving, this bit was still the best the show had to offer this night.

Final Score: 6.9

Lisa with an "S" (S27, E07-581)

I guess I should've used an animated gif here, not that it would've been funny or anything.

Plot Summary
On poker night, Homer ends up losing $5000 to one of Moe's friends, an aging broadway star named Laney.  Desperate to reclaim those losses, Homer takes up Moe's idea to invite Laney over to his crappy house in hopes of evoking Laney's pity.  That plan doesn't work out, but Laney notices Lisa's saxophone ability.  As Lisa was unable to go to an expensive band camp (even before Homer's crippling gambling loss), Laney suggests that Lisa go with her in an attempt to become a broadway star.  Marge, very reluncantly, agrees to give Lisa up.

As Lisa starts traveling with Laney, becoming the talk of Hartford no less, Marge starts to panic when a skype call with Lisa leaves her less than relieved over the safety of her daughter, and forces the family to head for New York to find their daughter.  Along the way, the car breaks down, and Homer is forced to seek the aid of a nearby Amishman, who is a distant relative of Ned Flanders and chastises Ned for his "ultra liberal" views (you see, its funny because Ned is considered conservative!  Political views are funny, see!?!?!?), but agrees to pull the Simpsons to New York the rest of the way.

Lisa helps out Laney in her broadway show, which becomes a mild success.  Marge arrives just in time to see Lisa succeed and, after the show, after seeing Lisa become popular, Marge decides to give up and depressingly takes her leave.  Taking note of this, Laney decides to kick Lisa off the tour, not cluing Lisa in as to her real motivations behind it, but Lisa runs back to Marge over it and the family is reunited.

Quick Review
This was a pretty boring episode.  The jokes just weren't there, the references got a bit too much again, and the overall plotline left little to be desired.  There's very little about this episode that's redeemable.

Final Score: 6.0

The Princess Guide (S26, E15-567)

Nothing like depressing books to help a depressed man live life!

Plot Summary
Mr. Burns' nuclear plant still hasn't recovered from the damage done by Elon Musk three episodes ago.  As such, Mr. Burns welcomes a Nigerian king (for real) to set up an uranium deal.  Burns admits that if the deal doesn't happen, Burns will be forced to sell his things and move to the south Pacific with Smithers, something Smithers imagines to be rather pleasant, and thus subsequently hopes the uranium deal fails.

The king requests that Burns hire a bodyguard for his princess daughter who traveled with him, and Burns decides to hire Homer, seeing Homer treat Lisa well during "take your daughter to work day". Knowing of Homer's incompetence, Smithers agrees with Burns' choice hoping that Homer's involvement will secure the deal's failure.  That night, Homer is persuaded by the princess to go out, and thus Homer takes her out to the only place he ever goes out to at night: Moe's.  Moe learns of the princess' origin, then in a panic immediately takes Homer to a room in the back to explain that, some time previous, he got scammed by a Nigerian prince (not for real), and that this lady may be related to him.  As Homer tries to talk Moe out of it, they both learn the princess has left on her own.

Homer goes out to look for her, but gets arrested under the (for once, mistaken) notion of being publicly drunk.  The princess, however, immediately goes back to the bar to talk with Moe some more, alone.  Moe, at first, tries to discern whether or not the scam prince is actually her brother, but as the two continue to talk, those pretenses are dropped, and a connection between the two is made. As the princess decides to sleep at the bar for the night, Moe drops his quest and is happy to of made a lady friend.  The next day, the two go on a montage of sightseeing, but Homer catches up and demands Moe give her up.  Moe runs off with her, but the princess admits she needs to go back.  She kisses Moe on the forehead before she leaves, but is caught by a paparazzo, who takes a picture that quickly virals on the web, catching the eye of the Nigerian king, who becomes so upset with Burns he decides to end negotiations, all going to Smithers' plan.

Later, all parties involved meet in Burns' office, where the princess admits the kiss happened, but it was not a romantic kiss, but rather, well, a platonic one.  Moe understands and is still happy she's otherwise okay with him, while Homer convinces the king to forgive his daughter and go through with the uranium deal, shattering Smithers' hopes.  Later, the princess is forced to field questions from the press, which Moe helps defuse, and the two exchange gifts before she leaves for Nigeria.

Quick Review
This was your average Season 26 episode (i.e. not good), but it was kinda weird in how it operated.  There were several Family Guy-tier cutaway gags and the story with the Nigerian princess wasn't all that funny.  Most of the humor came from Moe and Mr. Burns, though the odd subplot with Smithers' hoping for the deal to fail so that Burns will retire with him was just out of place in the episode, kinda felt forced.

Some other notes: Jon Lovitz cameo'd as the paparazzo, and Richard Branson guest starred as Burns' annoying neighbor.  I don't know who Richard Branson was before this episode, and I have already forgotten who he is already.  The episode also paid a quick tribute to the late Leonard Nimoy, who guest-starred in two episodes.

Final Score: 6.6

My Fare Lady (S26, E14-566)

Not even Lenny is immune to the cruelties of today's modern old ladies.

Plot Summary
Marge has a busy day ahead, needing to drive the kids everywhere.  Homer is aware that his help is needed for this mundane task, so he quietly escapes and is able to get a drink into his system at Moe's before Marge can do anything to stop him.  Undeterred, Marge is able to drive her kids to every needed destination that day.  While filling up at a gas station, she meets someone who turns out to be an Uber driver "a social media-based ride-share service", using a large smile on his car's grill to indicate his service.  Realizing she, too, can be paid for driving people around, Marge decides to opt in as a driver herself.

Meanwhile, Moe has in his possession a ticket to a theatre show, but can't leave the bar unattended on a Saturday night.  Homer agrees to take his place, but while Moe is gone, Homer, Lenny and Carl decide to find ways to get Moe some profit.  They set up a "ladies night", where ladies drink free under the premise that guys will also come in to court these ladies and spend money on drinks, thus profit.  Unfortunately for them, only ladies show up.  Not only are they giving up alcohol for massive losses, but the ladies start fighting amongst themselves, turning the bar into a nearly unsalvageable mess by the time Moe returns.

With the bar in ruins, Moe needs a new source of income.  The three men who helped ruin Moe tell him to apply for the nuclear plant's open janitorial position, which he does successfully.  There, Moe is able to shoo away some health inspectors.  Impressed, Mr. Burns promotes Moe to supervisor of Sector 7G, where Homer is stationed.  I should say "was", as Moe notices all of Homer's mistakes there, and decides to reposition him as Mr. Burns' flower waterer, opting to not just fire Homer because they're friends.  Soon, Homer as well as Lenny and Carl find that Moe is a huge jerk when he's not serving the three of them beer.

Marge's new life as a makeshift cabbie is immediately exhausting as she fulfills the zany requests of her customers.  Cab drivers across Springfield quickly gain notice of this, and Marge in particular.  One night, Marge picks up a depressed Moe.  The two (over a song) discuss their problems and both agree that they should each quit their new jobs.  Marge is confronted by the alliance of cab drivers for taking their business, but Moe shoos them away.  Marge officially quits her new job, and Moe uses what I presume is his earnings from the nuclear plant to rebuild his bar, so that Homer and his friends can go back to tolerating Moe once more.

Quick Review
This episode is slightly better than the last couple, but that's not saying much.  Neither plot was particularly humorous.  Marge's storyline which despite the episode title was only a subplot didn't have much going for it other than a couple of unimpressive visual gags while the main storyline with Moe had some potential but didn't really do anything to laugh much about.  The bit with the cab drivers seemed like a missed opportunity as well.  Another disappointment from this season.

This is, apparently, the first and subsequently only episode in which Bart has no lines to speak.  565 previous episode Bart had at least one thing to say.  In this episode, though there were a couple of instance he could've said something, he doesn't even appear after Marge agrees to be a chauffeur.

Final Score: 6.7

I Won't Be Home for Christmas (S26, E09-561)

The spirit of Christmas is... somewhere in here I think.

Plot Summary
It's Christmas Eve, and Homer needs to go home to spend the night with his family.  However, on the way back Homer is tricked and subsequently guilt-tripped by Moe to spend the evening at the bar instead.  Homer unwittingly stays there until nearly midnight, when he realizes his grave error and rushes home.  Too late, as Marge goes off on Homer, telling him that he isn't welcomed home for Christmas.

Homer tries to go back to Moe's, but the bar is now closed.  Moe is inside singing karaoke by himself, when he notices Homer left his wallet on a stool.  Meanwhile, forced to wander around, Homer attempts to buy a quick literally-last-second gift for Marge but can't as most shops have closed up.  Homer tries to spend some time at a movie theatre, but isn't pathetic enough to spend Christmas Eve alone at the movies, and leaves but not before giving up his food to one of the other lonely patrons.  He finds Flanders out selling left-handed wares and, given Ned's most recent loss, Homer decides to buy something from Ned out of support.  Homer is happy to help others, but is still pretty miserable himself.

Moe goes to the Simpson house presumably to return the wallet, but also confesses to Marge that he intentionally kept Homer at the bar all night.  Marge is very relieved that Homer isn't 100% at fault, and tries to call him, but gets no response, and thus she and the kids go out to find him, which is an adventure in itself.

Someone dressed as a nutcracker tries to shoo Homer away from sleeping on a public bench, but takes pity on Homer by taking him to a post-Christmas party at the mall full of mall Santas and other reject mascots.  Marge is tipped off on this, and finds Homer to present herself as a makeup present (I guess?).  Homer is happy and comes to learn a lesson after the night's events: the best place to get drunk is at home.

Quick Review
This was a weird episode.  Was it trying to be humorous?  I can't actually say yes to this question.  Was it trying to provide some kind of social commentary?  If it was, it did so very poorly.  It was an odd mishmash of smaller storylines that try to keep together a very thin premise, with not that many jokes to keep things entertaining.

Also some continuity notes: this marks the first episode to note Ned's post-Edna life as well as feature the comic book guy's new wife, Kumiko, from that episode I don't like.  Between this, a few references to older episodes, and making it a point to note a Frozen reference was coming up for the couch gag, the episode tried to make up for what I guess would be a surreal storyline by throwing in references everywhere, which we all know by now does not make for comedy.

Final Score: 6.1

Treehouse of Horror XXV (S26, E04-556)

Ghost Simpsons vs Zombie Simpsons; whoever wins, we all lose.

Plot Summary
School is Hell
Bart is in detention again for his various pranks, all by himself.  Trying to pass the time, he comes across a dust-covered desk with runes on it.  He gets Lisa to help decipher the runes, which state that those who read it get sent to hell.  Upon reading those words, well, the two are snatched and brought to hell, specifically a school in hell.  Bart comes to find out that the school is actually perfect for him as he learns how to torture and manipulate matters in the shadows.  Lisa eventually finds a way out, but afterwards Bart pleads with his parents to go to the school in hell instead.  The two agree after consulting the school's two-headed principal, and Bart quickly finds himself on the path to success.  He even aces his final exam: torturing Homer, who in his decapitated state is overjoyed when Bart graduates.
Individual Score: +0.5

A Clockwork Yellow
I'm assuming its a full-blown parody of A Clockwork Orange, not having seen the source material.  Anyway, a hooligan gang consisting of versions of Moe, Lenny, Carl and Homer are forced to break up when Homer fall in love with a version of Marge and settles down.  Years later, a now meek Moe finds himself under attack by a younger hooligan group, and he yearns for the past.  He visits Homer who agrees to go on one last run alongside Lenny and Carl - who happen to be policemen.  The four agree to do a home invasion and raids the Burns Manor, but rush into a very odd costume party.  Burns sics his guests on the four and a brawl ensues featuring several Stanley Kubrick references, which is Moe's happiest moment in years.  Its not Kubrick's, who dislikes how the bit turned out in an editing room.
Individual Score: -0.1 (yes, minus)

The Others
The Simpson house seems to be haunted, especially with blood writing and mysterious frosty chocolate milkshakes and endless Married with Children.  The family lures out the source, and out comes the ghosts of the Simpson family circa 1987, complete with animations and differently pitched voices!  Ghost Marge finds herself attracted to modern Homer, as he is nowhere near as strict as ghost Homer.  Modern Marge finds herself jealous over Homer's newfound ghost-lust, and kills herself to get Homer to notice her again.  With two ghost Marges over him, Homer is suddenly attacked and killed by his ghost self.  Hijinks cause Bart and Lisa to die, whose bodies along with a dead Maggie are dragged away by a hungry Willie.  As the two sides begin to bicker, and limbo-resident Dr. Marvin Monroe doing little to salvage the situation, the two Marges force modern Homer to choose between them.  While Homer likes that 1987 Marge is willing to put up with him, modern Marge has, and Homer picks modern Marge on that merit.  The next morning, as the two families eat breakfast, modern Lisa worries that if two different Simpsons could exists, what could stop marketing companies from making millions more.  Quickly, other versions of the Simpsons family arrive at the house.
Individual Score: +0.7

Quick Review
A new low in Treehouse of Horror.

The first segment was a slow starter but it picked up at the end.  The final segment, the nostalgia callback that it was, had its moments and it was pretty decent overall.  The Clockwork Yellow bit, which I guess which just an homage to everything Stanley Kubrick (?), I did not find funny at all.  I have come to realize that I abhor episodes that are just nothing more than references (see: Married to the Blob from last season), and this segment was nothing but.  It also hurt that, not being a Kubrick fan at all, I didn't even get most of the references, and the funniest joke in the bit was comic book guy noting he is no longer able to keep up with the references.  The middle segment alone ruined this episode.  The worst bit in Treehouse of Horror history makes this the worst Treehouse of Horror in history.

Final Score: 6.1

The Saga of Carl (S24, E21-529)

Iceland has never seen such a dramatic chase.

Plot Summary
With the kids all hyped up over some show, Marge attempts to get some education in them by taking them to a museum... which has exhibits up about that show.  Still, she takes them to a rather boring wing all about probability, and how stupid it is to play the lottery.  Regardless, Homer buys a weekly ticket for himself, Moe, Lenny and Carl at the bar - each person providing one number for a Pick Four type game.  To their amazement, all four of their numbers are called and they win the prize money of $200,000.  Everyone is excited, especially Carl, who takes the ticket and tells the three he'll cash the ticket while they set up a celebratory party.  Homer, Moe and Lenny do just that, inviting all sorts of people.  Homer reveals he plans on using his share of the winnings to build a swimming pool - in the ground!  However, Carl never comes back.  The three decide to check out Carl's apartment but learn its been emptied out a bit and Carl has left a message saying he's going home, and goodbye forever.

Moe is particularly upset that Carl ditched them, though Lenny persists there must be a good reason.  Marge wonders where Carl is actually from, but none of the men know, which Marge chides as the guys have only really done "guy stuff" and haven't really bonded as friends.  Still, the three are able to find a clue in a picture of Carl when it barely reveals that Carl, in the picture, is at "Strokkur Geysir".  The three enlist Lisa's help, and she determines that Carl is an adopted child who grew up in Iceland, something that Carl somewhat mentioned once some time ago as what was once a passing joke.  Quickly, the three pack up to go to Iceland which, while not as icy as Greenland, is still pretty cold.  After dressing appropriately, the three learn from a passerby that the Carlson family is scorned in Iceland, showing them a written "saga" that shows that, a thousand years ago, the Carlsons were tasked to keep watch on invading hordes, but failed and Iceland was subsequently ransacked thanks to that failure.  The three are given the address of Carl's old home, and learn that, yeah, Carl did go back here, but the mansion-like home bars them from getting inside.  The three stake out nearby, and as Carl exits the gates in his car, the three give chase.  They follow Carl to a building, and when he exits it, the three make their presence known and chase after Carl, eventually paying a guy to tackle Carl for them.

Carl reveals that he planned on using the lottery winnings to purchase a missing page from his family's saga which he believes will clear their name of any shame.  Lenny still ponders why Carl didn't just tell them, and Carl is blunt: they aren't friends, they're just four guys who sit together at the bar to talk about "guy stuff", and don't really share feelings (and facts like that Carl is from Iceland) like friends are supposed to.  This sets off the no longer faithful Lenny, who attacks Carl and the two get into a fight.  Moe grabs the briefcase Carl had been carrying which he believes has the lottery money, but it turns out Carl already purchased the missing page.  Upset, Moe, Lenny and Homer leave with the page, only willing to give it back "to a friend", which devastates Carl.

Later, the three ponder if they really are friends or just guys that hang out.  Marge calls Homer to see if he retrieved the money for the pool, but Homer reveals what's happened.  Marge reasons with the three that screwing with Carl at this point isn't really going to make them feel better and that they should at least figure out what the page says.  The three relent and, thanks to Moe's pep pills, take a crash course in ancient Icelandic to translate the page.  Afterward, the three are able to decipher the lost tale: that the ancient Carlsons didn't just fail to stop the viking invasion, they willingly gave up and joined the vikings in their raids.  The three now kinda feel bad for Carl as he wasted their lottery winnings on something that would've made his family look worse.

Some time later, the three are able to gather up the entirety of Iceland to tell them about Carl Carlson, telling them about the little good deeds Carl has done for each of them over the years, and that if they can forgive Carl for wasting their lottery winnings, then Iceland can forgive the Carlsons for something their ancestors did a thousand years ago.  The Icelandic people agree, and Carl and his parents can once again be seen in public.  Carl thanks the three for what they've done, and the four are friends again, going back to Springfield to do "guy stuff".  Later, Homer does get pools for his family, albeit its just water in split-open beer kegs.

Quick Review
It was a decent episode, nothing special but it wasn't bad either.  Its a somewhat odd episode to focus on both Carl and on Iceland, but it wasn't a particularly bad combination.  Could've been funnier, but oh well.

Final Score: 7.1

Whiskey Business (S24, E19-527)

Does this really happen to anyone?  Is this really a plausible situation?

Plot Summary
At the bar, Moe is once again depressed, and he finds the distracted Homer, Lenny and Carl unable to help him out.  Having lost the will to live again, Moe decides to hang himself.  However, the wooden beam he attached the noose to breaks, catching the attention of his customers.  Homer is able to give Moe CPR, saving his life.  Moe's optimism for life is renewed, but only for a moment as he's reminded his life is still awful.  Marge barges in to yell at Homer, but Homer tells Marge what happened to Moe and she, too, becomes worried.  So much so that she decides to take Moe on a road trip to brighten his outlook, which Moe is somewhat eager to do.

Marge leaves Grampa in charge of the kids, and Bart in charge of Grampa while she and Homer take Moe to Capital City.  While in Capital City, the two take Moe to a suit store and buy Moe a nice, new suit.  Moe is ecstatic with his new suit, and afterwards decides to clean up his dusty old bar.  Refurbishing the place as "The New Moe's", Moe gets new customers to come in.  The two want to drink something relatively old, but Moe only has one such drink: homemade bourbon.  The two men love the drink, and reveal themselves as venture capitalists who love both Moe's drink and his suit, and are willing to give Moe as much money as he needs to start up a business based around the bourbon, an offer Moe easily accepts.

Meanwhile, Bart distracts Lisa by buying her tickets to a jazz show (where she becomes offended over the place's use of a Bleeding Gums Murphy hologram full of advertising, which she protests to no avail) so he can set up a wacky water slide in the backyard.  Grampa shows up and accidentally goes into the slide, taking a nasty hit at the end.  Bart is able to give CPR to the old man to save his life, but with him in bad shape Bart hides him in the basement to nurse him back to health without his parents learning he wasn't able to take care of Grampa.  Grampa comes to appreciate Bart's care, but when Bart starts questioning whether he feels better, Grampa feigns injury to spend more time with Bart.  Bart eventually catches on, but when Grampa explains his reasoning, Bart forgives him and the two bond.

Moe's new business is a success, and the venture capitalists decide to put Moe's business on the stock market.  Moe is once again happy, but tragedy occurs when a thread from his suit gets stuck in an elevator door, causing the suit to fall apart.  Late that night, Moe goes to the Simpson place in ruins, but Marge convinces him that it wasn't the suit that made his business, it was his drink and charisma.  The next day, at the stock exchange, Moe learns that, hey, the suit was a pretty big part of it, as his appearance in his normal garb scares everyone and Moe's stock goes down the drain.  So, its back to normal for Moe, though with his latest experience he decides to leave his old friend the noose alone until the holidays.

Quick Review
For an episode that had three plots, it was awfully boring.  The Lisa storyline was by far the shortest, having only two scenes, but was awful enough to drag the episode down just by itself.  Bart's and Moe's stories weren't much funnier if not less cringeworthy, and it makes for a decidedly subpar episode.

Final Score: 5.1

A Tree Grows in Springfield (S24, E06-514)

Brockman "hopes" he can stop hope before he can be stopped.

Plot Summary
Homer is depressed about life in general.  Not even a Duff-sponsored party can cheer him up.  He remains depressed as his family takes him to a school raffle.  However, to his surprised glee, Homer ends up winning the top prize in the raffle: an Apple iPad - oh I'm sorry, a "Mapple MyPad", whatever.  Anyway, Homer loves his new iPad and it does everything for him, including cheering him up.  Homer in particular becomes addicted to a pizza making app, and becomes so distracted by it he doesn't see where he's going and falls down an open sewer drain.  Homer is physically not too hurt, however the iPad did not survive.  The iPad wasn't the only thing that shattered, so too did Homer's newfound optimism.

Depressed once more, Homer is dragged out by Ned Flanders to be shown an odd sight: his tree has maple markings on it that spell out the word "HOPE".  As Homer had prayed to God for a goddamned break after his iPad broke, and with Ned Flanders preaching a "even if your tires are flat, you just take things real slow until you reach the next station" message, Homer decides to see things in a new light.  In church, Homer tells everyone about the hope tree, and a following of people start praising the supposed miracle.

Kent Brockman, disillusioned after a childhood incident involving a guy in a Mickey Mouse costume, remains skeptical and decides to find out the truth behind the message.  Quickly, Brockman learns and shows to everyone videotape of a mysterious stranger coming from out of nowhere and painting the word on the tree using typical store-bought maple syrup.  The message of hope dies, as does Homer's optimism again.  Marge finally cheers Homer up for good by telling him that he doesn't need iPads or fake tree messages because the hope he felt was real, not to mention there was somebody out there on Homer's side telling him to keep hope.  Later that night, the mystery person returns to the tree, and ends up being a sleepwalking Homer, subconsciously telling himself to keep hope alive.

With the episode done early, a short mini-cartoon about a love story is presented, but its two minutes worth of referencing nearly every false product the show has made over the years.  Yawn.

Quick Review
Two things really bothered me with this episode, as "grounded" as it was: everything involving "Mapple" and the "MyPad" and Steve "Mobs" and jabs at Apple's privacy concerns because "everyone cool owns iProducts so if we just mention how much Apple sucks ironically then we'll get all the laughs!"  Why.

The short story at the very end was stupid too, again only there because the main plot was boring enough that it couldn't fill up just two more minutes.  The main episode had a couple of decent jokes and moments, but overall it was boring mixed with a few lowlights, which is why it scored so low.

Final Score: 5.4

Moe Goes from Rags to Riches (S23, E12-498)

It going "kill me", dying and then a black screen for 20 minutes would've been funnier.

Plot Summary
With city hall fumigated for bedbugs for some reason, Mayor Quimby hosts the next town meeting at Moe's bar, which erupts into a party upon the meeting's conclusion.  During the party, a discussion of best friends come up and Moe is unable to come up with anyone that would be his best friend.  People start mocking him, claiming his old bar rag is his best friend.  Bart chimes in and says that Milhouse is a better best friend than a rag, offending Milhouse enough to end their friendship.  Moe has enough and leaves, however the rag is given a spotlight and comes to life, decides to spend some time telling the audience the life its lived.

The rag began its existence way back in ye olde France, when a woman (Marge) is tasked by the Duke de Springfield (Burns) to create a tapestry for little gain.  On his way out, Burns happily slaughters some sheep that were in his way.  Those sheep gained the powers of the devil or something, and as Marge starts to use their wool for the tapestry, she becomes possessed to weave the tapestry non stop for years and years.  Upon its completion, the cloth showcases the events it would live through in the future.  Burns isn't pleased with it, though, and has Marge and her family killed as he rides off, but fate would turn its head and Burns would die by being hung by the cloth during a fall.

As Bart is disturbed that Milhouse is now neglecting him, the rag continues that in the dark ages it was a cloth that was celebrated until vikings came in and raided the place.  A viking that looked like Homer took it for himself and ate parts of it.  Some time later, the rag was used as barter by the Christians to dupe some Muslims, ruining things forever between the two.  It became a patch to the tent of a king (Nelson), who forced his many wives to perform for him or be sent to a pit.  His latest wife (Lisa) is able to free the other wives and they take out the king.  The cloth would start traveling all over Europe, eventually winding up as the rag used by Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, though it was tossed aside after its completion.

As Bart's mental state continues to deteriorate after Milhouse keeps ignoring him, the rag continues that it was used during the Great Depression as a flavoring for cheap soup, but at some point it became a flag for a guy's climb of Mount Everest, but the guy died and the rag was left wasting, until a yeti came by to claim it, giving it to its son, Moe, which brings things to the present time.  Moe is now sleeping happily with the rag, who actually now considers it his best friend, but a mysterious stranger nabs it.

Milhouse somehow hires Drederick Tatum to punch Bart for him, and afterwards Bart promises to be more subtle about his abuse of Milhouse, which Milhouse happily agrees to.  Moe is frantically searching around town for his rag, which is currently being run through a dryer.  A pan out reveals it was Marge who took the rag.  Moe arrives at the house and finds it, happy to be reunited with his rag.  Marge tells him she saw Moe hugging his rag and, after seeing how 'ripe' it was, decided to give it a good wash.  Moe then realizes, though, that the rag isn't his best friend, that since his bar is apparently a hip place to be, he's got plenty of human interaction to enjoy.  Confident, Moe throws the rag outside.  As the rag contemplates its end, Santa's Little Helper grabs it and makes it his own, which the rag rather enjoys.

Quick Review
Well, you can't say they recycled this plot!

Regardless of how weird an episode focused on Moe's rag is, the real inexcusable move was to make such an episode as unfunny as possible.  The episode barely got any laughs out of me, I dare to say not even a dozen times which is incredibly low.  The Milhouse side story was also pretty pointless and ended on a dumb note as well.  This is definitely one of the worst episodes churned out in quite some time.

Final Score: 3.7

The Book Job (S23, E06-492)

"I don't get the reference... was that supposed to be funny?" I said just one review ago.

Plot Summary
The family attends a show about dinosaurs when Lisa notices someone half-in-costume that looks awfully familiar.  After chasing the person down, Lisa recognizes the person as the author of her beloved Angelica Button books.  As Lisa is confused as to why her favorite author is bothering to dress up as a dinosaur, the woman reveals that she was a model whose picture was taken to set up a fake author for the books, and that the book was actually conceived by publishers who use reader trends and dozens of desperate English majors to develop books that are most likely to sell.  Lisa is shocked by the revelation and runs off crying.

Determined to now burn her set of books, Lisa tells Homer about the conspiracy, and Homer comes to realize how profitable it can be.  He quickly assembles a team featuring Bart, a pro at cons, Skinner who knows all about preteen trends, Patty who knows all about fantasy novels, Moe who has some publishing experience and Professor Frink the "computer guy".  As the group begins to brainstorm they realize they probably shouldn't do yet another dreamy vampire theme as that has already saturated the market so instead they make their story about trolls.  The idea gains the praise of a snooping Neil Gaiman who joins the group as an errand boy.  Lisa learns of the scheme and, angered, decides to write a book of her own, but constantly procrastinates.  By the time Homer's groups finishes the final draft of their book, Lisa still hasn't written anything besides "Chapter 1".

The group goes to a publisher to get the book published, but they've made a critical mistake: they never came up with a fake author to sell the book with.  Luckily, Lisa has become so distraught over her failure that she'll do anything to get her name on a book and she happily becomes that which she hated to that end.  The group receives a million dollar check, and all is well.  The group except Lisa celebrates their victory... until they get an advance copy of the book which reveals that their troll characters and themes have been replaced by vampires.  Realizing that while they initially set out for money, they've become so enriched in the world they've developed that they can't deal with it being destroyed by the book publisher.  Angered by this, the group tears up their check and decides to take matters into their own hands.

The team sneaks into the publishing area where they plan on swapping the vampire mock up with the original story on a flash drive moments before printing begins.  However, they get found out as Lisa ratted the group out to the publisher, desperate to see her name on a book regardless of its content.  The publisher gives Lisa the clear to print the material, and all seems lost.  However, the next day the group is stunned to find stores being stocked with the troll version of their story: it seems Lisa switched flash drives with Bart while asking for his forgiveness, thus secretly restoring the original tale.  The group is happy to see people enjoying their original vision, though Lisa is angered to find that the book has been credited not to her, but to Neil Gaiman, now on some island who revealed that he, too, switched flash drives at some point and is joyous that he can enjoy being credited for another successful book despite not even being literate.

Quick Review
It was hard for me to get into this episode as, and I just spent the last episode lamenting this, most of the episode was set up as one big reference and I hardly found any of it funny though Neil Gaiman did a pretty decent job in his role.

Final Score: 5.7

The Blue and the Gray (S22, E13-477)

It seriously looks just like as though an animator forgot to use a fill bucket.

Plot Summary
It's Valentine's Day and as you would expect, Moe is dateless.  He an ad on TV for a Dr. Kissing-her, a supposed love expert, who is hosting a forum on getting dates.  Moe decides the attend the next day.  Meanwhile, its the morning after Valentine's Day, and Homer and Marge are recovering from a wild night.  Marge looks in the mirror and, to her shock, finds a gray hair.  She talks about it with her hairstylist who tells Marge that she's been gray for a good long while, though the toxic fumes in the blue hair dye helps Marge forget that one single fact (clearing up a little contradiction at the same time).  Seeing other gray-haired people leading happy lives with their significant others, Marge decides to ditch the blue and let her hair go fully gray again, stunning the family.

Bart in particular doesn't take this news well while at school, and Homer can't stand seeing the hair though he's able to come up with a flimsy compliment for it.  At Kissing-her's forum, the supposed doctor finds Moe hard to give advice to, but tells him to use a wingman to make himself seem better by comparison.  Moe decides Homer is a natural choice for this role, and Homer is more than glad to do so, especially if it means not being around gray Marge for too long.  Marge initially likes her new change, but things start to sour when other women across town congratulate Marge only for being "brave", and even worse when women she doesn't know starts assuming she's a senior citizen.  Marge talks with Patty and Selma, who both reveal their gray hair is only from all the smoke and ash of their cigarettes, and that the two still have their natural hair color (reddish for Patty, blonde for Selma).  The two realize Homer hates Marge's hair, but Marge refuses to admit anything's wrong.  Then she hears other women talking about Homer during his time as a wingman, and realizes something is, in fact, very wrong.

Marge angrily rushes over to the nightclub where she learned Homer would be, trying to make herself pretty for the club while driving, but that leads to disaster and Marge ends up crashing the car, causing the makeup to get all over her.  Stumbling through strong winds and bramble bushes, Marge ends up with a rather witch-like appearance, but gains easy entry into the nightclub anyway.  Marge confronts Homer over his flirtations with women there, but Homer calmly tells Marge that he is Moe's wingman, and that he can afford to be a wingman because he knows that when he comes home, he'll have a beautiful woman waiting for him.  While the experience also 'probably' teaches the two that true beauty isn't about hair color, Homer does admit that he loves him some blue, and Marge decides to switch back to blue hair.

Quick Review
I feel as though this episode is full of wasted potential.  The episode starts off as another Moe episode, it seems like, but that story dissipates around the midway point once Homer begins as his wingman.  Really, the potential was there for the wingman story to produce much more comedy than it did, but it never happened.  The side story with Bart had its moments too but it was far too short and ended somewhat abruptly.  No, the latter portion of the episode focused mostly on Marge and, sadly, that didn't have much going for it comically.

Final Score: 6.6

Flaming Moe (S22, E11-475)

For gathering the courage to try and kiss that thing, lets give applause to Waylon Smithers.

Not to be confused with the similarly titled Season 3 episode Flaming Moe's.

Plot Summary
Smithers is stunned to learn he's been left out of Mr. Burns' will.  Confronting Burns later, Smithers is told that because he's always been a follower, and has never been independent, Burns can't respect Smithers.  Torn by these revelations, Smithers tries to go to a bar for a drink.  However, a popular gay bar refuses him entry just from his looks.  Dejected further, Smithers goes to the bar across the street: Moe's.  As Smithers laments over a lack of a gay bar for regular guys, he notices that business is once again slow at Moe's, and comes up with an idea.  Smithers suggests to Moe that the two spruce the place up and turn into a gay bar.  Moe is initially hesitant, but given his only other customer at the moment is Barney, Moe decides to give it a try.

Once a lazy montage, the new bar is open for business, and Smithers is able to convince several gay men to come to it.  One of them, the school's music teacher Mr. Largo, finds a 'soulmate' there and the two decide to leave town for a bit.  To take his place at school, Superintendent Chalmers brings in a free spirited woman Calliope Juniper.  Principal Skinner eventually meets the woman and immediately falls in love.  Skinner calls in Bart for a favor: Calliope has a daughter named Melody, and he'd like Bart to take her someplace, and Skinner can chaperon Bart to meet Calliope.  Bart agrees to do so with some conditions, and Skinner's plan ultimately works like a charm, as the two go back to Calliope's place for the night.  However, Bart really can't stand Melody and before the rather obsessed Melody can get too close to him, Bart breaks up with her.  Calliope gets upset over this and decides to move out of town, but asks Skinner to come with her regardless of whether their relationship lasts for just one more day or a lifetime.  With that mindset, Skinner decides to go with them.

Meanwhile, Moe's new bar is work out pretty well, and Moe hopes it doesn't turn out like the other past, failed attempts at reimagining his bar.  As "Mo's" becomes popular, Smithers does receive the respect he desired from Burns.  However, Moe starts getting popular among his new patrons under the notion that Moe is also gay.  Moe picks up on this, but keeps up the charade to maintain his popularity.  Smithers doesn't like this, and on more than one occasion tries to get Moe to tell the truth about his preferences, but when patrons decide to let Moe run for a spot in the town council so that they can have a voice in government, Smithers reaches a boiling point.  Moe meets several groups out in public, but Smithers confronts Moe, and reveals to the truth to the stunned crowd.  Moe tries to defend himself, but Smithers forces Moe to prove his orientation... by kissing him.  Moe can't bring himself to do, and as he's likely running against a closeted gay Republican, he loses all of his support.  With nothing to lose (and nobody else around), Moe decides to kiss Smithers now, with no regrets.  Skinner also comes back, admitting that his relationship with Calliope lasted just one more day, though he's been gone for three months.

Quick Review
This was an episode that started off rather well, but fell apart at about the time where the Skinner subplot started up.  There was hardly anything about that side story that was even close to funny, and it brought the rest of the episode down.  The main plot also started to lose its steam as the episode shifted focus from Smithers to Moe, leaving it as one of the season's weaker episodes thus far.

Final Score: 6.7

Judge Me Tender (S21, E23-464)

Not... not everyone enjoys the comic stylings of Ellen DeGeneres.

Plot Summary
Homer and Bart prepare Santa's Little Helper for an Ugliest Dog contest, but they just can't get the dog ugly enough, but Bart has a plan.  The next day, tons of people attend said event, including Moe who can't get anybody to let him sit next to them.  Krusty is the judge who is tasked with providing jokes depending on how ugly the dog is, but his jokes are old and he gets pretty tired of telling them during the contest.  Moe takes a shot at the lethargic Krusty, and with the crowd behind him, Krusty lets Moe do the rest of the judging.  Homer and Bart finish the contest with their entry: Santa's Little Helper's butt made to look like a really ugly face.  Moe falls for it, after making a superb joke, and the two win the contest.  The crowd, though, is only interested in Moe and how great of an insult judge he was.

Soon, Moe is invited to judge a crazy beard contest, but to make time Moe has to close down the bar.  This leave Homer with plenty of time to spend at home with Marge.  Marge is initially appreciative (though well aware why Homer is home), but when Homer starts tinkering around the house - poorly, Marge tries to come up with ways to occupy Homer.  She tries taking him to a sports bar, but Homer doesn't really like it, and continues to stay at home.  Grampa offers a more permanent solution: golf, but warns Marge that once he starts, he may never come back.  Still, with Homer unwittingly causing more damage, Marge takes that chance.

The word on Moe's judging ability continues to grow, and soon he gets an offer to judge for one of FOX's many reality shows though by the time the FOX rep gets done naming them all, all of them are cancelled save one: American Idol.  Moe agrees to help judge that and he gets flown to Hollywood.  He meets Simon Cowell, who is impressed by Moe's insults.  However, Simon offers a word of caution to Moe: if he sets himself up as the "mean judge", he'll become hated and lonely just like Simon has become.  During the first airing of American Idol, Moe takes Simon's words to heart and instead of mocking the first singer, he gives her plenty of praise.  The crowd seems okay with it, but as Simon goes on his usual rant against the singer, he also takes time to take a jab against Moe's judging.  As the crowd rallies against Moe, Simon reveals that he wasn't about to give Moe a chance to upstage him in the mean judge competition.  Guards take Moe away before he can stab Simon with a broken bottle.

Marge is ready to let Homer get hooked on golf, but after seeing an elderly man admit he barely knows his family thanks to golf, Marge reconsiders at the last second and prevents Homer from taking his first shot.  Marge takes his mind off golf by making love to him, and by this time Moe has returned so Marge doesn't have to worry about Homer's presence anymore.  The two attend Moe's grand reopening, and Moe tells everyone that he's now been banned from California for his actions, but on the plus side he's also banned from watching FOX, so the bar is as popular as ever now that he's only got NBC going on the TV, much to the delight of the 'actually-voiced-by-him' Rupert Murdock.

Quick Review
Learning that this episode was going to feature American Idol in some capacity, I feared the worst.  Thankfully, those fears weren't realized as this episode isn't as bad as I thought it'd be, and its not as bad as it could've been.  Simon Cowell provide another strong guest appearance, and the other judges from that show's particular season didn't do anything to detract from the episode (though Ellen did try).  The subplot with Homer and Marge has its moments, and while its kinda odd to have another Moe-focused episode so soon, Moe brings a good amount of comedy to keep the episode decent.

Final Score: 7.2

Moe Letter Blues (S21, E21-462)

This story's biggest failing is the assumption Moe can actually talk to women.

Plot Summary
As narrated by Moe, he notices many married couples going through rough patches, including the Lovejoys, the Nahasapeemapetilons and, of course, the Simpsons.  Its the day before mothers day, and the family sees on a commercial an amusement park on an island to give mothers a break from her kids for the day.  Marge insists Homer take the kids while displaying no enthusiasm towards dealing with Homer's usual tomfoolery.  The next day, Homer, Reverend Lovejoy and Apu take their respective kids to the boat leading toward the island, when the three of them are given a letter at the last second from Moe.  It states that Moe plans on leaving town forever, and that he's leaving with one of their wives.  With the three unable to turn the boat around, they're stuck all day on the island trying to figure out whose wife it is.

Homer recalls a short time ago when Marge hosted a birthday party for her mother, but Homer ruins it for Marge by getting into another fight with Patty and Selma.  Moe was working there as a drink provider, so the theory is that Moe got to Marge after that party.  However, Apu remembers when his family went to Moe's to dry up from the rain, but after leaving a bickering Apu and Manjula realize they forgot a kid back at Moe's.  Manjula goes back by herself, and Homer was at the bar when Moe entertains Manjula and her left behind kid (before Marge took him home for her mother's party), so now its likely Manjula is the departing wife.  Homer and Apu then make Tim remember the Sunday after Marge's party, where the Parson helps the pastor realize that his relationship with Helen isn't as cheery as he had thought.  Inside the church, Moe and Helen get to talking, and outside Apu noticed Helen put her hand on Moe's knee.  So, in the end, none of three can figure out whose wife is being taken.

Finally, the day is at an end, and the husbands get to confirm whether its them or not.  Homer is the first to go, and sees Marge packing from a distance, but soon learns Marge was actually putting away painting supplies as she had been painting in front of her mother for the day.  Her mother helped Marge realize the fault of that fight wasn't Homer's, but Patty and Selma's and Homer and Marge make up, which Lovejoy and Apu can plainly see.  Next up is the Reverend, who upon returning to his room sees that Helen has packed up, telling Tim she's leaving... with him to Istanbul on the world's most romantic train.  Apu sees Tim and Helen kissing and realizes he must be the loser in this game, and upon returning to his apartment he sees Manjula and Moe sitting together.  However, Manjula states she wants to stay with Apu.  Moe then reveals to Apu, and later all three, that he noticed the three wives feeling down following their separate encounters, so he got in contact with Marge's mom to talk to Marge, convinced Helen to take the train to Istanbul with Tim, and then talked things over with Manjula.  Moe wrote the letter to the three of them to help them realize they hadn't been treating their wives right, as there's no better judge of that than an ugly, creepy, perverted, lonely bartender!  Still, Moe's plan worked out for the best.

Quick Review
This episode ended up being okay.  The plot was decently clever if not a little lacking in the humor department, but Moe provided a level of comic relief that kept the episode afloat.

Final Score: 7.0

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

In the Name of the Grandfather (S20, E14-434)

Nothing like an army veteran dancing on graves to boost your spirits.

Plot Summary
Marge brings the family to a Home & Garden show, much to the disappointment of everyone else.  However, that disdain turns to joy when Homer finds a booth advertising a home spa system, and everyone in the family agrees to get one.  Upon setting it up, the family (and for a time Ned Flanders) melts away in the warm, soothing bubbles provided by the hot tub.  For a moment, the family tries to remember that there was something urgent to attend to, but are too enveloped in pleasure to care.  As it turns out, they're missing Senior-Family day at the retirement home, and Grampa is left alone for yet another social affair.  Angered, the old man goes to the Simpsons home and unplugs and eventually demolishes the hot tub.  The family does feel bad for missing Grampa's event, though, and knowing that Grampa may not be around for much longer, agrees to do one thing on his list of stuff to do before he dies.  Homer decides on an initially simple one: having one more beer at O'Flanagan's Bar.  Then he learns the place is actually in Ireland, but the family goes anyway.

Upon reaching Ireland, Grampa is more than ready to embrace Ireland's rich history.  Unfortunately for him, even Ireland has modernized, and is full of the same businesses and people one could find in, say, Seattle.  Still, O'Flanagan's bar is still around, but Grampa learns its also empty.  He finds an elder O'Flanagan in the back, who reveals that since all of his drunken patrons have since become employed, his business has tanked so bad he can't even remember how to pronounce 'pint' and 'pub'.  Regardless, Grampa and Homer buy a beer.  Marge takes the kids sightseeing in the meantime.  Grampa and Homer actually drink quite a bit, and wake up some time later hungover.  They learn that in their drunken state, they purchased the bar from O'Flanagan, who merrily leaves his dead pub to the pair of suckers.

The two men have as much trouble attracting customers as the previous owner, but Homer recalls there was someone who was able to make money from a old, customer-less bar: Moe!  Moe gets shipped in directly and upon arriving gives the two an important tip: provide a service that no other bar or pub can do, even if its not legal.  Quickly, they realize that smoking in bars is no longer allowed in Ireland, and they decide to run a smoking bar.  As Moe takes his leave, the bar quickly fills up with patrons who love to smoke, however the police arrive in due time and arrest the two for what they're doing.  Somewhat fortunately for them, the only punishment they receive is deportation and a small fine, as the judge admits that all of Ireland's dimwits of old have since gone to America and became cops somehow.  Just then, Chief Wiggum comes in...

Quick Review
So the Simpsons go on another adventure in a different country.  Unlike past episodes where they insult everything within, like in Australia or England or Brazil, this episode treats Ireland rather well.  In fact, it treats Ireland much better than it does the people watching the episode.  This was not a funny episode at all.  The random Q-bert reference was pretty bad, and the continued use of 'progressive' leprechauns was stupid, too.  The main plot was okay, as okay as it could be, but it wasn't nearly enough to salvage this mess.

Final Score: 4.6

The Burns and the Bees (S20, E08-428)

Here is an image that describes the title of the episode in adequate fashion.

Plot Summary
At a billionaires camp, Mr. Burns has a grand ol' time with his fellow billionaires.  During a poker game, he's able to win a professional basketball team from a rich Texan, the "Austin Celtics".  A short time later, Burns watches his team play the Dallas Mavericks and is flabbergasted over the flamboyant antics of Dallas' owner, Mark Cuban.  Burns decides to try some publicity acts of his own in his team's first home game.  Having renamed the team the Springfield Excitement, Burns is unable to drum up any excitement with his dated, annoying antics.  As people leave in drones, Burns comes up with an idea to get them back: a state-of-the-art arena.

Meanwhile, Lisa learns that the bee population is dying around the world.  She gets help from Professor Frink who tells Lisa that bees have contracted a deadly disease, and that they need to start up an unaffected colony.  Lisa attracts an unaffected queen, and is able to get it to sting her, attracting other bees and basically giving Lisa a beard of bees.  Given this is the only way the bees can survive for now, Lisa takes the bees with her back home.  Marge, unsettled by this, eventually finds a place for Lisa to keep the bees: an abandoned greenhouse.  Lisa is happy that her bees have done so well, however suddenly the greenhouse is hit with a wrecking ball; it turns out that Mr. Burns has chosen this site for his new arena.  After a failed attempt to sway the public at the town meeting, Lisa is forced to take her bees away before the construction kills them.

At Moe's, Lisa laments that her bees are unlikely to survive much longer in the jar she has them in.  As she leaves, Moe lets Homer know that he has with him a colony of Africanized bees and that if they mixed with Lisa's bees, the resulting group of bees would likely survive in any environment.  Homer agrees, and grabs Lisa's queen bee to mate with Moe's bees.  Six weeks later, Burns' arena is complete, and at the same time nearby Homer goes to show Lisa the new bees.  However, these are some angry bees, and Homer accidentally lets them fly free.  They head for the arena, shaped oddly like a bee colony, and swarm Burns' arena with nobody able to stop them.  Overnight, it becomes a bee sanctuary, and Burns is forced to abandon it much to Lisa's joy.  The next year, at the billionaire's camp, Burns tells this story, as well as the fact that he had to write off over $800 million because of it.  The other billionaires realize that write off makes his worth less than a billion, and promptly toss him over to the dirty ol' millionaires camp.

Quick Review
This episode has its moments - not enough of them - but moments, anyway.  Mark Cuban provided an okay guest spot, I suppose, nothing all that good, but it wasn't throwaway either.  The whole plot with the bees was decent, better than Burns' plot, but as a whole the episode wasn't all that great.

As an aside, this episode uses a modified version of its opening that gives it a Christmas theme.  This is the second episode to use this modified opening; Season 18's Kill Gil, Volumes I & II also used this opening.  Unlike that episode, this episode featured no Christmas theme outside of the opening.  Its also odd timing; the following episode will be the last episode to use the show's classic opening before it debuts its new HD opening.

Final Score: 6.9

Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind (S19, E09-409)

All of these events over 400+ episodes, all while everyone's ages stay the same.

Plot Summary
One wintry morning, Homer wakes up from under a pile of snow.  He doesn't remember what happened the previous night, and when he returns home he finds nobody around except the dog, who is growling at him for some reason.  Homer goes to Moe's, where he learns that he requested Moe give him the "Forget Me Shot", a drink that contains the venom of a certain moth that, when consumed, makes the person forget everything that happened the past 24 hours.  Homer wonders what could've happened that would want him to forget something that badly.  Nearby, Chief Wiggum reveals that he was at the Simpson place last night because of a reported domestic disturbance.  Homer starts to remember, and recalls that Marge had a black eye, using a seemingly flimsy excuse of "walking into a door" to cover it.  Homer starts to fear that it was him that hurt Marge, and decides to talk to the person who reported the disturbance, whom Homer quickly deducts is Flanders.  However, Flanders only tells Homer that he heard 'hubbub', and declines to go further into the matter.

Homer remembers Marge pleading him to stop, then a short time later covering her eye, furthering his fears.  He tries talking to Grampa about it, and he recommends going to a doctor specialized in recovering lost memories.  The doctor, who turns out to be Professor Frink, shows Homer a device that is used for that very purpose, and straps Homer into it.  Homer awakens inside a bubble which allows him to visit any of his old memories.  As he traverses through the 408 prior episodes that make up his memories, Homer comes across a memory from the prior night where, as he comes home, hears love-making squeaks on the couch, and finds Marge with an unknown man.  As the memory stops, Homer grabs a Lisa from a prior memory to help him figure out who that man is, bringing along that memory's Bart just because.  With their help, Homer is able to jump start that memory, and he learns that the man is actually Duffman, who admits Marge is gonna be sore in the morning.  Homer wakes up, and realizes that his life is ruined.

Homer goes to "Suicide Bridge" to jump where he's met by his sisters in law who not only wish to see him jump, but also push him off anyway.  During the fall, Homer is finally able to recall the memory in full.  It turns out Homer caught Marge planning a surprise party for Homer's community service, and with Duff sponsoring the party, Duffman is there to help.  An eager Homer tries to open a bottle of Duff champagne right away, but Marge tries to stop him, getting a cork shot right into her eye.  Duffman gives her an ice pack, stating how sore that will be in the morning.  Homer is happy to learn it wasn't nearly as bad as he thought, but then remembers he's still in the middle of falling.  However, Homer lands on a bouncy castle on a boat, and learns that he landed right into his surprise party.  Homer then remembers that this whole thing was his plan, in an attempt to make Marge's surprise a surprise again Homer willingly lost his memory of the night and correctly predicted his course of actions the following day, ensuring the boat had a floaty castle to secure his life.  Marge lied to Wiggum about her injury because she didn't invite him (or his wife Sarah, whom Marge cares little for) to the party, Patty and Selma pushed him down so that he'd land on the boat, supposedly, and the dog hates him because Homer just treats him badly in general.  With all of that cleared up, Homer enjoys his party, not actually drinking so that he'll remember these moments.

Quick Review
I enjoyed the direction the episode was trying to take and, fortunately, there was a decent amount of comedy in the episode as well.  These two factors combine to make Season 19's best episode thus far.  Its still nothing all that great, as opportunities for humor were limited over the drama of Homer's lost memory, but the effort to make the episode what it is is appreciated.

Final Score: 7.8