Posted by
Anticontrarian on Friday, July 27, 2007 12:39:04 PM
Many fans of the “classic” years of the series (variously considered to be seasons 2 through 5, 3 through 6, or some other subset of the first half-dozen years) have felt that the series long ago ceased to be funny. The only disagreement seems to be when the single shark-jumping moment occurred. I’ve always favored the double-whammy of back-to-back preachy, unfunny episodes near the beginning of season 7: Bart Sells his Soul and Lisa the Vegetarian.
But there are many, many of viewers who deny that the show has lost anything at all, and the nearly twenty years in the waiting Simpsons movie has been eagerly anticipated by millions.
Nothing I have heard about the movie makes me very hopeful about the movie. This quote from longtime Simpsons writer Al Jean about Lisa’s environmental screed says it all:
Series writer Al Jean agreed that there were big themes in the film, particularly the environment, but that the movie's makers did not obviously take sides.
"They are big themes, especially the environmental theme, but we always like to approach it from both sides, so later in the film when Lisa's giving a lecture about the pollution, the label of the lecture is 'An Irritating Truth'."
Leaving the “Truth” of Gore’s anti-scientific screed unchallenged while paraphrasing the adjective hardly represents approaching things from both sides.