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Julian Assange
Bill Oakley.
Former Simpsons writer/showrunner and notorious "hacktivist" Bill Oakley, who has been in communication with fans via the internet since before most people even had the internet, has been tearin' up the Twitter lately, uploading a treasure trove of rare Simpsons material that has never before been made public. Among the documents uploaded so far: the first draft of "$pringfield, (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Legalized Gambling)," the first draft of the "Skinner and the Superintendent" segment from "22 Short Films About Springfield," the original story outline for "Two Bad Neighbors," and a list of random ideas.

Among the more intriguing ideas lost to the sands of time:

  • An aborted "$pringfield" subplot involving Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Sylvester Stallone maintaining a Planet Hollywood in Springfield that got dropped since the three actors never actually agreed to be on the show.
  • More scenes of Springfield being hit by an economic recession, which somehow feels more timely and relevant than last year's "No Loan Again, Naturally" despite being written a decade earlier.
  • George and Barbara Bush eating pizza.
  • An episode plot where Bart obtains 144 Jeeps for some reason.
  • This visual gag:
     
    The town secretary records the vote in a ledger, where we see previous idiotic town votes, e.g. "Above-Ground H-Bomb Test," "Lower Drinking Age to 14," and "Build Monorail."

stephen kingCelebrated Goosebumps author Stephen King churned out a new book, Under the Dome, which features a town encased in a giant dome (possible metaphor???), which The Internet immediately declared to be a rip-off of The Simpsons Movie, which was of course the first movie to feature a dome. King denied these grave charges of plagiarism, claiming to have come up with the plot when he started the story in the 1970s, which pre-dates The Simpsons by a week or two. He further attempted to prove his innocence by scanning the first 60 pages of his manuscript, typed out in their original IBM typescript, which should erase any lingering doubts because faking old typewriter fonts is impossible.

It should be noted that even if King ripped off The Simpsons Movie, The Simpsons Movie is itself a rip-off of Neon Genesis: Evangelion, so uhhhh double jeopardy?? [The Independent]

Lest you think The Simpsons Archive, the holy grail of Simpsons nerdery, has been slacking (it is currently seven years behind on its encyclopedic episode capsules), contributor Tim Reardon [?!] has written an incredibly thorough 18,719- word summary, transcript, and review of The Simpsons Ride, including every line in the queue videos, the pictures on the walls, and a list of every character who appears in it. Why pay $50 to go on the ride when you can read this instead? [The Simpsons Archive]

The newly News Corp.-owned Wall Street Journal had Mark I. Pinksy, author of The Gospel According to The Simpsons, review the new Flanders' Book of Faith in a move that's totally synergystic! [Wall Street Journal]