rubbercat.net/simpsons - In The News

Simpsons Gets Lower Ratings Than Sit Down, Shut Up

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 01:59:00 +0000

THE D'OH REPORT

Not that ratings matter or anything, but last night's Simpsons episode got less viewers than the first episode of the quickly-cancelled Sit Down, Shut Up (5.11 million versus 5.2 million) [Simpsons Channel, Wikipedia]

Simpsons Picks A Side In Cola War

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 03:14:00 +0000

SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER

According to longtime director David Silverman's Twitter, The Simpsons did a Coca-Cola commercial for a sporting event called the Superbowl [Twitter]

The Secret Origin of The Simpsons

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 01:16:00 +0000

THE INSIDE SCOOP VIGINTENNIAL GROEN DRAIN

The Simpsons turn 20 today (that is, if you don't count the Christmas special as the first episode and completely ignore the original shorts from The Tracey Ullman Show), and there's been a number of retrospectives to mark the occasion. An oft-repeated claim in many histories is that creator Matt Groening, fearing the loss of his Life in Hell characters, came up with the Simpsons in fifteen minutes before a meeting with Ullman producer James L. Brooks. But the characters actually originated nearly 40 years ago, in an unpublished novel Groening wrote in high school:

Chat Transcript (April 6, 1999)

Question hobgoblin: How old were you when you first came up with the idea for "The Simpsons"? I know that the show has been on for a long time.
[...]
Matt_G "The Simpsons" originated in high school.
Matt_G I wrote a bleak little novel called "The Mean Little Kids" starring a teenage Bart Simpson with buckteeth and a very bad complexion.

Interview with Robert William Kubey, published in Creating Television: Conversations with the People Behind 50 Years of American TV (Late 1991)

How quickly did The Simpsons gel in your mind?

I needed to come up with an idea really quickly. In the back of my mind was the idea of doing something that might possibly end up spinning off into its own TV show, so I created a family which I thought would lend itself to a lot of different kinds of stories. In high school I had written a novel, a sort of a very sour Catcher in the Rye, self pitying, adolescent novel starring Bart Simpson as a very troubled teenager. I took that family and transferred it, made them younger, and then drew. It took about 15 minutes to design the characters the first time out.

Were they all the same characters that we now know and love?

Yes, but they've been transformed.

Why didn't you leave Bart as an adolescent?

TV does children really badly, and I thought there was room for something different. Teenagers are already running rampant on television, but kids are done very unrealistically in sitcoms. Sometimes, a particular character gels with an audience and becomes the star.

Was Bart at the center all along?

Yeah. The rest of the Simpsons in my original conception were in a struggle to be normal and Bart was the one who thought that being normal was boring.

And now you know... the rest of the story.

Cancellation Watch: "We Have It For Two More Seasons"

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 00:52:00 +0000

KANCELLATION KOUNTDOWN

When asked how long The Simpsons has left, Fox bigwig Kevin Reilly said "We have it for two more seasons and then we'll sit down and see where we are," which means the show may not be renewed during the next contract renegotiations. [iF Magazine]

Fourth Seth MacFarlane Show Possibly In The Works

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 23:49:00 +0000

FROM THE FRONT LINES OF THE CARTOON WARS

Fox Entertainment President: "We've got one other show we're contemplating with Seth... but our plan is not all Seth, all the time." [Freakin' Sweet News]

Simpsons Channel Back With A Vengeance

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 23:35:00 +0000

WEB-WATCH

Simpsons Channel has returned from the dead, and it's mad as hell!!! In a departure from the normally staid tone of the site, site owner Adam Wolf posted 10 reasons why readers should not buy the recently released Season 20 DVD/Blu-ray set. He even encourages readers to BREAK THE LAW by providing a link to a torrent site. Is nothing sacred??? [Simpsons Channel]

Simpsons Channel Down, rubbercat.net/simpsons Becomes World's #1 Simpsons News Source!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 01:03:00 +0000

WEB-WATCH

Simpsons Channel, the New York Times of Simpsons news, has been knocked offline for unknown reasons, which means this site has moved up the ranks to become the world wide web's #1 source for Simpsons news!!! Booya!!! [Twitter.com/SimpsonsChannel]

Simpsons To End Next Year

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 19:11:00 +0000

THE INSIDE SCOOP

I'm going to go out on a limb and declare that The Simpsons will finally, mercifully end in 2011, after twenty-two seasons.

The show has yet to be renewed beyond the 2010-2011 season (season 22), so there's no guarantee there'll be a Season 23.
In November, the Animation Guild blog mentioned that the writers were working on "another thirteen episodes". Each production season, the last couple of episodes become the first episodes of the next season; these are called "holdovers." The current season (season 21) has eight holdovers - notice the production codes in this chart. Presumably, this means next season will also have eight holdovers, which when coupled with the aforementioned thirteen episodes will fulfill a complete season order of twenty-one episodes, with no holdovers for a 23rd season.
The show has been losing a million viewers each season for the past couple seasons with no end in sight. It often gets lower ratings than Family Guy. Each episode costs somewhere around $3 million. All of these must be major concerns for Fox executives... but then again The Simpsons is the sixth-highest earner on television, and makes like a billion dollars from merchandise and syndication, so ratings are probably irrelevant.
The 20th anniversary hoopla feels like a final victory parade to me, a last hurrah before they ride into the sunset. It's probably wise to end it while goodwill is high.
I just want to be right so I can look prophetic.

They Redid The Simpsons Arcade Game For Some Reason

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 13:57:00 +0000

SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER

2009 was the year of "fixing" beloved Simpsons things that weren't broke to begin with, starting with the godawful new HD title sequence and ending with an iPhone version of the Simpsons Arcade Game from 1991, one of the very few Simpsons video games that is still remembered fondly.

What's different: The storyline (no more Smithers stealing Maggie for some bizarre reason), you can only play as Homer, you can slap him to revive him, new design (as far as I can tell, it looks like a modern episode and not all pixelated), and characters/locations that weren't around or as iconic in 1991 (including the Rich Texan).

What's the same: The basic controls (I think?), and the dated Binky-with-a-ghetto-blaster level transistions (which I like). [United Simpsons]

Not Even The Guest Stars Watch The Simpsons

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 13:00:00 +0000

THE D'OH REPORT

Mitch Albom, author of Tuesdays with Morrie, who had a cameo in last week's episode:
Months passed. Christmas. New Year's. And last Sunday, I was in the car on my way to a birthday party when someone called and said, "Hey, your 'Simpsons' episode is on."

And I said, "Again, please?"

They never called to tell me.

So I missed it.

[Detroit Free Press]

Simpsons Enters Fourth Decade

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 12:35:00 +0000

ANNOYED GRUNTS

I just want to direct your attention to this Dead Homer Society post from last February because it owns:

The Simpsons has been on for so long now that the world itself has changed around them and as a result the characters no longer epitomize what they're supposed to be satirizing. Homer and Marge are exquisitely crafted late model Baby Boomers; they came of age in the seventies and became adults in the eighties. He's a union guy; she's a housewife; they have cranky World War II generation parents, they go to church out of a sense of duty and their kids lead unstructured, small town lives. They are run of the mill late 1980s Americans, that is when they were created and that is the context in which they best fit.

[...]

The show is on Season 20, but culturally speaking it's going to enter its fourth decade next year. The characters can always be drawn the same way, but that doesn't keep them from showing their age.

CONAN SNUBBED???

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 12:22:00 +0000

THE MARGE REPORT

Back in 1993, when David Letterman headed over to CBS to start The Late Show, The Simpsons paid tribute with a not-very-funny couch gag (see screenshot here). Why didn't they do a similar tribute when famous Simpsons alum Conan O'Brien took over The Tonight Show??? And don't give me that "they couldn't because it started in June" B.S. excuse. Also why did they choose Letterman over Conan for a not-funny-at-all segment last night?? (Don't give me that "because Letterman has the Top 10 list" crap.) These two things add up to one conclusion: The Simpsons is snubbing Conan!!! What is the reason? A source tells rubbercat.net/simpsons that producer Al Jean has had it in for Conan ever since Conan gave him a wedgie during a staff meeting in '92... No denial from Jean as of yet... Developing...

POPE SHAKES DOWN SIMPSONS BLOGGER!!!

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 07:03:00 +0000

WEB-WATCH DOCTRINE OF D'OH

Charlie Sweatpants of the sycophantic Simpsons blog Dead Homer Society nicely asked the Vatican's newspaper (The Vatican Plain-Dealer) for an unabridged copy of the story where Pope Ratzinger personally declared himself to be the world's biggest Bart fan and they tried to charge him eight whole euros ($800 American) for the privilege of reading an untranslated article. Has the Catholic Church adopted Rupert Murdoch's pay-for-news business model? [Dead Homer Society]

Producers Not Hiding Any Terrible Secrets, Tried To Stop Tell-All Book Anyway

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 19:21:00 +0000

NEWS OF THE NASAL THE BROOKSOSPHERE

Al Jean, executive producer and current showrunner:
"Nobody's perfect," Mr. Jean said in a telephone interview. "But I don't think we have terrible secrets to hide."
John Ortved, author of The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History:

The story ran in the August 2007 issue, and by the fall I'd signed on with Faber and Faber to expand the material into a book. When word of this got out, [executive producer James L.] Brooks sent a letter to every current Simpsons employee, and all the former ones he thought mattered, asking them not to speak to me. The writers' agents sent denial after denial for interview requests and eventually stopped responding altogether. When I asked a mutual acquaintance to put in a query with Ari Emanuel, chief of the Endeavor agency (now WME Entertainment) - where many of the Simpsons writers were represented - Emanuel told my friend he couldn't even begin to talk about it. James L. Brooks was on the warpath.

Pope Praises Simpsons...???

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 22:10:00 +0000

DOCTRINE OF D'OH

VATICAN CITY (AP) - To put it as the devout Ned Flanders would, the Vatican's newspaper thinks "The Simpsons" are an okely dokely bunch.

L'Osservatore Romano on Tuesday congratulated the show on its 20th anniversary, praising its philosophical leanings as well as its stinging and often irreverent take on religion.

If you're making a supposedly subversive show and the Vatican praises it, you are doing something wrong [Chicago Tribune]

WE GET TWITTER

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 05:58:00 +0000

THE INSIDE SCOOP

you can not stop us.

we have this twitter.

you follow now.

are you afraid?

death to @springfieldx2.

death to @simpsonschannel.

@rubbrcatsimp is great.

[Twitter.com/rubbrcatsimp]

David Letterman Influences The Simpsons From The Future

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 08:33:00 +0000

TREEHOUSE OF ERROR
What's wrong with the graphic from this CNN article about The Simpsons? Well, although Late Night with David Letterman started in 1982, featured many future Simpsons writers (including George Meyer), and most assuredly influenced The Simpsons, The Late Show with David Letterman began in 1993, well after The Simpsons' fourth season. [CNN]

Animation Outsourced To Georgia

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 06:39:00 +0000

AZTEC THEATRE PENCIL PUSHING WHAA??

Due to Film Roman's inability to meet their demands for "faster, better, cheaper" animation, Simpsons producers have switched animation studios for the first time since 1992. Starting next season, The Simpsons will be primarily animated by a small animation studio in post-Soviet Georgia. Here's a preview clip. [Dead Homer Society]

Special Features For Season 20 DVD Announced

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:41:00 +0000

SPRINGFIELD SHOPPER

Fox has released an official press release about the upcoming Season 20 DVD/Blu-ray, detailing the many bonus features that will come included with the $50 set:

No audio commentaries
A "sneak preview" for a Simpsons documentary scheduled to air 2 days before the DVD is released

[TVShowsOnDVD.com]

Fictional Band Nominated For Fictional Award

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:36:00 +0000

VOCAL VOCATIONS

Harry Shearer has yet to win an Emmy for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance, but his alter ego Derek Smalls, along with the rest of Spinal Tap, have been nominated for a Grammy for their latest album, Back From The Dead. [Twitter.com/letwits]

Did Stephen King Steal The Plot Of The Simpsons Movie? And Who Would Want To?

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 02:41:00 +0000

READING DIGEST
Celebrated 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. [The Independent]

The Simpsons Goes Green

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:03:00 +0000

THE INSIDE SCOOP ANNOYED GRUNTS PARDON MY ZINGER

Al Gore would be proud: so far, Season 21 is the most environmentally-friendly season of The Simpsons yet. What makes this season so green? Each episode is made from a recycled plotline from an earlier episode:

Homer the Whopper: Radioactive Man but with Homer instead of Milhouse

Bart Gets A 'Z': Sweet Seymour Skinner's Baadasssss Song but with Mrs. Krabappel instead of Principal Skinner

The Great Wife Hope: The Homer They Fall but with Marge instead of Homer

Congratulations on reducing your carbon footprint, Simpsons writers!

Simpsons Replaced With Infomercial

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 18:02:00 +0000

FROM THE FRONT LINES OF THE CARTOON WARS

On November 8th, The Simpsons will be replaced by an episode of Family Guy, which will then be followed by a 30-minute "variety special" starring Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane and featuring integrated advertisements for the upcoming Windows 7 operating system. [Variety via A.V. Club]

Is There An O.J. Simpson Reference in Community's Credits?

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 03:41:00 +0000

UNRELATED SIMPSONS IN THE NEWS Is it just us, or is there something a little weird about a knife stabbing deeply into the "Nicole Brown" part of actress Yvette Nicole Brown's name? We don't doubt that SAG naming rules have forced Brown to suffer enough when slating her name in auditions ("Yes, 'Nicole Brown,' like OJ's murdered ex-wife"), but now that unfortunate comparison's been enshrined in the opening credits of her big break.
[Movieline]

Nobody Wants To Hire Simpsons Writers

noreply@blogger.com (Adam) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 02:07:00 +0000

WRITER WATCH

Newsarama tried to stealthily ask showrunner Al Jean why he's been showrunner for the past nine years, and he answered that the writers haven't been getting offers to work on other comedies and that comedy might finally be back on the upswing. I guess all those Judd Apatow-produced movies and animated comedies (some of them not created by Seth MacFarlane) and single-camera sitcoms like Arrested Development and The Office that have popped up in the past couple of years were actually part of a downswing?

Nrama: But haven't you always had a philosophy of keeping the writers rotating? It kept new blood flowing.

Jean: Well, it was never a philosophy. There were two dynamics at work. In the 1990's, there were a lot of comedies on the air. People who were on 'The Simpsons' got all these offers to work elsewhere. So they would leave, often to head their own projects. So we'd replace them.

This decade, unfortunately, comedy has not been doing so well. If people are doing a good job, then I keep them. So it doesn't rotate as much. Still, I'm encouraged by this year's ratings. Comedy might be back on the upswing. 'American Family' has started off really well.

[Newsarama]