>season 3
>The Simpsons need to make major sacrifices to scrounge together $750 for their dog’s surgery
>season 21
>The Simpsons decide on a whim to go to a vacation to Israel, insisting they pay their own way despite a trip like that easily costing $10k
Are there any other shows where writers totally forgot that the characters are supposed to be struggling financially?
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Didn't they explain that Homer got a huge raise or something at the power plant.
I think by that point the Simpson's would just run with any plots they could think of, have they been to Israel yet? No fuck it we'll sent them there
>homer has to give up his dream job to work at the nuclear plant to provide for his family
>homer leaves his nuclear plant job to pursue his dream job of the week
I don’t remember, but even if he did, to drop $10k just like that? That’s ridiculous. That’s enough to move him up a couple tax brackets. Enough to change their whole lifestyle.
was it always just handwaved away as "Springfield" that Homer and his family can struggle to get by at times despite him being an operator at a nuclear plant? On the low end guys like that should be clearing 75,000 annually and if Homer's been there ten years he should be making even more than that. Was the 80's when the show was conceived just a time when utility workers and nuclear power were perceived differently?
Why is just deciding to go to Israel on vacation a plot?
Wasn't the whole point with grimy like he was called by his friends that Homer lives in a big mansion and eats lobster
Presumably the Simpson family gets by via occasionally tapping into Homer's prodigious musical career. I imagine every so often he gets a fat check from the Bee Sharps or Sadgasm or his oddly popular one-offs, like "Everybody Hates Ned Flanders" getting used in a movie or commercial or something. Or from Bart's stint in a boy band.
He's vague friends with a number of movie directors and tv stars, they probably throw him a bone every so often.
They show has joked about this before.
Homer: Whoa, careful now. These are dangerous streets for us upper- lower-middle class types.
>why does media controlled by jews want you to go to israel and throw cash around
ever heard of inflation fucktard? and no one really wants to pay for surgery for some shitty dog.
The date of birth of the children had been changed multiple times from early 80s to 2010. You can't really care about consistency at this point
The first three seasons always made a point about them living on the fringe, when it came to maintaining their lifestyle. That's why Homer getting promoted in Simpson and Delilah was such a big deal for him, if only based Karl had stuck around and Smithers wasn't a huge prick
Have they done a "Homer raises emus" episode yet?
Maybe this is why Flanders was subtly getting phased out, so people didn't realise NuSimpsons have it as good, if not better than he did during the show's prime.
Isn't there a boycott of Israel anyway. Radiohead got a lot of shit for playing there.
Something to do with Flanders.
That was Marge's idea
Maybe because nobody cares about Christian fanatics anymore
>Homer is 38
>Their exist people who were children during season 1 that are now Homer's age
I was moreso talking about how he was Homer's well adjusted and well off opposite, but whatever floats your boat
Go home, Frank Grimes.
If I remember correctly, the Flanders took along the family on a trip to see where Jesus was. Basically Homer was a jackass, thought Ned ran away into the desert and became insane.
>Are there any other shows where writers totally forgot that the characters are supposed to be struggling financially?
honestly I've never liked that aspect of the Simpsons, or indeed most sitcoms, wouldn't mind an animated sitcom that focused on a wealthy family for a change
They have forgotten a lot of characteristics that were in the early/good seasons of the show. Take a look at the town of Springfield itself, it used to be a fairly run-down, crappy town but now it's just some weird upper-middle-class liberal city where fun and "wacky" stuff happens that the writers saw on the front page of Reddit when they were writing the script. Anything that's bad in Springfield isn't really a result of it being a dump of a town or crime or corruption anymore, it's just from the townsfolk being dumb, it's not like they were geniuses before but it feels that this trait has been stretched out and drowned out the subtler aspects of the town itself.
The same can be extended to all the characters, they used to have a little depth each, and maybe some interesting reactions with each other, now they are all just watered down with 2 or 3 "wacky" characteristics the writers can pin a bunch of crappy jokes to whenever they appear.
A lot of The Simpsons makes no sense these days. Why doesn't Marge just get a long-term job if she doesn't feel fulfilled being a housewife? Why do The Simpsons regularly go to church even though the average Christian these days doesn't?
It honestly didn't make sense back then, since the average salary for a nuclear safety technician is 4 times that of a minimum wage worker. Then again, Homer's awful with money.
They need the church setpiece and Lovejoy and maybe wife.
Do remember they kept her worthless unfunny ass around and ditched Maude just because they didn't feel like paying the VA.
Marge doesn't work, or at least only works part time most of the time.
They've got a relatively expensive house (around 180k+), and are raising 3 kids.
75k would be pretty slim at the end of that
>Simpsons makes no sense these days. Why doesn't Marge just get a long-term job if she doesn't feel fulfilled being a housewife?
I remember an episode whenever she opened up a lucrative chain of women’s gyms and another when she’s became an erotic baker. Both times she was back as a housewife in the next episode. They don’t even bother writing her deciding to quit or getting fired like when she became a cop or a real estate agent. She was happily employed by the end of the episode but the next episode just totally retconned it.
Not yet, but there was this one comic where he raised ostriches.
>being an operator at a nuclear plant
He's a 'low level' nuclear safety inspector. He used to be a nuclear technician.
Almost, he was selling ostrich burgers in a flashback, the episode where his Jaw was wired shut iirc
American dad is about a upper middle class family sometimes, other times they're scraping by for some reason to make a plot work
that was the joke, that they treated it like he was an uneducated factory worker when it's an incredibly complicated field
If i recall correctly, people who worked on the show were divided on the joke in The Day the Violence Died where Homer just keeps giving Bart increasing sums of money straight from his wallet because they're not supposed to be well off.
Listening to the commentaries you can hear how they progressively stopped caring about the reality of the show.
Groening himself is a real bitch about on-model animation and realism, but already in season 9 commentaries he stopped giving a shit.
I always justified it as Homer being irresponsible with money/actually paying off damages done to the house or other possessions.
Simpsons autists have always been a sight to behold.
I think the shtick with American Dad is supposed to be that they're reasonably well off but living beyond their means. They're supporting five people in a nice neighborhood on a single civil-servant's salary, after all.
Why the fuck do people even care about consistency in The Simpsons?
That's a case where I think the joke is funny enough to justify the inconsistency.
Because the writers don't.
Its weird watching earlier seasons and the Simpsons being super serious about going to church. You never see that in tv these days.
>Homer works at a power plant
>Easily makes at least 70k a year
But lets be honest Simpsons writers are willing to change anything establish or force in any bullshit for ratings
He was actually promoted to safety inspector in one of the first few episodes. It's a higher position in Springfield apparently.
I never felt that they were ever in real financial difficulty outside a few specific episodes based around that concept. Stan seems to make a lot of money.
It was a different time, user.
I guess. I mean, I'm older than the simpsons and still I don't remember church being a big deal in most shows back then, or in real life. But its not like I had wide vision of the world when I was 6 or anything.
There was literally an episode early on about how homer not going to church was going to make Marge leave him and all his neighbors ostracize him. How things change.
>American dad is about a upper middle class family sometimes, other times they're scraping by for some reason to make a plot work
well I meant a family that is rich enough that money problems should never show up, outside of maybe a single episode for drama purposes
Maybe its because simpsons is garbage past the movie, and the peak was 1997
That's just how shows like this evolved. Swap out Simpsons for South Park and your description still fits perfectly.
Obviously Roseanne. Most early plots or running themes were about Roseanne needing to work so the family had money, or even Dan trying to open up his own business and failing.
Once Roseanne got enough power to fire any writer who looked at her wrong, it became her soapbox and the family became wealthy because she had become wealthy. She wanted the show to include her stances on things because it was her show - so it became about women's rights and gay acceptance.
I thought they only got rich in the finale. Mind you all my knowlege of this show was watching bits over my life as other family members watched.
The last season. Even before that it was getting out of control with Roseanne changing lots of her own show up. Apparently it's coming back in a month and it'll be about nothing but gay relationships, abortion, marijuana, and Trump bashing.
They certainly know enough celebrities personally by now. Maybe they get handouts.
The show started in the early 90s when the Moral Majority/Christian revival thing was big. It was kind of a reflection of American culture at that time.
It just changes scenarios to fit the current audience. Back when it started, it was appealing to families that were in a similar scenario. Now, it's trying to appeal to millennials that think travel is the only important thing
In season 1 his assistant is promoted higher than him and Homer acts extremely defensive when Marge brings it up. I don't think he's that high up.
so many Simpsons threads since Disney bought them. wonder why.
It was only memorable for revealing that Homer is a Carolina Panthers fan.
It's more because during the Obama years, it became trendy to be a rich liberal hipster so the show was written to reflect that.
You seem to forget that homer is actually a millionaire, what with his work as an astronaut, country western manager, a singer, inventor, mountain climber, beer baron, and a heavyweight boxing contender. He just doesn't want his kids being spoiled brats so he pretends he's poor. He's just bad at it.
Actually it's quite interesting to see how the Simpsons has changed with the times. First they had the darkish episodes in Seasons 1-3 that had a kind of Christian message to them in the conservative post-Reagan America of the early 90s, then a cynical libertarian message during the mid-90s, then fratboy/grossout jokes in the Scully era which was back when this kind of humor was hot, and then it became the travails of neurotic rich hipsters.
Didn't he use to be a Cowboys fan?
>Groening himself is a real bitch about on-model animation and realism, but already in season 9 commentaries he stopped giving a shit.
That's funny given how much more wooden the animation has gotten with time.
Or on the opposite, Tim Allen who didn't have any creative control on Home Improvement to stop the writers from shoving in liberal messages so as soon as he got his own show with total control, he turned it into a Republican soapbox until it got canned because it didn't fit the network's guidelines for acceptable politics;
F L A N R D S
He's the man that I hate best
>You know, Wilson, that fence you're always standing behind has inspired me to build a fence of my own. One to keep out all of the disgusting wetbacks from this pristine country.
>Hmm, I don't know if that's a good idea, Tim.
>youtu.be
How did they get away with this?
>Or his creepy little offspring, Rod and Todd!
>That's us!
>Hooray!
>"wacky" characteristics the writers can pin a bunch of crappy jokes to whenever they appear.
HI, EVERYBODY!
I always thought the point was that he spends like half his income on booze
>and Trump bashing.
Pass, then. I was excited for this, too.
I'm not a political person. I don't give a shit who wins what or whatever the fuck. I'm not pro-Trump or anti-Trump or anything.
I just can't fucking stand hearing "HURR TRUMP IS BAD AMIRITE?" in every fucking thing now. I watched the first episode of Fuller House to give it a shot and I was done when there were 2 Trump jokes within the first 10 fucking minutes out of a kid's mouth.
The man's here for 4 years. Let it fucking go already.
Tim "sold some blow then sold out my bro" Allen is a conservitard? Lel
>The man's here for 8 years.
ftfy
My 10 year old nephew auditioned for that show he was going to play a gender fuild child. It's a shame he didn't get the part I really would of liked to meet Goodman
>he was going to play a gender fuild child.
>could be gender fluid or gender filled, user's spelling sucks ass
I don't even question this being true or not. That's sad.
I think the network that aired it didn't want to renew contracts as they would have to pay big bucks. This is us is made by fox and aired on ABC.
Yeah, you could've gone bowling.
Or to a stripclub. He took the underage boyfriend to one.
>gender filled child
By that point Homer has had several other jobs, won the lottery, been an astronaut, been a beer company mascot, Krusty lookalike, a voice actor, major film actor, best friends with the local mafia don, popular cartoon character, been a media darling, sold a script, edited a Mel Gibson movie, been an actor personal assistant, and managed the India branch of the power plant.
they had spare cash by then
>watching a classic, Golden Age Simpsons episode from season 6
>Homer gets a job as a limo driver! XD
>look it's Mel Brooks! XD
The Simpsons were already dead by season 6, weren't they?
She's pro-Trump according to her Twitter feed.
Yeah, like how Homer can go from being cripplingly retarded to knowing multiple languages.
Yeah, imagine a modern day cartoon where the wife leaves the husband because he doesn't go to church. She'd be seen as some fundy Jesus freak, whereas in that episode, Marge was portrayed in the right while Homer's alternative to religion was seen as lazy and absurd.
He also owns the Denver Broncos
Makes you wonder why Homer just doesn't go back to that old bowling job now that he's got money. It'd be a good excuse as any for the writers to write out Mr. Burns and Smithers and kick out Harry Shearer.
I know Shearer has been giving them problems, but I imagine that they're going to double down on him because they think the memes about the Skinner & The Superintendent clip mean people want more of them on the show.
>LOL dude Homer's new boss is a supervillain!
>HE JUST BLEW UP FRANCE XD
>now Homer owns a football team LOOOOOOOOOOOOOL
>OOH LOOKIE SPRINGFIELD HAS MR BURNS' MONEY!
>What shall we do?
>BUILD MONORAIL!
>Guest-starring Leonard Nimoy as himself because why not?!
>Homer gets a job driving the monorail because why not?
Damn.
>oh man. OH MAN! what if they get a FARM?
>hahaha dude YES [hits bong] and then Homer accidentally makes a new crop using radiation
>LOOOOOOOOL and it's got nicotine in it
>season 6
>Homer the Astronaut
leaving aside the question of where exactly the Simpsons departed "reality",
the fact is Homer could make so much just from turning up places to eat dinner and be "Homer Simpson, astronaut" that your point is moot
Gumball.
tomacco is actually a thing
the fact is most people don't realize the extent of possible cross-pollination of the solanicae, so "radiation" makes an easy explanation of what would otherwise be five minutes of Lisa talking, which they already know you hate
how does it work? do people take a bit and chew it like chewing tobaccy or do you eat the skin and smoke the tobacco part?
he literally says in one episode that he makes $6k/year
The fruit apparently doesn't contain that much nicotine but leafs have more of it than in regular tobacco leafs do. Making Tomaccos is pretty easy though (as in they were first created during 1940s), all that you need to is to graft tomato scion into tobacco stock.
EUUYGH?