Sunday, May 31, 2009

PoP News: MTV Movie Awards and Repeat of the Simpsons Tonight


Hey! Well now that this season of the Simpsons is complete, I decided to continue my blog with just some regular pop culture news...well at least the pop culture I'm really obsessed with at the moment. I will also continue with some Simpsons recaps of the repeats from this season since I started my blog pretty late for Season 20. So expect a general recap of tonight's episode of "Mypods and Broomsticks." I can't wait to recap this season's Treehouse of Horrors Episode.

Also in Simpsons news, (1) I recently bought The Simpsons Gone Wild DVD. The cover has Homer in a bra which the Best Buy employee found shameful in a funny way. Can't wait to watch the episodes. (2) I was on the ABC Lost website and found a familiar book that recently played an important role in a Simpsons episode. This episode was entitled "Four Great Women and a Manicure" and it was important because one of stories is based on the book The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. I never looked up information on the book. So I was very suprised to find that it was also importanton Lost. On the website, it shows that it was featured on the season 3 episode "Par Avion." Rand's book is summarized as the a book about the author's hero Howard Roark, an architect whose brilliant architectural designs lead to conflicts with his colleagues, society and a women with whom he is in love (http://abc.go.com/primetime/lost/index?pn=bookclub). I now realize I spelled Maggie's name incorrectly as Rourke instead of Roark. I guess I should read this book since it's relevant to my 2 favorite television shows.


Now for the MTV Movie Awards. I'm usually not interested in this award show, but this year they promised to show exclusive clips and have the casts of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and New Moon. This is super exciting. I can't wait for the Harry Potter film. If the books were still coming out this would have probably been a Harry Potter blog LoL.

I'm excited about New Moon because now that I am almost done with the Twilight Saga, I realize that it is the last good book of the series. The next two books are pretty awful which explains why it's taking me forever to finish them. They're 700 pages of little progress and a sickening amount of character self deprecation used by the author to make the characters seem like have normal human flaws when it just seems like they just have low self esteem and care about others to an unhealthy degree.
This is characerized by a lot of moments like, "I'm such an awful person because I can't give more than one life to make you happy ... I would die a million times just to make you happy ... Why does he love me, I'm just a plain person who everyone else in the world thinks is great ... I have do everthing to make this person happy even if I end up feeling horrible for the rest of my life .... But I still need to be more selfless like him." These are not really lines from the book, but it is pretty much what I have been reading for the last few weeks. I don't mind these lines every once in a while, but not every other sentence. Sorry for the rant.

Nevertheless, I am excited for New Moon movie. I really enjoyed that book because Bella seemed like she was about to get some sense, but then Edward decided to be senseless and then the horribleness of the next 2 books began. Luckily, the award show begins at 9, so hopefully I'll see the Simpsons...unless I go out, which I might :(. Okay enjoy the awards and the Simpsons rerun.

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Hank Azaria on Jimmy Kimmel; Star Trek

If you didn't know Hank Azaria was on Jimmy Kimmel last night. He spoke about his new film, Night at the Museum: Battle for the Smithsonian, and the Simpsons. During the interview he did some of his voices including Moe, Comic Guy and that dance teacher from "Four Great Women and a Manicure" and "Smoke on the Daughter". I pasted the video below...enjoy.



Also, I saw Star Trek today. It was a bit long, but it was filled with laughs (Chris Pine is really funny) and amazing CGI. If you haven't seen it already go now or at least make sure you set aside the cash for a dvd OR do what I do and borrow it from the library.

Until next time readers, Namaste!

Thursday, May 21, 2009

"Coming to Homerica" Recap ... Not Affiliated with Coming to America I'm sure

Well this episode was symbolic of the immigration of Mexicans to the United States and even the immigration of the Irish to New York. Although the episode does in someway represent a political viewpoint that I happen to agree with, I think it would be satisfying to any viewer. It simplified the issue to the extent that it becomes about the people as opposed to the policies and I think this is a great way to appeal to all audiences. It also made the hypocrisy of some of the viewpoints very clear. But I'm not here to judge, but to let you know how I felt about the episode... if that makes sense.

Well the episode starts with the health food craze that has engulfed America (in NYC it is definitely big). So in order to take advantage of the trend like many other fast food restaurants, Krusty decided to create a burger using the cheapest vegetable available, Barley, from Ogdenville. Ogdenville is a town adjacent to Springfield with Norwegian residents that specializes in all things barley. When all the residents of Springfield rushed to get a taste of this new burger, they all became sick. This is because the barley was tainted with the pieces of a rat that got stuck in one the Ogdenvilleans harvesting tractor. Gross! An Ogdenville citizen foolishly reveals this during a television interview that he didn't even know had begun. As a result the town is ruined. They are forced to close down all their refineries and other barley related businesses and they soon begin to migrate to Springfield. I think this presents both a hilarious view of the cause of the immigration. Tainted food because a single rat, but then again Krusty was choosing the cheapest vegetable that he could find. So I guess there is fault to pass around.

These Ogdenvilleans are hired by everyone around town. Homer hires quite a few to affix his rain gutters and Marge is finally able to afford a nanny. Everything seems well until the population of Ogdenvilleans become a nuisance. Maggie's first word is marred by a Norwegian accent, the ER is packed with Ogdenvilleans (who I suspect do not have regular health care) and Moe no longer sells Duff, but a strong liqueur called Aquavit. Homer even starts to wear Norwegian garb. Very similar to the whole "Mexican Problem" in the US.

The first solution to the Ogdenville problem is to create a border patrol. Originally it is inept because there were only two police officers. Eddie was nursing an illness. Soon they enlist towns folk who are equally inept because they are drunk (with beer and power) and have guns. It eventually becomes necessary to build a wall to keep the invaders out. Of course they hired the Ogdenville residents to help construct and erect it. In the end, they decide to allow the Ogdenville residents back in because they are pretty alright. Being the smart people they are, the residents of Ogdenville made sure they created a door just in case. So there was no breaking down the Berlin wall moment.

This episode was a great commentary on current issue of immigration. It reminds me of the episode "Much Apu about Nothing". In that episode the Mayor Quimby uses immigrants as a scapegoat for the problems the town is facing, so Apu takes the citizenship exam. This episode was not as heartwarming, but good nonetheless. It was a great end to season 20.

Now that the season is over, I'll probably watch the repeats and complete some recaps for the earlier episodes.

Until next time Namaste!

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Pop Culture Break....Simpsons Post to be up soon.

pic from EW.com

Hey well I made this a pop culture blog because I knew there would be things I couldn't help but post about. I'm running late on my Simpsons post because it's graduation season. I'm officially a college graduate...yay!..I just need a job now LoL. But yeah I loved the episode and can't wait to share my thoughts on it.



However as you can see by the pic, I'm very excited about this new Twilight Saga movie, New Moon. I started reading the books to deal with Harry Potter withdrawal. They are not nearly as good as Harry Potter, but they've been filling the void. Out of the 3 books I have read of the series so far, New Moon is my favorite. I can't wait to see the movie. The poster is great although Jacob/Taylor's are seems photoshop'ed. If it's not photoshop'ed I'm very impressed. The movie isn't out till November, but no worries Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is out in July. Thank God!

Okay, I'll have the Simpsons post up as soon as possible. Until then catch up on the older posts, spot my grammatical errors and missing words, and look at the Harry Potter trailer. Also find a high res pic of the poster on my favorite Twilight website: twilightsource.com

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Recap of "Four Great Women and a Manicure"...finger lookin good :)

I have to say that (1) that I just got a manicure on Monday for graduation, so its hard for me to type and (2) this episode was kind of good, but not as great as the last few episodes.

This is gonna be a brief recap because my fake nails make it difficult to type. Okay, so the episode starts with the couch gag; the Simpsons get carved out of marble, but are quickly replaced with a man on a horse the artist finds more to his liking. I'm not sure if that structure exists, but there you go.

The main story line is about Marge taking Lisa to the nail salon (hence the title of this article). Marge and Lisa then exchange stories on the importance of being smart and powerful vs. beautiful as a women.

Marge starts with the story of Queen Elizabeth, who is portrayed by Patty, as the perfect example of a women who has those qualities. She only lacks a...no, not a man, but a husband. I have to say the whole four hundred years before Kurt Gibson's famous home run was funny...what a random way to help establish a time frame. And who is Kurt Gibson? So yeah, Elizabeth searches for a husband but is stuck will pretty lame options. Prince Ralph of Austria ("off with my head"), Julio of Spain, and Sir Walter Raleigh (but he does have tobacco) and is played by Homer. So, after Julio is dumped he decides to attack England, but not before making sure that Lenny gets some bad things put inside him. Meanwhile Raleigh cheats with Elizabeth's maiden and Elizabeth catches him when in a towel and they are swiftly punished. Moe then confuses Elizabeth's body with that of Grendel and calls for Beowulf. When he realizes his error he tells of the coming invasion of the Spanish Armada. Raleigh exclaims "what Armada?" Moe replies "nothing what armada with you." That was hilarious and random. I like random jokes. So yeah England and Spain go to war and the English win because Raleigh accidentally sets the ship on fire and the "flaming dreamboat" (oh Julio :S) defeats Spain. Elizabeth finally proclaims that she doesnt need a man because she has a England...okayyy

So Lisa is about to tell her story of Snow White when a lawyer with atrociously long nails ("can you sharpen these") that I suppose are used to tear holes into people interrupts her. Lisa is forced to modify her dwarves to "crabby, drunky, hungry, greedy, lenny, kearny and doc-tor Hibbert" and there off to work song Ho Hi. With lines such as "we're bi, we're bi, we're bi" and use shrooms to get hi. The evil witch looks into her HDTV instead of mirror. She sends Willy to kill Lisa and has a box for Lisa's heart, body and Willy's body. Willy can't kill her or spider pig and doesn't manage to kill anything else. So Snow White is forced to eat the witch's apple, falls asleep and is brought to life by a lady doctor.

Marge tells the third story about a women who is held back by her husband. It's about a Marge who plays Lady MacBeth. In order to further her career she has Homer kill the other actors to get better roles until they are all dead. The ghosts haunt Marge and cause her to die of a heart attack, but even after Homer masters his monologue she still tries to get Homer to do other plays as a ghost, so Homer kills himself. ....ugh I didn't really see the point of this whole story. This made this episode lose points in my opinion. It might have fit better into a Halloween episode.

The last story is for Maggie and it is based on what Lisa describes as made for right wing losers. It is entitled The Foutainhead by Ayn Rand. The story is about Maggie Rourke, an architect, portrayed by our Maggie at a school called Medicri-tots. The teacher Mr. Toohey wanted all the children to conform to mediocrity, so he consistently tears down Maggie's blocks. At parent teacher night Homer admits that if he took care of toddlers there would be a lot of strangled babies LoL. Maggie continues to deny her teacher and is put on trial. She defends herself in Jodie Foster's voice...I never thought Maggie would sound like that. Well Maggie grows up to be a successful architect and encouraged other children to be creative. Alhtough Marge preaches a lesson of encouraging creativity, she doesn't follow it because in the last scene she discourages Maggie from using the nail polish to make her Starry Night-like art work on the wall of the salon. Mother knows best ;)

Okay as you can see this episode was very disjointed. The first two stories were uncanny and funny, but the last two were so random I didn't really laugh or get it much. Hope you enjoyed it more than I did. Can't wait for Lost tonight!

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Recap of "Waverly Hills, 9021-D'Oh"...Alaska Nebraska and Anton

Well this episode was pretty interesting. I don't remember laughing too much, but it definitely had its moments. I tuned in late and didn't get to see the beginning, so if you know it let me know. I still have finals, so I don't think I'll have any time to watch it again soon.

Well, in the first scene Marge was on a run and met a guy selling "Science Water," obviously a play on Vitamin Water except with flavors like "Purple," "Potato Lime," and "New Car Smell." They sound as a appealing as the real Vitamin Water flavors. Well after a taste test Marge has to use the bathroom really badly and the only place she finds with functioning toilets is Springfield Elementary. After using the bathroom she discovers that the school is horribly overcrowded...desks stacked on top of another and kids asking for help while squished against the doors...and sometimes teachers allow Ralph to teach (it seems he can read upside down and likes to jump out of windows when done with his lesson). Marge decides she wants to send her kids to a school in a better district.

Her choice is to send Bart and Lisa to a school in Waverly Hills; the Springfield version of Beverly Hills. Lisa wants to go because it is "better to have learned than lost than never learn again." Bart doesn't want lose Milhouse, so Homer makes fun of Bart by singing "Stand By Me" and he is quickly joined by Milhouse. I have to say that part didn't make much sense to me. I was left wondering how was that was supposed to be funny.

Well, in the end they decide to transfer Bart and Lisa, but Homer has to find an apartment in order to proves he lives in the rich district. So he goes to Cookie Kwan, #1 on the West Side, in order to find the cheapest, smallest, and most pathetic living space. After showing him a place she thinks fits his wishes, she asks Homer, "So cheap, ay?" and Homer who somehow hears this as a Asian language responds "so-shee-pay, so-shee-pay." That was one of the funniest parts of this episode.

When the family arrives to register the children, a Waverly Hills song plays in the background (a take on Weezer's Beverly Hills song) and they learn that they will have to prove their residence to the Inspector or Anton Chigurh, Javier Bardem's character No Country for Old Men. I just saw that movie a few weeks ago, so I was horrified by his presence. In this episode he used his air pressurizer to validate Homer's parking. Because of the inspector Homer is forced to live in his one room apartment in the Royal Waverly.

Meanwhile at the new school Bart and Lisa learn how to fit in. Bart has chief Wiggum fake his arrest so he looks like a rebel in exchange for Bart going to Ralph's birthday party. Lisa who is intially enthralled by the school's on campus stables, field trips to Europe and cafeteria with real meat has a harder time fitting in with the multiple Katelynns (this is just the spelling I chose) in the school and getting lame grades. Bart helps her out by telling everyone she is friends with teen popstar sensation Alaska Nebraska (I don't think I have to explain who this is supposed to be...okay she's like Hannah Montana), but Lisa doesn't even know who she is.

All is well until the Catelinnes ask to meet AL NE (aka Alaska Nebraska). Lisa is forced to beg AL NE for tickets. Alaska asks Lisa what is her fave episode of the show and Lisa just asks, "you have a show?" So Alaska who is obviously annoyed just tells her to do what she did to get popular at 16: get a new nose, get famous, and date a Clipper. She then pulls out a cigarette and admits to Lisa that she just lipsynched all of her advice. You gotta love Alaska. lol. In the end Alaska has her security (or insecurity guards as Lisa puts it) remove Lisa from her dressing room. The Katelins chase Lisa out of town because of her lying and for wearing last seasons shoes :)

Meanwhile, Bart faces trouble when he doesn't show up to Ralph's birthday party.

Homer and Marge are starting over thier relationship like a college couple because Homer is practically living in a dorm. They go to kegger parties, dance like weirdos and make out on a balcony. They even hook up Selma and Patty with some of Homer's neighbors. The guy with Selma is freaked out and wonders "what was I thinking?" Poor guy must have had some strong beer goggles LoL. H & M also go to a Tapas bar and Homer eventually gives her the key to his apartment. Like a typical women, I'm not included in this ;), Marge redecorates Homers apartment and Homer gets upset because he can't find his Wii.

In the midst of their bickering the Inspector, Anton, arrives. Marge and Homer are then forced to whip out all the kid toys and make a childlike mess. The inspector doesn't wait for him to open the door, but forces the lock out with his air pressurizer thing (just like in the movie). The lock hits Homer in the head. The Inspector comes to the conclusion that kids do live in the apartment and leaves his Friend-o Homer alone, but the Simpsons decide to leave town.

Sorry once again I'm pretty sure I flubbed the ending, but I think the rest of the description is cool. I really like this episode because of it's pop culture references. Alaska Nebraska was priceless. What did you think?

Friday, May 1, 2009

Recap: "Father Knows Worst"

The title is obviously a spin on the classic television show Father Knows Best. I guess I'm too young to know much about it, but it did come up in one of my history classes this week (we're looking at 1950s right now). But Homer shows in this episode that although he loves his kids, he has his clueless moments...if you can call the last 20 years moments :)

Well the episode started with a new beginning. The Simpsons were swimming to the couch, Marge won and of course Homer drowned...totally brought me back to the Poseidon-like segment from the "The Wettest Story Ever Told". Comic book guy tried to save the day by getting a rope and his attempt ended with his floating, lifeless body in the water.

The episode itself consisted of 2 main story lines. Homer injured injured his tongue and was only able to eat the blandest foods. Having no other choice, he begins to eat lunch at Springfield Elementary because they have the most tasteless food. The other story line is Marge finding a sauna in the basement that initially leaves her with a fabulous, frizzy, fro.

Eating lunch at school and sometimes helping to serve, in his underwear, Homer begins to notice that Bart and Lisa are social misfits. As he puts it, one is a loser and the other is a loner. Bart spends his time putting noodles in his nose and binder rings in his ears while laughing like he is mentally disturbed (these were laugh out loud moments for me). Lisa has no friends which is probably because the girls act like Alex Whitney. Alex is from the episode "Lard of the Dance." You remember that her, she is the one who had a cell phone, encouraged the school girls to pierce their ears, and encouraged an awkward school dance. So, we know from past experience this environment does not suit Lisa.

As a result, Homer learns about and adopts helicopter parenting. It involves spinning around like a helicopter at your child's school...oh wait no, that is what Homer decided to do. Actually it involves being a hovering parent. So, Homer decides to help Bart with his project and help Lisa make friends.

With Bart, he helps him build Westminster Abbey, the parents in the shop are shocked at his daring. Otto on the other is too busy buying glue, but not to make model planes ;). He buys Lisa a book entitled Chick with Cliques and uses Moe and the drunks to illustrate how being mean and lowering others self esteem can make you popular.

So, Homer makes Bart's model for him, but accidentally crushes it. Bart almost wins the Next Top Model Contest (there was a fan of the show in the audience) because it is obvious that he had no parental help (does this remind you of certain Lisa who wears a mattress in the shape of Florida because their mother has a gambling problem and the only person who could help is Homer?...Well it should!). Okay so the result was familiar, but I don't mind. So in the end Bart admits he had no part in the making of the model.

Homer gives Lisa a cell phone decorating party that makes her popular, but I forget the ending oops I check it out later.

Where is Marge throughout all this drama you ask? Relaxing in the Sauna of course. She keeps it a secret because she doesn't want to risk Homer inviting Moe, Lenny, Carl or the others. The episode ends with Homer and Marge making love there.

I actually watched the entire credits for this episode because the music was done by those people who use their voices as sound effects. (I don't know their name). Overall, it was really good. Okay I'll proofread this post later and find out what happened to Lisa and update it soon. Hope you enjoyed the episode too.