The Simpson's Movie Confirmed

bagsc writes "BBC News reports Twentieth Centruy Fox confirms The Simpsons are going to the movies! Should hit theatres in 2007." From the article: "A 25-second trailer for the film has been shown to US audiences at screenings of Ice Age: The Meltdown, promising to introduce 'the greatest hero in American history'. It then cut to Homer Simpson, wearing only his underwear, who admitted: 'I forgot what I was supposed to say.'"

"gay" tag?

[Jeff DeMaagd]

What's with the "gay" tag? I thought this place was intolerant of homophobes.

Maybe that's where the good writing went

[PapayaSF]

Because in the last couple of years the quality of writing on The Simpsons has taken a noticable drop. Too often the jokes are merely silly and almost random, and lack the inspired cleverness and connection to the characters and plots that made me a big fan of the show in the first place.

Yes, I know people have been complaining about a drop in quality for many years, but I felt that was arguable. The 2004-2005 season, though, really was pretty weak.

Re:Quickest way to Jump the Shark

[Pinefresh]

family guy seems to be doing pretty good. And I can't think of any other animated TV shows that have been made into a movie, so I'd have to say it's about a 50/50 chance.

Re:Quickest way to Jump the Shark

[Aqua OS X]

What are you talking about? Fans gobbled that stuff up.

And what about South Park The Movie... that was brilliant.

Re:Quickest way to Jump the Shark

[BewireNomali]

the simpsons jumped the shark a long time ago. it's a stalwart lynchpin in the Fox lineup, so they'll milk the cow until she's dry.

it's funny: my nephew's ten, and a huge fan of family guy. he thinks the simpsons are a poor imitation of the former - not funny, and not worth watching.

they'll do a movie and cash out of the franchise before its fan base and ratings erode significantly. It's good business.

In other words, the decision to do a film is a signal from Fox that they believe the swan song soon cometh.

Re:Quickest way to Jump the Shark

[Hao Wu]

Because technically, "the Jump" itself is the glorious moment (ie. the movie) -- and the "crash" happens AFTER the jump.

The B&H movie was GREAT. So great, it was never the same....

Re:Maybe that's where the good writing went

[DarkNemesis618]

I have to agree with you, alot of the jokes are not nearly the quality of previous seasons. However, even in some of the later episodes, a really good joke will be seen every once in a while. But yes, the overall quality has sadly dropped. I still watch them though.

Re:OOOOkkkkkaaayyy!

[neoform]

Really? I think you should go tell everyone about every story that you don't care about. No wait, even better, everytime you see something you don't care about, tell people about it, and not only that, expect them to care about you not caring.

Re:"gay" tag?

[Nasarius]

It just goes to show the mentality of some people here. For those over the age of 12, using "gay" as a generic derogatory is pretty fucking childish and insulting.

Tagging?

[Lord_Dweomer]

Ok, so it looks like a naughty monkey finally got into the tagging system. Taco...how exactly do you plan on dealing with "tag trolls" (I'm hereby coining this phrase!) who put in tags like "gay" and other childish things that no longer apply to post-April Fools stories?

Movie Traditions

[Jerf]

Traditionally, a television series made into a movie is an opportunity to do two things: To tell a Really Big story that just wouldn't fit in one episode, and to spend more money on special effects than you could on one episode.

The second really isn't a problem. But what story is too big for a Simpsons episode? Given the unreality of the series, what premise could carry a movie that shouldn't simply be an episode?

About the only storyline not used several times is the death of one of the major characters (and I mean a Simpson, not Mrs. Flanders). Which would make for a pretty disappointing movie, I think, not to mention some very out-of-character writing in all likelihood. I mean, what are they going to do, have Homer heroically sacrifice himself to save Springfield? (Not to mention they've basically done that a number of times, minus actual death...)

Oh well. It's quite likely that it will be at least average, given the state of movies lately, and what more can you ask for?

Re:"gay" tag?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure most people don't even notice that using "lame" is itself non-PC, by those standards. It is derogatory to the "differently abled"; yet no one seems to have problems with using "lame".
And using "childish" is derogatory to children; "uncool" is derogatory to those in the tropics...

Re:"gay" tag?

[4ndys]

For those over the age of 12, using "gay" as a generic derogatory is pretty fucking childish and insulting.

Feel free to mod me as flamebait, but I seem to be missing the point. Would that not be the intention?

Re:Maybe that's where the good writing went

[quokkapox]

True dat. The Simpsons has jumped the shark. It's over. Nothing lasts forever.

What I'm waiting for is the next one, the show that only people with bittorrent and their friends actually know about at first, but which gets so popular so quickly that the traditional media organizations find themselves reporting about it without actually understanding it. I think Lost had that kind of potential, but it wasn't quite the right time.

What the world needs is maybe a participatory TV show, that people can consume and maybe even play a part in creating, without need for the big networks. The first one of those we see will be revolutionary. And then we'll see more and more. It's getting easier for people to create their own content, and distributing it worldwide is now trivially simple and free. If you're the CEO of a big media corporation, this is terrifying. If you're a random human with a few friends and a net connection, it's a good time to yank our culture back and return it to the hands of the people who create it.

But I still like to watch M*A*S*H re-runs occasionally. They're funny.

Re:"gay" tag?

[welcher]

As you point out, gay has come to mean uncool or crap (or whatever) because it means homosexual. Gay still means homosexual. So you are asking people to accept that a word which denotes their sexuality also denotes general crappiness. It seems very much like how, as a child, we would use "jew" as a derogatory term: to jew money etc. I had no idea what jew meant in a broader sense, but when I found out, I realised how insulting it was to a people to use the word in that way. I think the use of gay to generally denigrate something is similarly insulting. That you know some gay people who use this term doesn't make it acceptable.

Re:Movie Traditions

[Jerf]

The kids finally age?

Done that, several times. As flash-forwards, yes, but story-wise it doesn't matter.

Marge gets pregnant?

Even if you age the kids, family-baby interactions have basically been mined with Maggie.

They move from Springfield?

Also been done, several times, plus every "vacation" episode is basically "The Simpsons Not In Springfield". May not be "permanent" but that's a flexible idea with cartoons.

I actually did try to come up with something before my post; if I came up with a good one I would have posted that instead.

Re:Maybe that's where the good writing went

[LordLucless]

What the world needs is maybe a participatory TV show, that people can consume and maybe even play a part in creating

You mean like Funniest Home Videos?

Re:"gay" tag?

[Jeremi]

Get off your high-horse and just deal with the fact that "gay" has been accepted, by a large part of the population, as a synonym for "uncool" or "lame".

Are you prepared to make the same arguments for "nigger"? i.e. That it's okay to use it in civilized conversation (yeah yeah, I know, but we'll consider Slashdot at +1 to be close enough) because some part of the population likes to use it, and because even some black people use it?

Or would it be better if people do get routinely criticized for using slurs like this, so that at some point the terms fall out of popular use and we can have a society where entire minority groups aren't automatically considered "uncool" or "lame"?

Re:Maybe that's where the good writing went

[harlows_monkeys]

Because in the last couple of years the quality of writing on The Simpsons has taken a noticable drop

Which still leaves it one of the best shows on television.

!gay, !ponies

[SCoil]

Upon closer inspection of the tags you will come to realize that this isn't a late april fools joke.
See the tags "!gay" and "!ponies"? I'm not the greatest code monkey ever, but if my memory serves me I believe that little ! says something important.

Dont be so quick on the draw /.

Re:"gay" tag?

[karnal]

In this day and age, the word "ant" would probably offend some people.
Sorry if I offended anyone in the production of this post.

Re:Movie Traditions

[SamSim]

Telling longer stories is *precisely* where the show needs to go to get out of its current rut. Essentially every story that can be reasonably fit into 25 minutes - without altering the status quo significantly - has been thoroughly explored. The result is the writers try to fit increasingly convoluted storylines into the timeframe and we get episodes that are rushed and crazy. I hope they build from this and start doing more two-part episodes, season-length story arcs...

Re:Obligatory.

[castoridae]

> that's unpossible!

It's perfectly cromulent.