Season 20, Episode 15--"Wedding for Disaster"

In this episode of “The Simpsons,” I found three main ideas to be particularly interesting. The episode begins with the news that the Minister who married Marge and Homer for the second time was actually not licensed at the time that he had married them. Therefore, they were not legally married and would have to go through another ceremony. What was very interesting to me, though, was the fact that Homer had divorced Marge at a previous point in the series, and that was why they had to get remarried. As I have said before, I never followed the show before this class, and I was somewhat disturbed by this new information. Divorce rates in America are such a problem now, and to see that even this cartoon couple was temporarily divorced is somewhat disheartening. Despite everything that Homer puts her through, it seemed to me as if Marge and Homer always stuck by each other.
Regardless, the two had plans to be remarried by the same Minister, now that he was licensed again. They were planning a romantic wedding, and it was nice to see that even Homer was being sweet and thoughtful. Homer had hired a violinist to play for them in the candlelight when he proposed to Marge before their upcoming wedding. Amidst all of this wedding excitement, however, Marge turns into a so-called “bridezilla,” becoming obsessed with everything being perfect, no matter if it was what Homer wanted or not. This seems to be a stereotype of many American women, thinking that they all go crazy with spending money and thinking only of themselves while putting together the “happiest day of their lives.”
The last issue that was very interesting to me was the fact that Marge’s sisters captured Homer right before the wedding because they didn’t want their sister to be with him. This is a very common theme on television shows—it seems like the wife’s family almost never approves of the man that she marries. On “The Simpsons”, however, the fact that the sisters don’t approve of Homer isn’t enough—they have to capture him and put him in an atmosphere almost like one from one of the “Saw” movies. When Homer recites his vows that he wanted to read to Marge at the alter, the sisters realize how much he loves Marge and let him go, however, he never finds out who had captured him on that day.

Season 3, Episode 2--"Lisa Goes to Washington"

This episode begins with Homer sorting through the junk mail that so many of us receive in the mail every day. He tosses mostly everything, but the one thing that he does end up getting out of the junk mail is a free issue of The Readers Digest. Ironically enough, Homer becomes obsessed with reading the magazine, and eventually comes across an essay contest in Washington D.C. for children 12 and under. Needless to say, Lisa writes a very patriotic essay called “The Roots of Democracy,” which goes to name some of the most wonderful things about America. The Simpsons win a trip to Washington, and one night while the rest of the family is sleeping, Lisa takes a late-night tour of the Winifred Beecher Memorial. It is there that Lisa catches a Congressman secretly accepting a bribe to give another man a logging permit to cut down Springfield Forest.
Lisa’s imagination gets carried away the next morning before the contest, and she sees politicians as pigs eating money and cats scratching each others’ backs. She then changes her essay to let everyone know that she thinks America “stank back then and it stinks now.” Lisa exclaims that she saw the Congressman accept the bribe, and she then adds, “One nation under the dollar with liberty and justice for none.” The Congressman is investigated and arrested.
Not surprisingly, Lisa’s second essay loses the contest, however, I found it surprising that her faith in democracy was so quickly redeemed after the Congressman was arrested. It is hardly a secret that there are lots of payouts and bribes in politics, and I believe that this situation happens more often than we know. I would have definitely expected the episode to end differently, especially since the creators took the time to name the hotel that the Simpsons stayed at "The Watergate Hotel." It just seems to me like the creators were trying to say something about their own faith in democracy through these characters, and I didn't think they would give up the joke so easily.

Season 20, Episode 12--"No Loan Again, Naturally"

Having worked in the mortgage department of a bank, I found this episode too realistic to be particularly amusing as poor Homer Simpson has once again gotten himself into trouble. After throwing an overly extravagant Mardi Gras party, he is asked by a friend how he can afford it. Homer replies by saying, “I got this magical thing called a home equity loan. I borrow all the money I want, and the house gets stuck with the bill!” No sooner does he finish his conversation when Marge receives an envelope in the mail stamped “Warning—your adjustable mortgage rate is about to reset.” When they go to see their mortgage broker, he reads them their charges off a computer screen. “Balloon payment…37% interest compounded every minute, not understanding the contract fee….oh wait I left out a zero.” When the family can’t afford the mortgage and their house is foreclosed, the banker tells them, “Don’t blame the bank…we fired our CEO and he barely got out with 50 million dollars!”
Though somewhat exaggerated, this exact situation is happening all over the country today, and it's a shame. People are spending more than they can afford, especially in the midst of this economic crisis, and they are forced into bankruptcy. And, as I have realized in my finance classes, it is partly because of the uneducated people like Homer Simpson that the country is in a financial crisis in the first place. Banks have made the mistake of loaning subprime mortgages, and even HELOC’s, to people who simply cannot afford them. What’s more, those same customers are taking out extra loans that they will never realistically be able to pay back. It is a huge problem in our economy today and I thought it was somewhat insensitive for the creators of The Simpsons to actually poke fun at the situation; especially when Homer was found hanging himself in the backyard. I did, however, enjoy that they added the comment about the CEO being fired from the bank with only $50 million, as another huge issue is the fact that banks are being bailed out, and then taking that money to offer bonuses to their executive officers.
Needless to say, the Simpson family is saved by their faithful neighbor, Ned Flanders; however, the problems in the episode are unfortunately not so easily solved in real life.

Season 20, Episode 11--"How The Test Was Won"

Having never really watched "The Simpsons" before, I think that this was a great episode to start with. Aside from the fact that this episode was hysterical, I can already see how the Simpson family can be so easily related to so many people.
In this episode, Lisa and Bart are taking a standardized test at their school. They are told that the test scores will determine how much money the school will receive from the government. Lisa the brainiac is ecstatic about the test, while Bart, on the other hand, is dreading it. It is with this that Bart ironically receives a score of 100% on the practice test by spelling out “Slurp My Shot” in the bubbles of the answer sheet. We later find out that the school gave Bart and other students like him such a score simply to “remove underperformers for test days…and hide them in capital city for the day so that they won’t drag down the scores of the children of our future.” The school in Springfield, like many others, places such a ridiculous amount of emphasis on these tests that I’m glad the creators of “The Simpsons” decided to poke fun at it.
While Bart is with the other “slower” kids, Lisa is at school about to take the test. While the students are in the classroom stressing about the test, a teacher tells them that if they get a question wrong, “a baby chick dies.” He also tells them to “Get down on your knees and pray to your God he will give you the right answer.” Lisa, though normally prided on what a brilliant student she is, doesn’t even get through the first question before the time is up. She suffers from the same anxiety that many real students face and can relate to.
My favorite part of this episode was the ending. I loved that the principal came to realize how foolish he had been in stressing the kids out about a single test. What’s more, Bart was able to show him that students need to be taught in a way that they can relate to. I think that it’s important for educators to see things like this and realize the impact that they have on kids. Schools should not be focused on test scores, but rather, the education that they are giving their students.