I still don’t quite get what inspired that. “Hey, everybody! I got a great idea. Let’s crap all over the hilarious cartoon kid that helped make us rich beyond our wildest dreams! ![]()
”
I just remembered another one of my favorite funny and nice moments from Grandpa Simpson.
Bart: Grandpa, I need some advice. Did you ever have a crush on an older woman?
Grandpa: I had a crush on the oldest woman! 124 years old she was. Here's a picture of her delivering Eubie Blake.
Bart: Cool. What happened?
Grandpa: She fell in with that Guinness Book of Records crowd. Suddenly she didn't have any time for me. Oh, I wore a 15 pound beard of bees for that lady, but it just wasn't enough.
Bumping this thread. For some reason, I keep remembering and laughing about this classic part from "Who Shot Mr. Burns?" XD ^_^;;
I do like how despite the floating timeline, there ARE things that are canon and consistent. Like Homer and Marge's wedding. So far it's consistent that...
Homer and Marge got married but it was through some sort of gambling house -> Homer divorced them to get remarried -> the time when Lovejoy married them, he actually had no "license" so Homer had to renew their vows again.
The stuff in the middle of those events tend to vary, but usually it's consistent that Homer had trouble getting a job until he got hired in the power plant, moves away to a separate house, asks Gramps to sell his house for the Evergreen Terrace house just in time for Lisa's birth, leaves the plant for his dream job, then comes back after Maggie.
What is it with Barney and confessing that he’s an alcoholic in the wrong places? XD
Barney: My name is Barney Gumble and I’m an alcoholic.
Lisa: Mr. Gumble, this is a Girl Scout meeting.
Barney: Is it? Or is it that you girls can’t admit you have a problem?!
Barney: My name is Barney Gumble and I’m an alcoholic.
Wiseguy: I feel for ya, pally, but you want AA. This is Triple A
.
They kept him sober for three seasons or so, but I guess they couldn’t commit to it for the rest of the series.
Join the Five-Man Band cleanup project!I remember the loss of coffee at the AA meeting made Barney snap and want to break the dome in The Movie.
Come on! Let's bless them all until we get fershnickered!It might also be the simple fact that when they took away his drunk shtick, they didn't really add anything else to him. It just became "I USED to be an alcoholic" jokes, if he even got that.
I can see this as the reason Kirk and Luanne got back together as well. Sure they clicked Kirk's pathetic character from it, but after a while they run the well of divorce jokes dry and probably felt they could get more out of them being a whole family of pathetic dirtbags.
Not sure why Marvin Monroe came back from the dead though, but I guess they figured they could squeeze a handful more appearances out of him.
Some experiments just don't take on, especially if they don't figure out where to take them long term. Kind of the Poochie problem lower key.
Edited by Psi001 on Jul 14th 2025 at 4:59:40 AM
Only 6% of divorced people marry again in real life, for the record.
Join the Five-Man Band cleanup project!Being a kid with parents going through divorce is wishing so much for them to get back together. Growing up is realizing that them splitting up, in fact, really was for the best, due to the issues both of them had.
Self-professed Wild Card who thinks cynicism isn't so bad.You sorta get it with this one however since they're the Van Houtens, Springfield's most iconic pity-weaponising Fair Weather Friends. Of course they'd spend a long duration being waspy and throwing each other under the bus only to cosy up to each other again when they realise being separate isn't as convinient. It just mirrors Bart and Milhouse's "friendship".
I wouldn't be surprised if they make it a Running Gag that Kirk and Luanne actually got divorced and remarried multiple times over by now.
Edited by Psi001 on Jul 14th 2025 at 5:27:45 AM
It wasn't on screen, but in "Who Shot Mr. Burns, Part 2", Burns was transferred to the "Dr. Marvin Monroe Memorial Hospital", implying that he died at some point (and "The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular" lumped him in with Bleeding Gums Murphy as a character who died over the past season). Then in "Diatribe of a Mad Housewife", they did a joke where Monroe appeared at Marge's book-signing, Marge is surprised because she thought he was dead, and Monroe claims he was "just very sick". And then later episodes went back to acting like he was still dead.

Re: Homer in kidney trouble
Yes in a terribly mean spirited episode that ignored medical laws. Homer is supposed to donate a kidney to Abe but runs away, is rendered unconscious, and then Dr. Hibbert says he helped himself to one of Homer's kidneys while Homer was unable to consent. You legally can't do that!
I could have maybe let it slide if Dr. Nick did the surgery since he's kinda sleazy already but Dr. Hibbert is supposed to be a more upstanding medical practitioner. And then the final joke is Homer plotting to steal one of Bart's kidneys by pretending to just tickle his son because we had just entered the "lol, Bart sucks" era of the show.
They could have made a good, interesting story by having Abe's kidneys start to fail due to old age (and not from holding his pee too long) and Homer, knowing he's a genetic match, is hesitant because 1. surgery is risky and 2. he doesn't like Abe very much because Abe was an abusive father.
Someone, maybe Marge, could help him realize that doing something to save Abe's life is a brave, honorable thing to do (and maybe he gets free hospital food or something to entice him further.) We could even learn about Marge's father during her pep talk, perhaps he was in the hospital once and she wished she could help him because family, even the members you don't like, are important.
I think it took like 20+ seasons before we learned that Clancy Bouvier died of lung cancer from smoking, that could absolutely be an angle to explore and good reason for Marge to be all "forgive your dad and help him please. You never know when he could leave you and then you might miss him."
Edited by GlitterCat on Jun 25th 2025 at 5:01:37 AM
see my completed Tangled (Varian) fanfic collection! https://archiveofourown.org/works/24467056/chapters/59049532