It's the cops! Worse. The police cops. This is the 13th episode of the
10th season of The Simpsons, titled "Homer to the Max." It's about a fictional TV
show airing in Springfield called Police Cops, a
parody of Miami Vice, that stars a heroic character
named Homer Simpson. [MUSIC PLAYING] Our Homer Simpson
loves it because he shares the same name as
this character, and in turn, receives a ton of attention. But then Police Cops
rewrites their Homer, turning him into
an inept imbecile. And the Homer Simpson we know
hates the change, so much so that our Homer
changes his name to-- Homer Si-- uh, Max Power. --to try to become someone else,
and takes on a new identity to escape being associated
with this fictional idiot. It plays like a critique on
bad character development. It also maybe accidentally
is a very meta look at what happened
to Homer Simpson. Relax. What is mind? No matter. What is matter? Never mind. [LAUGH] Homer has changed. Let's start with the design
as it's the simplest and least dramatic of the changes. This is how The Simpsons
characters were originally imagined by Matt
Groening, as silhouettes. He wanted the characters to
be recognizable by shape only. He succeeded. Homer's original design is here. His features are sharper, he
has constantly visible eyebrows, and a sharper mouth. While cartoony, he carries
the features of something recognizable to a human being. But almost immediately,
Homer begins to change. Now, while I think the design
change is for the better, it's also kind of foreshadowing
for his less fortunate character shift. This image here Homer three
seasons into the show. His hair takes the M
shape, which by the way, is meant to be Matt Groening's
initials at one time. His head and eyes become
rounder and bigger, his belly gets larger, and
his appearance in general becomes more
cartoony and oafish. And as the show would progress,
these cartoony features would only become
more pronounced. But while his design changes
may have been for the better, it's his personality where
things take a weirder turn. Oh, looks like young Simpson
is going to kill himself. Oh, maybe not. Maybe he's just taking
his boulder for a walk. This is "Homer's Odyssey,"
a season one episode that marks one of the first
times Homer loses his job. But things go differently
than they would, say, now. There are consequences. After Homer becomes unemployed,
his search for a job, while humorous, leads to
less than desired results. And then suddenly,
there's humanity in Homer. So much so that he tries
to end his own life. Yes, it's dark, but
it's meant to articulate Homer's natural human emotions. This original Homer is
a very different man. He's inept, but he cares. He cares about his
family, his intentions are almost always good, and
he cares about his image. These things are important. Early Homer makes
a lot of mistakes, but because he's
rarely doing things to be mean spirited
or out of absurdity, we understand why Marge
would stick around. He's dumb, but he shows
flashes of intelligence. He isn't cartoonishly
stupid, so we understand that he has
enough self-awareness to care about what
people think of him and try to be a
member of society. And importantly, early
seasons' Homer has a heart. Sometimes a big one. The show was more often focused
on relatively happy endings and presenting Homer as a
father that truly cared. His physical design,
especially very early on, was a great more human
representation of this. Every once in a
while, however rare, we the audience were OK with
Homer thinking of himself as Max Power, as a hero. Despite his characteristically
mean treatment of Bart even early on. But there was minutia
under all this that would slowly fall apart. For example, this
is Homer reading. Cosby's his first law of
intergenerational perversity. No matter what you
tell your child to do, it will always do the opposite. As you're about to see, this
one scene is very important. Far more important than
it probably should be. So let me give you this. Oh, look. She's presenting. We thought this would
take years to happen. [HOMER SCREAMING] [CROWD CHEERING] The Simpsons, and
its own Homer, was built around a deconstruction
of the family sitcom that dominated the decade prior. It was built almost
as a satire of that happy, nuclear household. It was meant to be a semi real
depiction of American families that we didn't see on TV. But by the sixth season,
most of the show's original primary creative
team were preoccupied with other projects,
and The Simpsons was falling into new hands. There's a much
cited Slate article by Chris Sullentrope that
points to this moment as the pinnacle of that
foundation falling apart. This is Homer being,
well, I don't know that it needs any explaining. Let's say he's being taken
advantage of by this panda. It's one of the most hated
scenes in Simpsons history, because this became the norm. Homer slowly became
an irredeemable idiot, and we can pinpoint
where this really began. A lot of the humor written
for Homer after the first four seasons became about
one-upping his stupidity. This was fine for a while, but
the writers realized quickly they'd have to top each moment
of stupidity to keep it funny. A.O. Scott once said that
Simpsons creator Matt Groening's strength was using
animation to address reality, but around season eight,
the Simpsons writing staff kind of ballooned,
and season nine saw the ten years of Mike
Scully and Ian Maxtone-Graham. And The Simpsons
absorbed itself. It lost sight of that realism,
however exaggerated it was, and Homer would
quickly fall apart in the world of
the new Simpsons. The world of the cartoon. Scully would executive produce
seasons nine through 12, and Maxtone-Graham would write,
partially during his tenure. It was these three seasons
where we'd meet this guy. Oh. Oh. Boy, I'm feeling this. Oh. Ooh, my head's going to
be sore in the morning. Remember that scene
with Homer reading? Well, to top Homer's
stupidity, suddenly Homer was completely illiterate. Gym? What's a gym? And the decline was
rapid from there. Homer would get
dumber and dumber until he became a nearly
functionless member of society. That illiteracy being a mark of
a joke that changed who homered was without much thought. He was always inept
at his job, but now he was a caricature of himself. He no longer cared
at all for how he was viewed by
society, quickly becoming entirely self obsessed. There also became no
consequence for Homer's actions, and thus, no emotional pull
from Homer in any way, shape, or form. Originally he was held
responsible for things and the episodes played out
through Homer's reaction to those consequences. Suddenly, Homer could
do whatever he want, get away with
anything he wanted, and there was no emotional
response or recognition of fault at all. But worst of all, in all the
stupidity and self-obsession, he lost the heart that
made his behavior funny. He became a
malintentioned villain. As Slate put it, these endings
very quickly turned into these. He was no longer a funny,
well-reasoned representation of the American dad. He was himself a
joke, an animated oaf. It got so bad that Dan
Castellaneta, Homer's voice actor, ended up rejecting
parts of scripts where Homer's mean spirited,
brazen new behavior got out of control. So how did we get here? I got a fever of 453. I'm hot, so very hot. [SCREAMING] Well, Scully's three-season run,
nine through 12, as producer marked the most dramatic
change in Homer, as the bloated writing
staff lost an appreciation for what the show was. Writer Maxtone-Graham
would say in an interview that he had hardly
watched The Simpsons before joining the staff. He'd then go on to mock Matt
Groening's writing rules, point to episodes without Matt's
name as great, and say of fans, go figure. That's why they're
on the internets, and we're writing the show. At some point,
probably around here, Groening's vision
spiraled out of control. It was lost as it was handed to
people that didn't understand what the original intent was. And Homer suffered. He became the embodiment of
Maxtone-Graham's attitude, intentionally or not. He became spiteful, harsh. His existence spit in the
face of who Homer was. There's irony in Homer's
rounder, softer, character design because as Homer
got easier on the eyes, he became harder to listen
to, and in turn, rueful. This mark of seasons
nine through 12 was the most dramatic and
obvious shift in the character yet. And still Homer's stupidity
after Scully's 12th season would only continue
to become exaggerated. He'd continue to lose any
semblance of relatability. He continues to become
less of a character and more of a punch line. He lost his personality. He'd be an oaf when
it was funny and then a sensational
talent at a new job when the joke called for it. He'd be mean when it seemed
cool and then a victim when it wasn't. He became a blank
slate of stupidity with no voice to call his own. As Sam Simon once said, as the
show got bigger and its writing staff ballooned, The Simpsons
became this homogenized version of itself. And Homer is the best
microcosmic example of this homogenization of ideas. Do not press the
Core Destruct button. Press-- [RADIO STATIC]
--destruct button. Scully and the team's
creation of Jerkass Homer, as fans have dubbed him,
make Scully's own episode, "Homer to the Max," a bit of
a self-fulfilling prophecy. Even Homer doesn't want to be
the guy that they turned him into. Even Homer knows that that guy
isn't the one that people love. But this isn't all
two people's faults. They just represent the problem. It's collaborative drain on
personality and the character, as much as it has improved and
fluctuated in quality since, and he has had better moments,
never really recovered. Because Scully and
Graham were just symptoms of a bigger issue. Maybe this is just
what happens when your character lives for 30
years, when it loses its heart. Much like SpongeBob, Matt
Groening's original vision for Homer in The
Simpsons was pure. It wasn't watered down. It was self-assured and
confident in itself. But as the creators begin to
hand their vision to others, that vision becomes diluted. The brushstrokes stop
flowing in one direction. It becomes messy. This is Homer Simpson,
and this is an attempt to recreate that guy. This is Max Power. Yes, this is the
original Homer Simpson. I wish. [MUSIC PLAYING] That's a wrap on today's
episode of "Nerdstalgic." Guys, if you enjoyed this
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Honestly, I disagree with many of the points here. The point that resonates with me is about original Homer’s good nature vs. later seasons callousness. That’s a pretty good angle on why the show lost its magic.
However, I majorly disagree with two things: one, the idea that Homer getting dumber was worse for the character (it is just funnier that way), and two, the idea that early Simpsons’ strong suit was applying realism to a cartoon setting. That seemed to be the MO for maybe the first 2 seasons, after which the episodes became more and more absurd, with dream sequences, extended film parodies, and sequences of jokes that would have drastic consequences in real life, but seem to be immediately forgotten by the show’s continuity. The thing is, these all worked for seasons 4-8; I think the key is that they kept a resonant sense of pathos going on in tandem with the outlandishness.
But either way, I find it very dubious to claim that classic Simpsons was good because of its realism. It was not only absurd, but it’s absurdity was a key part of its quality. It took advantage of what cartoons can do to present adult comedy with an unprecedented ambition and scope.
Huh, no comments. Excellent essay, I always wondered about the character progression of homer and why everyone hates the later seasons. Now I feel stupid for not noticing myself. Thanks!