Lower your quality standards. Once you've done that you can go on forever!

Thanks for the blog title Mike Scully, but not a lot else. It's widely accepted that since this bastard has tightened his grip on The Simpsons and its production that the quality of the programme has slipped. A process which began before the turn of the millennium, in an interview only a couple of years back Mr. Scully removed any doubt that he was to be held responsible when he churned out this load of tripe.

The Devil!

All insults inside, this is actually quite a close issue to me. The Simpsons is my favourite programme of all time and watching it would up be right up at the top if they done one of those revealing life studies on me (the ones that tell you that you've spent 3 years on the toilet or 4 sitting in traffic)

I sometimes wonder how the writers felt whilst at work on this show in its heydey. Did they realise that with gems like Homer Goes To College or Last Exit To Springfield that they were producing comedy that has essentially remained timeless, perhaps even gotten better with age. At times it is hard to believe that every line is written so perfectly, every joke delivered with such timing and finesse that if you take a step back and consider, it is so far beyond the limits of any other sitcom in its genius. 


Even though I am not a man of faith, I do believe the world works in very funny ways. It just seems to much to be true that when Ajax came up with the idea of 'total football' (that any outfield player can fill the role of another player) in the early 70's there happened to be 6 or 7 of the greatest natural footballers of all time coming of age in Amsterdam. Or that Colin Greenwood was in the same year as Thom Yorke in Abingdon Boys School and would get his younger brother Johnny to play harmonica in a band that would become Radiohead. This kind of thing is definitely mirrored if you consider that Jay Leno, Conan O'Brien and Jay Kogen were the writers of this particular cartoon during its (no pun intended) golden years.

But what Scully and people like him don't realise is that the physical lifetime of a product is one of the least important things. In years to come no one will remember Jose Mourinho's Chelsea and their grit like they do Pep Guardiola's Barcelona and their beauty . If you are talking about bands, spawned from the Britpop era, it is safe to say that no one today remembers  The Boo Radleys, Ocean Colour Scene and Cast like they do Radiohead. And it is most definitely true that no one will remember The Simpsons trip to Ireland like their trip to Australia.

The Boo Radleys had six studio albums, enough said.

The links between football, music and sitcoms may seem stretched but what I'm trying to say is that when it comes to a lot of aspects in life, people will always look for instant success and will lower their standards if it will mean a bigger paycheck at the end of the month. But while money comes and money goes, history is something which will last forever. I think I can safely say that I'd have preferred 10 more decent episodes of The Simpsons rather than 300 shit ones we've got.