[7.3/10 on a Selman era Simpsons scale] The two big things in “Cremains of the Day”’s favor are ambition and having something legitimate on its mind. The two big things against it are that it isn’t especially funny and gets too over-the-top at the end of the episode. I’m not entirely sure how to resolve those twin parts of its project.
On the ambition side, I like the show choosing to kill off Larry the Barfly. He’s never been more than a background character, but there’s a meta quality to that. He’s a background character in Homer’s life too, so Larry becomes an interesting vessel for the idea of processing your feelings about someone who’s always been there, but who you’re not close to. (Though I’ll admit, it’s a little odd that we never see Sam the Barfly here, who seemed to be the Rosencrantz to Larry’s Guildenstern.)
On the thematic side, I like the idea that the show is examining what the denizens of Moe’s relationship is when they’re not drinking at the bar. There too, there is an interesting concept of context-dependent friends, and wondering what sobriety and being outside of your usual setting means to your friendship. Mixed with the contemplation of the afterlife, and each member of the crew working through the death of their acquaintance, but not friend, in different ways, makes for a worthwhile subject for the episode.
The major problem for me is that it just doesn’t feel like a Simpsons episode featuring the characters as we know them. I’m all for the show taking big swings in its thirty-fifth season on the air. It’s one of the best things about the Selman era. But this feels ore like an interesting short story of film with Homer, Moe, Lenny, and Carl crammed into it than something that springs forth from the personalities we’ve known over the years.
To be charitable, you could argue that fits into the idea the show is going for, about only knowing those context-dependent friends on a surface level. But the characters feel off here, with personalities that aren’t bad or invalid, but just don’t necessarily track with who these players have been for the last three and a half decades, which detracts from the power of the story.
At the same time, there’s not a ton of laughs here. Maybe that's expected given the subject matter, but there’s attempts at jokes, and while none of them are cringe-worthy, few of them land. I did chuckle at the group staying at an “Adequate 8”, and there’s a certain charm to their different conceptions of what happens after death. On the whole though, this one felt more like a dramatic story with jokes awkwardly tacked on than a good comedic episode of the show.
It also gets way too out there for an installment that seems to want to be down-to-earth and personal. The guys getting mixed up with a crime syndicate, thrown into trucks, threatened with shotguns, and falling off cliffs is a bridge too far for an episode that wants us to take their situation seriously. You can sniff out the narrative purpose of the secret sapphires tearing them apart, and the metaphor of them having to leap together to avoid perishing in the car accident is a nice, if blunt metaphor. But even Larry’s urn stopping Homer from plummeting feels too cartoony and cute by half. There’s a way to tell this story without devolving into Scully-esque exaggerated escapades.
Still, at base, I appreciate the show trying for something here. A while back, Raphael Bob-Waksberg, of Bojack Horseman fame, wrote a little thread about a secret friendship between Marge and Maude Flanders, about being shuffled to the side and having someone who knows what that feels like. It was a heartstring-tugging deconstruction of how sitcom decisions of character focus would play out in real life, and critique of where the show often puts that focus. I like Larry as the fulcrum for a similar idea, with the story coming from inside the house. The final product isn’t perfect, and I have my criticisms, but I’ll take the show aiming high and falling a little short sometimes every week.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2024-04-26T04:57:34Z
[7.3/10 on a Selman era Simpsons scale] The two big things in “Cremains of the Day”’s favor are ambition and having something legitimate on its mind. The two big things against it are that it isn’t especially funny and gets too over-the-top at the end of the episode. I’m not entirely sure how to resolve those twin parts of its project.
On the ambition side, I like the show choosing to kill off Larry the Barfly. He’s never been more than a background character, but there’s a meta quality to that. He’s a background character in Homer’s life too, so Larry becomes an interesting vessel for the idea of processing your feelings about someone who’s always been there, but who you’re not close to. (Though I’ll admit, it’s a little odd that we never see Sam the Barfly here, who seemed to be the Rosencrantz to Larry’s Guildenstern.)
On the thematic side, I like the idea that the show is examining what the denizens of Moe’s relationship is when they’re not drinking at the bar. There too, there is an interesting concept of context-dependent friends, and wondering what sobriety and being outside of your usual setting means to your friendship. Mixed with the contemplation of the afterlife, and each member of the crew working through the death of their acquaintance, but not friend, in different ways, makes for a worthwhile subject for the episode.
The major problem for me is that it just doesn’t feel like a Simpsons episode featuring the characters as we know them. I’m all for the show taking big swings in its thirty-fifth season on the air. It’s one of the best things about the Selman era. But this feels ore like an interesting short story of film with Homer, Moe, Lenny, and Carl crammed into it than something that springs forth from the personalities we’ve known over the years.
To be charitable, you could argue that fits into the idea the show is going for, about only knowing those context-dependent friends on a surface level. But the characters feel off here, with personalities that aren’t bad or invalid, but just don’t necessarily track with who these players have been for the last three and a half decades, which detracts from the power of the story.
At the same time, there’s not a ton of laughs here. Maybe that's expected given the subject matter, but there’s attempts at jokes, and while none of them are cringe-worthy, few of them land. I did chuckle at the group staying at an “Adequate 8”, and there’s a certain charm to their different conceptions of what happens after death. On the whole though, this one felt more like a dramatic story with jokes awkwardly tacked on than a good comedic episode of the show.
It also gets way too out there for an installment that seems to want to be down-to-earth and personal. The guys getting mixed up with a crime syndicate, thrown into trucks, threatened with shotguns, and falling off cliffs is a bridge too far for an episode that wants us to take their situation seriously. You can sniff out the narrative purpose of the secret sapphires tearing them apart, and the metaphor of them having to leap together to avoid perishing in the car accident is a nice, if blunt metaphor. But even Larry’s urn stopping Homer from plummeting feels too cartoony and cute by half. There’s a way to tell this story without devolving into Scully-esque exaggerated escapades.
Still, at base, I appreciate the show trying for something here. A while back, Raphael Bob-Waksberg, of Bojack Horseman fame, wrote a little thread about a secret friendship between Marge and Maude Flanders, about being shuffled to the side and having someone who knows what that feels like. It was a heartstring-tugging deconstruction of how sitcom decisions of character focus would play out in real life, and critique of where the show often puts that focus. I like Larry as the fulcrum for a similar idea, with the story coming from inside the house. The final product isn’t perfect, and I have my criticisms, but I’ll take the show aiming high and falling a little short sometimes every week.