Bill Oakley, one half of the ethnic comedy duo "Oakley & Weinstein," has a brand-new blog in which he lists unpopular food carts in Portland, Oregon. Here's a sampler:
100% Vegan Styrofoam Cupcakes (SW 4th & Hall)
Neglectful Mom's Empty Bag Lunches (SE 3rd & Ankeny)
Vintage & Collectible Milk (NE 23rd & Alberta)
All fans of "Allied Biscuit" and "TableTime" are invited to attend. [Portland's Least Popular Food Carts via @thatbilloakley]
Alan K. Simpson, the Republican co-chairman of President Obama's bipartisan fiscal commission, removed his "size 15 feet" from his mouth to apologize to a critic on Wednesday for a stinging letter in which he compared Social Security to "a milk cow with 310 million tits."[New York Times]
The Simpsons - assuming they mean the the Simpsons and not, like, Jessica and Ashlee Simpson - will be appearing in some multi-network anti-cancer telethon thing (can we safely assume any celebrity not appearing supports cancer?) that will air September 10th. The last time The Simpsons did this, Homer got a colonoscopy, so that's where the bar is set. [TVbytheNumbers.com]
In a stunning career move never before accomplished, former Vanity Fair editor John Ortved made the leap from penning a whole bunch of words about The Simpsons to typing a dating blog for Glamour magazine, where he regularly explores questions like "Do You Have a Set Number of Dates Before You'll Sleep With a Guy?" and "Do You Ever Film 'It?'? Should You Ever?" Could there be a correlation between Simpsons nerdiness and sex smarts? Developing... [Glamour]
Shocking news from AOL's DailyFinance... terrorists are infiltrating beloved national conglomerates and using them to fund terrorists... even News Corp., parent company of Fox News and The Simpsons has fallen prey to their wily schemes... it's too late to stop it... they're already here...
For example, News Corp.'s second-largest shareholder, after the Murdoch family, is Prince Alwaleed bin Talal (pictured at left, and above right), the nephew of Saudi Arabian King Abdullah, and one of the world's richest men.
Through his Kingdom Holding Co., Alwaleed owns about 7% of News Corp., or about $3 billion of the media giant.
Saudi Arabia, which is ruled by Alwaleed's uncle King Abdullah, is, of course, an authoritarian petro-monarchy that actually is governed by Sharia law and is known as one of the top global sponsors of terrorism. A spokesperson for the Saudi embassy in Washington says that while Alwaleed is part of the royal family, he isn't a member of the government, but rather a private citizen.
Could this so-called media mogul be lining his coffers with the profits from Simpsons merchandise, and then giving that money to his terrorist pals??? It's not unpossible and we can't take any chances.
It's time to strike back. Nielsen families, stop watching The Simpsons. Internet video-watchers, stop watching The Simpsons on Hulu. Stop purchasing products advertised during The Simpsons. Next time you're at the store, walk right past the aisle filled with Krusty alarm clocks and Maggie plush dolls, don't even look at the Simpsons fruit snacks: they're not worth the risk. No more Homer t-shirts, no more Simpsons DVDs, no more Milhouse asthma inhalers. Do your patriotic duty: buy bootleg Black Bart Simpson t-shirts at swap meets. We will not vanish without a fight! We're going to live on! We're going to survive! Today we celebrate our Independence Day! [DailyFinance via AlterNet]
Last month, we were in a funk, because at Comic-Con executive producer Al Jean said they were writing a 2011 Christmas episode featuring Homer and Marge as grandparents, which would apparently confirm a 23rd season.
But in a recent interview, Jean jokingly suggests otherwise:
My math could be incorrect, but I believe your 500th episode will be airing this season. Are there plans for an extended special to celebrate this milestone?
Al Jean: I'm afraid your math is incorrect. Our current record schedule will take us to episode 493, so if Fox wants 500, then I'm afraid they will have to pick up season 23, hint, hint.
[MovieWeb.com]
As all Gleeks know, the cast of TV's megahit Glee will be guest-starring in an upcoming Simpsons episode entitled "Elementary School Musical," scheduled to air September 26, 2010. But rubbercat.net/simpsons has EXCLUSIVELY obtained your first look at how your favorite Glee characters will look Simpsonized:
simpsons glee gleeks omglee gleetastic fox musical theatre theater spoilers simpsons pictures images matt groening simpsonized elementary school musical jane lynch sue sylvester mark sailing puck chris colfer kurt hummel kevin mchale artie abrams amber riley mercedes jones iphone android tina cohen-chang jenna ushkowitz search engine optimization
Smartphones! They're all the rage now! The iPhone, the Android platform, and the upcoming Microsoft Windows Live Zune Phone 7 Series are all beautiful mobile operating systems that have dramatically raised the bar for OH GOD WHAT THE HELL IS THIS
AHUJ9BLJ8qwuyr8913h9h31oKjklajsfas;; [AndroidZoom via Sx2]
Bongo Comics, the independent comic book company owned by Matt Groening, has finally joined the 1990s and will launch a website tomorrow, which will feature news items, blog posts, and, most amazing of all, a list of "all Matt Groening's comic-book, trade-book, and calendar publications." Bongo, which publishes Simpsons, Futurama, and NewsRadio comics, has owned the domain www.bongocomics.com since 1996 but until now only used it for e-mail purposes.
Still no word on the long-dormant MattGroening.com, which has been "under construction" since 2000. [The Beat]
It appears Fox has scrapped the traditional 2-D look of the show in favor of slicker 3-D CGI. Now, many misguided Simpsons purists will surely decry the change in dimensions, but keep in mind that The Simpsons Ride was CGI and many Simpsons directors (David Silverman, Brad Bird, Jim Reardon) have plenty of Pixar experience, so this was inevitable. Developing...
Here is the late, great comics legend Harvey Pekar homerized for his 70th birthday by longtime Simpsons director David Silverman:
Coincidentally, Dan Castellaneta (voice of Homer) portrayed Pekar in a stage adaptation of his long-running comic American Splendor. [SMITH Magazine via Twitter]
Huffington Post blogger Harry Shearer was once again hosed by the TV gods, who failed to nominate him for a prestigious "Emmy" orange blimp award in the category of "Best Voice-Talkin' Guy." Shearer, voice of Mr. Burns, Smithers, Lenny, and Principal Skinner, among others, has only been nominated in that category once (in 2009) and is the only regular Simpsons cast member to have not won it (the others somehow all won in 1992, WTF?). Dan Castalleneta (Homer), Hank Azaria (Moe), and Anne Hathaway (the princess in that godawful 20th anniversary episode) are nominated this year along with Seth Green, Dave Foley, and Coach McGuirk. [Los Angeles Times]
Back in 2002, a more innocent time when we were told Saddam Hussein could attack us again at any moment, Futurama was on death watch. Since its premiere, Fox had shuffled its timeslot multiple times, and it eventually wound up in the 7 o'clock hour, the almost-but-not-quite-primetime hour where TV shows go to die (bad news for American Dad) and football pre-emptions occur every other week. Together with a lack of advertising and the fact that it was a niche show to begin with, Futurama could only manage to wring out a pitiful 6.4 million viewers when the show was mercifully put out to pasture by Fox.
In 2010, The Simpsons, which has held the same timeslot for sixteen straight seasons and has always had the full support of the network, recieved 5.74 million viewers for its season finale, which featured guest appearances by four American Idol judges and host Ryan Seacrest. [No Homers Club/Media Life Magazine]
Comic book company Bongo Comics is rolling out a five-issue comic book miniseries called Comic Book Guy: The Comic Book, centering around comic book guy Comic Book Guy, the once-funny Simpsons character who got overused and is now just plain irritating. [TFAW.com]
A top-secret informant has come forward with the plots of several upcoming episodes that will air in the upcoming 22nd season:
The Maude Squad
Maude Flanders returns to Springfield through an emergency exit door in Heaven
My Son Is Also Named A-Bort-ion
An old flame leads Marge to make a shocking revelation. Meanwhile Homer is tricked into becoming a pissboy. Jon Lovitz reprises his role as Jay Sherman.Now You See It, Now You Donut
A diet hypnotist makes Homer blind to fatty foods. Guest starring Mel Brooks and Rep. Joe Wilson.Kenya Feel It?
At Grampa's urging the Simpsons travel to Hawaii to find President's birth certificate.Love Hack
Lisa starts a successful web 2.0 startup only have her code stolen by Mark Zuckerberg. Homer constructs a tin roof. Guest starring Justin Long and Jon Hodgman, with Heidi Montag and Kim Kardashian as "shack sluts"
Feel free to send us your hot Simpsons tips by e-mail (simpsons@rubbercat.net) or by Twitter (@rubbercatsimp). We take great pains to ensure the anonymity of our sources. [Twitter.com/virgiltexas]
In a stunning rebuke to global warming, the Dachstein Ice Palace in Austria is set to unveil its new copyright-infringing ice sculpture of TV's the Simpsons today, or at least that's all I could extrapolate from this article:
Die Eiskünstler Hans Böhmer (Mitarbeiter der Dachsteingletscher-Bahn), Christian Schmid und Sebastian Zörweg haben in den letzten Wochen mehr als 4 Tonnen Kunsteis und 9 Tonnen Gletschereis verarbeitet, um die Simpsons in Lebensgröße so realistisch wie möglich zu schnitzen. Ab Samstag, den 12. Juni können alle Gäste auf der wohl berühmtesten Couch der Fernsehgeschichte gemeinsam mit der Familie Simpson Platz nehmen. Neu ist auch der Fotopoint im Dachstein Eispalast. Besteigen Sie den Eis- Thron und fühlen Sie sich für ein paar Augenblicke wie ein König in dieser frostig - faszinierenden Eiswelt. Dazu Dachstein-Geschäftsführer Ernst Trummer: "Der Eispalast ist seit dem 1. Tag eine Erfolgsgeschichte. Um weiterhin für unsere vielen Besucher attraktiv zu bleiben, haben wir heuer alle Figuren neugeschnitzt und die Eis-Säle neu gestaltet".
You should watch the video, particularly the moment at 1:54. [SimpsonsNews.de]
Still no word on a twenty-third season of The Simpsons... hmm.... [A.V. Club]
Of the many little things I detest about the new HD opening sequence - the egregious fanservice, the flow-killing Ralph moment, the inexplicable downgrading of Mr. Burns to "background character seen during whip-pan" - my biggest gripe is with the scene where Maggie is scanned. In the original, Marge becomes extremely concerned when she realizes Maggie is gone, she swivels around with her hair accentuating her movement, then she lets out a big sigh of relief when Maggie pops out of the bag. It's a nice little moment of character animation, which you can see here in this crude gif I put together (framegrabs shamelessly taken from No Homers Club poster Wooster):
In the new one, Marge doesn't really react at all - her head jerks around, her slight frown changes to a slight smile, and then she blinks while Maggie exchanges a shaking of fists with The One-Eyebrowed Baby (ughhh):
Aye carumba, Marge really did become a robot!
Anyway, the reason I'm posting about this now is because I only recently discovered this rather candid journal entry by Dane Romley, one of the animators who worked on it. Turns out he hates the Marge thing too!
This whole scene was mine. I didn't like what they did where they cut pieces of body parts and moved them in the computer ie. Maggie's head etc. It looks like it was done in flash. About the Marge turn, I had originally done a version where she did a nice head turn but, again, they didn't want it. "Just have a simple head turn because we want the joke to be Maggie and the unibrow baby," they told me. I didn't know they were going to stiffen it up that much, I'm just defending myself because that seems to be the first thing people mention is Marge. They kept my Maggie scan and popping out of the bag though and in my defense they added the fist shaking later, I didn't do those 2 drawing cycle *eck*At the end, he advises everybody not to blame the arists for the bad animation, they were only following orders, etc. It is a good read, you should read it! [deviantART]
Here's an interesting interview with former-ish animator Jay Robinson, about the highs and lows of working in television animation.
THE LOWS
THE HIGHS
Robinson's work still hangs in poster form at Von D's Hollywood shop; Metallica lead singer James Hetfield told him his work inspires the band; and [Bam] Margera sent him a letter, thanking him for the sketch of a nude skateboarding Bart Simpson clad in Margera's tattoos.
"We spent the next two hours drawing characters on bar napkins for drinks. It's a great girl-gettin' job."
[Duluth News Tribune via Sx2]
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