Pool 40 Results (my initial ranking in parentheses)
1. New Kid on the Block (1)
2. Old Money (2)
3. Dumbbell Indemnity (6)
4. Fear of Flying (5)
5. Robot (NR)
6. D'oh-in' in the Wind (4)
Near unanimity in the top half, razor-thin margin among the bottom three. But I agree with Paul about how generally easy this bracket is to rank. Also I'm in "hurry up and wait" mode in real life as I type this. I hope these past couple brackets don't end up seeming too rushed.
(See the category archive for other results.)
Pool 41, Pool 42, and Pool 43 are all still open.
Pool 45 won't be ready until over a week from now. All four sets of Pool 41-44 results will be posted when we get back from New Orleans.
As usual, I let a pseudorandom number generator choose six episodes, then post my on-the-spot rankings and observation. You comment, ideally with your own rankings. A week later I post my revised rankings, reserving the right to be autocratic (though in practice I almost always go with the consensus).
NOTE TO SELF: =INDIRECT("A"&(FLOOR(RAND()*(335-COUNT(C2:C336)),1)+COUNT(C2:C336)+1))
Numbers...
250: BABF20 (SI-1120 / S12E02) A Tale of Two Springfields
After Springfield's telephone area code splits in two, Homer spearheads a movement to divide the town itself in half along the new area code line. Guest starring The Who.
108: 2F02 (SI-602 / S06E05) Sideshow Bob Roberts
With the help of a radio talk show host, Mayor Quimby is pressured into releasing Sideshow Bob from prison. Once out, Bob promptly runs against the mayor and wins. Bart and Lisa set out to prove Mayor Bob didn't win legally.
15: 7F02 (SI-202 / S02E02) Simpson and Delilah
After trying a hair-growing formula (charged to the company's health insurance), Homer gets promoted to an executive position, and gets a male secretary who helps him along in his job. Harvey Fierstein guest stars.
141: 3F09 (SI-709 / S07E13) Two Bad Neighbors
Homer's jealousy at all the attention his new neighbors, George and Barbara Bush, receives, turns to rage when the former President gives Bart a spanking.
255: CABF03 (SI-1203 / S12E07) The Great Money Caper
Strapped for cash, Homer and Bart thumb their way through "A Child's Garden of Cons" in search of the road to easy money.
219: AABF12 (SI-1012 / S10E16) Make Room For Lisa
Lisa experiences stress when forced to temporarily share a room with Bart. Meanwhile, Marge discovers the joys of eavesdropping on cellular telephone calls and becomes obsessed with the personal dramas of complete strangers.
My first impressions:
"Two Springfields": Big fat ugh. Brutally heinous. Lousy excuse for The Who to perform.
Ah, Birch Barlow. Interesting side question is how to rank the Sideshow Bob episodes, nearly all of which are fantastic. This one's clearly top 100 material; hard to say whether it's top 50.
Klaus!! I love this episode wholeheartedly. Old-school masterpieces like this are why the series took off so quickly despite various weaker early efforts. So far this is my top pick, though I assume a healthy chunk of you would still put Sideshow Bob Roberts ahead.
"The one where Bart gets spanked by George H.W.": Solid 4-seed in a good bracket, not a terrible 3-seed in a weaker bracket but then not the end of the world if it slipped to 5 in a really stacked one.
Had to think about it a moment but yes, I've seen "The Great Money Caper." Not as bad as the miasma that hangs over {end of 10 through start of 12} but not very good either.
The biggest dilemma in this bracket turns out to be which of the worst two episodes I despise more. Very shallow pool: Arguably four below average of which two are way below average. But the top of the bracket is perfectly cromulent, there are three obvious tiers of two episodes each, and at least two of the those tiers feature interesting comparisons.
Preliminary rankings:
1. Simpson and Delilah
2. Sideshow Bob Roberts
3. Two Bad Neighbors
4. The Great Money Caper
999. Make Room For Lisa
1000. A Tale of Two Springfields
I agree with your three couplets, but would reverse the order of all of them. Though I could be convinced to keep the top one in order if memories of the Homer with hair one were more fresh.
Posted by: Mark at April 3, 2005 06:59 PMTop 100 episodes?!! You could make a strong case (and I will, when the time comes around) that Sideshow Bob Roberts deserves to be in the Top 1 list.
1. Sideshow Bob Roberts
2. Simpson and Delilah
3. Two Bad Neighbors
4. Great Money Caper -- I'll be pushing hard to relegate this one when time comes round. Its ranking here is the equivalent of Homer and Wiggum's trip to Springfield Chasm.
5. Tale of Two Springfields -- I will defend this as better than the cell phone episode, if only because of the chloroform gag.
6. Make Room For Lisa -- oh is this bad.
1. Sideshow Bob Roberts -- this episode mimicked the Chuck Robb (Joe Quimby)-Oliver North (Sideshow Bob) Senate race in Virginia perfectly, right down to having its very own Rush Limbaugh in Birch Barlow. Sideshow Bob's monologue on Springfield's urge to vote Republican was priceless, and the scene at "Republican Party HQ" was a hoot (particularly the sight of the group thinking that they nominated a water cooler to run against Quimby).
2. Simpson and Delilah -- good early episode, and Carl the secretary was a great one-shot character. But it's second to Sideshow Bob here.
3. The Great Money Caper -- the best of a weak rest of the field. This could have been a great episode, but there was simply too much crap around it to be successful.
4. Two Bad Neighbors -- the epitome of an overhyped episode that didn't live up to the hype. Think about it -- when you heard this episode was made, didn't you hope for a genuine sequel to the "Waltons vs. Simpsons" quips from the 1992 election? Instead, we get a rehashed "Dennis the Menace," with Bush 41 as Mr. Wilson. Bonus points for the Ford appearance, which was funny.
5. A Tale of Two Springfields -- only funny moment in the entire episode was Homer telling the Arizona Cardinals rep to "keep moving." A Who Huddle?!?!?
6. Make Way For Lisa -- it burns! It burns!
Posted by: James Dinan at April 3, 2005 07:14 PMI pretty much agree with Paul on Sideshow Bob Roberts - I'm not sure about top 1, but it's almost certainly top 5 material and easily the best I've seen out of this bracket. The fact that Cape Feare and Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming are also top 5 material goes to show what a great character Sideshow Bob is.
1. Sideshow Bob Roberts
2. Simpson and Delilah
3. Two Bad Neighbors
NR. The Rest
I don't see couplets, I see triplets: three great episodes and three big clunkers. Seriously, there probably are 200 episodes that I would rank between the 3 and 4 here.
1. Two Bad Neighbors - "And since I'd achieved all my goals as President in one term, there was no need for a second." "It's all in the Bible, son: it's the prankster's bible."
2. Simpson and Delilah
3. Sideshow Bob Roberts - Dr. Demento, "Mayor Quimby even released Sideshow Bob -- a man twice convicted of attempted murder."
4. The Great Money Caper
5. A Tale of Two Springfields
6. Make Room For Lisa
Sideshow Bob Roberts would be higher if it wasn't full of cartoonish hyperbole. I mean, yeah, but it's still a flaw.
Posted by: John at April 10, 2005 11:43 PM