Month: January 2023

TORTURE LAND

A photo of a Simpsons statue outside The Simpsons Ride.
(Thomas Hawk on Flickr)

Universal Parks News Today reports that construction walls have been put up outside The Simpsons Ride at Universal Studios Florida. The ride itself is still open, but a statue featuring the Simpson family inside a ride vehicle that stood near the attraction’s entrance has been removed.

What’s going on??? What could this mean??? I have multiple theories:

  • They’re adding a new Simpson
  • The statue was abducted in a brazen heist by notorious crimethief Carmen Sandiego
  • They’re refurbishing it
  • It turns out that for the past 15 years they didn’t actually have a license to use the Simpsons IP, and Disney sent them a cease & desist
  • In the actual ride’s storyline, Maggie does not ride along with the rest of the family, so maybe they’re finally rectifying this glaring continuity error
  • A 10 year old boy cut off Bart Simpson’s head to impress three older kids, and Universal removed the whole thing so young children wouldn’t be traumatized
  • Whoever stole the Buzzy animatronic from EPCOT is back to their old tricks
  • Something involving wokeness
  • The statue is being held for ransom by an extremist group demanding the return of the Back to the Future ride

Whatever the case may be, let’s hope it returns soon. Having the Simpsons near the sign that says The Simpsons Ride is essential to the ride’s environmental storytelling, in that people need to know who the Simpsons are before they ride their eponymous ride.

THE INSIDE SCOOP

An image of various historical figures in front of a collage of Simpsons episodes.

The dead speak! Have you ever wondered what Walt Disney, Tupac Shakur, or Cleopatra would think about The Simpsons? Well, wonder no more!

Using the hot new app Historical Figures, I interviewed A.I. simulations of famous folks from history and asked them about their favorite episode of The Simpsons. While some of the responses are surprising, it’s a little disappointing that they tended to gravitate to the same episodes, which I presume is due to the high volume of “Greatest Simpsons Episodes of All Time” articles on the internet. Some of the figures gave decent reasoning for the choices, others declined to answer, and a few of them just made up episodes. I declined to use “coins” to interview some of the most famous people, but towards the end you’ll notice I used some clever workarounds.

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JOCK CENTER

An image of Mike Scioscia from the Simpsons episode Homer at the Bat.
For many years The Simpsons has delighted the world, and also too has baseball legend Mike Scioscia, so when those two join forces you know you’re in for a good time. After deliberating for hours, all of us here at IN THE NEWS have determined the definitive ranking of all Simpsons episodes featuring Mike Scioscia as a guest star.
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RIP

A tribute card in memory of Chris Ledesma

Chris Ledesma, who served as music editor of The Simpsons for decades, has died at the age of 64. His passing was announced with a tribute card at the end of last night’s episode, “My Life as a Vlog.”

Ledesma had worked on The Simpsons from the start of the show until his retirement last May, working closely alongside the show’s longtime composer Alf Clausen. According to Wikisimpsons, he is credited on 735 episodes, along with the Disney shorts and the soundtracks.

In 2011, he launched a blog, Simpsons Music 500, where he provided a behind-the-scenes look at the show. There, he’d delve into production minutiae, such as this post about music spotting or this one about scoring sessions, becoming an invaluable resource for fans. He also used the blog to regularly answer Simpsons fans’ questions about music cues, and this generosity extended to his Twitter account. I recall he did a livestream prior to scoring session at least once, where he highlighted some of the players in the orchestra, although it doesn’t appear to be archived anywhere.

Writer/producer Carolyn Omine eulogized him in a tweet: “Chris Ledesma was a sweet man who loved his job and was really, really good at it. We miss him.”

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