WEB-WATCH

GABBIN' ABOUT GOD, WEB-WATCH

Charlie Sweatpants of the sycophantic Simpsons blog Dead Homer Society nicely asked the Vatican’s newspaper (The Vatican Plain-Dealer) for an unabridged copy of the story where Pope Ratzinger personally declared himself to be the world’s biggest Bart fan and they tried to charge him eight whole euros ($800 American) for the privilege of reading an untranslated article. Has the Catholic Church adopted Rupert Murdoch’s pay-for-news business model? [Dead Homer Society]

WAGON TRAIN, WEB-WATCH

wagon trainEveryone knows that one of the major causes of the writers’ strike was the fact that writers were not being compensated for profits made from online distribution. Rather than waiting to see how negotiations would turn out, News Corp. and NBC Universal launched the private beta of their YouTube rival Hulu at the end of October (I didn’t get my invite until like a few days ago, so whatever). Hulu features clips and full episodes of all your favorite Fox and NBC shows, including The Simpsons, with some fairly annoying ads for the upcoming movie Hitman built in. It’s actually a nice, clean interface, and you actually the option to turn on subtitles. As of right now, the Simpsons category only has full episodes from Season 19, as well as some 60-odd clips from Seasons 1 – 7, some of which are just couch gags.

So while you’re waiting for the strike to end, you can just sit back, relax, and enjoy all your favorite Fox/NBC-owned content, with the knowledge that none of that ad money is going to the writers. [Hulu]

WEB-WATCH

Wikipedia user “a metal shard” has blown the doors off the biggest plagiarism scandal to rock the animation world since the Lion King/Kimba the White Lion fiasco of 1994:

Neon Genesis: Evangelion—theme?

While viewing the movie, I was reminded several times throughout of the old Anime: 1. The corporation EPA and their helicopters = NGE’s EVA and their large scale assaults + heli’s are almost identical 2. Dome = Angel’s shields (were they called AT Fields?) 3. Homer’s Epiphany = Shinji’s numerous experiences, almost identical, with the clapping hands and such, 3.5 the boob-ladie’s blowing into Homer’s mouth remind me of the NGA’s women cleavage and kissing scene (during Shinji’s dream?). 4. Homer’s pig = Masato’s penguin

A naysayer attempts to shoot down his theories, forcing a metal shard to respond with these sage words of wisdom: “Maybe if you had seen the anime show, watched the movies, played the games, read the manga, or set foot in Japan, you wouldn’t be so quick to claim that I was implying anything…” Don’t let the bastards grind you down, a metal shard! Keep on fighting the good fight! [Wikipedia]

ANNOYED GRUNTS, WEB-WATCH

A TV Squad critic is infumed that some people think The Simpsons decreased in quality over the past decade or so, and that some of those people are using the internet to voice that opinion.

This is the CRITIC’s equation: Everybody loves this show, and since most people are stupid, their love must mean that the show is stupid too… if I express my disdain for the show, I am distancing myself from the stupid masses and am therefore smarter than the average person. I can thus explain my lack of a date to the senior prom as not a commentary on my severely lacking personal hygiene but on the Philistine’s inability to recognize genius in their midst. I will now go watch obscure BBC comedies and eat Fluff directly out of a jar.

[TV Squad]

WEB-WATCH

Candy Addict is a blog that’s completely crazy about candy – just look at its description: “Candy news, views, and reviews. All the candy that’s fit to eat, and some that isn’t. All candy, all the time. Addicted to candy.” In honor of The Simpsons Movie, or so I assume, they compiled a list of the top 10 Simpsons candy moments, which one of the candy addicts thought I might be interested in and kindly e-mailed me about it. The Simpsons article is good and well, but I strongly advise looking at the rest of Candy Addict because it’s delightfully insane. [Candy Addict]

ANNOYED GRUNTS, WEB-WATCH

Some conservative bloggers were outraged at a recent episode that supposedly made fun of the US military! Could the show that gave them their beloved war chant “cheese-eating surrender monkeys” actually hate America??

The Corner:

Yesterday’s episode wasn’t just unfunny, it was very poorly animated – a 1970s Hanna-Barbera-level of crudeness. The sequence in which Lenny’s car was crushed looked like it had been drawn by a 10 year-old trying to draw The Simpsons. I can only assume they’re devoting all their time and effort to the movie.

As for BSG, I agree with Jonah’s long-trusted reader and had exactly the same argument, err, discussion with my wife during the episode. Far more fun was Doctor Who in the hour beforehand, which involved Rose berating a pompous psuedo-patriot for not knowing how to fly the Union Flag and also included an interesting nod to the realization that families need fathers at the end…

Michelle Malkin:

I got tons of e-mail about the military-bashing Simpsons episode last night. Here’s a bit of the video if you haven’t seen it and want to get in a bad mood. The mockery of Army recruiters and enlistees is absolutely disgusting. This comes on the heels of last week’s election-timed episode mocking the Iraq war.

The show is getting long in the tooth and low on funny. Don’t bother with it.

Keep on fighting the good fight [alicublog]