Fixed Perspective

The great thing about The Simpsons is how the show is able to reinvent itself along with the times. One of the biggest changes I've seen recently is how the plots have gone from situations that we'd like to see, to situations that we haven't thought of. Since the HD revolution half way through season 20, the Simpsons universe has been modernized. More often now do we see cell phones, hand held games, HD televisions than we ever did when the definition was still *sigh* standard.

While you can't run a show for twenty years without repeating yourself, you can still find ways to tell the same stories with different characters and outcomes. Just as well, I really have enjoyed the writers efforts to keep the stories interesting to people by means other than storytelling--stuff like commentary on recent events, social fopas and the like. Tonight's episode, "Chief of Hearts" offers a stellar performance from unexpected characters while putting a new wardrobe on a well aged story.

The A-story is the strongest, and centers around a friendship between Chief Wiggum and Homer after our hero offers the Chief a free sandwich. I'll admit, I've made friends with people for lesser things, so I guess I can sympathize. I was hyping this episode in my mind these past few days because I've been finding a lot of the recent Chief Wiggum lines to be hilariously dumb, and I feverishly dig that backward and sideways logic that is bounding about the comedy world these days.

I didn't expect Wiggum getting shot, and it's a lot of the reason why I enjoyed this story. The writers, Carolyn Omine and William Wright, pushed the envelope a little and it actually worked out in the story instead of just being a quick fix after the act break. Wiggum falls into a coma and thus begins the whole guilt trip which eventually pushes Homer to a breaking point, balancing out the status quo once again.

Bart fills the rest of the episode with a less than impressive (I've used that phrase like three times today) B-story where he gets addicted to a combination of Pokemon and Digimon. Marge gets the wrong impression from Bart's secrecy and thinks he's selling drugs. So, yeah, another "drugs aren't for selling" campaign. It wasn't really that heavy, though, and served more as a Mother/Son bonding opportunity than it did social commentary. Still, the Homer/Chief story took up most of the episode and it was strong enough to keep the episode together.

There's a scene with Otto where he walks into the Principal's office and Skinner is dressed like a syringe, to which Otto delivers a creeped-out "...You." that made me laugh out loud. The random humour throughout the Simpsons is thankfully well weaved into the plot, and its that alone that makes it funnier than a cut-away gag. One of my favourite funnies is where Wiggum fires off a few rounds as he hobbles out of Moe's Bar a sobbing mess. Quite the moment.

6/10