REVIEW: THE SIMPSONS “A TREE GROWS IN SPRINGFIELD”

Episode Synopsis: Homer is bummed when his “MyPad” tablet computer breaks, but hope springs eternal when Ned Flanders discovers a tree with magical powers and a bark that spells out “HOPE” in the Simpsons’ backyard.Original Air Date: Nov 25, 2012. 

Spoilers Below

A rainy day ruins the house which gets Homer out of his dreams and at Moe’s. Turns out Homer is kinda depressed and Moe recommends some professional help in the name of Duff Man but he can’t help his depression nor the new boot placed on his car courtesy of Springfield Police Department.  Afterward, Homer has to go with the family to a school fundraiser but not before finding out the dog has the mumps which will cost a pretty penny to get treated.  The night is darkest always before the dawn it seems and that proves true as, during a raffle at the fundraiser, Homer wins a new Mypad!

After getting through his initial setup, Homer starts to become pretty infatuated with his new tech gadget instead of spending time with his wife and kids. Unfortunately, Homer gets so obsessed with gaming that he falls into a sewer and smashes the shit out of his MyPad. After praying Ned tells Homer of his tree which now has the word “Hope” inscribed on it.  This leads Homer to believe that God has spoken to him and as such uses this as an excuse to get a bunch of people to come check it out of course gaining the attention of Kent Brockman and the local news crew.

Kent decides to do a bit of investigative journalism to see what’s going down with this ‘Hope’ deal and finds out that this may is a big ol’ hoax and everyone’s been duped, including Homer of whom now believes there is no hope.  The culprit?? A sleeping fat man!

Our Take

How about that ending, huh?? The Simpsons writers did a better job than friggin” the full-length feature film Branded. But, what a great episode helping exploit the two biggest obsessions in America and maybe all the world, shitty Apple products, and crazy people seeing religious symbols everywhere. That said, the real mustard for this week was all the little things that the writers put in that maybe get overlooked by most like Homer and the kids at the zoo or fighting fire with a poker. I do think the plot kind of fell apart near the end there in terms of connecting the dots set forth from the opening but overall we had an entertaining episode of The Simpsons that has a pretty good lesson to the general masses for this holiday season.

Score

8/10

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