Review: The Simpsons ‘Blazed and Confused’

Spoilers Below:

Not to put any pressure on The Simpsons, but last week’s Futurama crossover is a tough act to follow. The episode had all the elements which you’d like in a Simpsons installment, and everything fans loved about Futurama, together in one package. This week, we’re back to reality. At least, as real as a fictional cartoon show can be.

At the Springfield School District’s annual “Dance of the Lemons” (where the individual schools can swap their lousiest teachers) Springfield Elementary received the creepy Mr. Lassen, voiced by Willem Dafoe. When Bart attempted to prank and intimidate him, Mr. Lassen responded by giving him a hack job of a haircut and electrocuting him.

Bart vowed revenge on the teacher, and after discovering he would be going to Blazing Guy (a Burning Man spoof), Bart tricked the rest of the family into attending the event in an attempt to catch Mr. Lassen incriminating himself in some way.

Instead, Bart and Milhouse sabotaged Lassen when he attempted to light the giant blazing guy during the ceremony, thereby humiliating him. Lassen also landed himself in trouble with the other Blazing Guy attendees and Springfield Elementary after he attempted to kill Bart.

At the very end, working in a new job as a prison guard, Mr. Lassen struck up a conversation with inmate Sideshow Bob. The two almost decided to team up to go after Bart, but Bob wasn’t down with sharing the joy of maiming Bart with anyone else.

In Case You Missed It:

1) During the opening credits, Kang and Kodos appeared, in costume, flying their ship and stating that they missed Halloween. (But they didn’t!)

2) Couch gag: The family arrived on a ski-lift couch, appearing quite injured.

3) It was implied that Mrs. Krabappel was replaced by a teacher named Sticky Fingers Stella.

4) Nelson’s mom works at a gentlemens club called “A Touch of Class,” or, more likely, “A Touch of Ass.”

5) The balloon Bart was given after his haircut read: “Ask me what was so funny.”

6) The New Zealand (The Milhouse of Australia) website provided, www.nzfilmhere.com, is a real link to a fox.com page featuring Milhouse saying, “Made ya look!”

7) Ms. Hoover was reading a dinosaur romance novel entitled To Saur with Love.

8) Did the color scheme in the Blazing Guy sequences remind anyone else of Futurama?

9) Whilst in the drum circle, Lisa played the same song as she does in the opening.

10) Johnny Cash’s Space Coyote from “El Viaje Misterioso de Nuestro Jomer” made an appearance.

When the episode was teased as one about Burning Man, I really thought it would be more central to the plot. I mean, it was important to the story, but it didn’t come into play until about halfway through. Instead, “Blazed and Confused” was a tale about Bart attempting to exact revenge on a new teacher – something that has been played out several times in the past. Granted, none of the previous teachers were ever bullies to Bart, so that is unique, but you get the idea.

Because of this odd balance, the episode as a whole felt a bit convoluted, and it was difficult to get into it. Also there really was no B-story, unless you count Lisa’s random jam session and Marge sipping some hallucinogenic tea, neither of which could really be called an additional plotline.

Speaking of odd balances, did anyone else notice how weirdly the commercials were timed? There was a normal-ish first segment, an extra long second segment, and an extremely brief ending portion. Not that that’s a criticism, per se, but it was weird, right?

Thankfully, there were a good amount of quotable lines and little gags consistently supplied in the episode – at least in the first three-quarters of it. The laughs unfortunately dropped off toward the end, making this surprisingly funny dud turn into a plain old kind of funny dud. I wouldn’t turn it off in syndication, but I also wouldn’t pick it on a future DVD release. However, to clarify my position in as much detail as possible, I’ll say that I would let it play if it was in the middle of a “play all.”

Got all that?