Review: The Simpsons ‘Mathlete’s Feat’

 

Spoilers Below:

I’ve always said a winning formula for any Simpsons episode is a simple story, and a whole lot of constant laughs throughout. A few big laughs could help, as could some minor subtle ones, as long as they’re peppered in evenly. The balance has been off for a past few weeks, and will need to be rediscovered if the show hopes to end season 26 on a high note.

At a kids math tournament, the nerds (Gary, Doug, and Benjamin) took pity on second-place Springfield Elementary for their lack of capital, and used their successful app money to fund the school. However, the servers overloaded and destroyed all the equipment, and Lisa had the idea to turn the facility into a Waldorf School that stresses hands-on education.

The approach was wildly successful, and the Springfield Elementary mathletes (led by Groundskeeper Willie) returned to the math tourney for a re-match with Waverly Hills. Springfield won.

In Case You Missed It:

1) Couch gag: The Rick and Morty one!

2) Sign outside the math tournament: “Good seats will always be available.”

3) The school’s film was entitled: “Springfield Elementary: Where excellence is in the dictionary.”

4) The original sign above the elementary school’s door read: “Warning: Noxious pork fumes.”

5) Michael Bay’s short film ended with, “Additional equations by Stephen Hawking”

6) The alternate electronic flags (in case of invasion) included: China, a jolly roger, Starfleet Federation, anarchy, Red Sox Nation, Reunite Pangaea, and Blockoland.

7) The book-burning machine was called the “Anti-Guttenberg 3000,” and it incinerated books at 451F (shout out to the late Ray Bradbury.)

8) The Springfield Shopper’s headlines: “School Electronics Destroyed!” and “Old-Timey Headlines Once Again Necessary.”

9) Waldorf Education pamphlet: “When you’ve given up on the modern world.”

10) Sign at the Action Fractions’ victory pizza party: “Congratulations, Springfield Mathletes. No one is > you.”

11) What the H was with the musical sequence at the end?

Right off the bat, The Simpsons failed the simplicity test. Sort of. It’s not easy to sum up “Mathlete’s Feat” in one simple sentence, and that’s troubling. However, the plot was still fairly straightforward, possibly because a similar premise has been attempted in the past. Let’s try it: “Springfield Elementary found itself without enough money and means for a proper education, and had to reinvent itself to save the children, the school, and the pride of the mathletes.”

There. Not so bad, right? There are a few more details than the ones housed in the description, but that’s probably for the best. In order to avoid redundancy, The Simpsons had to complicate things. First the school was rich, then it was poor, then they were doomed, then they cleverly changed, then they became successful. In fact, the story was so much more detailed than usual, that there was no unrelated set-up at the beginning. It began with a math competition, and ended with one. A rare and refreshing change. It was also a one-story show, which is a concept that has been notoriously difficult to pull off in latter-day Simpsons episodes.

As for laughs, the list above should show that they knocked it out of the park, at least quantity-wise. There were a ton of quick, visual gags, as well as a whole lot of math, technology, and literary references. In fact, there were a few number-based jokes that were designed to go over most people’s heads. (Including mine.) There were also some blunt, belly laughs (like Krusty’s: “Math?! I thought you said ‘meth’!”), some informative truth bombs (“Surge protectors are always power strips, but not vice-versa!”), and even a slightly-insensitive topical comment (the Italian cruise ship captain one).

In the end, this episode actually had all the ingredients of a classic installment, with its only faults being a lack of big laughs and the fact that the reinvention of the school has been done numerous times before.

But how many new ideas can there really be for a show that’s been on for 26 seasons? The writers took a familiar premise, added a different spin to it, and crafted every few seconds of the show to include a quality joke of some sort. If they wanted to end season 26 on a high note that reflects the caring effort still present after all these years, they absolutely succeeded. Well done.

(Also, the Rick and Morty couch gag might be the greatest one in the history of The Simpsons. It was absolutely fantastic, and kudos to the producers for making/letting it happen. I didn’t want to alter the score based on just the intro, because if I did, this episode would have been a ‘10’ after the very first minute.