The Simpsons Sing the Blues

Last night the 500th episode of The Simpsons aired on Fox.  500 episodes; over 20 years worth of Doh! and Ay carumba!  It's sort of quaint now to look back at the earliest episodes of and think about how much controversy that yellow, four-fingered family stirred up.  Remember when Bart telling a grown up to eat his shorts was big deal?  Gasp!  My mom hated the fact that I loved the show and I was mostly forbidden from watching it (only mostly because I would of course sneak a watch if she wasn't around...as if she didn't know that).

But I'm not here to write about The Simpsons controversies or it's place in TV history and how it paved the way for all the other "adult" cartoons--none of which, by the way, are even remotely as good--or it's significant impact on the culture, pop and otherwise.  I'll leave that to the professionals like Alan Sepinwall.  For the record, if you love TV, you should be reading Sepinwall at HitFix.com.

I thought about doing a list of some of my favorite moments (an idea I stole from Sepinwall), but it would be an almost impossible task to keep this post at a readable length if I did that.  So I had another idea.  I've always loved the musical numbers The Simpsons cast of characters have put on.  They're the perfect blend of absurdity, movie musical homage, and surprisingly good music.  Here's a few of my favorite ones (that I could find on YouTube) and a couple other random clips involving Mr. Burns.  Just because.

Who Needs the Kwik-E-Mart - After Homer gets Apu fired from the Kwik-E-Mart, the Simpsons try to lend him a helping hand at finding the bright side.  Homer's rhyming skills are, not surprisingly, sub-par.

And the lonesome reprise:

Monorail - Springfield's salute to The Music Man.  Not only is this a great musical number, but this might be the best episode ever.  It has Leonard Nimoy!  And once again Homer's musical timing leaves something to be desired.

No show made better use of pop culture spoofs than The Simpson's.  Sure, Family Guy probably has more pop culture winks per square inch than any TV show ever, but The Simpson's are usually able to weave the reference fairly seamlessly into the story, where as Family Guy throws it out there just for the sake of doing so.  Which isn't all bad, but still.

Planet of the Apes as a Broadway musical?  Yes please!  Featuring the great Troy McClure (RIP Phil Hartman), star of such educational films as Two Minus Three Equals Negative Fun and Here Comes the Metric System?  Double yes please!  The pinnacle of The Simpsons musical spoofery, in this blogger's humble opinion.  I give you, Dr. Zaius!  And yes, the very beginning dialog is in Spanish, but stick with it.

And just because you can't post about The Simpsons and not mention Mr. Burns...

  

My wife and I probably use this line on a weekly basis.  Still makes me laugh every time.

And one more....

One more thing before I go.  Aforementioned TV critic Allen Sepinwall has asked his readers to list their single favorite episode, character, and quote from The Simpsons on his blog.  If you're a fan, it's well worth checking out.  A very fun trip down memory lane.