The Future's So Bart
Last night's was the fourth Simpsons episode to take an extended look into a possible future for the characters, the first one being the sixth season "Lisa's Wedding," which took place in the year 2010. I don't think the writers had any idea that the show would still be on then. Anyway, I think this new one tried to cram too much in, and even though the underlying message was decent, I don't think it worked that well. As with some of the earlier future episodes, they did way too many jokes about improbable technology. "Lisa's Wedding" had some of those as well (and hey, it's now 2011, so where are our commercial biplanes and self-aware robots with melting heads?), but it mostly focused on the characters. With the other three, it seemed that the technology gags took precedent. Tonight's episode also had a similar characterization of Bart to the one in "Bart to the Future," which I really didn't like that much. So much of the show suggests that Bart really does have potential to turn his life around, but both of these suggest that in thirty years he's just become more of a loser. Eh, whatever. The stuff with Maggie was kind of cute. The Krusty as Andy Rooney gag was perhaps a bit ill-timed, but not especially so, and I guess that's going to happen when there's a gap between the show being made and aired. I would also imagine that the Sarah Palin bit at the end of American Dad was made before she announced she wasn't going to run in 2012. I liked the American Dad episode, by the way, largely because of how amusingly far-fetched the idea of being excommunicated from every kind of Christianity was. By the way, the service dog Stan shot was named Clancy, which is also the name of one of our dogs. I did watch the Cleveland Show, but as I've never seen Die Hard, I can't say I got most of the jokes. And Family Guy was all right, but I can't really think of anything specific to say about it.
Also, I got this meme from poisonyoulove, so I might as well go ahead with it.
Comment to this post, and I will list five things I associate with you - they might make sense or they might be totally random. Then post that list, with your commentary, to your LJ (or just add a reply back to me). Other people (including me) can get lists from you, and the meme merrily perpetuates itself.
Here are my five:
1. Oz
What makes you think I would be willing to expound upon this topic? :P Seriously, I'm not entirely sure why the Oz books have been my absolute favorites for so long, but it's still the case. It helps that there's a small but active fandom that's still cranking out Oz stories. The quality varies, but some are really good. Did L. Frank Baum have any idea what he had wrought?
2. Mythology
I remember starting to cultivate my interest in mythology, particularly the Greek variety, when I was in elementary school. I recall reading through the entry on the gods in my mom's old Book of Knowledge (published back when it wasn't so much an encyclopedia as a hardcover magazine), and checking out a lot of books on the subject from the library. Obviously it's stuck with me. Many things seem to; I've noticed that I rarely totally lose interest in anything these days, but simply put some things on the back burner from time to time.
3. They Might Be Giants
My favorite band, although I knew of their existence for years before really listening to anything of theirs. It was in college that I first heard a significant amount of their stuff (I lived in an honors dorm, so there were a lot of nerds there), and started buying their albums for myself. It seems that TMBG tends to attract completists who want to hear everything they put out, unless it's just the Internet that attracts such people. And now that their fanbase seems to be averaging out to an increasingly younger crowd, I guess I'm now one of their older fans, although it certainly doesn't feel like it.
4. Politics
I'm not the most politically astute person, but I try to keep at least some tabs on what's going on in the political arena, if only to avoid becoming one of those people who think they're too good to pay attention to current events. I'm obviously on the liberal side of the spectrum, which I'd like to say is because I really care about people, but ultimately it's more or less selfish. I'm not rich, so why would I support politicians who only care about the rich? Mind you, I think that in our country that's largely the case with both major parties, but I'm still a registered Democrat. Lesser of two evils, or something, plus I wouldn't be able to vote in the primaries otherwise.
5. Twitter
I think I first heard about Twitter from 3x1minus1, who's someone with her finger on the pulse of all the new online developments. Well, at least she's much more so than I am, but that's really not saying much. I think what led me to become a pretty regular Twitter user is that it's a good place for one-liners and one-off observations, which I'm generally loath to blog because a one-sentence journal entry seems wrong to me. Yeah, I'm weirdly obsessive-compulsive in that respect. I remember overhearing someone in the break room at work a few days ago talking about how Twitter is just people posting what they had for lunch. My problem with that complaint isn't even so much that there's more to it than that as it is that people wanting to share mundane details is nothing new. It's just that, prior to the Internet, people usually just shared them with anyone who happened to be around, most of whom really didn't care.
With the Internet, it's easier to acquire an audience that might actually take an interest, and when they don't it's easy to just skip the boring parts. I guess Twitter especially, and other social networking sites to a certain extent, is a good substitute for small talk for the socially awkward among us. To me, a lot of the complaints I hear people make about online socialization don't really have anything to do with technology at all, but rather are outgoing people not understanding the rest of us.
Also, I got this meme from poisonyoulove, so I might as well go ahead with it.
Comment to this post, and I will list five things I associate with you - they might make sense or they might be totally random. Then post that list, with your commentary, to your LJ (or just add a reply back to me). Other people (including me) can get lists from you, and the meme merrily perpetuates itself.
Here are my five:
1. Oz
What makes you think I would be willing to expound upon this topic? :P Seriously, I'm not entirely sure why the Oz books have been my absolute favorites for so long, but it's still the case. It helps that there's a small but active fandom that's still cranking out Oz stories. The quality varies, but some are really good. Did L. Frank Baum have any idea what he had wrought?
2. Mythology
I remember starting to cultivate my interest in mythology, particularly the Greek variety, when I was in elementary school. I recall reading through the entry on the gods in my mom's old Book of Knowledge (published back when it wasn't so much an encyclopedia as a hardcover magazine), and checking out a lot of books on the subject from the library. Obviously it's stuck with me. Many things seem to; I've noticed that I rarely totally lose interest in anything these days, but simply put some things on the back burner from time to time.
3. They Might Be Giants
My favorite band, although I knew of their existence for years before really listening to anything of theirs. It was in college that I first heard a significant amount of their stuff (I lived in an honors dorm, so there were a lot of nerds there), and started buying their albums for myself. It seems that TMBG tends to attract completists who want to hear everything they put out, unless it's just the Internet that attracts such people. And now that their fanbase seems to be averaging out to an increasingly younger crowd, I guess I'm now one of their older fans, although it certainly doesn't feel like it.
4. Politics
I'm not the most politically astute person, but I try to keep at least some tabs on what's going on in the political arena, if only to avoid becoming one of those people who think they're too good to pay attention to current events. I'm obviously on the liberal side of the spectrum, which I'd like to say is because I really care about people, but ultimately it's more or less selfish. I'm not rich, so why would I support politicians who only care about the rich? Mind you, I think that in our country that's largely the case with both major parties, but I'm still a registered Democrat. Lesser of two evils, or something, plus I wouldn't be able to vote in the primaries otherwise.
5. Twitter
I think I first heard about Twitter from 3x1minus1, who's someone with her finger on the pulse of all the new online developments. Well, at least she's much more so than I am, but that's really not saying much. I think what led me to become a pretty regular Twitter user is that it's a good place for one-liners and one-off observations, which I'm generally loath to blog because a one-sentence journal entry seems wrong to me. Yeah, I'm weirdly obsessive-compulsive in that respect. I remember overhearing someone in the break room at work a few days ago talking about how Twitter is just people posting what they had for lunch. My problem with that complaint isn't even so much that there's more to it than that as it is that people wanting to share mundane details is nothing new. It's just that, prior to the Internet, people usually just shared them with anyone who happened to be around, most of whom really didn't care.
With the Internet, it's easier to acquire an audience that might actually take an interest, and when they don't it's easy to just skip the boring parts. I guess Twitter especially, and other social networking sites to a certain extent, is a good substitute for small talk for the socially awkward among us. To me, a lot of the complaints I hear people make about online socialization don't really have anything to do with technology at all, but rather are outgoing people not understanding the rest of us.