The thirteenth season of the The Simpsons is a good one, especially on Blu-ray.
The highlights of season 13 start at the very beginning of the disc with ‘Treehouse of Horror XII’. This features one of the funniest shorts on it involving a leprechaun, a Gypsy and Homer. When I worked at the local Fox affiliate cutting promos this particular episode provided more comedy material then I could remember. Look for the wee Irishman to say some pretty rude, offensive stuff.
As for the rest of the collection, much like the last two seasons prior to this one it does have some ups and downs. The ups are episodes include the following:
Brawl in the Family — A monopoly game goes wrong and the Simpsons are assigned a social worker, with a good name, to study and help out. Wait for the Vegas babes to show up before everything gets even funnier.
Sweet and Sour Marge — While I was very cautious about this episode, namely because a ‘Marge cause’ was the main plot point, it turned out to be hilarious. Nothing like having the fattest town in the world becomes the namesake for Springfield.
Tales from the Public Domain — If the Treehouse episode had a cousin it would be this one. Taking public domain stories (thus the title) and warping them into a Simpsons’ view produces something magical and funny. Enjoy this one, folks.
Blame it on Lisa — Potentially one of the grossest episodes in the Simpsons’ history. You’ll know when it happens.
The Frying Game — I didn’t know whether to put this episode in the ‘bad’ or ‘good’ section. The second half of the episode is a bit odd with a very unsatifactory conclusion. The beginning of the episode is pure gold with a screaming caterpillar called ‘screamapillar’. I watched this episode three times and it still makes me laugh out loud (LOL) when that critter takes the stage.
These are the stand out episodes, while the rest kind of fall in the middle or in the ‘blah’ section. I’m not sure how everyone else feels, but I don’t love it when Lisa’s character is the focus of the episode. I’m not sure if it’s just that I can’t relate, but it always turns out to be something preachy and not as ‘off-the-wall’ as the rest.
Anyway, this is a very solid season that is well written for the most part.
As for the Blu-ray version of this season you’re going to love it like the previous. Not only do you get very solid animation that looks sharp in HD, but you also a beautiful menu system. The producers behind The Simpsons (and of course the Blu-ray producers) put forth some actual thought in the menu system.
Most of the Blu-rays that I review are pretty much the same. You get a menu across the bottom that has no personality and just ‘functions’. It wasn’t like that when DVDs were released, as people were finding new ways to make the menu experience exciting (I know, it sounds lame, but it’s nice to see companies put a large distance between technologies when they find creative ways to use them). For The Simpsons: The Complete Thirteenth Season they used a videogame theme to make the menu work. Each menu has a joystick and buttons that represent selections (Episodes, scene selection, extras, etc.) You navigate these options by using the animated joystick. It’s a neat process. Within each selection there is a list of options. For example, the episodes give you the episodic synopsis and other valuable bits of info. On top of all of this you also get a lovely timeline with each episode with jumping points where the intro ends and where each commercial break was when the episode was originally aired. I’m positive that this has been done before, but it just seems very nice combined with all the other efforts put on the menu.
Okay, I’m done being a huge geek.
On the special features side of the track, here’s what you’re looking at:
● Audio commentaries on every episode featuring executive producers, writers, directors, cast and notable guest stars on select episodes including Stan Lee, Joe Mantegna, Delroy Lindo, Robert Pinsky and others.
●Deleted scenes
●Special Featurettes:
– A Token from Matt Groening
– Ralphisms
– The People Ball
– The 13th Crewman
– Blame It On The Monkeys
– The Games
– The Sweet Life of Ralph
● Animation Showcases for eps. The Parent Rap and Sweet & Sour Marge
– Animatic with episode PIP
– Storyboard with episode PIP
● Sketch Galleries
● Commercials
On par with some of the recent BBC shows I’ve had the pleasure of reviewing, the special features here exceed expectations. I found the featurettes to be the best part of them (outside of the Easter Egg — which is just oddly self-serving, but factual). I particularly loved ‘The Sweet Life of Ralph’ which goes through different moments in the life of Ralph Wiggum, who has to be one of the funniest characters that have come out of The Simpsons (the only character I know of that has ever used the phrase, “This tastes like burning.”).
Another featurette that satisfied the gaming portion of my life is the tribute to every game created for The Simpsons. It goes through the arcade game, all the NES, Gameboy, SNES, Genesis and next gen console games. While the clips you get are short they are nonetheless interesting.
Finally, another big draw with this season is the commentary. If you’ve never had the pleasure of hearing The Simpsons commentary then you’re in for a treat.
