Surrealism vs Cartoonish Mainstream [re-post]
Chris Pfeiler
was some talk about the quality and balance of Season 7 and this text shows
some of my personal thoughts about evolution of the show, balance, and
especially Season 7. I think it愀 also an example for somehow constructive
criticism. Feel free to tell me if it isn愒.
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Surrealism vs Cartoonish Mainstream
No episode review this week but just some rambling and oldschoold thoughts
about classic and modern surrealism on the show, visual gags, cartoonish
mainstream, and evolution of style. It愀 a complex matter, so the following
text is of course just superficial.
People sometimes think I惴 completely against surreal and bizarre elements and
jokes in the show. That愀 wrong. I think on the contrary that a certain kind of
visual gags and surrealism was necessary to keep the show alive - something
that reality and dialogue humour alone couldn愒 do for so many years. But I see
big differences between intelligent visual surrealism and cartoonish filler
material.
When I talk about good surrealism on the show, I always mean the kind of
bizarre stuff that includes a deeper message, maybe some sort of "intelligent
kind of nonsense", something that is a little out of touch with reality but
that has an aim or direction and contains a certain deeper meaning.
If they would have continued to make the show in the "very close to reality"
style of Season 2 (let us consider Season 2 as very close to reality, even if
there were some exceptions like Blinky or Homer falling into Springfield Gorge.
Most of that scenes were satirical absurdities) it would have meant a very
small range of possibilities for new stories and ideas, so it was necessary to
"stretch" classic reality to a certain degree and to work with more abstract
and surreal concepts to keep the show alive for so long. Season 2 was a truly
brilliant season but sticking to its "hardcore reality" would have led to
stagnation and to a lack of fresh ideas already in the early years.
Let愀 have a look at Seasons 7 and 8, where the "teamwork" between "evolved"
surreal abstraction and classic Simpson spirit was IMO at its very best (in
Season 8 unfortunately with a slightly too parodistic tendency). Many episodes
from this time were to a certain degree bizarre and absurd but also had the
emotional and deeper content we knew from the earlier years.
I could name for example "Bart Sells His Soul" where the concept of a soul was
shown in a brilliant abstraction as simple sheet of paper (together with some
more symbolical aspects, read my review) with more philosophical than religious
implications plus true emotional depth at the end (Bart and Lisa). In addition
also the serious "Homediddly" with the excellent surreal scenario when Maggie
has to decide between the Flanders on the sunny side of the river and the
Simpsons on the dark side (symbolism) and finally comes to Marge. Dark story =>
surreal elements => classic symbolism => classic integrity of the family.
"Mother Simpson" is another episode which uses rather surreal gags (e.g. the
Dragnet Cops) but which is very serious and deep at the end. Let愀 not forget
the outstanding "The Day The Violence Died" which is on one hand about violence
in the media but on the other hand also about plagiarism in cartoons - every
good satire works on various levels - and which confronts Bart and Lisa at the
end with there own "existence" as plagiarized versions of their old selfs from
the Ullman show. IMO a brilliantly surreal ending. It愀 bizarre but it愀 also
intelligent.
"Summer of 4 Ft 2" on the other hand was a very real character episode without
surreal gags (except for the library hallucination sequence) which almost
reflected the character-oriented reality of Season 2. We see here the excellent
balance of stories/realities in season 7. The season was in a certain way
partly conservative and close to seriousness and classic ideas and partly
surreal and slightly out of touch with reality. That balance makes it at least
for me the best of the middle seasons. Season 8 continued with that style of
aimed surrealism (take "Mysterious Voyage") but became a little lighter and
more parodistic than Season 7. I think I扉e written a couple of more detailled
reviews about some 3F/4F episodes. You can find them on my website.
So what am I talking about? What I meant to say is, that there is an
intelligent kind of absurdity and of visual surrealism, namely the kind of
surrealism which has a deeper meaning and which doesn愒 destroy reality and
characters but "extends" them. That愀 what I悲 call "evolution" of the show and
that愀 what the modern seasons would need - classic spirit, dark sides, and
intelligent surrealism. I don愒 mean to say that the show should have stagnated
on the style level of season 7 (stagnation is always bad) but that season 7
showed the right way of development and evolution - a development with a wider
range of surreal possibilities but still with classic values from the very
first years.
I think there is a clear difference between intelligent and focused surrealism
(as shortly described above) and simple visual and cartoonish gags which are
used as nothing but filler material in these days. Such visual nonsense has no
aim and no meaning, it愀 just there to fill airtime and plot holes with forced
crazyness in the background. The show started to go in that (IMO wrong)
direction already in Season 5 when the plots became faster and more and more
dominated by louder "funny" visual gags without much meaning and depth. That
was IMO no evolution in a good way (thus it was corrected in season 7 - alas
for the last time) but part of a way that led into cartoon mainstream. Such
lighter visual gags aren愒 bad in moderate use but they should never dominate
plots.
What we have today is nothing I悲 call positive evolution. The roots are gone
and so is meaningful surrealism, only cheap visual gags and filler material
remains (often called surrealism but IMO way out of touch with the roots of
that style) together with loud obvious jokes about farts and boobs.
I agree that it was necessary for the show to become more abstract and surreal
to be fresh and alive for so many years (by that I mean seasons 1 to 8, maybe
9) but I don愒 agree that the style of today is a positive kind of evolution
and I see big differences between aimed surrealism and cheap visual gags and
filler material.
Comments are as usual welcome.
Chris