As ratings plummet, “The Simpsons” pulled out the big guns last Sunday to help revive interest and raise the show’s recent less than stellar ratings.
FXX’s recent marathon of every Simpsons episode ever, along with the hinted character death in the show’s season 26 premiere, may have helped raise ratings to their highest in years, but it didn’t help the fact that the actual premiere was rather disappointing.
The season premiere was only the beginning of Fox’s lukewarm Simpsons-centric Sunday, as the highly anticipated, hour-long “Family Guy”/“Simpsons” crossover episode, aptly named “The Simpsons Guy” followed.
Unfortunately, the crossover fell short. At best, the episode was harmless. At worst, it was discouraging.
As an episode of “Family Guy,” it was alright. As a Simpsons crossover episode, there was a lot to be desired. Boiled down to its core, “The Simpsons Guy” is nothing more than an episode of “Family Guy” that decided it might be fun to share the screen with “The Simpsons” for an hour.
Sure, Springfield’s finest all come out in full force, but the episode lacked any of the heart and soul that makes “The Simpsons” the show we know and love.
The jokes are all either patronizingly predictable, self-referential, unnecessarily crass or a mixture of the three.
The episode ends with a tiresome fight scene that drags on for more than seven minutes. The scene seems tacked on and fails to add anything to the episode other than a fight scene for the sake of having a fight scene.
“The Simpsons Guy” does deserve some credit, though. There are a number of good jokes and gags but nowhere near enough to make this a memorable crossover.
The episode may be a bad omen for the future of the series. It may be difficult to imagine a world where “The Simpsons” is no longer on-air, but after 26 seasons it might be time.
There may still be hope for “The Simpsons.” The crossover can hardly be considered a Simpsons episode, and there is still a whole season left including another (potentially far greater) crossover episode with Matt Groening’s sci-fi comedy, “Futurama”.
Let’s just hope that when “The Simpsons” does come to its inevitable end it will be able to do so with grace and dignity rather than withering away as a shell of its former self.
Catch “The Simpsons” every Sunday on Fox at 8/7c.
