Simpsons Pro Wrestling Episode
John Pollock and Wai Ting revi ew two wrestling-themed episodes of the world’s most famous animated sitcom, The Simpsons. We discuss our viewing history of The Simpsons, compare the quality of the series 16 years apart, and discuss how each episode represented professional wrestling’s mainstream status at the time.
'The Great Wife Hope' is the third episode of The Simpsons' twenty-first season. Originally broadcast on the Fox network in the United States on October 11, 2009, it sees the men of Springfield taking immense interest in a new combat sport called mixed martial arts (MMA). Don't know if any of you guys still watch this show, but they did an episode tonight where its revealed that Abe Simpson (Homer's father) was a wrestler in the 50's and Mr. Burns was his biggest fan. Sep 05, 2014 Wrestling Game Vs. Wrestling Reality: The Simpsons Wrestling. So the writers could still pick their asses up off the ground and do a good episode if they wanted to. #Pro Wrestling, #The.
| 'The Great Wife Hope' | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| The Simpsons episode | |||
| Episode no. | Season 21 Episode 3 | ||
| Directed by | Matthew Faughnan | ||
| Written by | Carolyn Omine | ||
| Production code | LABF16 | ||
| Original air date | October 11, 2009 | ||
| Guest appearance(s) | |||
| Episode features | |||
| Chalkboard gag | 'I am not allergic to long division'. | ||
| Couch gag | The Simpsons chase after the couch as it goes around the world. | ||
| Episode chronology | |||
| |||
| The Simpsons (season 21) | |||
| List of The Simpsons episodes | |||
'The Great Wife Hope' is the third episode of The Simpsons' twenty-first season. Originally broadcast on the Fox network in the United States on October 11, 2009, it sees the men of Springfield taking immense interest in a new combat sport called mixed martial arts (MMA). Marge is appalled by the violent sport and demands that the creator put a stop to it, but he agrees only if she will fight him in a match and win.
'The Great Wife Hope' was written by Carolyn Omine and directed by Matthew Faughnan. Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) champion Chuck Liddell guest starred in it as himself. The episode featured multiple cultural references to fighting moves and positions, along with a single reference to professional wrestlingpromotion ownerVince McMahon.
Since airing, the episode has received generally positive reviews from television critics, particularly towards the final scene. It received a 4.3/7 Nielsen rating with adults ages 18–49, behind all other programs aimed at that demographic in its timeslot.
Plot[edit]
The men of Springfield become obsessed with a violent new string of mixed martial arts (MMA) competitions called 'Ultimate Punch Kick and Choke Championships' (UPKCC). The kids soon begin to fight in small MMA matches of their own at the playground of Springfield Elementary School. While Bart and Nelson are fighting in one match, Marge sees them and is disgusted by the violent nature of the entire sport. She and a group of concerned women begin protesting the sport in front of the MMA stadium. Marge decides to go on stage before a match begins and demands that everyone cease the sport entirely. Chett Englebrit (patterned after actual fight promoter Roy Englebrecht), creator of the sport, agrees with Marge but only if she can fight him and win.
Marge begins to train for the event, practicing rhythmic gymnastics. However, the family believes that her methods are unsuitable for the extreme task at hand and get her professional help. She learns boxing from Dredrick Tatum, wrestling from former Yale wrestler Mr. Burns, jujitsu and Judo from Akira, and bullying from Jimbo, Dolph and Kearney. Now fully trained, she enters the ring (after the announcer introduces her as one of his 'Moms I'd Like to Fight') with Englebrit and is immediately knocked to the ground. Bart runs into the ring to defend his mother, but is thoroughly thrashed by Englebrit. Marge witnesses this and effectively beats Englebrit, winning their bet. Marge pulls down the ring's microphone and begins to give a speech, having had a change of heart about the demise of the violent sport upon having discovered her own dark side. She realizes, however, that everyone has already left the building to watch a drunken brawl in the parking lot.
As Marge and Homer leave to have some MMA-inspired sex, Bart and Lisa enter the empty ring and decide to settle their lifelong sibling feud then and there. As they approach each other to throw a punch, the credits begin, but the scene quickly returns to depict Lisa easily punching Bart to the ground.
Production and cultural references[edit]
'The Great Wife Hope' was written by Carolyn Omine and directed by Matthew Faughnan.[1] The writers of The Simpsons had a vast amount of knowledge and appreciation for mixed martial arts and included multiple references and themes of the sport throughout the episode.[2] Former Ultimate Fighter champion Chuck Liddell guest starred as himself, signing photographs for fans, including Bart, at a cost of $25.[3][4] Liddell commented that being a guest star was 'very cool' and that the recording sessions were 'easy'.[5]
The episode is a satire of the combat sport of mixed martial arts.[2] Throughout the episode, characters perform multiple fighting moves and positions. For example, Bart puts Nelson in a triangle choke at the playground when the two are fighting,[3] while Marge takes out Englebrit with a flying armbar.[3] Marge explains in the beginning of the episode that she found out about a creative new sport called 'Crazy Bowling' by typing in 'girls having fun'—after ignoring several thousand pages of porn—into the search engineGoogle. Also, H.R. Pufnstuf is parodied as HufnStuf on Ice, because Englebrit's assistant claims the next day, Hufnstuf on Ice will need the space.[6][7]
Marge claims that the word Ultimate makes everything worse, though Otto Mann protests that it does not affect the popular sport Ultimate Frisbee.[6] Englebrit carries similar traits to the professional wrestling promoter Vince McMahon. Marge initially tries to train for the match by performing rhythmic gymnastics.[8] She practices boxing with a character named Dredrick Tatum,[2][6] who is a parody of renowned boxer Mike Tyson.[9]
Reception[edit]
Simpsons Pro Wrestling Episode 2
'The Great Wife Hope' originally aired in the United States on October 11, 2009 on the Fox network. [10] In this initial broadcast, it received a Nielsen rating of 4.3/7, totaling 7.5 million viewers in the 18-19 demographic.[11]
The episode received generally positive reviews from television critics. IGN reporter Robert Canning gave the episode a 7.7/10 rating ('Good'), commenting that 'what really made me enjoy 'The Great Wife Hope' were the peripheral bits, characters and jokes outside the main storyline. There were many, and they were funny.[6]
Emily VanDerWerff of The A.V. Club, giving the episode a 'B', wrote that it had 'some amusing detours along the way'. She compared 'The Great Wife Hope' positively to season two's 'Itchy & Scratchy & Marge', writing that Marge's attempts to bring down the MMA sport is the parallel to her trying to bring The Itchy & Scratchy Show off the air due to its severe cartoon violence in the latter episode.[7] The staff of the website MMAjunkie said the episode was a sign that MMA had 'truly made it' and fans of the sport could appreciate the writer's knowledge on the topic.[2]
Among more negative reviews include Jason Hughes of TV Squad, who commented that several jokes in the episode did not work, such as the reveal that Krusty the Clown has been sleeping with Sideshow Mel's wife for several years, though he did enjoy most of the other jokes and applauded the development of Nelson's character.[4]
Dana White, president of Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), told reporters that he did not like the episode. He added, 'People like the [mixed martial arts] media always try to tell me that we're mainstream. [..] Did you see that Simpsons episode? Chuck Liddell signs an autograph for somebody, and he says, 'That will be $45, please'. The sport isn't like that at all. Then the promoter of the show fights Marge Simpson in the octagon, sucker-punches her in the face, and then says, 'You're the only woman I've ever hit that I didn't love'. That's the way mainstream looks at us and thinks of us, and I know that.'[12]
The final scene in the episode, featuring Bart and Lisa fighting in the arena, has received overwhelmingly positive remarks from reviewers. Canning wrote that it was 'a classic moment for the series [..] This almost felt like a moment that could have closed out the series.'[6] Hughes commented that it was 'the best moment of the night' as it 'would have been a typical ending' if it had not added the twist preceding the credits.[4] Melissa and Randall Baker of TV Guide magazine said that the scene was a moment of 'girl power', as Lisa knocks out Bart easily with one punch.[8]
References[edit]
- ^'The Simpsons: The Great Wife Hope'. Yahoo! TV. Retrieved 2009-12-26.
- ^ abcdStaff (2009-10-12). ''The Simpsons' MMA-themed episode, 'The Great Wife Hope''. MMAjunkie.com. Archived from the original on 2009-10-15. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^ abcDavies, Gareth (2009-10-13). 'UFC on The Simpsons as MMA enjoys cartoon iconography'. The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^ abcHughes, Jason. 'The Simpsons: The Great Wife Hope'. TV Squad. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^'The Simpsons - Videos'. 20th Century Fox. Archived from the original on 2010-01-17. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^ abcdeCanning, Robert (2009-10-12). 'Marge opens up a can of whup-tushy'. IGN. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^ abVanDerWerff, Emily (2009-10-12). ''The Great Wife Hope'/'The One About Friends'/'Spies Reminiscent of Us'/'Home Adrone''. The A.V. Club. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^ abBaker, Randall; Baker, Melissa (2009-10-12). 'The Simpsons Episode Recap: 'The Great Wife Hope''. TV Guide. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^Meyer, George (2006). The Simpsons season 8 DVD commentary for the episode 'The Homer They Fall' (DVD). 20th Century Fox.
- ^20th Century Fox (2009-10-11). 'Marge shows her competitive edge on 'The Simpsons' Sunday, October 11, on Fox'. Press release. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^Porter, Rick (2009-10-12). 'TV ratings: NFL games score for CBS and NBC Sunday'. Zap2it. Archived from the original on 2012-04-12. Retrieved 2009-10-16.
- ^Pandaram, Jamie (2009-12-12). 'Stomach for the fight: UFC president goes head to head with opponents'. The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2009-12-14.
External links[edit]
- 'The Great Wife Hope' on IMDb
- 'The Great Wife Hope' at TV.com
Hey folks, it’s time again to get impossibly nerdy and talk wrestling and video games all at once. As I mentioned in previous Game vs. Reality articles, wrestling games were once locked into covering a specific, narrow chunks of whatever promotion they had managed to license — a game that came out around Christmas might, if you were lucky, be based on the characters and storylines from the first three-to-six months of that year.
So, rather than simply reviewing old wrestling titles, I’m going back, comparing the wrestling game to the specific time period it was covering, and declaring an ultimate and definitive winner. The soul-wrenching decisions continue…
Before we begin, make sure to hit those share buttons. Old wrestlers! Video games! And this week, The Simpsons! You know you like all this stuff, so do it up!
I thought I’d mix it up a bit this week and look at a wrestling game that doesn’t feature any actual wrestlers. Of course there’s been countless unlicensed wrestling games made over the years, but it’s hard/impossible to do the game vs. reality comparison thing when a game’s based on nothing. In the case of The Simpsons Wrestling we at least have an established license to compare to, so to hell with it, let’s haul ass to Lollapalooza!
Retrieved 2008-12-13. ↑. Retrieved 2009-01-01. Simpsons wrestling ign 3.
His attacks are based on beer (including throwing beer glasses). Barney is one of the stronger characters, but lacks speed and stamina. Krusty is a balanced character who uses a combination of brawling and typical clown paraphernalia. Apu is a brawler with moderate strength, but has good speed and stamina. Willie uses gardening equipment to either keep opponents at a distance or to limit their movement. The simpsons wrestling review.
There have been a boggling array of video games based on The Simpsons extruded over the years, and with one exception (the original Simpsons arcade game) they’ve pretty much all been lousy. Even when The Simpsons was great the games were awful. No, trust me, go back and play that game you’re thinking of bringing up in the comments — without those rose-colored ’90s glasses you’ll realize I’m right. The Simpsons Wrestling was no exception to this rule. Boy howdy, was it no exception to the rule.
Yes, these are the game’s actual graphics.
Now, I’m not quite sure why they decided to make a Simpsons wrestling game. I suppose it was 2001, pro-graps was still popular, but some of that Attitude Era stink had wafted away, so it was okay for a respectable media franchise like The Simpsons to associate with wrestling. Also, making a skateboarding game probably would have been too hard.
The game had a passable roster of 16-characters featuring the expected faces and some quirky choices like Bumblebee Man and Professor Frink. Sadly George H. W. Bush isn’t in the game so you can’t recreate the best fight scene in Simpsons history. Also, I don’t think you can make this happen…
Even more painful than it looks.
…so we’re off to a bad start.
The game’s graphics are astonishingly bad. They characters look like they’ve been rendered by a five-year-old who may have never watched The Simpsons. Take a second to rubberneck at this roadkill…
To put that eyesore in context The Simpsons Wrestling came out in 2001. Halo came out in 2001. Soul Calibur came out in 1999.
The game’s controls are the opposite of most bad wrestling games, which tend toward the clunky and unresponsive. No, The Simpsons Wrestling is far too responsive, with a light brush of the d-pad sending you hurtling legs and arms akimbo across the ring. You basically have three levels of striking attacks, which you’re allowed to spam ad nauseam. I believe you can do a small handful of grapple moves, but good luck pulling them off, since they’re incredibly slow and can be interrupted by a simple punch. Ultimately though, the best move is the jump, which immediately fires your character 10-feet straight up in the air, where you’re free to treat your opponent like a big, jaundiced Koopa Troopa by bouncing on their head indefinitely. So yeah, not great, but between the uncontrolled barrelling around the ring and constant erratic jumping, it’s a pretty decent Kofi Kingston simulator.
Sorry Kofi, but I had to make at least a glancing attempt to tie this back to real wrestling.
The game does feature the real Simpsons voice actors, but they neglected to also pay any of the writers, so their lines are as generic as possible. They even got the legendarily cranky Harry Shearer, and a desultory “excellent” is all we get from Mr. Burns. What a waste.
Modes? Haha, come on now. There’s only two — a basic single-player tournament and two-player exhibition matches. It’s a near 100% sure bet you’ll run out of patience before you see everything The Simpsons Wrestling has to offer, but still, the lack of content is pretty galling.
So yeah, this game was a particularly dark mark on The Simpsons’ already badly smudged video game legacy. This game is what people who don’t play games, but hate them anyway, think video games are. This is a game so bad not even prime-era Simpsons could properly make fun of it.
Also, why didn’t they just make a Bonestorm game? Why did they never make a Bonestorm game?
The Simpsons Wrestling came out April of 2001, which means its release coincided with season 12 of the TV show. Of course it takes around a year to make a video game, so it’s doubtful the developers were inspired by anything past the 11th season.
Simpsons Pro Wrestling Episode 3
Not to get too dramatic or anything, but, ahem, the 11th season of The Simpsons is, without a doubt, the worst…season…ever. Okay okay, there’s probably been some completely unremarkable season in the 14-years since season 11 that was ever worse, but I’ll never hate a season quite as much as season 11.
I actually physically morph into Comic Book Guy when thinking about season 11. It’s not pretty.
This was the season where you can palpably feel the writers are not only burnt out, but have really come to resent the world they’ve created. During seasons 10 through around 12 all the major Simpsons characters transmogrified into twisted fun-house versions of themselves and they haven’t turned back since. Homer went from a simple-minded everyman, to a superpowered, job-swapping, violent asshole. Lisa went from sweet, smart, misunderstood little girl, to a shrill 50-year-old liberal scold in an 8-year-old’s body. Bart went from a clever, fast-talking underachiever to a childish booger-lovin’ brat. I could continue, but suffice to say, every major character changed so radically that most ended up literally the exact opposite of who they were during the show’s glory years.
Of course we were still only two or three years removed from said glory years back during season 11, so the writers could still pick their asses up off the ground and do a good episode if they wanted to — Take My Wife, Sleaze (the biker episode with John Goodman) and Behind the Laughter are classics. Unfortunately for every good episode there were two or three all-time sh*t bombs. Like, what about that episode where they get a horse (for the second time)? Or the one where they kill Maude Flanders for no good reason? Or that awful episode where Lisa’s the president that’s so bad it makes all the past “speculating about the future” episodes look worse by association? Or that spring break episode? Ugh. Uuuuuugggghgghh.
Season 11 of The Simpsons?
Simpsons Pro Wrestling Episode 1
Tough call, but ultimately I have to go with the one that makes me less sad. The Simpsons Wrestling was tripe, but I’d been swallowing Simpsons video game tripe for a while. Season 11 of The Simpsons was the death knell of a show I worshipped. A show that shaped my sense of humor and is largely responsible for this whole writing snarky things gig I’m doing today. The Simpsons Wrestling was a travesty, but Season 11 of The Simpsons was a tragedy. Another verdict well-rendered…
The Undisputed Unified Champion (This Week):The Simpsons Wrestling
Simpsons Pro Wrestling Episodes
Anybody else subject themselves to The Simpsons Wrestling or want to reminisce about lousy Simpsons games in general? Just want to fill the comments section up with out-of-context Simpsons quotes? Have at it!