At this point in its life, I always thought of The Simpsons as more of a symbolic show to be on than anything else, in that no one really WATCHES it–you maybe you watch an episode here or there or see clips online, but hardly anyone religiously watches it week after week. It’s just there because it’s comforting knowing that it’s on because its original 10 or 11 great seasons had enough goodwill behind them that they can now float through anything.
With Harry Shearer, the voice of Principal Skinner, Waylon Smithers, Mr. Burns, Otto, Ned Flanders, Reverend Lovejoy, Lenny, Dr. Hibbert and many others, now gone–FIRED–from the show, it’s clear that there’s no heart to the show anymore. It isn’t simply coasting by on its past glory or some duty to nostalgia, it’s a moneymaking, soulless machine that can’t even be bothered to slow its roll for the sake of one of the most important cogs in its wheel.
