EmployeeAMillion
Season 13 Time!
September 28 is an important date in The Simpsons' history for many reasons. Alongside Marge getting a job baking erotic cakes, Krusty's father dying and the Simpsons meeting the Griffins from Family Guy, today marks the 20th anniversary of the Season 9 episode "The Principal and the Pauper", often seen as a sign of the end of The Simpsons' Golden Age (roughly 1991-1997), or at worst, the beginning of its Dark Age (roughly 1997-forever). Upon initial airing, this episode (like most) recieved somewhat negative reception from the Simpsons community, though in this case, it was a lot more scathing and even professional critics found it to be off-putting. Looking back, was this really the shark-jumping moment of FOX's biggest hit, has the passage of time allowed it to age decently, or does it pale in comparison to the low quality of episodes from Season 10 onwards?
First thing's first, the episode's plot was ambitious. This was written during the show's 8th season, one responsible for Mr Burns' son being comedian Rodney Dangerfield, an everyman being driven insane by Homer's successful life, Bart destroying a good chunk of Springfield using amplified soundwaves, and The Simpsons Spin-Off Showcase, the first "3 Shorts" episode not to be aired around Halloween or even be related to it. Needless to say, the show was going in a nuttier direction, but at least they were always focused on present events and never focused too hard on rewriting or referencing established canon. This, the second to last episode written for it (alongside Lisa the Simpson, which established a strange yet sensical "Simpson Gene") was the exception.
The story focuses on Seymour Skinner, who is set to celebrate his 20th anniversary of being principal of Springfield Elementary School. However, celebrations are cut short when a man drops by claiming to also be Seymour Skinner. This is when the principal explains that he was really Armin Tamzarian, a streetpunk who 26 years ago was forced to be a soldier in the Vietnam war alongside the newly established Skinner, who was his officer. After thinking Skinner had died, Tamzarian decides to take his identity and move back to Springfield with Agnes Skinner as a mother figure. The rest of Springfield is mad to discover he was a fraud, so they reappoint the old Seymour as a principal and Armin moves back to Capitol City.
However, things don't go as planned as Seymour doesn't "feel" like the Seymour they'd grown accustomed to, so the Simpsons, Edna Krabappel, Agnes, Grampa and Jasper (long story, decent joke) go to Capitol City and talk Armin into coming back. Let it be known this is during the last 5 minutes of the episode, the rest of which involves them tying Seymour to a train (robbing him of the life he was already robbed 26 years of), with the Judge coming in to declare mentioning the events of this episode as illegal, a fourth wall break reflecting a sitcom's standard reset button.
My biggest issue with the story, aside from the overly rushed and on-the-nose ending, is the first act and how it concludes. It feels generic and like something out of a soap opera, not a satirical comedy series like The Simpsons. I guess they really wanted to leave to the commercial break on something exciting, but it comes across as tacky, and because it signals one third of the episode is over, it throws the rest of the episode somewhat off-balance. I'd imagine that the writers of the first four seasons would've added more time of the fake Seymour being Armin again in Capitol City, giving us some gags about him readjusting to him being a streetpunk after years of an authoritarian lifestyle. While not a major disappointment, at least until the end, it's a flawed narrative to say the least.
The episode's animation is your standard Simpsons fare for most of it. Characters are on-model, colours are sharp and crisp (though the yellow skin tone seems to be darker here for whatever reason), and each shot packs as many characters as it needs to. Additionally, the episode shows flashbacks to Skinner and Tamzarian's time in the Vietnam war, with lush, exotic backgrounds throughout. It's definitely one of the more artistaclly competent episodes of the 4F production line, a rarity for a time when many of the animators would begin getting tired.
Now onto characters, and believe me, this is where opinions start to get more controversial. First up for analysis is Principal Skinner, who was always one of my favourite secondary characters. He always struck me as what would happen if a nerd succeeded in life, having equal amount of authority and intellect at his disposal. I wouldn't say this episode detracts from or destroys his backstory, if anything I think it adds to how he feels about Agnes as a mother figure that he needed. Think about it, you find yourself a mother's boy in an intense war while you yourself have no family, how would you feel? Probably not lonely enough to take that person's life after he supposedly dies (pretty stupid move in my opinion), but it shows how desperate he was for a family.
Then you get to Agnes, Skinner's snappy, abusive mother. She's always been a hard character for me to appreciate it, because her voice and behaviour just aren't nice to see in real life. Given the situation presented in this episode, and the hard choices she has to make, I'd say she has a perfect reason to be angry here. Not a great character, but I love her speach to Armin about how he's "her Skinner". Now for the new character, "the real Skinner" voiced by Martin Sheen. You'd think given how much he wanted to be a principal, he's be overjoyed to have his life handed back to him, but no, he doesn't click with the residents of Springfield. I don't see that as a reason to eject him from the town, he can still be in the background for a sense of continuity. Heck, A Milhouse Divided, also produced in Season 8, established an arc where Milhouse's parents were divorced. How come this episode couldn't do the same?
A sidenote about the characters here would be the Simpson family themselves. They serve the story in very small ways. Marge is among the residents who is initially upset with Armin but soon misses him, Lisa prepares a speach during the 20 year ceremony, Bart makes a point of how he's forged his life, and Homer applies occasional comic relief. Not one family member is given more focus narratively than another, and I think that benefits this episode as being one much more about the secondary characters.
The episode's comedic moments are sparse to say the least, but that's never been too much of a problem with The Simpsons, as it's known for sprinkling comedy on top of a good story. However, given this episode's story is wonky, when there are and aren't jokes here is more noticeable. My favourite joke here is when the real Skinner describes his later days in Vietnam as a funny story, despite him making it sound horrific. It seems, like SpongeBob's Have You Seen This Snail?, they wanted a more serious episode, yet the narrative isn't nearly as heartwarming as in SpongeBob's case, given how unsatisfying the ending is and how in-your-face it is about it.
Now to describe the two key reasons this episode gets as much hate as it does- firstly, the reveal that Skinner was a fraud. Though a great secondary character, he's not vital to the series, so doing an experiment like this with his character wasn't that risky of a move in the longrun. The execution, while botched, didn't ruin Skinner's character for me, nor did it make any of his other appearances, past or future, mean less. It was a one-time thing. The second reason this episode has a bad rep among Simpsoniacs is the reset button ending. I agree that it was a cheap way to end an episode like this, as at worst it's saying "this episode is worthless", and it lacked the sentimentality or charm that the Classic episodes were known for giving off. Is it the shark-jumping episode of the show? In my opinion, no. Season 9 and 10 were standard Seasonal Rot, and letting Mike Scully stay in charge for Season 11 is what did it for me for various reasons.
Another reason the episode is hated that has little to do with the content of the episode is that both Harry Shearer, Skinner's voice actor, and Matt Groening, the show's creator, have expressed regret over working on the episode. Shearer's reasoning was that it destroyed the background of Skinner's character, to which I respectfully disagree, while Groening considers it gimmicky and nonsensical. Let me just say that when it takes until Episode 180 for your show to turn bad in the eyes of the staff and most fans, you did something right for the first 179, a record that isn't easy to accomplish for a TV series or any other piece of media. The Principal and the Pauper is not a great episode, or even that good, but it's a piece of TV history that'll be remembered for positive reasons. It taught us that not every show is perfect, not even The Simpsons, but that doesn't undermine or tarnish any of their legacies.
6/10 (Average)
What is your opinion on this episode?
First thing's first, the episode's plot was ambitious. This was written during the show's 8th season, one responsible for Mr Burns' son being comedian Rodney Dangerfield, an everyman being driven insane by Homer's successful life, Bart destroying a good chunk of Springfield using amplified soundwaves, and The Simpsons Spin-Off Showcase, the first "3 Shorts" episode not to be aired around Halloween or even be related to it. Needless to say, the show was going in a nuttier direction, but at least they were always focused on present events and never focused too hard on rewriting or referencing established canon. This, the second to last episode written for it (alongside Lisa the Simpson, which established a strange yet sensical "Simpson Gene") was the exception.
The story focuses on Seymour Skinner, who is set to celebrate his 20th anniversary of being principal of Springfield Elementary School. However, celebrations are cut short when a man drops by claiming to also be Seymour Skinner. This is when the principal explains that he was really Armin Tamzarian, a streetpunk who 26 years ago was forced to be a soldier in the Vietnam war alongside the newly established Skinner, who was his officer. After thinking Skinner had died, Tamzarian decides to take his identity and move back to Springfield with Agnes Skinner as a mother figure. The rest of Springfield is mad to discover he was a fraud, so they reappoint the old Seymour as a principal and Armin moves back to Capitol City.
However, things don't go as planned as Seymour doesn't "feel" like the Seymour they'd grown accustomed to, so the Simpsons, Edna Krabappel, Agnes, Grampa and Jasper (long story, decent joke) go to Capitol City and talk Armin into coming back. Let it be known this is during the last 5 minutes of the episode, the rest of which involves them tying Seymour to a train (robbing him of the life he was already robbed 26 years of), with the Judge coming in to declare mentioning the events of this episode as illegal, a fourth wall break reflecting a sitcom's standard reset button.
My biggest issue with the story, aside from the overly rushed and on-the-nose ending, is the first act and how it concludes. It feels generic and like something out of a soap opera, not a satirical comedy series like The Simpsons. I guess they really wanted to leave to the commercial break on something exciting, but it comes across as tacky, and because it signals one third of the episode is over, it throws the rest of the episode somewhat off-balance. I'd imagine that the writers of the first four seasons would've added more time of the fake Seymour being Armin again in Capitol City, giving us some gags about him readjusting to him being a streetpunk after years of an authoritarian lifestyle. While not a major disappointment, at least until the end, it's a flawed narrative to say the least.
The episode's animation is your standard Simpsons fare for most of it. Characters are on-model, colours are sharp and crisp (though the yellow skin tone seems to be darker here for whatever reason), and each shot packs as many characters as it needs to. Additionally, the episode shows flashbacks to Skinner and Tamzarian's time in the Vietnam war, with lush, exotic backgrounds throughout. It's definitely one of the more artistaclly competent episodes of the 4F production line, a rarity for a time when many of the animators would begin getting tired.
Now onto characters, and believe me, this is where opinions start to get more controversial. First up for analysis is Principal Skinner, who was always one of my favourite secondary characters. He always struck me as what would happen if a nerd succeeded in life, having equal amount of authority and intellect at his disposal. I wouldn't say this episode detracts from or destroys his backstory, if anything I think it adds to how he feels about Agnes as a mother figure that he needed. Think about it, you find yourself a mother's boy in an intense war while you yourself have no family, how would you feel? Probably not lonely enough to take that person's life after he supposedly dies (pretty stupid move in my opinion), but it shows how desperate he was for a family.
Then you get to Agnes, Skinner's snappy, abusive mother. She's always been a hard character for me to appreciate it, because her voice and behaviour just aren't nice to see in real life. Given the situation presented in this episode, and the hard choices she has to make, I'd say she has a perfect reason to be angry here. Not a great character, but I love her speach to Armin about how he's "her Skinner". Now for the new character, "the real Skinner" voiced by Martin Sheen. You'd think given how much he wanted to be a principal, he's be overjoyed to have his life handed back to him, but no, he doesn't click with the residents of Springfield. I don't see that as a reason to eject him from the town, he can still be in the background for a sense of continuity. Heck, A Milhouse Divided, also produced in Season 8, established an arc where Milhouse's parents were divorced. How come this episode couldn't do the same?
A sidenote about the characters here would be the Simpson family themselves. They serve the story in very small ways. Marge is among the residents who is initially upset with Armin but soon misses him, Lisa prepares a speach during the 20 year ceremony, Bart makes a point of how he's forged his life, and Homer applies occasional comic relief. Not one family member is given more focus narratively than another, and I think that benefits this episode as being one much more about the secondary characters.
The episode's comedic moments are sparse to say the least, but that's never been too much of a problem with The Simpsons, as it's known for sprinkling comedy on top of a good story. However, given this episode's story is wonky, when there are and aren't jokes here is more noticeable. My favourite joke here is when the real Skinner describes his later days in Vietnam as a funny story, despite him making it sound horrific. It seems, like SpongeBob's Have You Seen This Snail?, they wanted a more serious episode, yet the narrative isn't nearly as heartwarming as in SpongeBob's case, given how unsatisfying the ending is and how in-your-face it is about it.
Now to describe the two key reasons this episode gets as much hate as it does- firstly, the reveal that Skinner was a fraud. Though a great secondary character, he's not vital to the series, so doing an experiment like this with his character wasn't that risky of a move in the longrun. The execution, while botched, didn't ruin Skinner's character for me, nor did it make any of his other appearances, past or future, mean less. It was a one-time thing. The second reason this episode has a bad rep among Simpsoniacs is the reset button ending. I agree that it was a cheap way to end an episode like this, as at worst it's saying "this episode is worthless", and it lacked the sentimentality or charm that the Classic episodes were known for giving off. Is it the shark-jumping episode of the show? In my opinion, no. Season 9 and 10 were standard Seasonal Rot, and letting Mike Scully stay in charge for Season 11 is what did it for me for various reasons.
Another reason the episode is hated that has little to do with the content of the episode is that both Harry Shearer, Skinner's voice actor, and Matt Groening, the show's creator, have expressed regret over working on the episode. Shearer's reasoning was that it destroyed the background of Skinner's character, to which I respectfully disagree, while Groening considers it gimmicky and nonsensical. Let me just say that when it takes until Episode 180 for your show to turn bad in the eyes of the staff and most fans, you did something right for the first 179, a record that isn't easy to accomplish for a TV series or any other piece of media. The Principal and the Pauper is not a great episode, or even that good, but it's a piece of TV history that'll be remembered for positive reasons. It taught us that not every show is perfect, not even The Simpsons, but that doesn't undermine or tarnish any of their legacies.
6/10 (Average)
What is your opinion on this episode?
