[6.6/10 on a post-classic Simpsons scale] This is clearly when The Simpsons was in its Family Guy stage. What I mean by that is the gags still had some oomph, but the plot was an afterthought, and the characters only existed as joke machines, not anything even approaching real characters. So as I often say with post-classic Simpsons, I don’t know what to do with this episode. There’s more laughs-per-minute here than in a lot of what follows, but they’re all empty laughs, that have little to do with Our Favorite Family or anything specific to this particular show.
It’s worth noting that for an episode which takes place in Brazil, “Blame It on Lisa” only pokes fun at the most broad, stereotypical aspects of the country. People dance sexy there! They eat meat on a sword! They wear speedos on the beach! This is hardly the sort of incisive comedy the show was known for. And while episodes like “Bart vs. Australia” took plenty of liberties with the home country’s shtick, the episode could get away with it because, you know, it was funny. Here, it just seems like the writers read an encyclopedia entry for Brazil and left it at that.
That said, if you can turn your brain off, there’s some decent laughs here! Marge’s “I’ll dance and worry” bit is amusing. The charity sponsorship tape labeled “L’il Writeoffs” is a good gag. And I’m even a fan of Hank Azaria’s “You stupid lady!” character for his absurdity. But you could substitute the Griffins for the Simpsons here and not lose anything, which is not a good sign for the comedy of your episode.
Nevermind that this whole thing is total Looney Tunes. Homer gets electrocuted several times trying to replace his family’s phone service after a standard pointless opening act. The family plummets from a suspended transport and is totally fine. Bart ends the episode sambaing in the belly of a giant snake, and everyone shrugs it off. The cartoonist of The Simpsons reached its apex under Mike Scully, but it’s still pretty damn bad here.
Nevermind the fact that Homer’s at his dumbest and most cartoonish as well. Him getting kidnapped by Brazilian criminals is...something plot-wise. But his blithe demeanor with them, making a scrapbook and getting Stockholm syndrome despite implied beatings and torture, is just ridiculous, and not in a funny way. Nobody here acts like a genuine human being, or even what psses for one on television, so this whole thing just feels stupid and cheap.
All that said, the plot actually makes a modicum of sense. Lisa gets the family to travel to South America in a search for her sponsored Brazilian child who’s gone missing. But it turns out, he’s a character on the sexy children’s show Bart gets obsessed with when they arrive, and uses his earnings to pay the ransom for Homer. Look, it’s not exactly a clockwork screenplay, but given how bumpy the rest of the episode is, it's remarkably coherent as a case of the plot elements feeding into one another.
Overall, if you just want a raft of chuckle-worthy but lazy gags about Brazil, with some cool animation and design work given the change of scenery, “Blame It on Lisa” has it covered. If you want anything with intellect, insight, or lived-in characters, you’d better take a conga line to a different episode.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2021-09-18T00:09:16Z
[6.6/10 on a post-classic Simpsons scale] This is clearly when The Simpsons was in its Family Guy stage. What I mean by that is the gags still had some oomph, but the plot was an afterthought, and the characters only existed as joke machines, not anything even approaching real characters. So as I often say with post-classic Simpsons, I don’t know what to do with this episode. There’s more laughs-per-minute here than in a lot of what follows, but they’re all empty laughs, that have little to do with Our Favorite Family or anything specific to this particular show.
It’s worth noting that for an episode which takes place in Brazil, “Blame It on Lisa” only pokes fun at the most broad, stereotypical aspects of the country. People dance sexy there! They eat meat on a sword! They wear speedos on the beach! This is hardly the sort of incisive comedy the show was known for. And while episodes like “Bart vs. Australia” took plenty of liberties with the home country’s shtick, the episode could get away with it because, you know, it was funny. Here, it just seems like the writers read an encyclopedia entry for Brazil and left it at that.
That said, if you can turn your brain off, there’s some decent laughs here! Marge’s “I’ll dance and worry” bit is amusing. The charity sponsorship tape labeled “L’il Writeoffs” is a good gag. And I’m even a fan of Hank Azaria’s “You stupid lady!” character for his absurdity. But you could substitute the Griffins for the Simpsons here and not lose anything, which is not a good sign for the comedy of your episode.
Nevermind that this whole thing is total Looney Tunes. Homer gets electrocuted several times trying to replace his family’s phone service after a standard pointless opening act. The family plummets from a suspended transport and is totally fine. Bart ends the episode sambaing in the belly of a giant snake, and everyone shrugs it off. The cartoonist of The Simpsons reached its apex under Mike Scully, but it’s still pretty damn bad here.
Nevermind the fact that Homer’s at his dumbest and most cartoonish as well. Him getting kidnapped by Brazilian criminals is...something plot-wise. But his blithe demeanor with them, making a scrapbook and getting Stockholm syndrome despite implied beatings and torture, is just ridiculous, and not in a funny way. Nobody here acts like a genuine human being, or even what psses for one on television, so this whole thing just feels stupid and cheap.
All that said, the plot actually makes a modicum of sense. Lisa gets the family to travel to South America in a search for her sponsored Brazilian child who’s gone missing. But it turns out, he’s a character on the sexy children’s show Bart gets obsessed with when they arrive, and uses his earnings to pay the ransom for Homer. Look, it’s not exactly a clockwork screenplay, but given how bumpy the rest of the episode is, it's remarkably coherent as a case of the plot elements feeding into one another.
Overall, if you just want a raft of chuckle-worthy but lazy gags about Brazil, with some cool animation and design work given the change of scenery, “Blame It on Lisa” has it covered. If you want anything with intellect, insight, or lived-in characters, you’d better take a conga line to a different episode.