29x16 King Leer

[9.0/10 on a post-classic Simpsons scale] Well, we’ve come to that time of year again -- the time of year why I ask “Why isn’t Matt Selman running the whole show at this point?” If you’d asked me, ex ante, what I’d think of an episode where we meet Moe’s family, including his deadbeat dad and get backstory on his childhood, I’d say it sounds like a cheesy attempt to fill in the gaps two decades too late.

Instead, Selman & Co. deliver a great episode about Moe having a conscience, about how the things that set you apart from your family aren’t always bad, and about earning the support and sympathy of your friends, while throwing in some pretty damn funny mattress and family-based humor into the mix. Moe’s dad (Ray Liotta, in a bit of casting that feels right), is a solid presence, and the show’s self-consciously Shakespearean tale of him reconciling with Moe and passing down his mattress stores to his kids provides a nice backbone for the episode.

There’s plenty of good stuff for Moe in here, between teasing out the moral choice that estranged him from his dad, having him reconcile with his pop and compete with his siblings, and then turn down that opportunity after the Szylak ruthelessness starts to go too far as an infection in Moe’s soul. There’s also a nice mini-arc for Marge, who tries to bring Moe’s family together only to learn that some families are better off apart.

And the humor is pretty good too! I’ll admit the opening act capering with Homer trying to save Bart’s violin was a little much for me, but between the intentionally cheesy mattress humor, the shoe-whacking fisticuffs, and Homer’s grand strain not to say “I told you so”, this episode had plenty of the well-done funniness that sustained the series.

Overall, this one was a real treat of an episode that took a premise that easily could have felt like grasping at straws and spun it into gold.