R & R: Deep Space Homer

[Charmy]

I just got finished watching this episode, and I was reminded just how good it is. Probably the most unrealistic 'Homer Gets a Job' episode in terms of the concept, but in all works in a way thats really amazing. The carbon rod is a good laugh (I'll show you inanimate!) and it mocks the NASA progam rather nicely. I give it a 5/5.

What do you guys think?

[kuumuus]

I always thought this was the most popular episode before I started posting on Simpsons message boards and stuff.

It's definitely a classic and gets a 5/5 from me.

[Starbucks Exec]

Nice easy-viewing episode. Great outing for Barney especially. Homer being shot into space sounds wacky at first but it is actually believable, to the writers' credit. Loved the whole carbon rod thing! A-

[squishee lady]

B+. Hail Rod.

[doyle]

Yes, it's wacky. Yes, it's another Homer gets a new job episode. Yes, it ignored most of the main characters (and minor ones, for that matter). But I must say it's an enjoyable episode. I find it to be one of the better season 5 episodes. It starts off well with the worker of the week award scene. The show is able to explain how Homer becomes an astronaut, not through some stupid scheme, but through a real life situation of dying interest in space exploration. His well timed phone call gave them an idea they had to cash in on. The plot was well paced, as the plot unfolds in the first act to go into full swing about halfway through the episode. Jokes were well placed and hilarious, as there are shots taken at NASA, along with some decent sight gags and some clever jokes as well. Not to mention the quote in my sig. And the potato chip scene is still one of my favorites. However, the episode had a few problems as well. Marge's conern for Homer and fear he may not make it was not played out to it's full potential, and her fear was presented as a joke, which kinda ruined it. The scene featuring James Taylor provided one of the worse guest appearances of the classic era, as he really served little purpose other than to get in there and play a song. The ending wasn't particularly clever eeither, and could have been executed better. All things considered though, this episode keeps me interested all the way through, and that's what counts. B+

[newhook_1]

4/5 liked it alot but not my fav.

[SideshowTim]

9/10. Wish we got to see some close ups of the rod.

[MacGyver 666]

Deep Space Homer is one of my all time favorite Simpsons episodes. (It’s in my top ten) It was a “wacky” episode, but in a fun (and some what believable) manner. I haven’t seen it in a while but from what I can remember most if not all of the jokes and gags hit right on target. The NASA scientist in the episode is one of my favorite one-time characters ever. I give Deep Space Homer an A+.

[pat]

My 4th favorite Simpsons episode. Very easy to follow episode, very funny, great space satire/parody, and who could forget the Inanimate Carbon Rod! The potato chip scene is one that has always stuck out in my mind and is one of my favorites. The beginning was really funny, with Homer and Barney at space training. Who could forget the memorable line "Default! The 2 sweetest words in the English language! De-fault! De-fault!" A hands-down 10/10, A+ episode.

[Rnymd]

Very wacky, but a classic nontheless with some great jokes - A

[Steve Allen]

A-

[HomertheGreat]

Very wacky and kind of stupid at times, but it did have some nice clever bits about the Space Program, so that helps it a little bit. B+

[Dr Zaius]

Some great gags in the first act.
But to me, it gets a little dull from when they aboard the rocket. The potato chips scene, in particular -although nicely done to fit in with the music- takes too much time.

[George Cauldron]

This plot is rather unlikely, but at the same time, very likeable, about Homer being selected as the first 'average' American to go into outer space. So, not entirely realistic, but very fun, and very funny. I could watch Homer eating potato chips to the tune of the Blue Danube over and over again without getting tired. Some good satire of the overreacting media, and some good references to films, in particular, 2001: A Space Odyssey.

[Wezzo]

A-/B+, 4/5.

[Garp]

One of the weirdest episodes ever, and one of the funniest ever. 5/5, and it´s in my top 30 :)

[Firewalker]

It may be a wacky adventure, but it's downright funny. The laughs just keep coming and that's what makes it stand out. You'll never get tired of this one.

A+

[Charmy]

Some stuff: I loved Homer's dynamic with the other astronaut, who's name escapes me. 'If I'm going down I'm taking you to hell with me'. Unlike Dondelinger, I felt James Taylor's cameo strangely managed to fit into an already strange episode. I thought naming the shuttle after one of the most unsafe cars ever built was great.

That's about all for now. :)

[Sloppy Jimbo LXIX]

Plot wise, it's highly reminiscent of a Scully era episode. What saves it from falling apart though, is that its content is surprisingly down to earth and it has a cohesive theme (Homer feeling unimportant) running throughout. NASA's search for a "blue collared slob" is a cleverly satirical plot devise that is handled in a believable enough manner. For an uber-wacky season five episode though, it's unusually dull and the humor overall, lacks a certain punch. Good, but perhaps a little overrated.

Grade: B

[y2dave2004]

Yet another gem from season 5. Top marks 5/5

[wee raging wilie]

4.5 it was great with the whole queen ant scene.

[The Foot]

A very funny episode. Lots of great gags. Homer doing flips while he eats potato chips, Homer crashing into the ant farm , and Homer Singing the Golden Grahams theme while the ship is on fire heading for earth.
This episode gets a 9/10 on the laugh-o-meter. Grade A-

[Warren]

5/5.The 2001:A Space Oddysey references pushed it up.

[bovine_university]

3/5. I know it's from a golden season, and I laughed alot while watching it, but it just isn't superior material for me. There was that great moment when Homer ate the chips, but for most of the episode Homer was either annoying or too stupid. The plot of this episode was just too wacky. Season 5 was a classic, but this episode was not so classic.

[Air Homer]

8/10 it's a good epesode but not one of my favourites.

[prince jafar allah]

A fun episode with more than enough decent commentary, but the characterisation is far too thin, and it's just not as funny as most season 5 episodes. A-

[HappyPalooza]

"I'll show you inanimate!" is one of the best played jokes in animation.

5/5

[ThatAsianGuy]

5/5, excellent episode and Mirkin showed that he could script as well as head the writing staff.

[Fox Executive]

I liked it. It had som great jokes and typical Mirkin (homer eating the chips). I also liked George Meyer's line ''Freedom, horrible freedom!''

5/5

[Moe Nopoly]

i think that's really a great Homer episode.
Also great to see Barney in a bigger role. The guest appearance of James Taylor wasn't bad imo, that made the scene with the chips and ants in the space ship even more hilarious.

A-

[Sprocketeer]

This episode was another example of how Mirkin was actually able to pull off "out-there" plots without making a mess of them. Likewise, it was fully enjoyable and humorous, with some great guest appearances. 4.5/5

[Granto]

Great example of wackiness done well. So many great jokes, Homer's characterisation is excellent and I love Burns' spiel about Colonel Montoya.

#16 on my all time favourites.

4/5

[Thrillho]

5/5 or A-
Good episode, made even better by the "2001" references.

[Mr Johannson]

I love the inanimate carbon rod, and Brockmans reaction to the ants is fantastic.
Another one of my favourites.

5/5

[joe miller]

5/5, i loved Homer's speech to Marge about him meeting Mr. T at the mall

[McRibwich]

Why does homer refer to James Taylor as a former president?

[hughes]

Why does homer refer to James Taylor as a former president?

Because it's a joke on Homer's stupidity/Taylor's popularity

[Nauru-1]

A little too wacky at times to me, though I did really like the inanimate carbon rod stuff. It was the space training stuff that I didn't feel was up to par with the big classics. That being said, it's still quite good. 4/5

[Uosdwis R. Jewoh]

5/5 love it

[Goon]

Great episode (the carbon rod rules). I'd give it a 5/5, but if I were rating it /15, it would get a 13-14. The plot is a bit odd that's for sure, but all in all they managed to pull it off quite well.

[ComicBookGuy402]

Just got done watching this again. The planet in the apes bit is hilarious every time and kent brockman kills it.

A+

Probably my favorite ep.

[Steve]

So funny. I love the Married ... With Children and Home Improvement parodies. The famous Blue Danube Waltz scene is great. And I always laugh at the Popeye/Nixon transformations, even if Groening hates them.

5/5 all the way.

[MILPOOL...]

One of the best lines ever:

Bart: Wow! My father, an astronaut! I feel so full of ..... what's the opposite of shame?

Marge: Pride?

Bart: No, not that far from shame.

Homer: Less shame?

Bart: Yea.

[J Dog]

Bizarre, but well-developed. It would make some bit of sense for NASA to send some average schmo into space to increase publicity about the program, and I loved the Star Trek reference during Homer and Barney's training (along with the irony of ironies given what happens to Barney after he flies off in the jetpack). The scenes in space are well-designed, and I enjoyed Homer's montage of eating the potato chips.

I also like the callbacks in future episodes where the carbon rod is still higher in the pecking order than Homer.

5/5

[Green_Peaness]

Originally posted by half the people in this thread

"it's wacky and kind of dumb, but it's decent...episodes aren't really great unless they have EMOTION. I missed the point of this episode and don't really understand the comedy part of the Simpsons"

This episode is relentlessly hilarious...just pure season 5-ness. 5/5

Edit: Oh no wonder, half the posts were from 2003 when anything vaguely reminiscent of Scully would still kind of suck.

[Denis Dufek]

B+

Kent Brockman and the ants!

Croatian:
Kent Brockman i mravi!

[BartSimpsonfan17]

Little wackey but still enjoyable. Had a lot of good humor in it, I laughed a lot all the way through. LOL Wondered where Bart got his phone call pranks from, of course HomerXD
Over all I give it a hmm 4/5.

[Denis Dufek]

I liked when they used in some later episode:
"Former US astronaut Homer Simspson was arrested yesterday in Canada"

Croatian:
Svidjelo mi se kad su u kasnije epizodi koristili:
"Bivši Američki astronaut Homer Simpson je jučer uhićen u Kanadi"

[joe miller]

Can we make episodes of season 19 or 21 to look like the classic episode of season 3 or 7?

What is the thing that makes classic seasons so much better than the modern ones?

Croatian:
Možemo li pretvoriti epizode sezone 19 ili 21 da izgledaju kao klasične epizode sezona 3. ili 7.?

they have better plots {and episodes being "wacky, fun fun fun!" doesn't equal better, or even funnier for that matter"} and are funnier.

also, is homer's line about "anyone knowing where to get tang" to clinton{?} an innuendo?

[Doh29]

This has got to be up there with the greatest episodes. The scene where Homer realizes the planet of the apes occurred on Earth is HILARIOUS! And Barney is hilarious as well :LOL: in this gem of an episode.

[Nauru-1]

My updated opinion of this episode: not far off from what it was before actually. I rate it about a B+, which lower mid-range for the classic era. I suppose you could say season 5 rubs me the wrong way in parts because it got a little crazy. Bart Gets An Elephant would probably be my biggest example of that. Fortunately, and this episode is a prime example, it wasn't at the expense of the humour which remained great. Lots of stuff to love in this one, although I'll never put it up there with my all-time favorites. 4/5 (B+)

[zartok-35]

Lots of stuff to love in this one, although I'll never put it up there with my all-time favorites. 4/5

:)

[Mr. Blackheart]

I mean for me this is the greatest episode in The Simpsons, Bart Gets an Elephant being next in line. There are perhaps 20 A* jokes that all make me laugh as hard as the 'main' joke from any lesser TV show's episodes. Sorry for the occasional caps, the jokes in this show literally crack me up:

- Burns' speech at beginning (Colonel Montoya etc)
- I'll show him inanimate!
- at least TV respects me!...*turns on TV to have man laughing directly at the camera*
- commentators at NASA- 'Everything from watchmaking to...watch repair', + 'the three musketeers...a mathematician, a different kind of mathematician, and a statistician'
- Super intelligent chimp (though not particularly funny for me it was funny when I was a kid)
- AMAZING and swift satire of married with children *flushes toilet*, almost as good as the 'Smithers, I'm home!' one.
- Homer calling up NASA and asking for Tang, then the president
- Assistant hits them both with a cosh to knock them out, even thought they would have happily gone
- My second favourite Homer-is-stupid joke of all time. That *terrible* planet of the apes! Wait a minute...statue of liberty! That was OUR PLANET!!!! etcetc
- My favourite ever Bart joke- I feel so full of...what's the opposite of shame? Pride? No...not that far from shame. Less shame? Yeah :)
- Another of my favourite ever jokes in the Simpsons. I believe there's a little something called the...Swimsuit Competition??
- Gentlemen, you've worked very hard, and in a way, you're both winners...but in a more accurate way, Barney is the winner. HAHAHAHAHA kills me every time
- Barney goes crazy with NON ALCOHOLIC champagne oh god it's almost as amazing as 'I don't understand...there wasn't any nuclear material in the truck!'
- Assistant clubs Homer with the cosh, and says he 'sent away' for it.
- Another of my favourite ever jokes- 'THE PRECEDING PROGRAM CONTAINED SCENES OF EXTREME VIOLENCE and should not have been viewed by children' :D
- Homer can't use the touch tone phone, by this point in the episode I have cried several times and am on the verge of a comedy heart attack
- 'Request permission to sedate cargo ahead of schedule' ahhh I love the derogatory way Homer is referred to.

Now follows the only boring part of the show, the incredibly laborious BD waltz as Homer flies around eating potato chips...BUT it sets up what is in my opinion the greatest joke of all Simpsons of all time...the

- 'Kent Brockman Special'. The godly and perfect joke where Kent immediately infers from one picture of the Corvair spacecraft that a....master race of giant space ants have taken over the craft. The entire monologue in its perfection:

Kent: Ladies and gentlemen, er, we've just lost the picture, but,
uh, what we've seen speaks for itself. The Corvair spacecraft
has been taken over -- "conquered", if you will -- by a master
race of giant space ants. It's difficult to tell from this
vantage point whether they will consume the captive earth men
or merely enslave them. One thing is for certain, there is no
stopping them; the ants will soon be here.
And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords. I'd like to
remind them that as a trusted TV personality, I can be helpful
in rounding up others to toil in their underground sugar
caves.

It is a masterpiece in absurdity, and the best thing about it for me is the fact that the turnaround time of the production team has meant that by the time Kent talks about 'Underground sugar caves', they have presented him with a picture in the top left of an ant, in Indiana Jones trousers, whipping a business man. Please excuse the bold.

- James Taylor changing his lyrics
- Assistant saying 'Quiet You' and about to hit James Taylor with his cosh
- Referring to James Taylor as an 'unkempt youngster'
- Homer taking time to think, but still choosing to 'bust that pretty face of yours!!!'
- KENT BROCKMAN RELOADED: 'reaffirming' his allegiance to the earth president LOL
- Inanimate carbon rod gets parade and front cover of Time magazine

Well that was fun to revisit the jokes. In my opinion, only truly great comedy can stand up to analysis. When you bear close scrutiny towards Simpsons jokes, you find they are so finely crafted that they are simply a wonder to behold, I light to hold them up in my mind and think about them in all sorts of ways, try to imagine funnier ways to phrase them or better ways to get to the punchline, and very rarely can I come up with anything!!!

[HMS pinafore]

the best homer gets a job plot but despite its premisis it is not that wacky.
Kents part about the giant space ants is possibly the most this show has ever made me laugh
an easy 5/5

[Toomanygrandmas]

'Deep Space Homer' is certaintly one of Season Five's best episode, along with episodes like 'Cape Feare' and 'Secrets of a Successful Marriage'. It certaintly is an ambitious episode, and when you compare it to some other Season Five episodes, that seem quite bland and boring, this is something to be commended. This episode goes where no other episode has been - and with the exciting climax, you could hardly call the episode boring.

However, the episode doesn't feel like a masterpiece some seem to make it out to be, and whilst still a great episode, is overrated. It's funny throughout, but rarely laugh-out-loud funny. There are funnier Season Five episodes. That's not to say that there weren't a few classic moments - namely 'I for one welcome...'.

I don't think I'm making a great argument against why it's all that overrated, but I still stand by my views that it is very good... but not flawless.

4/5

[Bleedin' Gums Murphy]

10/10 A+

[Riviera]

Middle-of-the-road for the classic era, which works out to a 4/5.

[ANdre1001]

A really good episode 4/5, A-

The inanimate carbon rod makes me crack every time

[Essomms]

Loved every minute of it. One of my all time favourites from the series. 5/5

[J Dog]

I don't mean to comment once more on an episode I already discussed, but this episode had the greatest line Barney Gumble ever spoke:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JUCfX1P1ik

[Bleedin' Gums Murphy]

"LORD PALMERSTONE!" is way better. :D

[The Wiggs]

Obviously a classic episode. The scene with Homer eating the chips in space is one of the most memorable scenes in the history of the show. The episode isn't perfect, but that doesn't stop it from being great. 4/5