Season 26, Episode 2
October 5, 2014

Plot: After Bart’s continuous stubborn disregard for Homer’s authority, the two are brought aboard a “Relation Ship”, to fix their problems at sea.

Thoughts:
• Guest starring Nick Offerman (Parks & Recreation) as Captain Bowditch.
• Bart acting out and people being sick of his shit seems to be a recurring storyline. See S23’s “Bart Stops to Smell the Roosevelts”, “Moe Goes from Rags to Riches” and S20’s “Double, Double, Boy in Trouble”.
• One of the problems with this storyline is that since the reset button is pressed after every episode, there’s no character development, so this conflict and resolution is for nothing. We’re back where we started and none the more entertained.
• It’s shown that Homer’s parenting (and being a lousy role model) is a large part of why Bart is an intractable little shit, which is a positive.
• Two protagonists sick of (dealing with) each other is not enjoyable, on the Simpsons anyway.
• Martin is shown to have taken self-defence classes and (off-camera) beats the tar out of Nelson. I would’ve loved to have seen it.
• The pun of the “relation ship” was funny the first time I heard it.
• The B-Plot is Marge taking control of Homer’s fantasy football account. Shocked by the smack talk, she resolves to win the league. Tis a time-filler.
• Even Season 1, when it wasn’t funny, it was at least interesting. This is neither.
• The maritime songs and dancing a jig made me embarrassed to watch current Simpsons.
• I felt bad seeing a trailer video of Nick Offerman pretending to have enjoyed “The Wreck of the Relationship”.

Overall: Oh man. This episode is so bad I don’t know if I can review current Simpsons. It’ll just be me giving out/explaining why it was awful and you’ll wonder why I’m reviewing it.