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Planet Simpson January 18, 2006
I love me some Simpsons, but I really didn't like this book. Ostensibly it's about The Simpsons television series and after reading the dust jacket I expected to find stories and anecdotes about the show, its history, its creators, and the like. Kind of like an episode of VH1's "Behind the Music" for the show, except with 40% less drugs. Instead, Planet Simpson turns out to be a platform for the author's politics, with amusing Simpsons quotes thrown in when relevant.
If I had to pick one word to describe this mess, it would be "undisciplined." Turner may start a chapter by sticking with a promising topic (e.g., an analysis of the different kinds of humor employed by the show), but he invariably traipses off into la-la land within a few pages. Why am I holding a book called "Planet Simpson" and reading a 10,000 word treatise on Radiohead, the Bush administration, or the evils of consumerism? What does this have to do with Homer? The writing is so meandering and self-indulgent that it stumbles from topic to topic, stitching them together with the only an occasional Simpsons reference or quote. In fact, the only parts of the book I really enjoyed were the quotes from the show and sometimes we'll go pages without any reference to Our Favorite Family.
Don't get me wrong, some of the ideas Turner puts forth are interesting, if smug and written in a needlessly complex and so-anti-elitist-that-it's-elite manner. But there's only so many times I can tolerate phrases like "cultural zeitgeist" or "sisyphean endeavors" or "postmodern deconstructionalist." I have as big a vocabulary as the next guy and understand all those big words (well, after one or two trips to dictionary.com), but I also recognize when someone is deliberately trying to be pedantic and priggish. Yes, I'm being ironic. How postmodern of me.
I just wanted a book that talked about how once Matt Groening got all drunk and punched Al Jean. Is that so much to ask?
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Tags: Book Review, Nonfiction, Television
