“The Simpsons”

With the intent to watch “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” I, however, was drawn into the promise of a new episode of the “The Simpsons.” Already at the always hilarious opening of the animated, dysfunctional family we all know and love (and secretly relate to) I had switched off my brain’s thought process abilities for the evening, (or perhaps that happened a long time ago) but to my surprise, they were kicked back into high gear. “The Simpsons” is quite good at capturing aspects of life and turning it into jabs of humor, and tonight a lot of the content poked fun at…the media! To be a little more specific, it was the news. To set up the scene just a little, Mayor Quimby was being investigated for having an affair. Lisa observes the “media circus” coming, consisting of local and national news vans going down the street. At the press conference, dialogue and actions convey the competition between the local news, Channel 6 “Springfield Action News” with Kent Brockman, and “Global News” with a woman’s name I can’t remember. In response to hard-hitting questions, the mayor whips out a puppy and woos the spectators and Kent into a perspective of not guilty, but the woman from the national news is shown to be competent and accomplished, with video proof. Kent jumps in and (trying to recover the station’s pride) reminds the audience that Channel 6 has car chases every night, the weather girl wears a tube top, and if she doesn’t, you get a free pizza. My favorite part was when Tom Brokaw and Dan Rather played “monkey in the middle” with the microphone with Kent in the middle. Despite the gales of laughter, I thought about the ideals that we had talked about for better programming. Point number eight talked of “story-telling venues relocalized,” which would aid in the reduction of the “gate keepers” narrowed political agenda. The point made by “The Simpsons” seems to suggest the local setting of the news has many drawbacks. On a more intimate level, there is more station competition which requires such activities like “make-over Monday” and other such deadweight in a broadcast. National news tends to be more news orientated because the broadcast’s credibility is a main feature, given the nature of the audience. With more resources, it contains a more in-depth broadcast and doesn’t need extra draws, for those constrict what stories we see.