Simpsons by the Season: 20

"If I ever get a hold of you, I shall thank you for showing me the futility of human endeavours."

The Simpsons is no phoenix. From the ashes in which it has burned will not rise some new, glorious age of quality in which all Simpsons fans, young and old, will join hands and rejoice in television's warm glowing warming glow. However, I hope this is the bottom. I hope that this is the lowest it will drop, the twentieth season being this milestone where they finally take a look and realize that what they're putting out isn't acceptable. This is the first season where I wasn't entirely sure if I've seen some of the episodes I've watched, as not all of them were particularly familiar, so this is likely where my interest started to wane in the series. So perhaps it improves. That is yet to be known. But I can assure you, it cannot get much worse than this.

I won't be doing my usual synopsis of what went right and what went wrong. I'll be going episode by episode of the worst, as there's... there's just a lot to cover...

"Four Great Women and a Manicure"
Typically with the three-part Halloween Special wanna-bes they'll give a background to why they're going into the past. Something to give the episode at least a semblance of reason before jumping needlessly into time-period stories. This time, it was fifty-two seconds into the episode and we're off to Patty sitting in a throne as the Queen of England. That includes the opening theme, so really the reason for saddling us with another set of shorts like this is sold to us in twenty-five seconds. The stories themselves only tenuously link; at first Marge argues something about women needing to look good, followed by Lisa saying beauty can be dangerous, and the third story is just a woman held back by a man - but told by Marge, breaking the theme.

Thank goodness it was mercifully done at seventeen minutes.

Oh... Maggie wants a story too. I guess they did four. The way to link the fourth was literally just saying "Maggie wants a story." This episode cheats a real plot-line with the multi-story non-canon arc again, and cheats further by not even having them linked.

"Wedding for Disaster"
Marge and Homer find out they're not actually married, and thus have to remarry! Fortunately, they know exactly what to do as this is the... what... fourth time they've been married by now? But wait! Homer is kidnapped! He finds himself in a Saw-like torture chamber in which he has to find a way out. Honestly, I think someone just poked a hole in the Halloween Special this year and it leaked out to some of the other ones.

As it turns out it was Selma all along. As the writers were not yet satisfied with making Bart evil and Homer a thief they had to shatter the spirit of some other characters too. Selma ruined their second (well, fourth-ish) wedding, putting Marge through pain, but also kidnapped and tortured Homer.

"Gone Maggie Gone"
Last season we had a spy caper, having the Simpson family sabotage a missile. This year, we go on a Da Vinci Code style mystery adventure! It's complete with Lisa infiltrating a convent full of crazy nuns, who lead her in a search for a gem that a nun tells her has mystical powers. After moving through a series of clues, she is led to the Springfield Bell Tower where she finds Comic Book Guy and Skinner who are part of some secret organization to find this gem as it will bring peace to the world. She eventually solves the puzzle and returns to the convent believing herself to be the "gem child" in which will bring the world peace. However, she is wrong - it's actually Maggie. Maggie is then placed on a throne, rainbows shoot everywhere and Springfield instantly becomes a happy, peaceful place. That is, until Marge discovers Maggie has been taken and demands her back, and Bart is placed on the throne in her stead. Instantly, fire and brimstone shoot through the church, as Bart is no longer a good-hearted kid with bad tendencies, but sent by the devil himself (the picture is below).

This episode is best described as being poor simply by stating the plot itself. Here's the kicker, though - this wasn't the worst of the season. In my opinion it wasn't the worst by a long shot. That prestigious title belongs to...

"Lisa the Drama Queen"
My father, an avid Simpsons fanatic and long-standing devotee of the series (he still watches every episode, and I admire his tenacity) often speaks of "Lisa the Drama Queen". He didn't know the title so he would describe it as some mess where Lisa makes a make-belief land with dragons and unicorns and other crap. Add Lisa slipping in and out of an aggravating english accent and he had it pretty well dead on. It's a contender for a bottom ten of the series, which really, really means something now. An episode that ends with the Simpson family going to Machu Pichu because Bart put a tracker Marge planted on him on a bird didn't even make the list - neither does an episode that has a magic sauce foretelling what would have come had Homer become class president in high school.

Best Episode:
Speaking of my father again, he always says that he sticks around because the show can, on occasion, pump out some decent episodes still. I'd debate if it's worth pushing through that much muck and mire for something that still won't hold with any of the first hundred or so episodes.

"Homer and Lisa Exchange Cross Words", an episode in which Lisa becomes a crossword puzzle champion and Homer bets on her (and eventually against her) keeps the characters at least somewhat close to themselves, shows Homer having regret for his actions, and stays at least somewhat in the realm of reality. For season twenty, that's knocking it out of the park.

Best Quotes:
"Man, those are some ugly kittens."
-Bart reflecting on his kitten calendar gift for the family

"Last time I checked, pirates weren't gay."
"Ugh, how'd you check?"
-Bart and Homer to a salesman trying to give a puffy shirt to Bart

Simpsons by the Season: 19

"Sometimes I think about getting on a bus and never coming back."

You know, I don't enjoy writing scathing reviews. It's hard not to come across as a whiner, or some real-life version of Comic Book Guy sitting behind his computer contributing nothing but judging everything. I miss the days where I struggled deciding which is the best episode of the season rather than sifting through the muck and mire and pulling out the best of a rotten bunch. Above all, I miss these characters of which I have given so many hours watching them develop (as well as throwing more than my fair share of dollars at merchandise, some of which even Krusty would be embarrassed of) and looking forward to Sunday night comedy slots where The Simpsons could very well be the highlight. I was just a touch too young to appreciate it's prime during the days in which it aired, but watching the repeats time and time again made me appreciate them all the more - especially as I aged and gradually understood it better. Watching it decline, bleeding out all the greatness it had is such a sad experience. So it is with a heavy heart I'm attacking you, Simpsons, because I know what you were and what you could be, but worse yet, I know what you are.

The writers have changed dramatically since the show's inception. Many of the very best have long since left, and they hired on a crew of new blood to push the longevity of the program. Sometimes I wonder if the newbies have watched the show since the beginning the way so many true Simpsons fans have. They forget the Simpsons have always been a family that just kind of gets by. Lisa is the only one with any real brains except for perhaps Marge to some degree, and Homer and Bart stumble through. At the core, they're the average, every-day family; even if you're not a fan of the show, you probably would know this anyway just through general pop-culture knowledge. So when did they suddenly become so talented at whatever they so please as they have in the past few seasons? 

In this season: Homer can suddenly sing incredibly well while laying on his back (which does not come to any real conclusion - he still can); Marge stops an assassin while doing front flips; Homer is making beef jerky quite successfully just as a thing on the side; Marge is great at dance, suddenly; Lisa has inexplicably found comedic talents; and Homer is some fighting machine/spy, swinging a cinder block tied to a chain at a bunch of Burns' men that are protecting some sort of rocket. Last season, Bart became an incredible jazz drummer and Marge became a top-class carpenter, just to name a few. Where is this sudden influx of skills and talents coming from?

I understand that this has happened in the past where the family finds sudden success or surprise talents, but it's handled in such a different way. Looking through the glory years, Bart got famous on the Krusty show just through sheer luck, not talent. Homer became an astronaut strictly because he's an average man. In "Homer the Great" he leads the Stonecutters simply because he has a fortunate birthmark. In "The Homer They Fall" Homer can stand up to most boxers simply because he has just that thick of a skull. It's all chance and fortune (the crux of the Frank Grimes episode) that propels the Simpsons. It's never skill. That's what makes it funny in the first place. (It's important to note that an episode I'll be discussing later, "Homer's Barbershop Quartet", is a notable exception to this rule.)

As if that wasn't enough, some of their talents have even crossed out previous moments of Simpsons lore. We'll put aside the scene where Gil, working as a security guard, gets shot multiple times (is Gil dead now? who knows?) and move on to Marge and Lisa. Marge is not the only Simpson with dancing talent, as we suddenly learn this season. Lisa is a natural ballet dancer. Of course, not only has Bart already learned ballet, but Lisa has already tried dancing; she gave her best shot with tap but failed miserably, only finding success with the help of Professor Frink's self-tapping shoes as she was otherwise hopeless. That episode wasn't even that long ago. 

Then, of course, Homer apparently created the grunge music movement entirely on his own. Lets look at this for a moment. Again, putting aside the fact that Homer has already been a successful musician ("Homer's Barbershop Quartet") he's been to Hullabalooza, where he cannot understand their brand of music. Music that was popular in the '90s. Music that while not necessarily categorized as grunge holds many similarities. He even said to The Smashing Pumpkins' frontman Billy Corgan that he just can't "share [their] bleak world view". Now, not only does he understand it, but he started their very movement. 

I understand that doing episodes where things are happening in the past gets muddled when the show has been running for such a length, but such an oversight on what is a classic episode it's certainly hard to ignore. A prerequisite to being a Simpsons writer should be an encyclopedic knowledge of the show - which considering the fan-base it has, should not be a tall order - and I just don't feel that's the case right now.

Well... That being said...

If the writers didn't watch the show they couldn't lift the jokes from the early seasons, like Nelson's heartfelt Sundance film festival entry in "Any Given Sundance" that is essentially Barney's movie in Burns' film festival (right down to ending the clip with the word "fin" coming on the screen.  But I digress. 

Best Quotes:

"You have what made America great: no understanding of the limits of your power, and a complete lack of concern for what anyone thinks of you."
-Stephen Colbert's life-coach character to Homer

“Martin was a shy, awkward child who will never fulfil his promise to become a weird, unloved adult.”
-What is said of Martin after they believe him to be dead

"The first inspirational speech of the day was by the woman that climbed Mount Everest and got everyone else killed!"
-Marge speaking about a women's conference

Best Episode:
It's a tie. "Little Orphan Millie" has Milhouse believe his parents have died, and as a result he becomes emotional and reclusive, much to the admiration of the girls in Springfield Elementary. Emo Milhouse is genuinely funny, but it has to share the top episode spot because the ending in which they stumble upon his parents in a hot air balloon is so preposterously stupid I can't forget it. The second half tie goes to "The Debarted". Bart befriends a class clown that one-ups him at every turn. Unfortunately, he turns out to be a snitch. It's not great by any means, but it's a decent idea for a story and it has a few solid laughs.

Worst Episode:
With no doubt in my mind it's "Mona Leaves-a". Homer's mother returns once more, but this time is the last time as she passes away. Her final wish is to have her ashes thrown off the top of a mountain at a precise time.

Now this is where it gets messy.

The ashes clog the ducts of one of Mr. Burns' nefarious plots, stopping his plans. Suddenly it's a spy show in which the Simpsons are the heroes. Shocking.

The Worst Adventures

I can tell you about climbing Everest, being lost in the Antarctic and surviving a plane crash.

Of course, I haven't actually done any of those things, but that's the beauty of books. You can live the lives of those far more courageous and bold than you without having to get up off the couch - a nice way of confronting cowardice without actually fixing anything or taking a real risk.

In the past while I have read three books that have to do with true stories of extraordinary circumstances: Into Thin Air, Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage, and Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors. All three are tremendous (all five-star ratings on my Goodreads account, enough to make any author swoon) and all three tell incredible stories, true stories with none of the Hollywood flair or alterations - these are real, historical accounts. But which one of the three events was the most incredible feat of survival? Which of the three had the most difficult circumstance? We'll take a look.




The Story:

1. Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors
A rugby team takes an ill-fated plane trip over the Andes and crash lands in the snowy peaks. Rescue attempts prove futile, and they're all believed to be dead. Over half survive the crash, but left with no food, inadequate shelter, and little hope for rescue. As a last resort, the survivors resort to the cannibalism of their friends and family to stay alive. Seeking a way out means trudging through the mountains in hopes of reaching a town.

2. Into Thin Air
A team of climbers attempt to reach the peak of Mount Everest, led by a few experienced guides which do this for a living and a number of sherpas to help them along the way. Snowstorms and blizzards assault them savagely, and with dwindling oxygen, they have to fight to get down the mountain to safety. It's cold. It's blinding. It's Everest.

(I tried to make the last part sound like a movie promo.)

 3. Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage
Back in 1914 when men were men, a team of twenty-eight set out to conquer the Antarctic. Their ship gets caught in the ice (surprise surprise) and they must find their way back with little in the way of navigational tools and supplies. It's cold. It's wet. It's the Antarctic.

Deaths:

1. 
Of the initial fourty-five that were on the plane, twenty-seven survived the crash, which feels like a miracle in and of itself. However, not all were in the best of shape, and a few would succumb to their injuries within just a few days. Later, an avalanche would claim more. In the end, sixteen eventually made it back to civilization.

2. 
All told, there were eighteen people that went on the expedition to Everest. Eight of them would not make it back. If we're speaking strictly of percentages, the Everest climbers lost the highest number (if we count the initial survivors of when the plane first went down in the Andes). It's eerie to think that with the lack of decomposition on the mountain, they would still be fairly well preserved still up near the peak. The book details the author's climb and how on the way up he would find the occasional corpse of a climber who met his end doing exactly what he was doing.

3. 
Somehow - SOMEHOW - not a single man died on this expedition. If you read the book, you will recognize just how incredible that number is. I believe you can chalk that up to some 1914 hardiness and strength of will.

Difficulties:

1. 
All three stories have certain aspects in common: extreme cold and the frostbite and limb damage that comes with it. Shackleton's and theirs adds hunger to the mix. What the Andes survivors had to endure was something else entirely; a level of mental anguish that I don't believe is comparable in the other two. Having to resort to cannibalism, and cannibalism of those they were speaking with only moments prior, is as trying a circumstance in and of itself as anything else.

As for physical difficulties, their way to rescue was sending two men to climb through the Andes with little more than a few pieces of human meat and whatever clothing they could find. It was a shot in the dark through mountainous regions without climbing experience, and it's the best they had - and it worked.

2. 
Aside from the obvious difficulties associated with the cold, the climbers on Everest had to deal with being deprived of oxygen. They were frequently delirious, making the account of the expedition sometimes somewhat spotty and having to be backed by multiple sources. Some memories of the climbers seem to have been entirely hallucinations. Pair this with the sudden panic and desperation (a short, unbearable time rather than a stretched out unbearable time) would make decision making near impossible.

3. 
Not only were they dealing with freezing cold, a lack of navigational equipment and low supplies, what they did have was from 1914. Their trek back should have been near impossible; they had to battle through not having set foot on land for the entirety of the expedition (they were living on icebergs that occasionally broke), finding their way through sheets of ice while freezing water poured onto their hands and into their boats, and upon finally reaching dry land the few men they sent out for rescue had to climb across a mountain range. That same mountain range hadn't been climbed ever before, and wasn't again for another fifty years. And considering they were planning on a boat trip and crossing flat Antarctic surfaces, you can imagine their climbing equipment (hint: they didn't have any).

Expectations and Risks:

1. 
The Andes survivors were simply going on a plane. They had no preparation, no plans, no equipment, food, shelter, know-how, or anything beyond what you and I have right now. There was no contingency plan if they crashed, because a plane going down just isn't something you consider happening. There was no legitimate risk in their choice, not like the other two who actively decided on an expedition. These were regular folk put into an extraordinary position.

2. 
Some say the reputation of Everest has been tarnished by the fact that any rich guy with even moderate physical ability can be practically carried up the mountain defeats the purpose. It's a fair point. However, Everest still claims the lives of climbers each and every year, reminding us that while we have conquered much of nature, she still has a few tricks up her sleeve. The climbers had every bit of equipment and knowledge of what to do. Their leaders were prepared and well-versed in climbing, having made it to the peak countless times. Yes, they ran into some bad weather (and some bad luck) but they knew the risks. They knew this could, technically, happen.

3. 
Shackleton and crew were the most prepared for a catastrophe. Well, at least acknowledging that it may happen. The ad that was placed for Shackleton's voyage read as follows: "Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success." They knew what they were getting into. However, being 1914 where the concept of safety was some newfangled idea, preparation for catastrophe was pretty scarce.

Hope of Rescue:

1. 
The people in the Andes always had hope. Search parties went out on occasion, and having found a radio and managing to get it to function, they heard when planes were meant to be passing near or looking for them. Even when they heard they were stopping the searches (later restarting them) they knew Chile and civilization lay somewhere to the west. As for a plan - well, it was basically send their best and hope.

2. 
They did have the right gear, that's for sure. You don't go to Everest without packing the right stuff. However, when you're completely snow-blind in a blizzard on top of the world, having it and using it are two entirely different things. A lack of communication and cognizance caused by oxygen deprivation and lack of sight spun everything wildly out of control. How are you supposed to find your way down a mountain when you can hardly see ten feet in front of you?

3. 
I cannot describe the chances of rescue for Shackleton's group without going into very lengthy detail. Their journey was long and arduous, and perhaps the least possible of the three - in spite of not losing a single man. One guy even had a heart attack, and another had to have his foot cut off with only the medical supplies they had taken from the boat, but even they toughed it out. They travelled the farthest distance through ungodly conditions, and pulled off some feats that no man should reasonably be able to do. However... they knew what they were getting into, and Shackleton himself was an experienced explorer.

Time:

1. 
From the day the plane crashed to the day they were rescued was a full seventy days. Months on a snow-capped mountain with blizzard conditions and no food seems like certain death, and by all means it should have been.

2. 
From what I can tell, the actual catastrophic event of the blizzard that caused the deaths of the climbers seemed to occur over two days. However, you could argue that those two days were worse than two days any of the others experienced, as if they had to continue in those conditions they likely wouldn't have lasted much longer. A day or two at the most.

3. 
Here's the topper for the Shackleton expedition. They set out on December 5, 1914 and returned on August 30... 1916! That's a whole year and a half surviving off whatever supplies they could carry and pilfer from their sinking boat, hunting seals and penguins in a frozen wasteland that not even the light of the sun survives in for long. They were so long forgotten no one was even considering their survival - especially since the war had taken the public eye.




 Geez. Can we just call it a three-way tie?

_____________________________________________

For more info, check out my three-part blog on Shackleton's voyage on my history blog.
http://idiothistorian.blogspot.ca/2015/06/shackletons-endurance-setting-sail.html

Far Cry 4 Review

Overview:

Only so many games allow you to blow up a rhino with C4; Far Cry 4 is one of them.

There's a little more to it, though. Far Cry 4 follows Ajay Ghale's travels to the fictional, mountainous, and beautiful region of Kyrat. There, he hopes to fulfil his mother's final wish: to have her ashes spread in location of her choosing. As it turns out, things go south fairly quickly - the land is undergoing a civil war between tyrannical leader Pagan Min and the Golden Path, a band of revolutionaries hoping to take him down. As video games never side with the tyrannical leader you're going to be the one killing a whole bunch of evil soldiers fighting for Min, the pink-suited, metrosexual dictator.

Far Cry is engaging, undeniably fun, challenging and visually stunning; however, it is not without its flaws. The majority come in the second half in the game, when a first half that is polished and intriguing just doesn't continue as one would wish.

Visuals:
Far Cry 4 is an incredible feast for the eyes. The land of Kyrat is beautiful, and the style of the game lets you not only explore it at your leisure but fly through it, climb it, swim in it and drive over it. There were plenty of times when I would find myself taking a moment just to look around and take in the sights. It's vivid and colourful, and flying around in a junky flying machine or soaring past the mountains in a wing-suit is an experience in and of itself.

The motions and movements of the people, both when you're riddling them with bullet holes or having a discussion with someone about whom you should leave riddled with bullet holes next, are smooth and natural. This is a big thing when you're running a game that's particularly story driven - a character that comes alive in the voice acting can fall apart if the motions don't match, but Far Cry clearly put the effort in.

"Far Cry 4 is an incredible feast for the eyes."

Lastly, there is one stand-out in Far Cry that deserves special attention. There is a side-plot set of missions that are not necessary to complete to pass the game, but rather just to provide a degree of background to the mystical world of Kyrat. It sends you to the corrupted paradise of Shangri-la, a place of bright yellows and reds that is perhaps the most beautiful place I've seen in a video game. Basically, the whole land looks like this, but it doesn't really do it justice until it's on a big screen with so many sun-shafts coming through it looks like the an artillery barrage of light everywhere you turn. I rarely like side missions that separate you from the weapons, armour, or skills you have acquired along the way, but the sheer beauty of this segment of the game is well worth the time.

Gameplay:
If you played Far Cry 3 you're not really finding anything new here. The game requires stealth to take over outposts, meaning you stab many people in the back with knives or quietly dispatch them with a bow and arrow, or, more likely, you screw up and find yourself pulling out an assault rifle and blasting your way through, Rambo-esque. From the beginning, it's challenging and rewarding for those who possess a degree of planning and patience, and taking an outpost without a single one of the dead having known of your existence until you're carving them up like a Christmas ham is an incredibly satisfying experience.

The problem with Far Cry is the difficulty level isn't entirely maintained from start to finish. At some point you find yourself wielding a sniper rifle, allowing yourself to pick off enemies from the distance without them knowing where you've shot from. They counter with mortars, but for the most part they're not particularly effective. Suddenly, it's become easier to crouch in a hill somewhere and take your time bumping off unwary men in towers rather than sneaking through on foot. It turns from planning and nervous execution to simple point and shoot. Discovering explosives is next on the list, and again, it takes away a little bit due to the fact that C4 is about as devastating in the game as it is in real life (I would imagine). Lobbing a couple into a room tends to clear it out without much of a worry. It's also cheap enough that it's readily available, making the previously adequate difficulty level no longer applicable. Lastly, the most wildly overpowered weapon comes in the form of a simple side-arm. It's a hand-held grenade launcher that, by the end of the game when you have the upgrades for a better ammo belt and explosives pouch, holds more than you would ever need. Side missions that occur (like blowing up drivers of enemy vehicles) become mind-numbingly easy - a vehicle is no longer something that requires some clever driving and shooting to take down but rather one single shot from a weapon slot that held a sub-par pistol. Considering it's also an explosive, accuracy doesn't even really matter. Hit it close enough to the truck and it's game over. If they survive the first blast, well, shoot again. The repercussions for doing so are essentially nothing and the risk and strategy is cut to ribbons.

"The problem with Far Cry is the difficulty level isn't entirely maintained."

You can say "well, to get the achievements or to enjoy it more you can choose not to play that way", but video games don't work like that. The first time you play you use any advantage you can to complete the game. Far Cry, as much as I enjoyed it, isn't necessarily something I wish to play again - it's not a knock on it, but rather speaks to the nature of single-player campaign based games. The difficulty has to be spot on at the first attempt, and sadly, it falls short. The final mission in which there are plenty of enemies does not prove to be particularly difficult as a sniper rifle and grenade launcher (as well as very high powered assault rifles) make short work of whatever they throw at you. Higher numbers are irrelevant if they're not really strong enough to cause you any real harm (or to dodge your explosives). There is the occasional mission where stealth is 100% required or you lose instantly, but those were few and far between. They were also far and away the most challenging, rewarding, and ultimately the most fun.

Characters and Plot: 
*Careful: spoilers ahead for the rest of this blog.*
Admittedly, Far Cry 3 left a tough act to follow with the absolutely superb voice acting and characterization of Vaas Montenegro. Vaas stole the scene of every one in which he was featured, but can the same be said for Far Cry 4's Pagan Min? Well... sort of. Not quite. The beginning of the game has him torturing people (but treating you fairly well with a fine meal) and it certainly grabs your attention. But as the game progresses, he comes across as an eccentric but nothing in which you're all that interested in. I found myself asking why I even wanted to kill him so badly. That's disappointing when it's the driving force of your character's motivation.

The ending mission has you storming his castle, finding him once more at a dinner table much the same way the game started, and it's up to you to decide his fate. I decided, at first, to let him live. He led me to plant the ashes where they belonged from the beginning. I left the room to find him taking off in a helicopter. Panicked, and not wanting to let him get away, I pulled out (what else?) my side-arm grenade launcher and fired two well placed shots at the retreating helicopter. "THE KING IS DEAD" comes up on my screen. I've completed the game. I didn't even see Pagan Min die - I just saw his helicopter go down. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a little disappointing. Not every game needs some big shock twist, but I need a little more to think about than a simple search for an enemy, finding him, and eliminating him much the same way I eliminated literally everyone else from the second half up until that point.

This poor ending isn't an isolated incident. Far Cry simply seems to have issues with the final results of characters, being able to build up all the interest and intrigue but ultimately letting it fall short. I felt the same way with the death of Vaas in the third instalment, and I felt pretty much the same way with everyone else in this game as well. I chose Sabal's path (the leader that is for religion and tradition at the cost of economics) leading me to kill Amita (who is the opposite of Sabal, believing in a drug trade economy that will help Kyrat flourish). When Sabal forces me to eventually kill Amita, it wasn't really all that exciting. He asked me to kill her. I went and killed her. Done. That section is over, and the repercussions for it were ultimately pretty minimal. It was building to it for so long, and when it finally happened the only reason it wasn't entirely predictable was because it was so predictable. I kept thinking something would happen that would change the course of things, but no - going much the same way as Pagan Min, with a build up to the death of a character followed by the expected death of that character. Everything about it was entirely expected.

"Far Cry 4 seems to have issues with the final results of characters, being able to build up all the interest and intrigue but ultimately letting it fall short."

The two most disappointing storylines were the side missions of Longinus, a born-again Christian and former African warlord, and Reggie and Yogi, two drug addicts. The warlord supplies the Golden Path (the anti-Min rebels of which you become a part) with a number of weapons. He continually sends you on missions to blow up, assassinate, or otherwise dispatch of whomever he feels like murdering, depending on his mood. Most of the missions are basically the same, to the point that Ajay actually states that he knows what Longinus is going to say next. There's a slight change in demeanor in the penultimate mission of his, when after going from his eccentric, loud and Bible quoting self to tearful and drunk, you wonder where the next turn in the story will take you. Suddenly you're interested, and you're hoping you see more into what makes a former warlord tick. You complete the mission he sends you on to find him packing up his stuff and leaving, giving you a final reward of a rocket launcher that is a bigger version of your all-powerful hand-held grenade launcher - but ultimately much less effective due to the fact that it only hits a little harder, and this one takes forever to reload. All that stuff that looked like it was building somewhere? No sir. Longinus' story flirts with progression, but in the end literally just packs up and leaves.

Yogi and Reggie, the most annoying part of Far Cry 4, fare no better as they frequently stab you with needles and send you on drug fueled adventures. I had hoped for some degree of progression with them as well, having their stories tie into the main one in some way. However, nothing really comes of it. The final time they drug you, you return to find them once more pleased at you finding your way back and inexplicably not bombing the heck out of them the way you do everyone else. They thank you for being such a good test subject. Again, nothing really happens with them and it leaves the story a little hollow. No big epiphany, no moment. They just say thanks and that's about it.

Synopsis:
Far Cry 4 is still an excellent game. The stealth missions are top notch, the visuals breathtaking, and the length of the game about what it should be considering it's a simple campaign focused game (I took no interest in what felt like needlessly tacked on multiplayer Call of Duty stuff). The combat is streamlined and sleek, similar to its predecessor but making improvements wherever they were needed. However, the second half of the game starts to fall apart due to having your weaponry and resources vastly surpass the abilities of your enemies. As well, all the intrigue and interest in the first half of the game in regards to character and story progression began to taper off, resulting in disappointing endings for literally every character in the game. It always left me wanting more, building towards payoffs that simply never came.

Simpsons by the Season: 18

"I can't believe he acted completely in character."

Season ten started the decline of The Simpsons. Eleven found the plots becoming decreasingly realistic. Twelve, the plots went from unrealistic to just not entertaining. In the thirteenth, the characters weren't even really acting like themselves anymore. Fourteen, the quality of the humour really started to sink, as if it wasn't already. The fifteenth season finds the show trying to conjure up happier feelings with nostalgia in place of good writing. While the sixteenth is a strange throwback to slightly better stuff, it was too little too late as the following the characters just lose their humanity. 

This eighteenth is a culmination of everything that has gone wrong with the series, tied into one tidy bundle of garbage. Here's how!

Reality is taken out back and shot: 

Far too many episodes can essentially pass for Halloween episodes now, as writing in reality has evidently become too hard. If you remember when Community had their first paintball themed episode, it was fresh, original, and above all pretty funny. Then they started doing more of them, and other such episodes that didn't fit with the format and went about as off the rails as a show can go. It's probably easier to write as it opens up nearly endless material, but they rarely hit the mark and come across as cheap. "Revenge is a Dish Best Served Three Times" is another three-part episode in which the characters are different people, "Marge Gamer" (a self explanatory title) takes them into another universe, and "24 Minutes" (an episode parodying the show 24) is just an extended Halloween bit. With the Halloween episode itself added, about 20% of the episodes a season don't actually exist within the Simpsons universe anymore (maybe "24 Minutes" did, but man, that's a push).

The plots losing entertainment value:
I understand that this is about as subjective as it comes, but episodes like "Kill Gil" just can't make it past the first stages. Gil is a side character, and having him lead an entire episode in which he comes and lives with the Simpsons would work as a side plot as best. He's a one dimensional character - he can't hold a whole plot. It's like when The Office, in its declining years, had a few Creed-based episodes.

Characters just aren't themselves:
Homer becomes a thief (again?) in "Crook and Ladder". This isn't Homer being morally questionable, this is him flat out taking advantage of someone's buildings burning down and, in the case of Burns' Manor, just plain robbing him. Beloved family man, Homer Simpson...

The humour is dead and gone:
Watch "Rome-old and Juli-eh" in which Abe dates Selma and tell me if you laugh just once.

They might try for nostalgia but forget their own stories:
The crux of the "Haw Hawed Couple" episode is Nelson and Bart becoming unlikely friends. But... Nelson and Bart have already become friends before, in the episode when Bart  shoots the bird. This is already old news. Nelson even says at one point "I've never had a best friend before" - but he has! And it is the same person. 

The characters lose their humanity:
In "Please Homer, Don't Hammer 'Em" there is a side plot where Bart finds out Skinner has a peanut allergy. He then continues to blackmail, taunt and torture skinner by waving a peanut on a stick at him. Bart is a malicious and horrible person in this episode, and in the end Skinner is throwing shrimp at Bart (in which they find he is allergic to) and Bart is throwing peanuts at Skinner. All this occurs after an extended Family Guy-esque fight scene. I would say it would be like a time in Family Guy when it started declining, but that show has always been trash.

Bring on season 19. Lets try to forget this ever happened.

Best Quotes:
"This is the most disgusting place we've ever been!"
"What about Brazil?"
"After Brazil."
-An exchange between Lisa and Bart

"You have destroyed all human life on Earth. Level one: completed!"
-The video game Death Kill City 2: Death Kill Stories

Best Episode:
"The Mook, the Chef, the Wife and the Homer" is probably the top of the season. Fat Tony has a son, and exploits occur. That's all you need to know. It's pretty good.

Worst Episode:
"Please Homer Don't Hammer 'Em" is in contention for being one of the worst ever, in my books. I've already explained how terrible the Bart and Skinner side story is, but the main one fares no better. Marge inexplicably becomes a very talented carpenter (Bart in this season also becomes a fantastic jazz drummer too, somehow) but no one trusts her as she's a woman. Homer then takes the credit while letting Marge do the work. There's a terrible bit with a roller coaster falling apart, nothing makes sense, and if you laugh once it would be at, not with, this trainwreck of an episode. I can't believe it's worse than "Crook and Ladder".