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The Simpsons (season 10)
Encyclopedia
The tenth season of the animated television series The Simpsons
was originally broadcast on the Fox network
in the United States between August 23, 1998 and May 16, 1999. It contains twenty-three episodes, starting with "Lard of the Dance
". The Simpsons revolves around a working class family
that consists of Homer
, Marge
, Bart
, Lisa
, and Maggie
. Set in the fictional city of Springfield
, the show lampoons American culture
, society, television, and many aspects of the human condition
.
The show runner
for the tenth season was Mike Scully
. Before production began, a salary dispute between the main cast members of The Simpsons and Fox arose. However, it was soon settled and the actors' salaries were raised to $
125,000 per episode. In addition to the large Simpsons cast, many guest stars appeared in season ten, including Phil Hartman
in his last appearance before his death.
The season, which won the Annie Award
for "Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Television Program
", has been cited by several critics as the beginning of the series' decline in quality. It ranked twenty-fifth in the season ratings with an average of 13.5 million viewers per episode. The tenth season DVD boxset was released in the United States and Canada on August 7, 2007. It is available in two different packagings, both featuring Bart.
). As show runner and executive producer, Scully headed the writing staff and oversaw all aspects of the show's production. However, as he told UltimateTV
in January 1999, he did not "make any decisions without the staff's input. We have great staffs in all the departments from animation to writing. So I don't want to make it sound like a dictatorship." Scully was popular with the staff members, many of whom have praised his organization and management skills. Writer Tom Martin
has said that he was "quite possibly the best boss I've ever worked for" and "a great manager of people". Scully's aim while running The Simpsons was to "not wreck the show." In addition to his role as show runner during the tenth season, he co-wrote the episode "Sunday, Cruddy Sunday
".
In 1999, there were around sixteen staff writers working on The Simpsons. Many of them had written for the show for several years, including John Swartzwelder
and George Meyer
. The third episode of the tenth season, "Bart the Mother
", was the last full-length episode written by David S. Cohen
, a longtime writer on the show. He left to team up with The Simpsons creator Matt Groening
to develop Futurama
, a series on which he served as executive producer and head writer
. The tenth season marked the full-time return of staff member Al Jean
, who had departed from the show after the fourth season to create the animated series The Critic
. Between seasons four and ten, he had only worked periodically on the show, writing four episodes.
The main cast of the season consisted of Dan Castellaneta
(Homer Simpson, Grampa Simpson
, Krusty the Clown, among others), Julie Kavner
(Marge Simpson), Nancy Cartwright
(Bart Simpson, Ralph Wiggum
, Nelson Muntz
), Yeardley Smith
(Lisa Simpson), Hank Azaria
(Moe Szyslak
, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
, Chief Wiggum, among others) and Harry Shearer
(Ned Flanders
, Mr. Burns
, Principal Skinner
, among others). Up until the production of season ten in 1998, these six main voice actors were paid $
30,000 per episode. In 1998, a salary dispute between them and the Fox Broadcasting Company
(which airs The Simpsons) arose, with the actors threatening to go on a strike. Fox went as far as preparing for casting of new voices, but an agreement was soon made and the actors' salaries were raised to $125,000 per episode. Groening expressed his sympathy for the cast members in an issue of Mother Jones (magazine)Mother Jones a while after the salary dispute had been settled. He told the magazine: "They are incredibly talented, and they deserve a chance to be as rich and miserable as anyone else in Hollywood. It looked for a while there like we might not have a show, because everyone was holding firm on all sides. That's still my attitude: Hold out for as much money as you can get, but do make the deal."
Other cast members of the season included Pamela Hayden
(Milhouse Van Houten
, among others), Tress MacNeille
(Agnes Skinner, among others), Russi Taylor
(Martin Prince
), Maggie Roswell
(Helen Lovejoy, Maude Flanders, among others), and Karl Wiedergott
. Season ten also featured a large number of guest stars, including Phil Hartman in his last appearance on The Simpsons in the episode "Bart the Mother" that aired in September 1998. Hartman had been killed by his wife four months before the episode aired and it was dedicated to his memory. Rather than replace him with a new voice actor, the production staff retired two of his recurring characters, Troy McClure
and Lionel Hutz
.
and Holding the Baby
by serving as a lead-in, "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace
" (airing on September 20, 1998) was the official premiere of the tenth season. The season aired in the 8:00 p.m. time slot on Sundays. It ranked twenty-fifth (tied with Dharma & Greg
) in the ratings for the 1998–1999 television season
with an average of 13.5 million viewers per episode, dropping twelve percent in number of average viewers from the last season. The Simpsons was Fox's third highest-rated show of the television season, following The X-Files
(ranked twelfth) and Ally McBeal
(ranked twentieth).
wrote in his book Planet Simpson that "one of the things that emerged was that [the staff] began to rely on gags, not characters, wherever that switch got flipped, whether it's the ninth or tenth season." Jesse Hassenger of PopMatters
named the tenth season of The Simpsons the series' "first significant dip in quality, a step away from its golden era [...] with broader gags and more outlandish plots," and a BBC News
writer commented that "the common consensus is that The Simpsons' golden era ended after season nine". Similarly, Tyler Wilson of Coeur d'Alene Press
has referred to seasons one to nine as the show's "golden age."
DVD Verdict
's Mac McEntire noted in a review that while the tenth season contains "a lot of laughs", it is missing the emotional core of the earlier seasons. Chris Barsanti of Filmcritic.com has commented that around the time the tenth season aired, "not only did the show start losing its status as untouchtable—read: everyone stopped expecting every episode to be a masterpiece—it also developed the bad habit of building episodes around celebrity guests, who were practically never as amusing as they were meant to be." Michael Passman of The Michigan Daily wrote in 2007 that "in hindsight, the 10th season can now be seen as a tipping point of sorts for a number of the show's less attractive plot devices. Homer's get-rich-quick schemes start to become all too prevalent, and there are an inordinate amount of unnecessary celebrity cameos." Passman did not only have negative things to say about the tenth season though. He commented that it "is not the last great 'Simpsons' season ever. The last great season was the eighth. The last really good season was the ninth. But the tenth is just pretty good, nothing more, nothing less."
Scully, who was show runner during seasons nine through twelve
, is held responsible by many critics and fans for the decline. An op-ed
in Slate
by Chris Suellentrop argued that The Simpsons changed from a realistic show about family life into a typical cartoon when Scully was the show runner: "under Scully's tenure, The Simpsons became, well, a cartoon. Episodes that once would have ended with Homer and Marge bicycling into the sunset now end with Homer blowing a tranquilizer dart into Marge's neck. The show's still funny, but it hasn't been touching in years." John Ortved wrote in his book The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History
that "Scully's episodes excel when compared to what The Simpsons airs nowadays, but he was the man at the helm when the ship turned towards the iceberg." The Simpsons under Scully has been negatively labeled as a "gag-heavy, Homer-centric incarnation" by Jon Bonné of MSNBC
, and many fans have bemoaned the transformation in Homer's character during the era, from sweet and sincere to "a boorish, self-aggrandizing oaf", dubbing him "Jerkass Homer".
The Simpsons writer Tom Martin said in Ortved's book that he does not understand the criticism against Scully because he thinks Scully ran the show well. He also commented that the thinks the criticism "bothered [Scully], and still bothers him, but he managed to not get worked up over it." Ortved noted in his book that it is hard to tell how much of the decline is Scully's fault, and that blaming a single show runner for lowering the quality of the show "is unfair." He also wrote that some of the episodes from Scully's first two seasons (nine and ten), such as "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace" and "When You Dish Upon a Star
", are better than certain episodes of the two previous seasons.
UGO Networks' Brian Tallerico has defended the season against the criticism. He wrote in a 2007 review that comparing "tenth season Simpsons episodes to the prime of the series (3–7) is just unfair and really kind of self-defeating. 'Yeah, I laughed, but not as hard as a couple of years ago. So it sucks.' That's nonsense. The fact is that even the tenth season of The Simpsons was funnier than most [other] show's [sic] best years." PopMatters' Hassenger commented in his review that although the show had declined in quality, "this is not to say that these episodes are without their charm; many, in fact, are laugh-out-loud funny and characteristically smart." Similarly to Tallerico, he also noted that "weaker Simpsons seasons are superior to most television."
for "Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Television Program", beating Batman Beyond
, Futurama
, King of the Hill
, and The New Batman/Superman Adventures
. That same year, Tim Long
, Larry Doyle, and Matt Selman
received an Annie Award in the "Outstanding Individual Achievement for Writing in an Animated Television Production" category for writing "Simpsons Bible Stories
", the eighteenth episode of the tenth season. The trio faced competition from writers of Futurama ("The Series Has Landed"), King of the Hill ("Hank's Cowboy Movie"), Batman Beyond ("Rebirth Part I"), and Space Ghost Coast To Coast
("Lawsuit"). The Simpsons was also nominated for two Emmy Awards in 1999, though the show did not win either. The season ten episode "Viva Ned Flanders
" lost in the "Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour)
" category to "And They Call It Bobby Love" of King of the Hill. Alf Clausen
was nominated in the "Outstanding Music Composition for a Series
" category for his work on "Treehouse of Horror IX
", the fourth episode of the tenth season, but lost the award to Carl Johnson of Invasion America
.
in the United States and Canada on August 7, 2007. As well as every episode from the season, the DVD release features bonus material including audio commentaries
for every episode, deleted scene
s, and animatics. The set was released in two different packagings: a standard rectangular cardboard box featuring Bart on the cover driving through a security checkpoint gate at a movie studio, and a "limited edition" plastic packaging molded to look like Bart's head.
The Simpsons
The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle epitomized by its family of the same name, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie...
was originally broadcast on the Fox network
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
in the United States between August 23, 1998 and May 16, 1999. It contains twenty-three episodes, starting with "Lard of the Dance
Lard of the Dance
"Lard of the Dance" is the first episode of The Simpsons tenth season, that originally aired on August 23, 1998. Homer discovers he can make money by stealing and reselling grease, but eventually stops after negative encounters with Groundskeeper Willie and the Springfield Grease Company...
". The Simpsons revolves around a working class family
Simpson family
The Simpson family is a family of fictional characters featured in the animated television series The Simpsons. The Simpsons are a nuclear family consisting of the married couple Homer and Marge and their three children Bart, Lisa and Maggie. They live at 742 Evergreen Terrace in the fictional town...
that consists of Homer
Homer Simpson
Homer Jay Simpson is a fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons and the patriarch of the eponymous family. He is voiced by Dan Castellaneta and first appeared on television, along with the rest of his family, in The Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987...
, Marge
Marge Simpson
Marjorie "Marge" Simpson is a fictional main character in the animated television series The Simpsons and part of the eponymous family. She is voiced by actress Julie Kavner and first appeared on television in The Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987...
, Bart
Bart Simpson
Bartholomew JoJo "Bart" Simpson is a fictional main character in the animated television series The Simpsons and part of the Simpson family. He is voiced by actress Nancy Cartwright and first appeared on television in The Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987...
, Lisa
Lisa Simpson
Lisa Marie Simpson is a fictional main character in the animated television series The Simpsons. She is the middle child of the Simpson family. Voiced by Yeardley Smith, Lisa first appeared on television in The Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987. Cartoonist Matt Groening...
, and Maggie
Maggie Simpson
Margaret "Maggie" Simpson is a fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons. She first appeared on television in the Tracey Ullman Show short "Good Night" on April 19, 1987. Maggie was created and designed by cartoonist Matt Groening while he was waiting in the lobby of James...
. Set in the fictional city of Springfield
Springfield (The Simpsons)
Springfield is the fictional town in which the American animated sitcom The Simpsons is set. A mid-sized town in an undetermined state of the United States, Springfield acts as a complete universe in which characters can explore the issues faced by modern society. The geography of the town and its...
, the show lampoons American culture
Culture of the United States
The Culture of the United States is a Western culture originally influenced by European cultures. It has been developing since long before the United States became a country with its own unique social and cultural characteristics such as dialect, music, arts, social habits, cuisine, and folklore...
, society, television, and many aspects of the human condition
Human condition
The human condition encompasses the experiences of being human in a social, cultural, and personal context. It can be described as the irreducible part of humanity that is inherent and not connected to gender, race, class, etc. — a search for purpose, sense of curiosity, the inevitability of...
.
The show runner
Show runner
Showrunner is a term of art originating in the United States and Canadian television industry referring to the person who is responsible for the day-to-day operation of a television seriesalthough such persons generally are credited as an executive producer...
for the tenth season was Mike Scully
Mike Scully
Mike Scully is an American television writer and producer. He is known for his work as executive producer and showrunner of the animated sitcom The Simpsons from 1997 to 2001. Scully grew up in West Springfield, Massachusetts and long had an interest in writing. He was an underachiever at school...
. Before production began, a salary dispute between the main cast members of The Simpsons and Fox arose. However, it was soon settled and the actors' salaries were raised to $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
125,000 per episode. In addition to the large Simpsons cast, many guest stars appeared in season ten, including Phil Hartman
Phil Hartman
Philip Edward "Phil" Hartman was a Canadian-American actor, comedian, screenwriter, and graphic artist. Born in Brantford, Ontario, Hartman and his family moved to the United States when he was 10...
in his last appearance before his death.
The season, which won the Annie Award
Annie Award
The Annie Awards have been presented by the Los Angeles, California branch of the International Animated Film Association, ASIFA-Hollywood since 1972...
for "Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Television Program
Annie Award for Best Animated Television Production
The Annie Award for Best Animated Television Production is an Annie Award, awarded annually to the best animated television show. In 1998 the award was split into two categories, Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Daytime Television Program and Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Primetime...
", has been cited by several critics as the beginning of the series' decline in quality. It ranked twenty-fifth in the season ratings with an average of 13.5 million viewers per episode. The tenth season DVD boxset was released in the United States and Canada on August 7, 2007. It is available in two different packagings, both featuring Bart.
Production
The tenth season was the second that Mike Scully served as show runner for (he had previously run the ninth seasonThe Simpsons (season 9)
The Simpsons ninth season originally aired between September 1997 and May 1998, beginning on Sunday, September 21, 1997 with "The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson". The show runner for the ninth production season was Mike Scully...
). As show runner and executive producer, Scully headed the writing staff and oversaw all aspects of the show's production. However, as he told UltimateTV
UltimateTV (Online Service)
UltimateTV was the name of a Web site for all-things-television officially launched in May 1998 in Encino, California. Originally a hobby website started by David Cronshaw, an engineer at KCAL-TV 9, it caught the attention of Jeff Rowe, a Vice President at NBC and JD Publishing, a publisher of TV...
in January 1999, he did not "make any decisions without the staff's input. We have great staffs in all the departments from animation to writing. So I don't want to make it sound like a dictatorship." Scully was popular with the staff members, many of whom have praised his organization and management skills. Writer Tom Martin
Tom Martin (writer)
Tom Martin is an American television writer. He grew up in Southern California and attended Rolling Hills High School and Indio High School. He graduated from University of California, Irvine in 1987 with degrees in Economics and Political Science. While at UC Irvine he ran on the Track and Cross...
has said that he was "quite possibly the best boss I've ever worked for" and "a great manager of people". Scully's aim while running The Simpsons was to "not wreck the show." In addition to his role as show runner during the tenth season, he co-wrote the episode "Sunday, Cruddy Sunday
Sunday, Cruddy Sunday
"Sunday, Cruddy Sunday" is the twelfth episode of The Simpsons tenth season. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on January 31, 1999, just after Super Bowl XXXIII. In the episode, while buying new tires for his car, Homer meets a travel agent called Wally Kogen...
".
In 1999, there were around sixteen staff writers working on The Simpsons. Many of them had written for the show for several years, including John Swartzwelder
John Swartzwelder
John Swartzwelder is an American comedy writer and novelist, best known for his work on the animated television series The Simpsons, as well as a number of novels. He is credited with writing the largest number of Simpsons episodes by a large margin...
and George Meyer
George Meyer
George A. Meyer is an American producer and writer. Raised in Tucson, Arizona in a Roman Catholic family, Meyer attended Harvard University. There, after becoming president of the Harvard Lampoon, he graduated in 1978 with a degree in biochemistry. Abandoning plans to attend medical school, Meyer...
. The third episode of the tenth season, "Bart the Mother
Bart the Mother
"Bart the Mother" is the third episode of the 10th season of The Simpsons, originally airing on September 27, 1998. The episode was written by David X. Cohen and directed by Steven Dean Moore. It was the last full-length episode Cohen wrote for The Simpsons before leaving to work on Futurama...
", was the last full-length episode written by David S. Cohen
David X. Cohen
David Samuel Cohen , primarily known as David X. Cohen, is an American television writer. He has written for The Simpsons and he is the head writer and executive producer of Futurama.-Early life:...
, a longtime writer on the show. He left to team up with The Simpsons creator Matt Groening
Matt Groening
Matthew Abram "Matt" Groening is an American cartoonist, screenwriter, and producer. He is the creator of the comic strip Life in Hell as well as two successful television series, The Simpsons and Futurama....
to develop Futurama
Futurama
Futurama is an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series follows the adventures of a late 20th-century New York City pizza delivery boy, Philip J...
, a series on which he served as executive producer and head writer
Head writer
A head writer is a person who oversees the team of writers on a television or radio series. The title is common in the soap opera genre, as well as with sketch comedies and talk shows that feature monologues and comedy skits, but in prime time series this function is generally performed by an...
. The tenth season marked the full-time return of staff member Al Jean
Al Jean
Al Jean is an award-winning American screenwriter and producer, best known for his work on The Simpsons. He was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan and graduated from Harvard University in 1981. Jean began his writing career in the 1980s with fellow Harvard alum Mike Reiss...
, who had departed from the show after the fourth season to create the animated series The Critic
The Critic
The Critic is an American prime time animated series revolving around the life of film critic Jay Sherman, voiced by actor Jon Lovitz. It was created by Al Jean and Mike Reiss, both of whom had worked as writers on The Simpsons. The Critic had 23 episodes produced, first broadcast on ABC in 1994,...
. Between seasons four and ten, he had only worked periodically on the show, writing four episodes.
The main cast of the season consisted of Dan Castellaneta
Dan Castellaneta
Daniel Louis "Dan" Castellaneta is an American actor, voice actor, comedian, singer and screenwriter. Noted for his long-running role as Homer Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons, he voices many other characters on The Simpsons, including Abraham "Grampa" Simpson, Barney Gumble,...
(Homer Simpson, Grampa Simpson
Abraham Simpson
Abraham J. "Abe" Simpson, often known simply as Grampa, is a fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Dan Castellaneta and he is also the patriarch of the Simpson family, the father of Homer Simpson, and the grandfather of Bart, Lisa, and Maggie Simpson...
, Krusty the Clown, among others), Julie Kavner
Julie Kavner
Julie Deborah Kavner is an American film and television actress, comedian and voice artist. Noted for her role as Marge Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons, she also voices other characters for the show, including Jacqueline Bouvier, and Patty and Selma Bouvier.Born in Los...
(Marge Simpson), Nancy Cartwright
Nancy Cartwright
Nancy Campbell Cartwright is an American film and television actress, comedian and voice artist. She is best known for her long-running role as Bart Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons...
(Bart Simpson, Ralph Wiggum
Ralph Wiggum
Ralph Wiggum is a recurring fictional character on the animated series The Simpsons, voiced by Nancy Cartwright. The son of Police Chief Wiggum and a classmate of Lisa Simpson, Ralph is best known as the show's resident oddball, and is noted for his non sequiturs and erratic behavior...
, Nelson Muntz
Nelson Muntz
Nelson Mandela Muntz is a fictional character and bully from the animated TV series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Nancy Cartwright. Nelson was introduced in Season 1's "Bart the General" as a bully but later turned into a friend of Bart Simpson, who is best identified by his signature laugh .-Role...
), Yeardley Smith
Yeardley Smith
Yeardley Smith is a French-born American actress, voice actress, writer and painter. She is best known for her long-running role as Lisa Simpson on the animated television series The Simpsons....
(Lisa Simpson), Hank Azaria
Hank Azaria
Henry Albert "Hank" Azaria is an American film, television and stage actor, director, voice actor, and comedian. He is noted for being one of the principal voice actors on the animated television series The Simpsons , on which he performs the voices of Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief...
(Moe Szyslak
Moe Szyslak
Momar / Morris "Moe" Szyslak is a fictional character in the American animated television series, The Simpsons. He is voiced by Hank Azaria and first appeared in the series premiere episode "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire"...
, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
Apu Nahasapeemapetilon
Apu Nahasapeemapetilon is a character in the animated television series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Hank Azaria and first appeared in the episode "The Telltale Head". Apu is the proprietor of the Kwik-E-Mart, a popular convenience store in Springfield, and a friend of Homer Simpson. He is also...
, Chief Wiggum, among others) and Harry Shearer
Harry Shearer
Harry Julius Shearer is an American actor, comedian, writer, voice artist, musician, author, radio host and director. He is known for his long-running role on The Simpsons, his work on Saturday Night Live, the comedy band Spinal Tap and his radio program Le Show...
(Ned Flanders
Ned Flanders
Nedward "Ned" Flanders, Jr. is a recurring fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Harry Shearer, and first appeared in the series premiere episode "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire". He is the next door neighbor to the Simpson family and is generally...
, Mr. Burns
Montgomery Burns
Charles Montgomery "Monty" Burns, usually referred to as Mr. Burns, is a recurring fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons, who is voiced by Harry Shearer and previously Christopher Collins. Burns is the evil owner of the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant and is Homer...
, Principal Skinner
Seymour Skinner
Principal W. Seymour Skinner is a fictional character in the American animated sitcom The Simpsons. He is voiced by Harry Shearer. Born in Capitol City, he is the principal of Springfield Elementary School...
, among others). Up until the production of season ten in 1998, these six main voice actors were paid $
United States dollar
The United States dollar , also referred to as the American dollar, is the official currency of the United States of America. It is divided into 100 smaller units called cents or pennies....
30,000 per episode. In 1998, a salary dispute between them and the Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
(which airs The Simpsons) arose, with the actors threatening to go on a strike. Fox went as far as preparing for casting of new voices, but an agreement was soon made and the actors' salaries were raised to $125,000 per episode. Groening expressed his sympathy for the cast members in an issue of Mother Jones (magazine)Mother Jones a while after the salary dispute had been settled. He told the magazine: "They are incredibly talented, and they deserve a chance to be as rich and miserable as anyone else in Hollywood. It looked for a while there like we might not have a show, because everyone was holding firm on all sides. That's still my attitude: Hold out for as much money as you can get, but do make the deal."
Other cast members of the season included Pamela Hayden
Pamela Hayden
Pamela Hayden is an American actress, best known for providing various voices for the animated television show The Simpsons.-Biography:...
(Milhouse Van Houten
Milhouse Van Houten
Milhouse Mussolini Van Houten is a fictional character featured in the animated television series The Simpsons, voiced by Pamela Hayden. He is Bart Simpson's best friend in Mrs. Krabappel's fourth grade class at Springfield Elementary School....
, among others), Tress MacNeille
Tress MacNeille
Tress MacNeille is an American voice actress best known for providing various voices on the animated series The Simpsons, Futurama, Tiny Toon Adventures, Animaniacs, Disney's House of Mouse, Courage the Cowardly Dog, Rugrats, All Grown Up!, Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers, and Dave the...
(Agnes Skinner, among others), Russi Taylor
Russi Taylor
Russi Taylor is an American voice actress. She is the current voice actress of Disney's Minnie Mouse character. She has held this role since 1986, longer than any other voice actress...
(Martin Prince
Martin Prince
Martin Prince, Jr. is a recurring character in the Fox animated series, The Simpsons, and is voiced by Russi Taylor. Martin is Bart Simpson's classmate, and is Lisa Simpson's rival in intelligence, as well as Nelson Muntz's favorite target for bullying...
), Maggie Roswell
Maggie Roswell
Maggie Roswell is an American film and television actress and voice artist from Los Angeles, California. She is well known for her voice work on the Fox network's animated television series The Simpsons, in which she has played recurring characters such as Maude Flanders, Helen Lovejoy, Miss...
(Helen Lovejoy, Maude Flanders, among others), and Karl Wiedergott
Karl Wiedergott
Karl Wiedergott, born Karl Aloysious Treaton is a German actor. He is noted for his voice work on the long-running Fox sitcom The Simpsons since 1998, voicing background characters and some celebrities such as John Travolta and Bill Clinton...
. Season ten also featured a large number of guest stars, including Phil Hartman in his last appearance on The Simpsons in the episode "Bart the Mother" that aired in September 1998. Hartman had been killed by his wife four months before the episode aired and it was dedicated to his memory. Rather than replace him with a new voice actor, the production staff retired two of his recurring characters, Troy McClure
Troy McClure
Troy McClure is a fictional character in the American animated sitcom The Simpsons. He was voiced by Phil Hartman and first appears in the second season episode "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment". McClure is a washed-up actor, usually shown doing low-level work, such as hosting infomercials...
and Lionel Hutz
Lionel Hutz
Lionel Hutz is a recurring character from the animated television series The Simpsons. He was voiced by Phil Hartman, and his first appearance was in the season two episode "Bart Gets Hit by a Car". Due to the death of Hartman, his final speaking role was in the episode "Realty Bites"...
.
Broadcast and ratings
The tenth season of The Simpsons was originally broadcast in the United States on the Fox network between August 23, 1998 and May 16, 1999. Although "Lard of the Dance" aired on August 23 to increase ratings for the early premieres of That '70s ShowThat '70s Show
That '70s Show is an American television period sitcom that centers on the lives of a group of teenage friends living in the fictional suburban town of Point Place, Wisconsin, from May 17, 1976, to December 31, 1979...
and Holding the Baby
Holding the Baby
Holding the Baby was a 1997 UK sitcom television series produced by Granada Television. It lasted for two seasons. The series' average audience in 1997 was 6.85 million viewers, making it the 16th-highest rated British sitcom that year....
by serving as a lead-in, "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace
The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace
"The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace" is the second episode of the tenth season of The Simpsons. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on September 20, 1998, and was viewed in approximately 7.95 million households that day. In the episode, Homer has a midlife crisis realizing his...
" (airing on September 20, 1998) was the official premiere of the tenth season. The season aired in the 8:00 p.m. time slot on Sundays. It ranked twenty-fifth (tied with Dharma & Greg
Dharma & Greg
Dharma & Greg is an American television sitcom that aired from September 24, 1997, to April 30, 2002.It starred Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson as Dharma and Greg Montgomery, a couple who married instantly on their first date despite being complete opposites...
) in the ratings for the 1998–1999 television season
1998–99 United States network television schedule
This was the United States broadcast television schedule on all six commercial television networks for the fall season beginning in September 1998. All times are Eastern and Pacific.New series highlighted in bold....
with an average of 13.5 million viewers per episode, dropping twelve percent in number of average viewers from the last season. The Simpsons was Fox's third highest-rated show of the television season, following The X-Files
The X-Files
The X-Files is an American science fiction television series and a part of The X-Files franchise, created by screenwriter Chris Carter. The program originally aired from to . The show was a hit for the Fox network, and its characters and slogans became popular culture touchstones in the 1990s...
(ranked twelfth) and Ally McBeal
Ally McBeal
Ally McBeal is an American legal comedy-drama series which aired on the Fox network from 1997 to 2002. The series was created by David E. Kelley, who also served as the executive producer, along with Bill D'Elia...
(ranked twentieth).
Critical reception
The tenth season as a whole has attracted a moderate amount of criticism; many critics and fans cite it as the beginning of the series' decline in quality. By 2000, some long-term fans had become disillusioned with the show and pointed to its shift from character-driven plots to what they perceived as an overemphasis on zany antics and gags. Chris TurnerChris Turner (author)
Chris Turner is a Canadian author. He is the author of Planet Simpson: How a Cartoon Masterpiece Documented an Era and Defined a Generation, published in 2004...
wrote in his book Planet Simpson that "one of the things that emerged was that [the staff] began to rely on gags, not characters, wherever that switch got flipped, whether it's the ninth or tenth season." Jesse Hassenger of PopMatters
PopMatters
PopMatters is an international webzine of cultural criticism that covers many aspects of popular culture. PopMatters publishes reviews, interviews, and detailed essays on most cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, films, books, video games, comics, sports, theater,...
named the tenth season of The Simpsons the series' "first significant dip in quality, a step away from its golden era [...] with broader gags and more outlandish plots," and a BBC News
BBC News
BBC News is the department of the British Broadcasting Corporation responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online...
writer commented that "the common consensus is that The Simpsons
Coeur d'Alene Press
Coeur d'Alene Press is a U.S. daily newspaper serving the Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, area. It is owned by Hagadone Newspaper Group. The paper's target market includes Kootenai and Bonner Counties.-External links and references:* * -Notes:...
has referred to seasons one to nine as the show's "golden age."
DVD Verdict
DVD Verdict
DVD Verdict is a judicial themed website for DVD reviews. The site was founded in 1999. Current editor in chief is Michael Stailey, who also reviews for Rotten Tomatoes...
's Mac McEntire noted in a review that while the tenth season contains "a lot of laughs", it is missing the emotional core of the earlier seasons. Chris Barsanti of Filmcritic.com has commented that around the time the tenth season aired, "not only did the show start losing its status as untouchtable—read: everyone stopped expecting every episode to be a masterpiece—it also developed the bad habit of building episodes around celebrity guests, who were practically never as amusing as they were meant to be." Michael Passman of The Michigan Daily wrote in 2007 that "in hindsight, the 10th season can now be seen as a tipping point of sorts for a number of the show's less attractive plot devices. Homer's get-rich-quick schemes start to become all too prevalent, and there are an inordinate amount of unnecessary celebrity cameos." Passman did not only have negative things to say about the tenth season though. He commented that it "is not the last great 'Simpsons' season ever. The last great season was the eighth. The last really good season was the ninth. But the tenth is just pretty good, nothing more, nothing less."
Scully, who was show runner during seasons nine through twelve
The Simpsons (season 12)
The Simpsons 12th season began on Wednesday, November 1, 2000 with "Treehouse of Horror XI".The season contains four hold over episodes from the season 11 production line. The show runner for the twelfth production was Mike Scully. The season features three episodes that were produced for the...
, is held responsible by many critics and fans for the decline. An op-ed
Op-ed
An op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page , is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper's editorial board...
in Slate
Slate (magazine)
Slate is a US-based English language online current affairs and culture magazine created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley, initially under the ownership of Microsoft as part of MSN. On 21 December 2004 it was purchased by the Washington Post Company...
by Chris Suellentrop argued that The Simpsons changed from a realistic show about family life into a typical cartoon when Scully was the show runner: "under Scully's tenure, The Simpsons became, well, a cartoon. Episodes that once would have ended with Homer and Marge bicycling into the sunset now end with Homer blowing a tranquilizer dart into Marge's neck. The show's still funny, but it hasn't been touching in years." John Ortved wrote in his book The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History
The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History
The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History is a book about the American animated television series The Simpsons. It was written by John Ortved, and first published in October 2009 by Faber and Faber...
that "Scully's episodes excel when compared to what The Simpsons airs nowadays, but he was the man at the helm when the ship turned towards the iceberg." The Simpsons under Scully has been negatively labeled as a "gag-heavy, Homer-centric incarnation" by Jon Bonné of MSNBC
MSNBC
MSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...
, and many fans have bemoaned the transformation in Homer's character during the era, from sweet and sincere to "a boorish, self-aggrandizing oaf", dubbing him "Jerkass Homer".
The Simpsons writer Tom Martin said in Ortved's book that he does not understand the criticism against Scully because he thinks Scully ran the show well. He also commented that the thinks the criticism "bothered [Scully], and still bothers him, but he managed to not get worked up over it." Ortved noted in his book that it is hard to tell how much of the decline is Scully's fault, and that blaming a single show runner for lowering the quality of the show "is unfair." He also wrote that some of the episodes from Scully's first two seasons (nine and ten), such as "The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace" and "When You Dish Upon a Star
When You Dish upon a Star
"When You Dish Upon a Star" is the fifth episode of The Simpsons tenth season, which was originally broadcast on November 8, 1998. When the family spend the day at Lake Springfield, Homer meets Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger, who are hiding from the media in their secluded summer home...
", are better than certain episodes of the two previous seasons.
UGO Networks' Brian Tallerico has defended the season against the criticism. He wrote in a 2007 review that comparing "tenth season Simpsons episodes to the prime of the series (3–7) is just unfair and really kind of self-defeating. 'Yeah, I laughed, but not as hard as a couple of years ago. So it sucks.' That's nonsense. The fact is that even the tenth season of The Simpsons was funnier than most [other] show's [sic] best years." PopMatters' Hassenger commented in his review that although the show had declined in quality, "this is not to say that these episodes are without their charm; many, in fact, are laugh-out-loud funny and characteristically smart." Similarly to Tallerico, he also noted that "weaker Simpsons seasons are superior to most television."
Awards and nominations
The season and its episodes gathered some awards and award nominations. The Simpsons won the 1999 Annie Award27th Annie Awards
The 27th Annual Annie Awards were held on November 6, 1999.Winners are marked in bold text.-Best Animated Feature:*A Bug's Life*The Iron Giant*The Prince of Egypt*South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut*Tarzan...
for "Outstanding Achievement in an Animated Television Program", beating Batman Beyond
Batman Beyond
Batman Beyond is an American animated television series created by Warner Bros. Animation in collaboration with DC Comics as a continuation of the Batman legacy...
, Futurama
Futurama
Futurama is an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series follows the adventures of a late 20th-century New York City pizza delivery boy, Philip J...
, King of the Hill
King of the Hill
King of the Hill is an American animated dramedy series created by Mike Judge and Greg Daniels, that ran from January 12, 1997, to May 6, 2010, on Fox network. It centers on the Hills, a working-class Methodist family in the fictional small town of Arlen, Texas...
, and The New Batman/Superman Adventures
The New Batman/Superman Adventures
The New Batman/Superman Adventures is a name given to a rerun package series that combined Superman: The Animated Series with The New Batman Adventures produced by Warner Bros. Animation. It aired from 1997-2000 on Kids' WB...
. That same year, Tim Long
Tim Long
Tim Long is a comedy writer born in Brandon, Manitoba, Canada. Tim calls Exeter, Ontario, Canada his home town and has written for The Simpsons, Politically Incorrect, Spy Magazine and The Late Show with David Letterman. Currently credited as a consulting producer on The Simpsons, Long was - until...
, Larry Doyle, and Matt Selman
Matt Selman
Matthew "Matt" Selman is an American writer and producer. Selman grew up in Massachusetts, attended the University of Pennsylvania and was editor-in-chief of student magazine 34th Street Magazine. After considering a career in journalism, he decided to try and became a television writer...
received an Annie Award in the "Outstanding Individual Achievement for Writing in an Animated Television Production" category for writing "Simpsons Bible Stories
Simpsons Bible Stories
"Simpsons Bible Stories" is the eighteenth episode of The Simpsons tenth season. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on Easter, 1999. It is the first of The Simpsons now annual trilogy episodes, and consists of four self-contained segments. In the episode the Simpsons all fall...
", the eighteenth episode of the tenth season. The trio faced competition from writers of Futurama ("The Series Has Landed"), King of the Hill ("Hank's Cowboy Movie"), Batman Beyond ("Rebirth Part I"), and Space Ghost Coast To Coast
Space Ghost Coast to Coast
Space Ghost Coast to Coast is an American animated parody talk show hosted by the 60s Hanna-Barbera cartoon character Space Ghost. The show premiered on April 15, 1994 on Cartoon Network...
("Lawsuit"). The Simpsons was also nominated for two Emmy Awards in 1999, though the show did not win either. The season ten episode "Viva Ned Flanders
Viva Ned Flanders
"Viva Ned Flanders" is the tenth episode of The Simpsons tenth season. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on January 10, 1999. In the episode, Ned Flanders, who is revealed to be 60 years old, feels that he has not lived his life to the fullest...
" lost in the "Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour)
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (For Programming less than One Hour)
The Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program is a Creative Arts Emmy Award which is given annually to an animated series which is judged to have been the best...
" category to "And They Call It Bobby Love" of King of the Hill. Alf Clausen
Alf Clausen
Alf Clausen is an American film and television composer. He is best known for his work scoring many episodes of The Simpsons, of which he has been the sole composer since 1990...
was nominated in the "Outstanding Music Composition for a Series
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series
This is a list of winners and nominees of the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series.-1970s:-1980s:-1990s:-2000s:-2010s:-Total Awards:* CBS - 10* ABC - 7* NBC - 6* FOX - 3* Syndicated - 3* Discovery Channel - 2...
" category for his work on "Treehouse of Horror IX
Treehouse of Horror IX
"Treehouse of Horror IX" is the fourth episode of the tenth season of The Simpsons. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on October 25, 1998...
", the fourth episode of the tenth season, but lost the award to Carl Johnson of Invasion America
Invasion America
Invasion America is an animated science fiction miniseries that aired in the prime time lineup on The WB Television Network and later as a part of the Kids' WB programming block...
.
Episodes
Key- In the # column:
- The first number refers to the order it aired during the entire series.
- The second number refers to the episode number within its season.
- The production code refers to the code assigned to the episode by the production team. The first four characters refer to the season the episode was made for: 5F for season nine, AABF for season ten. The number at the end is the order the episode was produced, not the airing order. For example, AABF11 aired before AABF10.
| # | Title | Directed by | Written by | |Prod. code |
|---|
DVD release
The DVD boxset for season ten was released by 20th Century Fox20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
in the United States and Canada on August 7, 2007. As well as every episode from the season, the DVD release features bonus material including audio commentaries
Audio commentary
On disc-based video formats, an audio commentary is an additional audio track consisting of a lecture or comments by one or more speakers, that plays in real time with video...
for every episode, deleted scene
Deleted scene
In Entertainment, especially the film and television industry, Deleted scenes are parts of a film removed or censored from or replaced by another scene in the final "cut", or version, of a film...
s, and animatics. The set was released in two different packagings: a standard rectangular cardboard box featuring Bart on the cover driving through a security checkpoint gate at a movie studio, and a "limited edition" plastic packaging molded to look like Bart's head.
| The Complete Tenth Season | ||||
| Set details | Special features | |||
|
Matt Groening Matthew Abram "Matt" Groening is an American cartoonist, screenwriter, and producer. He is the creator of the comic strip Life in Hell as well as two successful television series, The Simpsons and Futurama.... Lard of the Dance "Lard of the Dance" is the first episode of The Simpsons tenth season, that originally aired on August 23, 1998. Homer discovers he can make money by stealing and reselling grease, but eventually stops after negative encounters with Groundskeeper Willie and the Springfield Grease Company... ", "Homer to the Max Homer to the Max "Homer to the Max" is the thirteenth episode of The Simpsons tenth season, which originally broadcast on February 7, 1999. Homer discovers that a television show broadcasting in Springfield, Police Cops, has a hero also named Homer Simpson. He is delighted with the positive attention he receives... " The Simpsons Movie The Simpsons Movie is a 2007 American animated comedy film based on the animated television series The Simpsons. The film was directed by David Silverman, and stars the regular television cast of Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer, Tress... DVD Butterfinger Butterfinger is a candy bar made by Nestlé.The bar consists of a flaky, orange-colored center—somewhat similar texture to crisp caramel, with a taste similar to peanut butter—that is coated in compound chocolate.- History :... commercials Intel Corporation Intel Corporation is an American multinational semiconductor chip maker corporation headquartered in Santa Clara, California, United States and the world's largest semiconductor chip maker, based on revenue. It is the inventor of the x86 series of microprocessors, the processors found in most... commercial CC's CC's is a brand of flavored tortilla chips created by Snack Foods Limited and produced since the early 1980s by the Australian food company Snack Brands Australia . CC's are predominantly sold in Australia and come in assorted flavors... Chips commercials |
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| Release Dates | ||||
| Region 1 DVD region code DVD region codes are a digital-rights management technique designed to allow film distributors to control aspects of a release, including content, release date, and price, according to the region... |
Region 2 DVD region code DVD region codes are a digital-rights management technique designed to allow film distributors to control aspects of a release, including content, release date, and price, according to the region... |
Region 4 DVD region code DVD region codes are a digital-rights management technique designed to allow film distributors to control aspects of a release, including content, release date, and price, according to the region... |
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| August 7, 2007 | September 10, 2007 | September 26, 2007 | ||
External links
- Episode guide at The Simpsons.com
- Episode guide at the BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...