Simpsons Shrine
The Simpsons is an animated sitcom that needs no introduction. It has already been talked about at length on the internet, especially its downfall (my personal definition of the Golden Era is S1-9, although I do enjoy some later seasons).
I love the series as it's hilarious, with excellent satire, but does have its fair share of heartwarming and touching moments. My favorite seasons are 4 and 7, as they are pretty much my perfect seasons, with a nice mix of comedy and heart (more of the latter in S4). The show is not as cynical as most other adult shows either.
This shrine is mainly about my favorite characters on the show, Lisa Simpson and Homer Simpson.
My History
My first ever exposure to The Simpsons was actually a mouse pointer. As a kid, I loved to download random pointers off the web and came across Dierk's List, a list of cool animated cursors. One of the cursors was Blinky the Fish. I got curious about the Simpsons from then on.
Later on, I watched various videos about the show's downfall, and most of them pointed to S9E2 as the main cause of the show's decline, but there was a lot of debate in the comments about that, and I was getting interested in the show anyway. Super Eyepatch Wolf's video on the show was probably my favorite, and I've since watched the sequels of it. I watched Bart Gets an F in 2020, and liked it a lot.
In Aug 2021, the NoHomers Club was migrating to a new server and I saved some of the offtopic stuff, but knew the main stuff was staying. Still, I took a peek at the posts, and most people were positive about even some later episodes, so my interest was more piqued.
It all truly started when I decided I'd finally go ahead and watch The Simpsons back in Nov 2024. While I kinda liked Season 1, I decided to skip ahead to Season 2 after the 5th episode and come back to it after finishing S2. I already liked the characters (all of 'em including even background ones like with MLP), but in Season 2 I started to love the characters, especially the title family, although the episode that really got me excited to watch all the rest was Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish. The rest is history...
Lisa Simpson
"If anyone wants me, I'll be in my room."
Lisa is the most intelligent member of the family. She loves school, learning, and crusading for social justice, but gets overlooked often, as others barely bother to listen to her. She's a misfit, both in her family and at school, due to her high intelligence, and although she does have a few friends in certain episodes, most of the time she's portrayed as having no friends. She does want to be popular though, so much so that she tries to change herself to fit in better, but her true friends do appreciate her knowledgeable self. She's a vegetarian and a Buddhist. She plays the saxophone in her spare time to express and process her emotions. She's still a kid though, and loves dolls, ponies, unicorns, and teasing her brother Bart. She also is witty and sarcastic sometimes.
She's my favorite because I relate a lot to her, as I'm a vegan and care deeply about the state of the world, and have a mischievous big brother. While Lisa was at her best in the Golden Era, IMHO, she's still a great character in the newer seasons, and the sheer hatred for Lisa in certain YouTube videos and comment sections is unwarranted, at best...
Common criticisms of her from Lisa-haters include her being too preachy, an Author Avatar, and just not as funny as the rest of her family. I think that while Lisa doesn't necessarily need to be funny, she does have many funny moments of her own throughout the series. Many of 'em are included in my Simpsons playlists linked below. I also think that in most episodes, she is likable and has a good balance between having high morals and learning that she's not necessarily better than others just because of them.
Some of my Favorite Lisa episodes are Moaning Lisa, Lisa's Substitute, Lisa's Pony, Lisa the Greek, Lisa the Beauty Queen, Lisa's Wedding, and Summer of 4 Ft. 2. Most of these episodes are about the relationship between Homer and Lisa, which is my favorite part of the show, due to them being almost polar opposites, but trying to get along with and understand each other. Which leads me to...
Homer Simpson
"D'oh!"
Homer is the gluttonous, beer-guzzling, doofus main character of the show, and the funniest. Most of my favorite Simpsons gags feature him, including The Land of Chocolate, the bits with Homer talking to his Brain, and his parody of the Flintstones theme. He's my second favorite because, at least in the classic seasons (and S33-present), he's pretty much a dimwitted naive idiot, but a caring father and a lovable goofball. He does have a major anger problem though, which leads me to the infamous gag...
Yeah I'm not really the biggest fan of Homer choking Bart, but at the same time, I don't think it's a big deal whether it gets removed or not. In fact, it seems to be already mostly phased out in the newer seasons, as it's been getting old anyway.
Homer is usually found on the couch watching TV. He goes to work for most of the day and when it's over, he goes to Moe's, only coming home at night and watching more TV. He embodies all the seven deadly sins, including stealing his neighbor's stuff. He gets annoyed by his family especially Bart, who loves to trick and prank him a lot. Yet he loves them, so most episodes either have him be selfish and learn his lesson at the end of the episode (although it naturally resets, of course), or whenever he tries to help he fails in a funny way, although to be fair he doesn't always fail; for instance in S8E9, he does somehow manage to not drink at the cookoff, although he gets close...
Homer has so many interesting changes in each season that almost make sense, even though the show is episodic. Thus there are different versions of him: in the Tracey Ullman Show shorts, he's stricter, angrier, and is more like a typical father, although he does win the burping contest in one of the shorts. He's slightly dim, but nothing like what he would later become. Most of the shorts are about the kids, so we don't get to see much of Homer.
In S1, we see more about him, such as how he got his job at the nuclear power plant. He is more humble in this season, and overall more of an everyman type of character. While he has some silly moments, he's quite a different character.
In S2, he's closer to his later self, with more stupid and funny moments, but in S3-8, he becomes Classic Homer, my favorite version of him. Part of it could be due to a certain famous scene in Bart the Daredevil... He is quite endearing, due to his silliness and uniquely positive attitude towards life. He goes on long weird rambles leading to some of my favorite scenes in the series, and has many fantasies like living Under the Sea, and becoming King Homer, covered in gold! He's pretty emotional, sentimental, and sensitive, surprisingly self-aware at times, and can easily become happy or angry depending on the situation. He's childlike, and childish, but he deeply cares for his family. He's driven by his instincts and relies on creature comforts a lot. He's really crazy and silly in S5, but it gets dialed back down in S6 and onward. I relate to many of his traits, so that's another reason he's one of my favorite characters.
In around S9-12, possibly due to a midlife crisis, he turns into a Jerkass, and this version of him is probably my least favorite, although I still enjoy some episodes with him in them, as they can be funny. There are also some episodes where he's less obnoxious and annoying, such as HOMR and Mom and Pop Art.
In S13 to around the 30th season, he's... weird. Sometimes he is Captain Wacky, taking up a new job every week, and doing random stuff, going on ridiculous adventures where he gets into a lot of pain, but most things go right for him. But, sometimes he is simply the stupidest version of Homer yet, or he spouts random lines that have nothing to do with him. There are a lot of Marriage Crises too, which don't help. At least he starts to become less of a Jerkass over S13 to S18, culminating in The Simpsons Movie, which basically deconstructs Jerkass Homer, literally LOL (aside: I love the movie, and have watched it around eight times so far. It makes me laugh almost all the way through! Can't wait for the sequel!)
In S33-present, he's finally close to Classic Homer, maybe due to all the lessons he learned. But he's a lot nicer, and so this version of him is known as Teddy Bear Homer. This is my second favorite version of him. But he became too nice according to many in S33 and S34, so in S35 and beyond he regained some of his jerkishness.
Some of my Favorite Homer episodes are Last Exit to Springfield, King-Size Homer, Mother Simpson, Homer the Great, Homer Goes to College, Deep Space Homer, and Pixelated and Afraid.
In Mother Simpson, Homer reunites with his mother, Mona, and it is revealed that she had to go into hiding after sabotaging Mr. Burns' germ warfare lab, while Homer was still a kid. As a result, Abe, Homer's father, had to raise him by himself, and didn't do the best job, often calling him stuff like "dumb" and "ugly", belittling him, and ignoring him most of the time. Sure, those moments are funny in the show, but they're also pretty sad. Homer is happy to have Mona back, and so is the rest of the family, especially Lisa ;) but alas! Mr. Burns tracks her down and she has to go to the Underground again. The scene that follows is one of the most beloved, heartrending scenes in the series, and is one of my current wallpapers. This episode indirectly explains a lot about Homer, like his childishness. Homer and Mona are kinda similar with their free spirited nature, and even impulsivity. It's interesting what they did with Mona, Abe, Homer, and Bart in the later seasons, especially the 30th season and onward, with some episodes focusing on generational trauma and all that, but Mother Simpson is still the best Mona episode of them all.
There's a cool theory by Stubagful involving his office: that it's oversimplified because of Homer's POV of it, that he thinks he's doing the most mindless job ever, just staring at screens and pushing random buttons when the alarm rings. From his POV he's an incompetent boob, but in reality he's actually doing an OK job as a Safety Inspector or else Springfield would have blown up ages ago. In a nutshell he's depicted just as stupid as he thinks he is, thus setting the stage for many of the funniest jokes in The Simpsons and TV history.
I've released a Homer desktop buddy using SSP! He can be downloaded here.
Links
These playlists include funny and heartwarming moments, reviews, analyses, interviews, behind the scenes stuff, etc.
I'm Homer, who are you? by Lexi
I'm Bart, who are you? by The No Homers Club
Page first created on Tue, Apr 22, 2025.
Page firstly updated on Sun, May 18, 2025 (added more info to Homer and Lisa sections, and added more personality quiz results).
Page secondly updated on Tue, May 27, 2025 (added catchphrases, italics to titles, more pictures, Homer screenmate link, and more info to Homer section).
Page thirdly updated on Fri, Jun 27, 2025 (I've watched the movie six times now! Added preview pic of Homer screenmate, a Maggie PicMix by pizzahutz_inthegarage, and a sentence about my history with The Simpsons.)
Page fourthly updated on Sat, Oct 4, 2025 (added more to Homer section, a section about my history with the show, and a sentence about the sequel)
