Two Cars in Every Garage Three Eyes on Every Fish

Season 2 continues on its roll with the political satire masterpiece Two Cars in Every Garage Three eyes on Every Fish. It was actually made to be the season premier but Bartmania was in full swing so they went with Bart Gets an F instead. The episode was written by Swartzwelder and Simon and you can really tell because Swartzwelder was the best at writing satirical pieces maybe because of his Libertarian background the characters don't take on the zany aspects they do in most of his episodes. The characterizations particularly of Burns is beautiful and so intertwined with the character of Charles Foster Kane a la Citizen Kane that it's obvious Simon had a lot to do with this episode as he was the force behind making the characters far more three dimensional.

The episode starts off innocently enough with Bart and Lisa fishing in the river. They are soon greeted by reporter Dave Shutton and Bart says his infamous line while introducing himself to Shutton. "I'm Bart Simpson who the hell are you?". There is some nice back and forth dialogue between the kids and Shutton before Bart catches a fish. The fish they catch is Blinky the three eyed fish. A fish that would become famous just as much in our world as the Simpsons world. Blink still currently referenced by environmentalists and politicians. Blinky of course gets his third eye from SNPP's waste being dumped into the river and Shutton soon runs this story and SNPP is given a inspection by a committee. The plant along with dumping waste is in really poor shape. Many of the things wrong with the plant are humorous i.e gum in cracks and Homer sleeping on the job. Burns after failing the review tries to bribe the committee. The bribe fails and Burns learns that it will cost 56 million dollars to fix the plant. Burns begins to heavily drink and sings a heartbreaking version of Brother Can You Spare a Dime. Burns tossing the bottle aside wakes up Homer who was still sleeping and Homer rushes to go home. But he sees a distraught Burns and decides to talk to him. Homer gets into Burn's car with him and the two of them have a talk. Burns declares him and Homer are a dying breed Burns of course thinks Hoemr has stayed late to work. Homer convinces Burns to run for governor and the act ends of a great gag with Burns declaring he's going to change the world and Homer asking to be dropped off on the way.

So the campaigns for governor begin. On one side supported by Marge and Lisa is Mary Bailey(reference to It's a Wonderful Life) and on the other is "one of the most despicable men" Monty Burns supported by Homer because of not wanting to get fired. The next scene is some of the most biting political satire in the history of TV. With Burns meeting with his campaign staff. The staff inform Burns that 98% of the people of Springfield find him despicable or worse. But they have an easy way to change that. The campaign team is filled with people who will make Burns seem like a relatable yet intellectually sound and most important nice. He also has enlisted the help of a smear team to attack the character of Mary Bailey. Burns declares that "this is exactly the kind of trickery I'm paying you for". It's is really telling in this day and age that the satire hasn't faded in this episode. Candidates are still run mainly by other people and they use all sorts of deception to improve their public image. Next up is Mr. Burns's campaign commercial. The commercial itself is rife with political satire but just the way people react to the commercial with Jasper and Abe being to lazy to change the channel so they're forced to watch Burn's commercial and Barney being upset that the bars will be closed for the election. While both are good enough character jokes they say something about our current societies reaction to election with low turnouts etc. But the most telling piece of satire surrounding the advertisement is Homer and Marge's dialogue about it. Marge wonders if Burns will say anything about the fish and Homer says that before the media blew the story out of proportion Marge probably didn't know how many eyes a fish had. It's another perfect Simpsons joke because of its satirical bite. It's an excellent joke at people that eat up media but also that most people can only back themselves up politically with such outlandish statements such as someone not knowing how many eyes a fish has. Mr. Burns commercial is one of my favorite moments in the show. It has everything that makes a great Simpsons joke it's satirical, absurd and just hilarious. The commercial of course makes really stupid points such as Blinky being evolved and they even get an actor portraying Darwin to back up their theory. They make some hilarious analogies about the fish but it works so well because while outlandish you know many people would fall for such things. Burns even makes a ridiculous plea for the town to stop slandering Blinky but to in fact slander him because Blinky is just a poor fish(there is a great Hamlet reference in this scene as well). Lastly Burns says the fish has a taste that can't be beat a statement that would of course come back to haunt him. "Only a moron wouldn't cast his vote for Monty Burns". Burns of course wins over everyone who sees the advertisement Barney falls for the super fish, Abe and Jasper fall fr Burns's charm and Homer continues to flaunt his love for Burns. It soon switches to Bailey's campaign. She of course represents a true politician who refuses to play dirty and will rely on the voters intelligence to get their vote. Of course everyone knows this will not work for the town of Springfield because of its anti intelligentsia stance. Even the Burns's campaign team can't find any dirt on the beloved Mary Bailey. Burns gives a speech a la Kane with the poster in the background and Homer and Bart's dialogue is another reference to the film. Burns also gives a speech from a tank like Dukakis and the polls show that Burns smear and fake campaign is beating Bailey but he is losing touch with the common man. So his team cooks up a new scheme to get Burns back in their favor. He has to have dinner at a employees house and of course Homer is chosen.

So Homer begs Marge to have Burns over for dinner she reluctantly accepts and the campaign team is brought into the house. The next scene is a really great look at Lisa's character a first since the first scene of the episode. Her being the young girl is given the demeaning job of asking a blatantly planned question she asks whether or not she can ask a more suited question about the environment. Homer and the campaign team shoot her down and Homer calls Lisa smart enough to memorize the question. A slight insult to Lisa but she lets its slide. That night Homer and Marge have one of their bedroom talks. There is a great deal of subtlety in this scene with Homer attempting to be the man and Marge subverting him. It's another fantastic look at their marital life Marge being always unsatisfied with her life and Homer attempting to be the ruling man this time in the form of snuggling and him saying Marge can express herself with her cooking and cleaning. Homer doesn't really mean these things in a sexist way but he is just too oafish. But that is what makes season 2 so great because not only is the satire in Burns campaign etc but it's also a brilliant satire on American ideals.

The dinner scene is a piece of satirical brilliance and just makes me lose it every time. It starts off with Burns being pounced on by the animals he reacts badly at first but kisses the cat when it jumps on him. The family then sits down for dinner and Bart is given the task of saying grace. He of course doesn't say what anyone else would "dear god we paid for all this stuff so thanks for nothing." Simple enough dialogue but it does say a great deal about Bart (he speaks the truth, he always speaks his mind unlike Lisa) but it also says a great deal about American ideals. Burns quickly recovers the grace by blaming Bart's age for his blasphemy. Hilarious! Homer then asks Burns one of his planned questions. He answers in his typical fashion of suave near answers and talk of taxes and fat cats in Washington. This combined with Lisa's question really say a great deal about the political system. Burns while fighting for lower taxes despite the fat cats in Washington downplaying of course the fact that he himself is the wealthiest man in town and the fact that he knows very little politically other than what people want to hear. But most of the time that's all you need. The cap to the dinner is of course Marge feeding the family Blinky. Burns of course can't eat Blinky and the same media circus that brought Burns to a god like stature are the same that destroy his campaign. In the last Citizen Kane reference Burns starts to destroy the Simpson home. You can't do this to me I'm Charles Montgomery Burns!" But Lisa gets him to stop when Homer can't. Burns gives a chilling speech to Homer stating that Homer will have none of dreams filled for his remaining years and Burns will make it his duty to make him miserable. The ending of the episode is so blatantly Simpsonian just the way Homer and Marge lay in bed once again and Marge is able to downplay Mr. Burns's speech. It's beautiful.

I know I've already written more than I should but I just can't go without talking a bit about Burns' characterization in this episode. it's the perfect characterization. He is a man that should be feared but in fact he is just as vulnerable as anyone is. His character is a special one he wants to be liked by the common man in times but other times he doesn't but while he wants the love of the common man he also wants to be treated with more respect than the common man. It's very weird for me because we know he didn't deserve to win the campaign but you can't help but feel for him when he loses. I guess it's the brilliance of the writing at this point in this series. You can really see in this episode as well as Rosebud that Burns was in fact modeled after Kane. But the greatness of the shows writing is that you don't have to have seen Citizen Kane to really appreciate this episode or Burns character. While this episode isn't a Burns and Homer battle like some future episodes would be it is still a great piece for the two of them. Their interactions are tightly scripted and every moment especially that scene in the car are emotionally poignant. I do think Burns is probably my second favorite secondary character behind Skinner and it really hurts that Burns has taken quite a hit with the decline of the show. Burns is just hilarious from his nicknames for common people to his anachronistic idiosyncrasies everything works. Lastly not about Burns but this episode is a fantastic piece of animation and it infuriates me when people say season 2 had sloppy animation. The background colors are so amazing in this episode. The scene with Burns drinking and the scene in the car with Homer are so nicely animated and direction of the scenes are so beautiful it just makes the scenes all the more worthwhile.

Grade: A+ and number 11 on my list of top Simpsons episodes.