Rate & Review: "The Simpsons in Plusaversary"

How would you rate this short?

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Available to Stream on Disney+: November 12, 2021
Writers: Joel H. Cohen, Jessica Conrad, Al Jean, Loni Steele Sosthand & Dan Vebber
Director: David Silverman
Synopsis: "The Simpsons" host a Disney+ Day party and everyone is on the list... except Homer. With friends from across the service and music fit for a Disney princess, Plusaversary is Springfield's event of the year.

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R&R Poll Average Score: 1.72 / 5 (as of September 23, 2022 / 32 votes)
IMDb User Rating: 5.0 / 10
 
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It was less painful than the Loki short as far as I'm concerned, and at least there is some biting-the-hand humor in Lisa's song, as basic as it is... that's pretty much all about it, as usual it's very surface-level all around, kinda cringe and yet it still feels like a wasted opportunity.

A generous 2/5 rounded up from a 1.5, I guess.
 
From fresh interview

1) “We sort of asked Disney, ‘Who can we use?’ And they said, ‘Anybody, except don’t have a character who’s a real hero to kids, like Belle, get drunk,’” Jean says. “And I couldn’t agree more with that rule.”

2) (more important) Jean reveals that they’re currently working on another short “coming out by the end of this year”.

“My one clue is, it’s not English language, which is really exciting,” he teases.
 
Song was as unfunny as the one from the Bambi segment due to it's very on the nose lyrics. Only thing that got a small smile out of me was the reveal of Bart dressed as Mickey. Small margin better than the Loki short but only because it doesn't end with everyone being dumbed down to a total dumbass.

1.5/5, rounded down.
 
A shame they couldn't get several of the Disney characters' actual current voices; just having Simpsons regulars Dan Castellaneta, Hank Azaria and Tress MacNeille voice them (though Tress was the voice of Daisy Duck and Chip for quite a while).
Even with the show overhauling their writing staff, I guess they're still keeping Joel H. Cohen on board, since they've felt he's their top writer for several years now (despite his writing quality not so great).
But at least it was nice to hear the standard post-1992 end credits theme, since it's almost never used on the actual show nowadays.
 
I'm still mad that we haven't got House of Mouse yet, but Disney jumps at the chance for Winnie the Pooh to waddle his chubby ass into Moe's pub.

1/5
 
Fuck my obsession with this Franchise that produces ten-minutes commercials and a series of uniformly expendable shorts and I feel obliged to watch them. Another four minutes were lost. I think Disney+ is really missing the point of these shorts. If these crossovers were carefully selected and with an actual engaging story, the reputation of The Simpsons could increase and there's nothing better for the platform than that. If these shows are bland publicity, I guarantee, few people will give a shit. I mean, it's better publicity for Disney+ to make really good and natural shorts than actual publicity like this. Nothing happens here, so nobody cares.

2/5, only because once again I found the visuals really good. But it could be a 1, just like the previous two segments, and it'd be fair.
 
I finally found it... And it wasn't worth it.:shake:

I liked 2 things: a) grumpy Happy dwarf and b) Lisa's song, which was a bit of silly-funny (especially while other characters were not happy, NOT according to genre - that's a note:thumbsup:).

After reading the condition from Disney, that "the real Mickey Mouse mustn't to be shown" I can understand "Bart" 's appearance (and for God sake there wasn't any jokes like "boy, don't try to deceive us"). Sadly, but that's another good note of special.

As for other things - that was nothing. Semi-decent drawn characters (not to offence to David Silverman's effort), who just always drunk or do "adult things", and randomly inserted just "for the count of references". OK, they want to make "satire" of them bad and picture in "another light". Personally I just didn't get this satire.

This time, even closing credits were bad - mostly, just frames from the short.

Overall, in short, this short didn't impress me, but in the same time I don't HATE this another promotional thing from Disney.:ashamed: 1/5 (down from strongly deserved 1.5)

P.S. And, my theory was right: every new short is worse than previous one:
The Longest Daycare - 5/5 from me
Playdate with Destiny - 4/5 from me
The Force Awakens From Its Nap - 3/5 from me
The Good, the Bart, and the Loki - 2/5 from me
The Simpsons in Plusaversary - 1/5 from me. I really sorry for it, really I hadn't wanted, it came true.

On another side🤭, by this logic, the Spanish-short is going to get 0/5 from me... or not?

Actually, being positive, I hope, this unpleasant streak will get over.

P.P.S Yes, just recently I was wrong, and this short, imho, is WORSE than Loki one. In "Loki" there was at least, some story to involve different refer characters, and even respective guest star
 
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The whole rationale for the shorts is that James L. Brooks thinks The Simpsons is hard to find on Disney+ since it doesn't have a natural brand tile (even though it's perpetually in the featured carousel at the top, lives in the Star tile internationally, and clearly people are managing to find it because it's the only non-Netflix acquired show to crack the Nielsen streaming charts), and the premise for this one in particular is that Homer doesn't fit in. So why in the world did they include a tile for 20th Century Studios:

plusaversary2.png


I 100% think they took a fake mockup from reddit and nobody ever bothered to correct them. It's indicative of the level of care they put into this. The joke that the characters are wondering where the background vocals are coming from doesn't work if nobody lifts their head up. The ending where Goofy and Homer wish they could be sidekicks doesn't work if you don't set it up (Homer thought Goofy was a downer like 5 seconds ago!).

There's some cute gags and the criticism that Disney+ is essentially a babysitter they hope you'll forget you're paying for is a little more biting than what we've seen before. I appreciate that they imitated the voices instead of getting the actual people so it's at least a little parodic. In general I think it've would've worked better as a series of actual commercials when Disney+ was first launching. "Look, all your favorite characters are together in one place." Ah well.

I had assumed they were just doing one short per tile and thought "well obviously they'll go CGI for the Pixar one and hopefully they'll bump up the animation quality for the Disney parody"… I guess this being a mish-mash means that's probably off the table (especially with Jean saying they want to do more).
 
I watched this one today and all in all, what is there to say about it that hasn't been said in one way or the other really? I think it really didn't work and was pretty much just as bad as the prior two Disney+ shorts, if not worse in some ways.

I wouldn't say that the idea of doing a Disney characters crossover story with a party at Moe's is bad, there really wasn't a lot to this at all and what was there mostly fell flat on its face and came off as messy, unfunny, hollow and kinda soulless. I kinda like the concept of Homer meeting Goofy and kinda bonding with him over some beers (after Homer was rejected at the door and snuck in with him), but it just didn't come together and felt rushed, underdeveloped and the various little joke skits here or whatever didn't do anything for me or even elicit as much of a real chuckle (and I just don't get it why Homer wasn't let in as the Simpsons didn't have an brand tile the Disney+ menu while the other Springfielders were let in? And they just let him go in with Goofy?)

The designs of most of the Disney character just felt really off; also what was with that odd, jarringb orange/sand-colored skintone to the white characters? Why not just make them yellow? The coloring used made them look like 'South Park rejects') and while I can appreciate the idea of Lisa singing a Disney songit didn't work for me (I guess it is just that I feel that a company doing a biting-the-hand spoof of something it created and owns pretty much takes away the point of doing a spoof, if that makes any sense) and came off as forced and completely eyerolling (and made the short even more of a promotion). Also, it actually felt kinda insulting they didn't invite any of the VAs for the Disney characters, not even freakin' Bill Farmer as Goofy. Really?

To give it some praise, the Donald Duck bit was OK (at first, before they dragged it out), the "Mickey Mouse" reveal did feel a little inspired and meta amusing (even though it didn't manage to make me laugh) & the animation work was really solid (well, it is a David Silverman short), but still, it was a bust and felt like a blatant commercial for Disney+ with some super lame attempt at satire and biting-the-hand humor. So sad that the Balenciaga commercial short could have proper story and 10 minutes to work with while these shorts made for a streaming service for a huge media company are so pointless and throwaway.

I'm sorry, but I'm gonna put an 1/5 (rounded down from a 1.5/5). This one was pretty dire, but had some bright spots (that unfortunately didn't help much). The Simpsons crew and Disney really need to step up their game with these shorts.
 
This really felt more like just an ad rather than a Simpsons short. It integrated their style of humor for most part which also lead to a few funny gags, but the clip was just to busy showcasing all the different Simpson and Disney characters together for a lot of quick gags that just don't land (though I kinda like the Donald and Moe/Barney jokes). Apparently the Disney princesses aren't shown drinking beer because they are supposedly underage, yet why are they even in the bar then? I also like the take of using Bart as Mickey because apparently he wasn't allowed to be shown in this clip either. Nancy does a pretty funny Mickey impression which I was a fan of the moment they used that Disney gag in the Simpsons Movie.

Lisa's song felt pretty meh. I always liked Julie's singing but for this song it was too talkative like the way Scar sang in the Lion King remake, and its lyrics are all just advertisements while trying to put a funny spin to it. Their main focus is apparently building up some chemistry between Homer and Goofy which could lead to more bonding in a possible future but I couldn't get myself to care much for them.

This clip is way too short and has a lot of shortcomings. I haven't been impressed with their clips as of late and they mostly suffer from pacing issues due to their short length Both Marge and Maggie weren't even in it where they could have played a role of becoming an actual Disney princess or something and call out that she's way too old to be one. The Simpsons has done a much better job of making fun of Disney in the past, which were mostly just quick random jokes troughout an episode and even in the movie. It had some good gags to earn at least a:

2/5
 
WHOOPS NEVER REVIEWED THIS.

There is nothing really much to find here - it's nothing more or less than just an advertisement for Disney; literally. Apart from the character designs and animation for the Disney characters, there is nothing to be found here. And I guess I enjoyed Bart as Mickey. Also, I await for the day Lisa stops singing, because she can't sing. 2/5
 
I'm sorry, but I just find Lisa's singing voice a bit too awkward. Seriously.
 
The "story" of this if you even want to call it that is that Homer didn't get invited to the anniversary party for Disney+, but Goofy gets him in. They have a beer together, and a bunch of other Disney characters make appearances.

There is absolutely nothing here to latch onto. Even if you watch it just to see all your favorites in one room, most of them don't speak and the few that do sound terrible. Goofy's laugh is completely offputting, Donald doesn't even sound like a duck as soon as he starts talking and Grumpy sounds like The Rich Texan. I don't really know why they couldn't get the official voice actors for some of them, but these impressions are so bad you could ask a hobo on the street to do better ones.

The main selling point is Homer and Goofy bonding with each other, but they're not given very much. Goofy mopes over being seen as goofy and Homer finds him annoying. Then we get a tearful goodbye at the end when they're forcibly separated. You have no idea where Homer's sudden love for Goofy came from, so it feels phony and lazy.

And I kid you not, I think there might be no jokes at all. Or if they were they were such lacking in tact, timing or wit I couldn't notice them. I know this is a clichéd saying, but when I'm watching a COMEDY I'm expecting at the very least a smirk.

Then the icing on the cake is something so earbleedingly abysmal it can be compared to the ending song of Lisa Goes Gaga. Lisa sings... about how fantastic the Disney streaming service is and how all your favorite shows and movies are there. It's not only incredibly sappy and cringeworthy to listen to, but manipulative as hell since they're not even hiding that this only an ad in disguise of a short. It's the kind of shameless self-promotion that makes you want to vomit up your skull.

The Good, The Bart And The Loki is almost as bad, but I can still call that a product made to "entertain". This however is cheap patronizing garbage that only those who are already in love with Disney+ and everything it stands for will appreciate it. And even some of those subscribers might get sickened by the blatant sense of pride. 1/10
 
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Just to note (or fix, if you want): official title, which appeared in Copyright Catalog recently is Simpsons in Plusaversary. No more wrong options of the short's name!😅
 
So far, the short is so bad it can be considered a 'Jumping the shark' moment for the Simpsons.

Everything about this short screams: We're owned by Disney, and we're perfectly happy Shotgun sounds. At least in the other times they referenced Disney after Disney bought Fox, they used satire to describe their exact feelings. The short however, praises Disney and feels like a big advertisement with no effort put into it, like not even jokes about how Disney is terrible.

It becomes even more ironic once you realize that the Simpsons was once, an anti-establishment cartoon. Guess what happened? The Simpsons during the 2000s became the establishment but it still made fun of it, even after Disney bought the Simpsons. But in this short, they LOVE Disney. In fact, they LOVE the establishment. I remember considering 'Lisa Goes Gaga' to be the worst episode of the Simpsons ever, because it goes against everything the Simpsons was about. I thought of it as nailing an already nailed-coffin. This short however, cements the coffin and tries to wrap it so it can never be opened, ever.

Since I can't rate it a 0/5, I'll just rate it a 1/5: F
 
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