10 Times The Simpsons Got Political
It's election season - who's running in Springfield???
Rarely does The Simpsons move into the realm of political satire. The show tends to focus on relationships, the familial unit, and zany antics far more than politics. That said, there are times when The Simpsons have gone, well, there. It's no secret that the show has certain political leanings (let's say towards the left), and when it really comes down to it, it hasn't been afraid to show those colours.
Some of those ventures into the political realm have worked well, and produced some classic episodes. Others have fallen flat, victim at times of being overly preachy, or just downright not that funny.
With the upcoming election year, The Simpsons are at it again, this time lampooning Donald Trump even before the current season of the show began airing. You can expect a few more jabs as the months role on, right up until election day. Maybe even the classic scene of Homer's vote repeatedly going to the wrong candidate will be revisited.
In the meantime, lets take a stroll back through the show's storied history to take a look at ten times The Simpsons has gone the political route, and see which were resounding successes - and which were campaign failures so to speak.
10. Bart-Mangled Banner
Season fifteen's Bart-Mangled Banner sees Bart inadvertently mooning the American flag after a case of temporary deafness causes him to become disoriented.
That's actually the story at its most basic core - while not a bad episode per se, it's actually much more convoluted than that, probably (okay, definitely) overly so. Still, it does a decent job of lampooning political hysteria and over-reaction, partisan political talk shows, and rights-trampling laws like The Patriot Act - spoofed in the episode as the Government Knows Best Act.
With gems like the family being asked "How much do you hate America?" after Bart's accidental disparaging of the flag, Bart-Mangled banner has a lot to offer - but it's far from the best time in which The Simpsons went the political route.