The adventures of Homer Simpson in outer space in season 5, have been looked back upon very fondly over the past two decades. The episode features in ScreenRants top 16 episodes, Rolling Stones top 45, and IGNs top 10. And while the episode was certainly not bad and has some iconic imagery (every real Simpsons fan instantly pictured Homer eating chips in zero gravity the moment they saw the title of this entry), it is puzzling that people can think that highly of it when it is not even the best episode of the season in which it featured. If anything 'Deep Space Homer' marks a point where the Simpsons was already starting to creak under the strain of its prodigious output and desire to come up with fresh ideas. Considering the show is still running 22 seasons later after the borderline developmentally disabled Homer Simpson became an actual astronaut, it is a miracle that the shows writers even try anymore. Having Homer enter Space was a pretty radical stretch for a show that only a couple of years before had been considerably more grounded and found its humour in the banality of blue collar American life. Although in fairness to this episode, it did gift us the hilarious gag of the inanimate carbon rod as well, so maybe for that alone it deserves all the credit it gets.
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