Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
THE Simpsons, the hysterically funny animated family, which debuted on the Emmy Award-winning Tracey Ullman Show, has come to primetime Super Comedy! Every Friday at 8.30pm. Created by cartoonist Matt Groening (and named after the members of his immediate family except for Bart, who represents Matt), The Simpsons premiered as a half-hour Christmas special in December, 1989 and then as a primetime, half-hour comedy series in January, 1990. The show has been acclaimed by critics and fans alike as one of television's truest and most hilarious portraits of the American family.
The Simpsons, who live in the community of Springfield, include Homer, Marge, Bart (an anagram for Brat), Lisa, and baby Maggie. Mixed together they represent the American family at its wildest!
Giving voice to the family are Dan Castellaneta as Homer, Julie Kavner as Marge, Nancy Cartwright as Bart and Yeardley Smith as Lisa. Hank Azaria and Harry Shearer also provide the voices of a myriad of characters.
Meet The Simpsons family and feel better about yours!
Homer - A devoted husband, Homer leaves his wife with few complaints. When pressed, however, Marge did once acknowledge to a marriage counsellor that Homer 'forgets birthdays, anniversaries, holidays (both religious and secular), chews with his mouth open, hangs out at a seedy bar with bums and lowlifes, blows his nose in towels and puts them back and scratches himself with his keys'. Despite these foibles, Homer loves his family and he will do just about anything to prove it - even if that means making himself look foolish.
Homer works at Springfield's nuclear power plant as a safety inspector, a job he secured after passing the specialised training course on his third attempt. Homer's favourite book and/or pamphlet is 'So, You've Decided to Steal Cable', which also happens to be the most recent book and/or pamphlet he has read. When he's not reading, Homer enjoys drinking beer, at home or in a bar.
Marge - Marge is the putty that just barely holds the Simpson family together week after week. By sensibly drawing the line at such frivolous expenses as an electric garage door opener and changes of clothing for her children, Marge manages to stretch Homer's modest salary to cover the tremendous costs incurred by a family of the new millennium: Homer's beer and donut supply and such necessary expenses as a day trip to India to meet the owner of the Kwik-E-Mart Corporation. Marge's one extravagance is having her tall blue hair done twice a day. Her hair does come in handy, however, as it enables the Simpsons to locate one another easily when they visit an amusement park or zoo.
Bart - Bart is the most misunderstood Simpson. He is constantly frustrated by the narrow-minded people of Springfield who judge him merely by his thoughts and actions. At heart, he's just a good kid with a few bad ideas, a couple of really bad ideas and one or two that are still being reviewed by the Springfield District Attorney. Basically, Bart is no different from any ordinary fourth grader.
Labelled an 'underachiever' by authority figures, Bart rides an academic roller coaster, his grades running the loop-the-loop from F to D-minus, and back again. But he can be ingenious when the chips are down - as long as his ingenuity is never applied to anything school-related.
Perhaps more than anything else, Bart's first words as a baby provide a window into his character 'Aye, Carumba!'
Lisa - Lisa Simpson takes after both her parents. She has Marge's common sense, hard work ethic and sympathy for others; she has Homer's last name. Lisa's enormous intelligence and moral authority place her in a unique position in the Simpson family and, for that matter, Springfield at large.
For the record, Lisa says she watches TV only for 'The MacNeil-Lehrer Report' - particularly since it expanded to one hour - and any Masterpiece Theatre serialisation of wordy British novels. In truth, however, she is always willing to interrupt a piercing MacNeil-Lehrer roundtable whenever her beloved 'Itchy & Scratchy' cartoons are on TV. Her deep love for cartoon characters proves that, no matter how precocious she may be, Lisa is still a Simpson.
Maggie - Over the years, we have watched Maggie grow from a cute pacifier-sucking infant who's said her first word, 'Daddy'. This places Maggie just behind Bart and slightly ahead of Homer in vocabulary development.
For an infant who can neither talk nor walk with any consistency, Maggie nonetheless leads an exciting and rewarding life. She is perhaps proudest of the baby escape she led at Springfield Daycare Center.
