The Simpsons just delivered what was arguably the best episode of the season. A big reason why “The Day of the Jack-Up” worked so well is that it actually managed to comment on a number of contemporary issues in a creatively fresh fashion, unlike some other Matt Groening-produced shows…
The episode is all about Mr. Burns opening a Las Vegas Sphere-esque music venue, which soon books the K-pop girl group Kneesock Dolls. Unfortunately for superfan Lisa, bots controlled by an anonymous online reseller called “SeatMiser” immediately buy up all the tickets for the concert.
All of this culminates in an extended parody of M. Night Shyamalan’s Trap – which, to be fair, was already kind of a comedy.
While the episode featured a number of very funny moments – including an FBI profiler played by Criminal Minds’ Paget Brewster and a twist ending that was better than Shyamalan’s – the best joke was an extended gag that began just moments into the episode.
When Smithers informs Mr. Burns that he’s to meet with someone who wants to buy the nuclear plant’s excess power in order to mine blockchain cryptocurrency, the 104-year-old tycoon agrees, reasoning, “I do know mines, chains and crypts.”
We then get to see the “C. Montgomery Burns Rules of Negotiation.” Each rule is introduced with a title card accompanied by classical music. Rule One? “Act Like You Don’t Need the Money.” Mr. Burns demonstrates this by setting fire to a pile of cash on the boardroom table. Rule two is “Speak First, Lose First.” When one of the crypto investors remarks that the silent Burns “might be dead,” he takes this as a win.
Then there’s “Extreme Demands, Tiny Concessions,” which finds Burns opening the blinds in the darkened meeting room very slightly and telling his guests “If you agree to triple your offer, I will, in return, let in a sliver of sunlight.” They eventually storm off, which Mr. Burns refers to as a “classic counter move.”
But the bit isn’t over yet. When Lisa announces that she wants to see Kneesock Dolls (“My favorite girl pop band, from my favorite Korea”) we get to see the first of the “Homer J. Simpson Rules of Negotiation” which is “Say Anything to Do Nothing.” After rattling off a bunch of nonsense to weasel out of buying tickets, Lisa bursts into tears and he relents.
But this is all part of her negotiation tactic: “Cry Your Way to ‘Yes.’”
It’s a fun joke that harkens back to classic formal experiments like Homer’s dictionary presence in “Homer Defined.”
And is there any better visual representation of the billionaire class than a rich guy in a bejeweled gas mask watching a roomful of people choke on the smoke from his burning money?
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