The Simpsons - Season 17 - DVD

Movie: Over 25 years they have been around now, the Simpsons from Springfield. 25 years, in which the yellow cult family could make their fans laugh again and again and provided in over 560 episodes and a hugely successful feature film for countless wonderful moments. Since 2001, individual seasons of the cult series have also been successfully released on DVD time and again. After thirteen years, Fox Home Entertainment has now reached season 17, which is again released in two variants - as a classic DVD box and as a limited edition in the Tingel-Tangel-Bob design.

Homer, Marge, Lisa, Bart, Maggie, Mr. Burns, Moe, Smithers, Ned Flanders, Krusty - they have all long been an integral part of pop culture. Matt Groening and his outstanding team of writers, which in the early years included the successful US late night talker Conan O`Brien, and cartoonists have undoubtedly shaped and changed the TV landscape with this series. However, many fans are of the opinion that the quality of the series has clearly declined at some point around the tenth year. This can't really be dismissed out of hand. But if you look at the episodes of the 17th season, it becomes clear again and again that even some of these episodes can definitely still be attributed to the heyday of the series.

Admittedly, there is the one or other sag. But the mix of obvious gags, subversive humour and absurdist comedy still works in spades in its seventeenth year! Moments like an Itchy & Scratchy musical based on The Lion King, the evolution versus creation story battle waged by Lisa, a parody of the disaster movie classic Poseidon Inferno, and Selma and Patty's plan to kidnap the real MacGyver Richard Dean Anderson make the season's 22 episodes quite enjoyable. Even when Marge loses her memory and suddenly remembers everything - even Milhouse - but not Homer or when the Simpsons participate in a wife swap and are supported in the original by Ricky Gervais, in the German version by Christoph Maria Herbst, the season is extremely fun despite some weaker moments.

The DVD then also allows fans to watch the episodes in the original English. As wonderful as the German dubbed version is, much of the wordplay is unfortunately lost in translation. But no matter if in English or German: The Simspons are simply cult. It's been that way for the last 25 years - and it will stay that way for the next 25!

The episodes in detail:

DVD 1:

Live the Manatee

Fear Eats Soul

Milhouse of Sand and Fog

B.I.: Bartificial Intelligence

Mommy's Little Darling

DVD 2:

The Security Salamander

Marge and the Women's Club

The Italian Mob

.Simpsons Christmas Stories

Who is Homer's father

The Street of the Damned

DVD 3:

A Perfect Gentleman

The Seemingly Neverending Story

Bart Has Two Mothers

Wife Swap

Corrida de Toro

Kiss, Kiss Bang Bangalore

DVD 4:

Three Wet Stories<x><N</x>Equation with an Unknown

Blessed Are the Ignorant

God vs Lisa Simpson

Homerun for Love

Image + Sound: The technical realization of the seventeenth season can once again be considered very successful. The image is pleasing with its vibrant colors, clean lines and very good overall sharpness. The audio is a bit front-heavy overall, but there are some very nice surround effects to be heard here and there that bring life to the multichannel. So for an animated series, the technical realization really turned out very well!

Extras: As with the previous box sets, there is again an audio commentary for each episode, with Matt Groening being joined by writers, directors, producers, cartoonists and voice actors. These commentaries are a real pleasure to listen to, as the good-humored protagonists always have quite a few interesting details to share about the individual episodes and their creation in between various jokes.

On the first DVD, after a short introduction (approx. 3:48 min.) by Matt Groening, there is also a picture-in-picture comparison of storyboards and animatics from the episode Fear Eats Soul, a concept gallery (approx. 3:21 min.), as well as a bonus episode from the 25th anniversary season.DVD 2 takes a look at the recording of the music for the series (approx. 5:06 min.) and also has another concept gallery (approx. 3:21 min.) on board.

There's a real cult following on the third disc, where the best couch-gags have been cut together (approx. 21:22 min.). In addition, the episode Frauentausch is offered in additional language versions. Finally, fans are treated to dropped scenes from the season (approx. 11:43 min.) and a live script reading (approx. 34:55 min.) on DVD 4. The script reading, however, is only available as an audio track, while the script pages can be seen alongside to read along. If you click around in the menu a bit more, you might also discover an Easter Egg. Good!

Conclusion: The seventeenth season of The Simpsons may no longer show the yellow cult family at their best, but this season still has plenty of strong episodes and wonderful moments that make buying the box set an absolute no-brainer for fans. The DVD conversion is very well done, both technically and in terms of the extras! And for this there is a very clear: Absolutely recommendable!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp