This The Simpsons review contains spoilers.
The Simpsons Season 33 Episode 4
Love meant never having to say you’re sorry until The Simpsons’ “The Wayz We Were.” Moe himself puts it best at the ending, the song is pretty good, but the movie, well, he didn’t like it. That might explain why he is sadly miscast.
What doesn’t work is how it turns Moe into mush. This isn’t in response to his lovelorn demeanor, but because he’s not his usual anti-effervescent self. Being cornered by emotion should bring out the kinds of Moe-isms which inspired Lisa to rebrand him as an angry poet but, in “The Wayz We Were,” his caustic wit is dulled. Pamela Reed is well cast as the voice of Ruth Powers, and it is a clever self-revelatory observation that her skin is smoother than American cheese, but their scenes together have too much of an easy sheen.
Moe’s gritty and greasy existence is good, on Moe terms, at the beginning of the episode, plant closings mean more unemployed drunks, and the possum who got trapped in his bathroom is getting good at dispensing towels and aftershave. But, stuck in a traffic jam while James Taylor’s “Damn This Traffic Jam” is playing, he has time to think. “Nothing to be late to and no one who cares,” he says while his reflection betrays “objects in the mirror may be more depressed than they seem.”
This actually works very well as foreshadowing to the later mirror scene in his bar. Moe has the kind of face which makes Facebook face recognition say “yuck.” Even the warped reflection in a dirty spoon doesn’t improve it. Moe previously had a flashback where he realizes everything which has gone wrong in his life happens after he says the words “I love you.” He can’t even proclaim “I love New York” without getting mugged by both Elmo and Spiderman. The inevitable “love ya” payoff is actually well-downplayed when it happens, until Moe begins playing those spoons.
In the leadup to the episode, the story of the prehistoric first traffic jam, we see Fred Flintstone as one of the cavemen. Caveman Moe neither hunts nor nests, he brings drinks in the skulls of fallen Neanderthals. During the setup, Professor Frink invents transportation, and says he’s working on language. No one understands, of course. Frink will later smite a global data behemoth by hacking into their source code. He’s changed his own social media standing by having it be known he’s gone five months without a wedgie. Social media social commentary comes when the Wayz traffic app’s claim to fame is they are not invasive, like Google, but they have a disclaimer saying they are owned by Google.
The traffic jam itself offers some comic background payoffs. Ned has a field day, first observing “All those middle fingers pointed up to the Lord,” and ultimately becoming a carhop, serving iced coffee and snacks to irate drivers, while the Simpsons charge for photos. Also, Moe learns to watch out for stray jam musicians at Fish Crossing stops.
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“The Wayz We Were” is a tepid episode, which is only slightly warmed by the songs. It is also a sweet episode, which explores Moe’s innermost turmoil, but it doesn’t bring it to a boil, much less a simmer. Moe has sex in this installment and it’s still not hot enough.
