Springfield Work

Like many people, I joined the audience at the Simpsons Movie last weekend. I was pleased to hear that pal Mike Reiss wrote what is credited as being the funniest joke in the movie, so I figured I'd do my bit to support Writer's Guild Members, at least while the current system that guarantees the payment of residuals is still in place.

There were plenty of references to cyberculture in the story of the apocalyptic fate of the cartoon landscape of Springfield, which is brought to the brink of disaster by a combination of environmental pollution and a secretive federal government. Bart writes on a blackboard over and over the promise not to download the movie illegally. Children play a hand-held game called "Baby Blast," and adults in the frozen North play "Grand Theft Walrus." Cell phone cameras and surveillance cameras occupy a role in the story. There are also info-graphics on the news and teleconferencing on a giant dematerialized screen. There's even an OnStar joke in which Springfield is first digitally removed from the map of an automobile navigation system before it is to be literally obliterated.