The Simpsons Movie: Everything You've Loved About the Show and More

Every year, there are one or two movies based off a TV series, a toy, a cartoon, or something else fairly trite and every year I usually dread them. Occasionally I've been optimistic, but I'm usually let down.

So, with The Simpsons Movie, I was hopeful (surely they can't ruin this, right?) but I had my reservations. A lot of the hype surrounding the movie really seemed promising and the trailer certainly reminded me of everything I've loved about the TV series. But after so many other disappointments, I couldn't be sure. Well, after watching The Simpsons Movie as it opened today at Eton Square 6 Cinema in Tulsa, I am sure. This movie is good, really good.

The Simpsons Movie is not only the best TV-to-Big-Screen movie I've ever watched, it's by far the best comedy movie I've seen in a very long time. I laughed almost non-stop. There were only four or five minutes throughout the entire movie that weren't filled with laugh-out-loud jokes. It's seriously that good.

As it should be. The Simpsons is the longest-running animated series, the longest-running animated prime time show, and will soon be the longest-running scripted show in America. It's also spawned a number of other prime-time family and animated comedies that have each done considerably well. Homer's characteristic "D'oh!" has even made its way into the dictionary. The Simpsons is part of our collective culture. And there's a reason for it. People love The Simpsons with its character-based plots, its political (and often religious) irreverence, and its all-too-often accurate portrayal of real-life family, work, and school drama. And they love it because throughout all this, it still manages to emphasize good, even old-fashioned, family values.

For The Simpsons Movie, they took their best work from each of these elements, packed them in a feature-length film, and tied it all together with a Simpsons-quality epic plot. Unlike other TV-to-Big-Screen fiascoes where an epic plot is introduced to be "worthy" of the big-screen (and to use up the additional hour of time they don't usually have), there is no unnecessary contrivance with The Simpsons Movie. Everything fits, it all works. Instead of being a 30-minute TV episode extended to an hour and a half with very few extra jokes to fill the time, The Simpsons Movie is like watching three of the best-ever Simpsons episodes back-to-back with a longer plot and even more jokes packed in to tie it all together.

If you've found anything to like in any of The Simpsons TV episodes, you'll love this movie. But as a movie, they've taken their content in areas they couldn't have taken it on TV. There's a few cuss-words thrown in, there's even a split-second of cartoon nudity. But it's all to the same effect that makes people love The Simpsons show and it doesn't deviate from it. The Simpsons Movie humiliates current political ideas and pop-culture figures (who willingly stood in for their cartoon counterparts) on both sides of the fence. It doesn't matter if you're liberal or conservative, there's something to make fun of here. And in the end, the only thing you can really say the movie narrows down to is an hilarious support of basic family values - just like the show.

For living up to (and possibly surpassing) its original, and for making me laugh the entire time, I give The Simpsons Movie a hearty thumb's up!