The Simpsons One Step Beyond Forever a Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family …Continued Yet Again

The Simpsons One Step Beyond Forever A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family…Continued Yet Again is the fourth and latest addition to the series of episode guides to greatest television show of all time. It took me a long time to find an advanced copy: I had to drive Brockway Ogdenville, and North Haverbrook, but I finally tracked one down. And now I have episode guides to seasons 1 through 14 of The Simpsons.

Carrying on in the tradition of its three predecessors, The Simpsons One Step Beyond Forever A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family…Continued Yet Again features detailed plot synopses of each episode featured in seasons 13 and 14. Like the previous edition, each regular episode is granted a full two-page spread and the Treehouse of Horror Halloween episode get four page spreads. The book overflows with terrific quotations, character profiles, and references to pop culture and meta-references to previous episodes of the show itself.

In addition, there is also cover to cover animation of all your favorite Simpsons characters as well as some guest stars. These provide terrific opportunities for scanning into your computer as wallpaper, by the way. All of Bart's chalkboard gags are featured as well. Of course, the highlight of any page is probably the box titled "The Stuff You May Have Missed." These contain gags that you're likely to miss unless you tape the episode and use a freeze-frame. Among the gags usually included in these boxes are things like the titles of books and movies seen in the background, the names of companies and products, etc.

Continuing the tradition set forth by the previous edition, The Simpsons One Step Beyond Forever A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family…Continued Yet Again contains production art drawings of scenery and characters in the earliest stages of development. In addition, you get the requisite extras marked by the earlier editions such as detailed synopses of the couch gags that open each episode, the situations which caused Homer to cry "D'oh!" and the items that caused Homer to go "Mmmmm…."

Fans of particularly violent cartoons will enjoy the exhaustively detailed plot synopses of Itchy and Scratchy shorts. Fans of the show's incredible musical numbers will appreciate the lyric sheet provided for songs featured during seasons 13 & 14, including the instant classic "Everybody Hates Ned Flanders" as well as the brilliant improvement on Billy Joel's REM "It's The End of the World as We Know It" rip-off "We Didn't Start the Fire" called "They'll Never Stop the Simpsons." And lastly, the page that lists who does what character has smaller print than ever in order to fit all the information onto two pages.

The Simpsons One Step Beyond Forever A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family…Continued Yet Again is an indispensable book for any true Simpsons fan. Yes, it's true that there are some factual errors to be found in all of these guides, and yes it's true that the information can be found online.

But you can't get the terrific drawings online and you can't carry it around with you and, well, a video screen will never replace that feeling of having a book in your hands. Since these books also make for perfect bathroom reading, I might also mention that it's probably more trouble than it's really worth to take a computer into the bathroom with you. So go ahead and buy the books.

And one last thing: Hey, Groening! When is the next volume coming out? It's been long enough.