The PCS Staff Poll: What’s Your Favorite ‘Simpsons’ Episode? ‘A Star Is Burns’

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“A Star Is Burns” first aired on March 5, 1995, and it is the 18th episode of the sixth season of The Simpsons.

The episode revolves around Springfield having a film festival with most of the secondary characters of the series entering films in the competition. Jay Sherman, the main character from the short-lived series The Critic, makes a crossover appearance as a judge at the festival. The short films that everyone makes are hilarious, from Barney’s artistic Pukahontas, a black and white film about alcoholism, to Hans Moleman’s Man Getting Hit With Football, in which a football hit’s him in the groin. Like many Simpsons episodes, the plot doesn’t really matter except as an excuse for the witty dialogue. Everyone knows that the best thing about the Simpsons is the infinitely quotable lines. In my opinion “A Star Is Burns” has some of the best lines in the series.

There’s Mr. Burns telling Smithers to find him Steven Spielberg’s “non-union Mexican equivalent” which is followed by the even better exchange:

“Listen, Señor Spielbergo, I want you to do for me what Spielberg did for Oscar Schindler.”
“Er, Schindler es bueno, Señor Burns es el diablo.”
“Listen, Spielbergo, Schindler and I are like peas in a pod: we’re both factory owners, we both made shells for the Nazis, but mine worked, dammit!”

There’s the woman asking Barney “Excuse me, did something crawl down your throat and die?” only for Barney to reply “It didn’t die!”

How about Jay asking Krusty how he could possibly vote for Burns’ movie and Krusty accidentally admitting that he was bribed:

“Let’s just say it moved me…to a bigger house! Oops, I said the quiet part loud and the loud part quiet.”

I could go on and on but honestly, this episode will always be my favorite because of one word: Boo-urns. To this day, almost 20 years later, I don’t think I go a week without saying “I was saying Boo-urns!” at least once. Here’s a video of Hans Moleman saying Boo-urns. Sorry about the picture quality, it’s the only one I could find.

My favorite character would have to be Homer.  Again, I’m a dialogue guy and Homer has had some of the most consistently funny lines in the whole series. From “I am so smart! S-M-R-T … I mean S-M-A-R-T ” to “Lisa, in this house, we obey the laws of thermodynamics!”, Homer’s lines are the ones I quote more than any other character’s.