carwash conveyor belt; they get washed, blasted with wax, scrubbed with prickly brushes, resulting with Marge's bushy hair and Maggie with a fresh pacifier.[1]
"G.I. (Annoyed Grunt)", also known as "G.I. D'oh", is the fifth episode of the
military-industrial complex
.
Plot
At the Springfield Mall,
Springfield Elementary
, the recruiters show a short movie depicting the Army as a high-tech adventure. According to the film, soldiers fly around in attack helicopters destroying evildoers by day and rocking out in front of thousands of screaming fans by night. The students are easily swayed and quickly line up to enlist.
An excited Bart comes home from school and shows
China). Upon learning that it is a live fire exercise, with the weapons to be tested on them, the unit tries to hide. Homer, mistaking gunfire for Chinese New Year, accidentally exposes his unit's location by launching a flare gun in the air. The flare blinds the colonel and his men, who were all wearing night vision goggles. Homer and his unit soon escape into Springfield
while the Army gives chase as well as invades Springfield.
As the colonel and his troops patrol Springfield searching for him, Homer sneaks back home. Marge and Homer are surprised by a
enlistment
. Homer does so by becoming a recruiter.
During the closing credits, a martial scoring of The Simpsons theme plays and the colonel voices "frontline infantry" assignments to nearly every cast and crew member (one exception being Kiefer Sutherland, who is assigned to the United States Coast Guard), as the credits roll.[1]
when Homer says that the Army will strip people naked, put a bag over their face, and have hicks laugh at them.
Reception
In its original run, the episode received 11.43 million viewers,[2] and garnered mixed-to-mostly negative reviews.[4][5]
Adam Finley of
TV Squad praised that the episode was entirely random, and enjoyed the parody of Looney Tunes.[4] Dan Iverson of IGN however, hated the episode, giving it 3.5 out of 10, calling it "painfully unfunny", and "the show's attempt to satirize the state of the U.S. military simply crossed the line of good taste". He concluded that it was "by far" the worst episode of the season, and "quite possibly" the worst episode in the entire of The Simpsons history. He did, however, enjoy the Looney Tunes parody and Sutherland's guest performance.[6] Conservative commentator Michelle Malkin criticized the episode, writing, "the mockery of Army recruiters and enlistees is absolutely disgusting."[7]
