QUICK SYNOPSIS

Apu receives a letter from his mother stating that it’s time for him fulfilled his arranged marriage obligation, he pretends Marge is his wife.

POINTLESS GUEST STAR(S)

Not pointless, but having Andrea Martin as Indian Woman #1 and Jan Hooks as Indian Woman #2 doesn’t fly here in the Year of our Lord 2025. Mindy Kaling and… uh… Padma Lakshmi. That would be more like it. LET’S DO BETTER, PEOPLE! CHOP CHOP!

WHY THIS EPISODE SUCKS

Yes, yes, insensitive, racist, callous, problematic. Call it what you want, but this episode was from fucking 1997 and, you know what? It’s handled with the kind of depth, humanity, and heart that you’d expect from classic-era Simpsons. Writers did their research on Indian and Hindu customs. They didn’t make everyone a stupid caricature. They expounded upon Apu’s character without retconning the past. Sure, there are a couple of issues such as poking fun at Apu’s mother’s bindi, or Homer dressing up as Ganesha in order to try and stop the wedding, or having two white women play Indian characters. But, largely, this is a fun episode. Apu playing the foil to Homer is always fun (see Season 5’s “Homer and Apu” for an obvious example). Apu pretending to be married to Marge was lackluster, though, and Homer committing identity theft in order to successfully live in the retirement home wasn’t the smartest B-plot. This is really where the episode loses me.

“The Two Mrs. Nahasapeemapetilons” straddles the fence between classic Simpsons and Zombie Simpsons. Usually, episodes that permanently shake up a character are more of a miss than a hit (see Season 7’s “Lisa the Vegetarian”, which makes a permanent change to Lisa’s character and also has a very Zombie Simpsons-esque third act), and it’s hard to say whether this one succeeds or not. In the end, a lot of this episode feels too much like a dumb sitcom for me to enjoy it fully as an episode of The Simpsons. BUT, we fleshed out Apu a little further, a character that already has a lot of depth in the first place. So, I call it average. Good, not great. Much like this post.

IMDb TRIVIA FUNHOUSE!

Homer takes Apu to a barbershop called “Hairy Shearers”, a nod to cast member Harry Shearer.
How long were they sitting on this pun? It would be incredible if it took them nine years to think of it. Here’s another one: “Yard-ly Smiths” for, like, a forge shop in someone’s backyard. Someone give me $1,000,000.

In the scene where Apu’s mother asks Bart if the wedding fire is sacred yet, Bart is tearing pages out of a book titled “Hymns”. It was originally planned to be a bible, but after it was animated, the staff decided that it would be too disrespectful and made the change.
Man, the staff are a bunch of wimps. I would’ve stabbed a Jesus effigy and burned it over a fire to make it sacred.

Mike Scully said that Homer writing “Where are the sticky buns” on a sheet of paper after Apu is asking for advice is one of his favorite jokes.
Solid joke! I would expect a favorite joke to be from an actual classic season, but Mike Scully was a contributor to the Simpsons’ decline so what are ya gonna do? At least it’s better than Al Jean’s favorite joke: Homer getting raped by a panda.

The staff wanted to include jokes about the lotus flower before discovering that nothing hilarious can be made out of it.
Au contraire! This piece of trivia made me laugh 27 years later, so it was all worth it.

FINAL GRADE
C+