The Ziff Who Came to Dinner
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"The Ziff Who Came to Dinner" is the fourteenth episode of the fifteenth season of the American animated television series ''
The Simpsons ''The Simpsons'' is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, ...
''. It originally aired on the
Fox network The Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly known simply as Fox and stylized in all caps as FOX, is an American commercial broadcast television network owned by Fox Corporation and headquartered in New York City, with master control operations an ...
in the United States on March 14, 2004. The episode focuses on
Artie Ziff The American animated television series ''The Simpsons'' contains a wide range of minor and supporting characters like co-workers, teachers, students, family friends, extended relatives, townspeople, local celebrities, and even animals. The write ...
, who takes residence in the Simpson family's attic after declaring bankruptcy. After playing poker with Homer and losing, he gives Homer all the shares of stock of his bankrupt company. Homer then gets arrested and Marge gets upset with Artie. This is the third of nine episodes to date written by ''The Simpsons'' voice actor
Dan Castellaneta Daniel Louis Castellaneta (; born October 29, 1957) is an American actor, comedian, and writer. He is best known for voicing Homer Simpson on the animated series ''The Simpsons'' (as well as other characters on the show such as Abraham "Grampa" ...
and his wife,
Deb Lacusta Deborah Lacusta (born March 15, 1958) is an American television writer and actress. Personal life Lacusta is married to ''The Simpsons'' star Dan Castellaneta (who voices Homer Simpson among many other characters). They met at an improvisationa ...
.


Plot

Homer Homer (; grc, Ὅμηρος , ''Hómēros'') (born ) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the ...
takes
Bart Bart is a masculine given name, usually a diminutive of Bartholomew, sometimes of Barton, Bartolomeo, etc. Bart is a Dutch and Ashkenazi Jewish surname, and derives from the name ''Bartholomäus'', a German form of the biblical name ''Bartho ...
and
Lisa Lisa or LISA may refer to: People People with the mononym * Lisa Lisa (born 1967), American actress and lead singer of the Cult Jam * Lisa (Japanese musician, born 1974), stylized "LISA", Japanese singer and producer * Lisa Komine (born 1978), J ...
to see '' The Wild Dingleberries Movie'' and he has to bring
Ned Flanders Nedward "Ned" Flanders Jr. is a fictional character in the animated television series ''The Simpsons'', voiced by Harry Shearer and first appearing in the series premiere episode "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire." He is the good-natured, ch ...
' children with him, because Ned volunteered to take the senior citizens for ice cream for
Jasper Jasper, an aggregate of microgranular quartz and/or cryptocrystalline chalcedony and other mineral phases,Kostov, R. I. 2010. Review on the mineralogical systematics of jasper and related rocks. – Archaeometry Workshop, 7, 3, 209-213PDF/ref> ...
's birthday. However, at the
Googolplex A googolplex is the number 10, or equivalently, 10 or 1010,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 . Written out in ordinary decimal notation, it is 1 fol ...
Theatre, the movie and every other kid-friendly movie is sold out, and Rod and Todd will not let Homer see a raunchy comedy called ''Teenage Sex Wager'' since it is one of many movies condemned by a Christian publication called "What Would Jesus View?". After hearing Lenny mention he had a small part in the horror movie '' The Re-Deadening'' as a gardener, Homer takes the kids to see the movie. The movie is very scary, causing it to scare Bart and Lisa at home, who think they hear noises from the attic. But when they look in the attic, their fears scare them away. When Bart and Lisa ask Homer and Marge to look in the attic, they discover
Artie Ziff The American animated television series ''The Simpsons'' contains a wide range of minor and supporting characters like co-workers, teachers, students, family friends, extended relatives, townspeople, local celebrities, and even animals. The write ...
living there. Artie explains that he was living in the attic because his Internet business, Ziffcorp, crashed in the
dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Compo ...
, and he lost all his money after spending it on many extravagant items which then got repossessed, including the repo vans. He chose to live with the Simpsons, claiming that Marge was the closest thing he ever had to true love - although Marge quickly points out that she and Artie only had one date where he almost raped her on their high school prom night. Artie promises that he will not hit on Marge if he stays with them, which Marge objects to, but Homer, Bart, and Lisa do not. While living with the family, Artie connects with Lisa by reading her ''
The Corrections ''The Corrections'' is a 2001 novel by American author Jonathan Franzen. It revolves around the troubles of an elderly Midwestern couple and their three adult children, tracing their lives from the mid-20th century to "one last Christmas" togeth ...
''. He then tries to buy ice cream for Bart and Milhouse, but when his credit card gets cut up, he unsuccessfully attempts to hang himself. Homer gets Artie down and takes him to Moe's. Marge sees on the news that the SEC is looking for Artie, who is playing
poker Poker is a family of comparing card games in which players wager over which hand is best according to that specific game's rules. It is played worldwide, however in some places the rules may vary. While the earliest known form of the game w ...
with Homer and his friends. Homer wins 98% of Ziffcorp's outstanding stock. The SEC sweeps in to arrest Artie, but Homer says he owns 230 million shares of Ziffcorp, making him the majority stockholder. To protect himself, Artie has Homer take the blame. Homer is taken into SEC custody, placed on trial and ultimately sentenced to ten years in prison. Blaming Artie for this and angered by his selfishness, Marge kicks him out of the house and tells him she never wants to see him ever again. Visiting
Moe's Tavern Springfield is the primary fictional setting of the American animated sitcom ''The Simpsons'' and related media. It is an average-sized, fictional city within an indeterminate state in the United States. The fictional city's geography, surroundi ...
, Artie encounters
Patty and Selma Patricia Maleficent "Patty" Bouvier and Selma Bouvier-Terwilliger-Hutz-McClure-Discotheque-Simpson-D'Amico () are fictional characters in the American animated sitcom ''The Simpsons''. They are identical Twin, twins and are voiced by Julie Kavne ...
, and Selma takes Artie to her apartment after he mentions putting Homer in prison. As they spend the night together, Artie makes a plan to turn over his corporate books in order to admit he is the real crook. He turns himself in, and Homer is released from prison. The family takes one last look at their "Uncle Artie", who is using a squirt bottle to put out the prisoners' cigarettes, much to their anger.


Critical reception

In a September 2008 review, Robert Canning of
IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
gave the episode a 5.8 out of 10, saying "Unfortunately, ‘The Ziff Who Came to Dinner’ fails to match the previous episode's quality in both story and humor."


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ziff Who Came To Dinner, The The Simpsons (season 15) episodes 2004 American television episodes The Critic