The Simpsons Natural Born Kissers (1989– ) Online

This was the end of an era- The Simpsons was at its very best in seasons 1 to 9. Granted, season 9 had the first bad episodes of the series- Principal and the Pauper, All Singing, All Dancing, Bart Carny- but between this, the New York episode, Miracle on Evergreen Terrace and the Lisa episodes, season 9 is an overall winner. Natural Born Kissers is funny, but more importantly, it's sexy. Some people might find that strange for a cartoon, but in fact if you listen to the DVD commentaries, the makers of the show regularly talk about sexiness in The Simpsons. Cartoon nudity is a good thing.

In this episode, Homer and Marge find themselves in a rut on their sex life. When in a rainstorm they take shelter in a stranger's barn, the farmer nearly finds them, and turned on by the danger, Marge and Homer have sex. The couple soon realizes that risking getting caught spices up their life, and begin having more sex in public. While on a mini golf course, they're nearly caught and have to flee through the town naked.

Homer and Marge having difficulty getting in the mood has been touched on before, in Grampa vs. Sexual Inadequacy (season 6), another great episode. It's worth doing again though, because it's a common enough experience, and it's really just a subplot in the season 6 episode: this subject matter needed a whole episode devoted to it. Reflecting the fact that it's a common experience, the writer Matt Selman based it on his parents' marriage, although why he knew so much about his parents' sex life is something we may prefer not to know. While on the subject of kids knowing about their parents' sex life, we can note Bart and Lisa are a little strange here- Bart asks if they had sex and both kids look at a naked picture of their parents in the end. On the other hand, at times they act grossed out, which is the more usual response.

The humour is good- among other things, seeing Grampa at war, and seeing Homer's backside on a church window. But again, the episode is also sexy, starting with Marge's hair getting messed up in the rain scene. When she flees through town naked we see her butt for the first time (a Simpsons milestone; previously they only showed male butts), and we see a nice side of her breast in the lawn ornament scene. One things for sure: the more yellow we see, the better.

Natural Born Kissers is a terrific Simpsons episode with a very well written storyline and a ton of very funny scenes. It dosen't feel like an episode that would work, the entire story is basically Marge and Homer doing crazy things in order to put more excitement in to their marriage, it's not a proper storyline and there's never really any turnaround for the characters actions, but it's simply because the episode is so funny and puts Homer and Marge in a scenario we've never seen before, that's this stands out as very unique and a pleasure to watch every time. The only real problem I had with this episode it was almost too funny, it never really took time out to evaluate and give the viewer a full understanding on why Homer and Marge are doing this, it could have had some more dialogue between the two of them that conveyed hoe difficult their love life was really becoming. I also really enjoyed the side story, actually one of my favourites in any episode, the idea of Bart and Lisa finding an alternate ending to Casablanca is also ridiculous, but once again this works because it is simply hilarious, it was a clever parody on the classic film that has me in stitches every time. Fun and enjoyable, Natural Born Kissers is a pleasing finale to the ninth season.

Marge and Homer try to spice up their sex life.

Season 8 of this show had continued the generally high standard thus far, but seemed to have more plots that were triggered by a big event outside of the (comparatively) normal world of the Simpson family. In the ninth season there is still a good chunk of this, where Homer joins the Naval reserves, or the kids get trapped on an island, but generally it is not such extreme things such as we saw in the eighth. Instead we have more which are more based in character or in smaller events; this is not to say that it is not larger than life or in the realm of the fictional, because of course it is, but just that the plots seems a bit more balanced and even if they lead to bigger things, they do not jump right into them from the very start.

Crucially they remain funny, with lots of generally funny material as well as asides. I am not sure if it is real or just my perception, but there did appear to be a lot more guest voices than previous seasons. This mostly works because whether they play themselves or not, they generally feel like being done in the service of a joke, or because the person worked well – none of them really feel like they are in an episode because the producers just needed a name to draw in ratings (which perhaps is more the case with later seasons). Animation remains very good (and still looks so, 18 years later) and of course the voice work is generally very strong, with good sense of character and timing.

It has been quite a few years since I last watched these episodes, although when I did watch them they were on either Channel 4 or Sky very frequently, so there is an element of knowing the episodes inside out already, but otherwise it remains fresh and funny season.