Kredit Kookies: Billboard: Kearney, Dolph and Jimbo, requesting you “Support your local bullies”.Chalkboard Gag: “My piggy bank is not entitled to a TARP fund”.Couch Gag: OFF’s faces appear in varying plates of food (Homer is a plate of salad, Lisa’s face a bowl of soup, Marge a plate of spaghetti and meatballs, Bart a steak, and Maggie an after-dinner mint).We pan up to reveal Comic Book Guy wiping his mouth, having consumed a Simpson-shaped meal; the napkin he leaves behind features a stain depicting The Simpsons sitting on their couch (best couch gag ever?)

Dumbing It Down: The Parson – head of the Presbylutherian church – causes a ruckus when he arrives in Springfield for a meeting with Reverend Lovejoy (Ned Flanders can hardly contain himself).It turns out the Rev’s old school mate brings bad tidings (no, not the revelation that Helen Lovejoy used to be a man (?!)):Lovejoy’s license has expired, thus making every ceremony he’s officiated over the three months preceding completely invalid.

Included in this list: Marge and Homer’s re-marriage in “A Milhouse Divided”, which means their union has been invalid for three months.The Simpson ‘rents decide to do things the right way this time and go for an old-fashioned, Traditional ceremony, leading Marge to behave in a Bridezilla-esque fashion.

Homer no-shows the elaborate ceremony, disappearing from the scene completely.Marge sinks into a funk while Lisa and Bart – who’ve discovered a keychain marked “SB” – try to find their father.

The trail initially leads them to Sideshow Bob, but, escapee from prison or no, he hasn’t done anything illegal and is in fact spending his time hanging out with Krusty.

Bob leads them to the true SB: their aunts, Patty and Selma Bouvier, who’ve been holding Homer hostage in a Saw-like holding cell and torturing him with such implements as a hot sauce-filled lollipop.They’re finally convinced to let Homer go after they hear the vows he’d planned on reciting to Marge.Just as they’re preparing to release Homer, Lisa and Bart catch up to their aunts, and threaten to tell their mother about the kidnapping unless they pay for Marge and Homer’s remarriage ceremony.This they do, and it’s a lavish affair held at the courthouse.

Red Dress Press: To really love “Wedding For Disaster”, you’re going to have to set aside the fact that it takes four hundred episodes’ worth of continuity and informs us that they took place within the span of three months Springfield time.It doesn’t make sense if you really think about it (the multiple Christmas celebrations are the biggest give-away), but let’s give the writers a little slack; Springfieldians don’t age in normal time, and that makes using past canon problematic.I don’t particularly enjoy such time-bending conceits, but the show’s framework gives its showrunners very little choice (no, I’m not taking back my mainly-negative review of That 90’s Show).

The most appealing fixture of “WFD” is it’s unabashed sentimentality.

Homer is wonderfully sweet and romantic here, and his basement proposal to Marge is one of the highlights of the later part of the show’s run.Selfless Marge’ssudden left turn into bridezilla-esque mania is somewhat understandable; her first wedding took place in a Casino chapel, the second in her own living room with no pre-planning on her part.This was Marge’s first time in the driver’s seat, and it’s unsurprising a wedding planner would coax her into riding pell-mell through the world of bridedom.

Bart and Lisa’s team-up, a fixture of the show over the years, was a surprisingly minor part of the episode; that it led them to Selma and Patty is a new twist.

Patty and Selma’s aggression isn’t too surprising; considering he lengths they went to conceal Homer’s location from Marge in “I Married Marge”.Selma’s always been the romantic, love-lorn soft touch who reunites Homer and Marge at the end; it was nice to notice Patty’s more vulnerable turn here.

As for Bob’s cameo, it was almost entirely pointless, though it did bring a few laughs.Whatever happened to the rest of his family, however?He didn’t return to break them out of prison after his escape in “Sex, Pies and Idiot Scrapes?”

Even at its worst, the show’s always been consistent about Homer and Marge’s love for one another, and this episode is another reminder of the bond that’s always been portrayed as being the strongest, most important one on the show.In that, “WFD” succeeds in its aims, and provides a sentimental, if not exactly funny, episode.

The only truly unforgivable joke was the throwaway line involving Helen Lovejoy’s purported sexual reassignment surgery.Since the Lovejoys have a biological daughter (the fanonically adored Jessica), such a pointless joke plays more ludicrously than the time compression plot line.

My favorite cut-away this episode involved Maggie watching her folks fight, envisioning her parents as battling monsters.

An emotionally rich but vaguely pointless episode, “Wedding For Disaster” is among the better episodes in a season that’s being toted by its audience as the best in a long time.

Did It Fail at Masonry?: How funny do you like your Simpsons, and do you enjoy the twisty insanity of the show’s timeline?If you have a firm conception of what’scanonically appropriate for this show, you won’t enjoy the canonbending, and you won’t even try to tolerate the Helen Lovejoy joke. If you like “wacky”, the episode’s grounded emotional center won’t work for you.If you have the willingness to ignore the nagging timeline holes and the patience to enjoy the more left-of-center plot twists, than “Wedding For Disaster” is a worthy experience.

What The Screwballs Think: “Wedding For Disaster” pulled in a 6.1, the second-highest rated program Fox produced Sunday evening, and the second-highest rated program in its 8 PM Timeslot.

Springfield Shopper: The next new episode of The Simpsons, “Eeny Teeny Mya Moe” will air on April fifth.Check back here on the sixth for a full recap!