TVSquad

If you haven't entered our latest giveaways yet, here's a reminder that the two Festivus ones are ending today. You've got until 5PM Eastern today to enter the The Simpsons Movie DVD giveaway and the Adventures of Young Indiana Jones, Vol. 2 DVD giveaway.

Just head on over to the post linked above, read through the rules and make the applicable comment there (not here!) We'll notify the winners next week.

Good luck!

Our first Festivus giveaway! This one is for five copies of The Simpsons Movie on DVD! All you've got to do is submit a comment below before 5PM Eastern, December 21, and mention your favorite character from The Simpsons. We'll randomly choose five winners to receive the DVDs!

Some other details:

• To enter, leave a confirmed comment below stating who your favorite Simpsons character is.
• The comment must be left before December 21, 2007 at 5:00PM Eastern Time.
  
• You may enter only once.
• Five winners will be selected in a random drawing.
  
• Five winners will receive a copy of The Simpsons Movie on DVD (valued at $29.99).
  

Click here for complete Official Rules.

(S19E01) Blackboard Gag: I will not wait 20 years to make another movie

Adam, this one's for you.

To begin this review I would like to speak to all of the continuity wonks out there in the audience. You know who you are! You're the folks who keep writing about how nothing changes in Springfield, even after something major happens the episode before. Well, The Simpsons has plenty of continuity. If not, then Ned's wife would still be alive the week after she died and Selma's last name would not be Selma Bouvier Terwilliger Hutz McClure Stu Simpson, Continuity is there . . . it's just subtle.

If you noticed, we haven't done a lot of posts about The Simpsons leading up to the release of The Simpsons Movie. There are a few reasons for that: 1) it's a movie, and our friends at Cinematical have that beat pretty well covered, 2) we did some Simpsons stuff before its 400th episode, and 3) everyone else was doing it.

But there's no denying that all the promotional tie-ins, Simpsonizing web sites, and just the general popularity of the show paid off, now that the weekend's box office totals are in: the movie came in at #1 for the week, bringing in an impressive $71.9 million. Even Adam Sandler's latest epic, I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry, couldn't withstand the power of Yellow: it came in second with just over $19 million in sales.

Earlier this year, we told you about a possible advertising deal brewing between the producers of The Simpsons Movie and 7-Eleven. Well, that advertising deal is now a reality; to promote the movie, which is opening on July 27, selected 7-Eleven outlets have been changed into Kwik-E-Marts, in what the chain called its "most massive and complex" promotion ever.

AdAge.com details what's been changed in the promotion, which runs until the end of the month. The signs out front will be different, of course, but a series of Simpsons-branded products will be sold in the store, including Buzz Cola and Krusty-Os cereal. Even the Slurpees will be called Squishees.

Matt Groening's getting around these days. Last month he spoke with TV Squad's Joel Keller, and recently he met with the folks at Crave recently to talk about The Simpsons TV show and upcoming movie.

A few gems from the interview:

• The movie will not be about Bart losing his virginity. Someone once asked one of the writers what the movie would be about, and he joked that this was the plot. It's not. Some folks don't seem to know a joke when it sleeps with them.
• When asked straight out whether the movie will reveal what state Springfield is in, Groening replies "Yes. We actually have a really good joke about that. Remember, I said joke." I'm going to take that as a no.
• Thanks to all the pop culture references thrown into The Simpsons over the years, Groening's kids (and millions of others) have seen movies like Casablanca later in life and said to themselves "Oh, that's just like that Simpsons episode!"
  

[via Cinematical]