- Kent Brockman
-
The Simpsons character 
Kent Brockman Gender Male Job News anchor Relatives Wife: Stephanie
Daughter: BrittanyVoice actor Harry Shearer First appearance The Simpsons "Krusty Gets Busted" Kent Brockman is a fictional character in the animated television series The Simpsons. He is voiced by Harry Shearer and first appeared in the episode "Krusty Gets Busted". He is a grumpy, self-centered local Springfield news anchor.
Contents
Profile
Kent Brockman hosts the Channel 6 weekday news, as well as Smartline, a local current-affairs program (a parody of the national current-affairs program Nightline), Bite Back! With Kent Brockman (a parody on "Fight Back! With David Horowitz), Eye on Springfield (a parody of Eye on LA), which focuses mostly on Springfield's entertainment news, "Springfield Squares, The Krypton Factor and has his own personal commentary segment of the Springfield News, "My Two Cents".
As seen in a flashback to the 1960s in the episode "Mother Simpson", Brockman was known as Kenny Brockelstein early in his career, but a comic book had him named Brock Kentman. Brockman has a daughter, Brittany.
In "Dog of Death", Brockman won the multi-million-dollar ($130 million) state lottery jackpot and left the news desk while still on the air. However, he remained a news anchor because he was under contract, though he also admitted that he likes making $500,000-a-year. He has an ongoing feud with traffic reporter Arnie Pye, and has been shown to criticize Pye's reporting and also even chuckles when it was thought Pye had died in a helicopter accident.
It has been hinted that Brockman is Jewish, having changed his name from Kenny Brockelstein in order to be more successful in show business. He can sometimes be spotted wearing the Hebrew Chai symbol on a necklace. That being said, he is seen several times attending Reverend Lovejoy's protestant church.
Brockman's penchant for using offensive language works against him in the 400th episode, "You Kent Always Say What You Want", where, after Homer accidentally spills coffee on Brockman's crotch, he shouts, what Ned Flanders calls, a "super swear" that shocked everyone who watched it. Brockman was demoted to weather man due to the station paying a fine to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and was soon fired when the network executives deliberately mistook a ring of Splenda in Brockman's coffee for cocaine. Brockman was later given his job back to silence him (after doing an expose that was seen on YouTube uncovering the real reason the FCC is cracking down on obscenity in the media), with a 50% raise, making his new salary $750,000-a-year.
Creation and inspirations
Brad Bird designed Brockman.
Kent Brockman first appeared on television in the first season episode "Krusty Gets Busted", which originally aired April 29, 1990.[1][2] The character was based on Los Angeles anchormen Hal Fishman and Jerry Dunphy.[3] The director of "Krusty Gets Busted", Brad Bird, designed the character and modeled him after anchorman Ted Koppel.[4] Another influence on the character was The Mary Tyler Moore Show's Ted Baxter, played by Ted Knight.[5] Dunphy was proud of the fact that Brockman was based on him and would tell people that he was Kent Brockman.[3]
Cultural influence
Brockman is the source of the idiom "I, for one, welcome our new [fill-in-the-blank] overlords", which is commonly used on Internet forums when a "participant vastly overstates the degree of oppression or social control expected to arise from the topic in question", or to express mock submission, usually for the purpose of humor.[6] The term has been used in the media, such as New Scientist magazine[7] and Ken Jennings on Jeopardy!.[8] Brockman's harangue about the Corvair spacecraft being taken over by a master race of giant space ants in "Deep Space Homer", which generated the meme, is considered to be one of the show's classic moments. The spacecraft was carrying an ant colony to see if they could be trained to sort tiny screws in space, but were released by Homer by accident. This led to an ant drifting by the video feed, appearing gigantic due to the perspective. Author Chris Turner called it "perhaps his finest hour as a journalist"[9] and said that it is "simply among the finest comedic moments in the history of television."[10]
Reception
The author of the book Planet Simpson, Chris Turner, said that "if the institution of the News has a single iconic face on The Simpsons, it's Brockman's"[11] and that "in Brockman's journalism, we see some of the modern news media's ugliest biases", of which he says are glibness,[11] amplification, and sensationalism.[12] MSN called Brockman one of the worst TV news anchors.[13]
"You Kent Always Say What You Want" was well received by critics. IGN called it the second best episode of the season.[14]
Merchandise
Playmates Toys created a Kent Brockman action figure for its World of Springfield toy line which was released in July 2001.[15]
See also
Notes
- ^ Krusty Gets Busted, BBC.co.uk. Retrieved on 2008-12-30.
- ^ "Krusty Gets Busted". The Simpsons.com. Retrieved on 2008-12-31.
- ^ a b Groening, Matt; Jean, Al (2003). Commentary for "Homer Defined", in The Simpsons: The Complete Third Season [DVD]. 20th Century Fox.
- ^ Bird, Brad; Wolodarsky, Wallace (2001). Commentary for "Krusty Gets Busted", in The Simpsons: The Complete First Season [DVD]. 20th Century Fox.
- ^ Woo, Stephanie. "The Scoop on The Simpsons: Journalism in U.S. Television's Longest Running Prime-Time Animated Series", pp. 5–8. Retrieved on 2008-12-31.
- ^ Turner, p. 293–294
- ^ "The British government welcomes our new insect overlords". New Scientist. http://www.newscientist.com/blog/space/2007/06/british-government-welcomes-our-new.html. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
- ^ Melissa Maerz (2011-02-16). "Watson wins 'Jeopardy!' finale; Ken Jennings welcomes 'our new computer overlords'". Los Angeles Times. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/showtracker/2011/02/watson-jeopardy-finale-man-vs-machine-showdown.html. Retrieved 2011-02-17.
- ^ Turner, p. 403
- ^ Turner, p. 69
- ^ a b Turner, p. 400
- ^ Turner, p. 402
- ^ Semel, Paul. "The Best & Worst TV News Anchors". MSN. http://tv.msn.com/tv/bestworstnewscasters-2/. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
- ^ Canning, Robert. "The Simpsons: "You Kent Always Say What You Want" Review: Number 400 delivers a classic.". IGN. http://tv.ign.com/articles/790/790235p1.html. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
- ^ "Series 5". The Simpsons Action Figure Information Station. http://figures.nohomers.net/WoS_Figures_Series_5.html. Retrieved 2008-12-31.
References
- Turner, Chris (2004). Planet Simpson: How a Cartoon Masterpiece Defined a Generation. Canada: Random House. ISBN 0-306-81341-6.
(HeD)p.e. (band) : Song I.F.O.
External links
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