While at the beach this past weekend, I happened to re-read To Kill a Mockingbird. I don’t even know why this occurred to me, but it struck me as odd that such a ubiquitous reference such as “Boo Radley” has never been turned into a joke on “the Simpsons.” Especially since the kid characters involved in that story have ready-made Simpson counterparts: Jem = Bart, Scout = Lisa, and Dill = Milhouse. I imagined the three of them becoming obsessed with the identity of a reclusive shut-in living down the street from the Simpson house, spending an episode trying to get him to come out, then finding out it was Hans Moleman, and promptly telling him to go back inside.
Then I got to thinking what else choice tidbits from pop culture history haven’t been made fun of by the yellow-hued, three-fingered quintet? I made my own shortlist of utterly random bits…
Truman Capote’s black & white ball.
the tv show “Zoom.”
the increasingly ornery attitude of Bill Cosby.
Michael Jackson dangling a baby over the balcony.
the movie “Freaks.”
internet chat-rooms such as “the Straight Dope Message Boards.”
the X-Men.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer (I always expected them to do “Lisa, the Ghoul Killer” or similar bit on one of the Halloween special; but no.)
Martha Stewart going to jail (but maybe that’s too recent an event for them to have produced an animated 30-minute episode about.)
the Moldavian wedding massacre on “Dynasty”.
Fan debates on if & when the Simpsons stopped being funny.
This example led me to reflect that there seem to be surprisingly few specific comic book references on The Simpsons…I mean, examples of specific characters from superhero-oriented comic books (not comic strips like Peanuts) being parodied or even just mentioned. Homer turns into a sort of Hulk figure in one episode, Adam West makes an appearance as Batman (but these are both TV references, not just comic book references). Comic Book Guy will sometimes make a crack about a specific comic in his store, and there are the fake comic book characters (Radioactive Man)…but no parodies of Superman, Spiderman, Thor, Captain America, etc…Is this impression mistaken? (If this is not a hijack of your original question.)
The two most specific ones that come to mind are:
[ul][li]Homer (at Mr. Burns’ direction) purchasing a recognizable copy of Spider-Man#1 from Comic-Book Guy then eating it, sending CBG into convulsions.[/li][*]Homer finding and casually dismissing a recognizable copy of Action Comics#1 at a garage sale.[/ul]
Did this one. (Don’t remember episode, so I’m paraphrasing here):
Homer is babysitting Rod and Todd and they watch “Kids Say the Darndest Things” Bill Cosby is the host and he turns a comment about Pokemon into one of his usual indecipherable routines. “Pokemon! With the pokey and the mon!” <gibberish and silly dancing>
Did this one too. (Don’t remember the episode):
They all went to an Internet cafe. Bart pretended to be Mary, “40’s, heavy and willing to settle” and a few chairs away Lenny got excited. Then Homer started buying Cayman Island stocks, and Snake came to rob everyone. He sees Homer’s portfolio, puts in a disk and steals it while the bar chart depletes on the screen. Then he says “Adios, backslash losers!”
I guess you didn’t see Saddlesore Galactica. (Understandable, as it was pretty unwatchable):
CBG: "Excuse me, I believe this family already had a horse, and the expense forced Homer to work at the Kwik-E-Mart, with hilarious results.
Homer: Anybody care what this guy thinks?
Crowd: No!
Then later when Marge thinks she may have a gambling problem, CBG shows up with a shirt that says Worst Episode Ever and says “I’m watching you!”
And over the end credits he actually says “Worst. Episode. Ever!”
In the episode (Helter Shelter) where the Simpsons’ move to a 19th C. house as a reality show (“1895 Challenge”), it shows Bill Cosby auditioning for the show, wherein he goes off on his ornery tangent. (The exact wording escapes me, but the TV Exec says “The Cosbys? Let’s get a family that hasn’t been on TV for forever. How about, The Simpsons?”)
The Simpsons have been doing chatroom and BBS parodies since the internet craze first hit.
CBG: alt.nerd.obsessive. Need know star RM Man pic. (Followed by a convoluted series of nerds passing the message round and spying on the production meeting)
Message boards have evolved a bit form the old AOL standard, but you can’t say they haven’t done it.
In the episode where CBG has a heart attack and Bart and Millhouse run the store, they are sold a whole heap of comics about an extremely nerdy, goggles-wearing hero called “Biclops”. Particularly given the nerdy image Cyclops was given in the movies I think this counts as a definite X-men parody.
I think that the reason why some of these haven’t been done is that they aren’t well-known enough. I’m not a pop-culture expert, nor do I consider myself a total philistine. I’m a pretty average man-in-the street.
And I have never seen an episode of “Zoom”.
I have no idea what Truman Capote’s black & white ball is.
I wouldn’t know a “Freaks” reference if it gave me a haircut.
I am aware enough of ‘Buffy’ that I could spot a really blatant parody, but I’ve never watched an episode, so subtle references will be lost.
The Moldavian wedding massacre, huh? I know the whole 5-year dream sequence and the “Who shot JR line” from “Dallas” which have both been parodied on the Simpsons, but have no idea what Moldavian wedding massacre parody would be like.
A lot of Simpson’s pop-culture references are throwaway lines, rather than important plot points. 2 seconds of “Wonder Years” voiceover, a brief view of “biclops”, Homer’s discovery of a can of Billy Beer, “Ich bin eine Springfielder” and so on. For even some of the audience to get the references they need to be pretty well known icons for the general population, or else unimportant enough that the audience won’t lose if they don’t get the reference.
And of course there was the whole upside down kiss thing from the Spiderman movie parodied in the episode where Homer became The Pieman. Once again though, this has received so much publicity and so many other parodies and the movie was so popular that it’s easy to use.
They did this one in the first season. After the family embarrasses Homer at a company picnic at Mr. Burns’ house, he imagines them beckoning him to join them in the car by chanting, “One of us! One of us!”
This was done the season before last. Homer leaves Marge in a huff after finding out about an 11-year old slight and moves into an apartment with a couple gay guys where he undergoes a “queer eye” makeover.
In one of the earliest episodes (the one where they seek counseling with Dr. Marvin Monroe), Homer hears his family chanting “One of us! One of us!”, which is a clear Freaks reference (even the family’s drawn a bit satanically).
Truman Capote gave a Black and White Ball in November 1966, with Washington Post publisher Katharine Graham as the guest of honor. It was considered the social event of that and the next several seasons.
Another previously unmentioned comic book parody was in a Treehouse of Horror when Bart and Lisa got super-powers.