Home Sweet Homediddly-Dum-Doodily
From Simpsons Wiki
"Home Sweet Homediddly-Dum-Doodily" is the third episode of The Simpsons' seventh season, which originally aired October 1, 1995. This episode's opening scene parodies a deleted scene from the episode "Some Enchanted Evening", as Marge makes breakfast almost exactly the same way as she does in that scene.
Contents |
Plot
Homer gives Marge a surprise trip to a relaxation center, leaving the children under the ineffective care of Grampa. Meanwhile, Bart has gotten lice from Milhouse's new pet monkey, forcing him to have his clothes burned in the school furnace. Lisa has had her prescription shoes stolen by her former friends, who say she has cooties. After Lisa denies this, the school intercom announces for Lisa Simpson to report to the nurses office for headlice inspection. The children go home wearing potato sacks, finding that their parents are not home, and the child welfare agency, prompted by Principal Skinner, has taken offense at the poor conditions of the house. Most of the work needing to be done has simply been postponed, but the agency misinterprets such signals as a stack of 20-year-old newspapers obtained for Lisa's history project. Homer and Marge arrive as the two snobbish welfare agents take Bart, Lisa and Maggie, convinced Marge and Homer are bad parents.
The Simpson kids are taken to a foster home - right next door, at the house of Ned Flanders. The kids have to get used to Flanders' style nachos (cucumbers with cottage cheese), bedtime at seven-o-clock with the sunlight still out, and hours of Bible bombardment. Bart and Lisa hate it, but Maggie enjoys being there (just because she's a baby). When Ned finds out that none of the Simpsons were baptized, he faints and takes it upon himself to give the kids an emergency baptism.
Meanwhile, there's no way for Homer and Marge to talk to their children, even by phone. They are forced to attend parenting classes, where they learn home care, such as putting garbage into garbage cans and leaving milk either in a refrigerator or a cool, wet sack. Marge is genuinely humiliated, while Homer seems to have learnt a lot. After some blood tests, they are declared decent parents. When they go to pick up the kids, they see only a note at the Flanders' saying "Gone Baptizin'". They quickly head for the Springfield River. Homer gets there ahead of the others, just as Flanders is about to pour holy water on Bart's head. (Baptism as practiced by Protestant and Evangelical congregations tend not to involve the use of holy water at all.) Homer dives at Bart, shoving Bart over and the holy water splashes on Homer's head, baptizing him and apparently burning him. Homer has a moment of grace after his baptism but quickly reverts back to his old self and angrily reclaims his kids from Flanders. Nevertheless, Maggie would rather stay with the Flanders than with her real family until Marge shows up. The Simpson family is back together again, and they head home together, mocking the old paint cans in Ned's garage.
Production
When the Simpson kids arrive at Flanders, Ned says "welcome to your new home, neglect-areenos!". The line was originally written as "Welcome to your new home, abuse-areenos!". It was changed because it was found to be offensive to children who really are abused. The original line was mentioned by Matt Groening in the season 7 DVD commentary, which was met with groans of distaste and laughter by the other commentators.
Censorship
- On the flashback of Bart and Milhouse playing with the monkey, Milhouse says he got the wicker basket from Pier One Imports, who took offense to this line and the rebroadcast changed the line to "Trader Pete's" (the UK version keeps in the Pier One reference since Pier One isn't well known in the UK), but the Pier One reference is intact in syndicated versions and on the season seven DVD set.
Cultural references
- While the Flanders were driving to the Springfield river with the Simpsons' children, Maggie, who was sitting at the front row, spun her head around to look at Bart and Lisa. This is a parody of the infamous head-spinning scene from The Exorcist.
- Milhouse being sick after playing with a capuchin monkey is a reference to the 1995 film Outbreak.