The Telltale Head

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The Telltale Head
Season One Episode 8
Production Code	7G07
Original Airdate	February 25, 1990
Written By	Al Jean Mike Reiss Sam Simon Matt Groening
Directed By	Rich Moore
Show Runners	James L. Brooks Matt Groening Sam Simon
Special Guests
Blackboard Text	"I did not see Elvis"; one line reads "I did see Elvis"

"The Telltale Head" was the eighth episode of The Simpsons. The episode deals with Bart pulling a questionable stunt that shocks the entire town. The title is a play on Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart.

Plot

Homer and Bart are chased through the streets of Springfield by an angry mob while carrying the head of the statue of their town founder. Someone has sawn off the head of the statue of town founder Jebediah Springfield. Surrounded by the surly crA wiki site just for the Simpsons universeowd, Bart pleads for understanding and relates the events of the previous day. As the story unfolds, Bart borrows $5.00 from Homer and sneaks away to see Space Mutants IV at the local movie theater. On his way, he runs into a gang of troublemakers. One of them, Jimbo, invites Bart to sneak into the movies with him and his buddies.

Later, as the boys throw rocks at Jebediah's statue, Jimbo wishes someone would cut off the statue's head. When Bart tries to defend the town's hero, Jimbo and the boys laugh at him. To be cool, Bart sneaks out of the house that night and saws the statue's head off.

The next day, all of Springfield grieves the decapitation of the town founder. Bart finds Jimbo and his pals and discovers they are as distraught as everyone else. Jimbo tells Bart that the decapitating was just cloud talk and they hope to meet the 'one who done this,' so they can break every bone on his body. Feeling scared, Bart decides not to tell. Feeling remorse, Bart returns home and confesses to his family. As Homer (who also feels more than a little responsible for this incident) takes Bart to place the head back on the statue, they are confronted by the angry mob. Bart tells the crowd that his act has united the town and taught people to appreciate their heritage. The townspeople agree, the head is placed back into the statue, and Bart is forgiven.

Cultural references

• The episode title is a reference to the short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" by Edgar Allan Poe. In addition, Bart actually hears the head talking when he is overcome with guilt. The story is also very similar to Paul Jennings' "Headley Hopkins".
• The Bridge over the River Kwai - the line "What have I done?"
• When Bart awakes to a find the head of Jebediah Springfield in bed next to him, it is reminiscent of the scene from "The Godfather" where Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall) "persuades" Woltz to cast Fontane in the movie by leaving the head of the producer's prize racehorse in his bed.
• Homer reads about a bowling ball called "The Hammer of Thor" that will "send your pins to Valhalla."
• When Bart wakes up, he says "Top of the world, Ma!", referring to the final scene of White Heat.

Debut Appearances

Characters making a first appearance in this episode are:

• Reverend Timothy Lovejoy
• Sideshow Bob
• Jimbo
• Kearney
• Dolph
• Ms. Albright (Sunday School Teacher)
• Apu

Trivia

• Announcer: "Wolodarsky takes it at the 5... oh my, he fumbles," reference to show writer-producer Wallace Wolodarsky.
• This is the first episode in which Tress MacNeille takes part.
• Sideshow Bob's hair evolves from a huge red afro, while Barney Gumble appears with brown hair for the first time.
• This is one of five Simpsons episodes to display the title on the screen, excluding the Treehouse of Horror episodes. The others are "Bart Gets Hit by a Car", "22 Short Films About Springfield", "The Simpsons Spin-Off Showcase" and "The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular".
• This episode has been referenced twice in the television series South Park. In "Simpsons Already Did It", Butters, as "Professor Chaos" cuts the head off a statue in South Park to wreak havoc on society, but is foiled when he realizes that, not only have The Simpsons already done this, but the townspeople would prefer to leave the statue headless in order to be reminded of The Simpsons. Second, in "Cartoon Wars Part II", Cartman visits the FOX studios in order to convince the network prsident to cancel Family Guy, but, before he can have a meeting with him, he finds Bart Simpson (in a reference to the fact that many of The Simpsons writers, like Matt Stone and Trey Parker, also dislike Family Guy) has an appointment ahead of him. When Cartman asks Bart what the worst thing he's ever done is, Bart replies "I cut the head off a statue once", to which Cartman wins the argument when he said that, "I once didn't like a kid, so I chopped his parents into chili and forced him to eat it", a reference to Scott Tenorman Must Die
• The Season 1 DVD boxset is missing two scenes from the episode: one where Bart told the crowd that, after decapitating the town statue, he realized he was taking his heritage for granted (an issue that would later resurface in Season 7's "Lisa the Iconoclast"), and another with church bells ringing. It is rumoured that these scenes, which add up to 28 seconds, were added to comply with an FCC regulation that all cartoons must include this length of educational content.
• The DVD does, however, contain two scenes that were not in the original broadcast; an extended remark from Otto ("It's beautiful, man!"; "man" was not in the original broadcast), and Homer telling Bart that "most lynch mobs aren't this nice". These scenes add to five seconds; note, however, that the run time for this episode on the Season 1 DVD set is 22:42, and the run time for its original broadcast is 23:05. Bart mentions earlier in the episode that the story takes "about 23 minutes and five seconds" to tell; the story itself is only 17 minutes and 10 seconds, though this more likely refers to the length of the full episode.
• This is the first episode where Bart is seen skateboarding outside of the introduction.
• In The Simpsons Road Rage, if you drive into the Jebediah Springfield Statue, the head falls off.
• In The Simpsons Hit and Run, you can remove the head with a kick or by driving into it.
• While Bart is telling the story Barney is seen with brown hair. But when Bart puts the head back on the statue you can see Barney with yellow hair.