Recap / The Simpsons S13 E9 "Jaws Wired Shut"

Original air date: 1/27/2002 (produced in 2001)

Production code: DABF-05

To escape a gay pride parade marching by their house, The Simpsons take in a movie, but all the cheesy trailers and useless trivia fillers wear on Homer's nerves, and he instigates a riot. While escaping the ushers, Homer runs out of the theater — and fractures his jaw on Drederick Tatum's unveiled park statue. With Homer's jaw wired shut, the only thing he can do is listen to his family and friends, and suddenly becomes a kinder, gentler Homer, which is nice at first, but soon, Marge misses Homer and his brash, wacky ways.

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This episode contains examples of:

• Artistic License – Medicine: Contrary to what the episode indicates, you can talk if your jaw is wired shut. Writer Matt Selman did not know this at the time he wrote the episode but later found out from fellow Simpsons writer Brian Kelley, who had undergone the procedure himself, but didn't bring it up because he didn't want to blow a hole in the premise.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • Before the previews, the movie screen shows a word jumble for celebrity names. One seems to obviously spell Tom Hanks, before it's revealed to be "Otm Shank". According to Apu, "He is India's answer to Brian Dennehy".
  • Marge hears Homer shout out "I'm going to kill you!" and thinks Homer has already gone back to his old ways. It turns out that he was reading the title of a play he was helping Bart prepare for.
    • This is then followed by Homer greeting an academic, with a tone implying that he’s reading the dialogue. Then an actual academic appears on camera to note that they’re rehearsing a play.
  • Homer's reaction to finding out that the Gay Pride Parade is passing by at first sounds like he's scared or bigoted towards it, until he lets out a "whoo-hoo!", indicating that his tone was excitement.
  • At one point in the movies, after several minutes of previews, it says "And now, our Feature Presentation." As Homer gets excited, an announcer pronounces an ad that says "If that's a phrase you'd like to hear, then you'll love Movie Call!" This finally sends Homer into a rage.
• Berserk Button: Prolonging the movie in the cinema with plenty of previews and ads is bound to gradually set Homer off.
• The Bore: Deconstructed. While Marge usually takes this trope and holds onto it, she relies on Homer to counterbalance it to bring excitement to her life. When Homer's becomes normal and thoughtful, she finds it painfully dull and goes into a dangerous situation in a desperate attempt for excitement.
• Charlie Chaplin Shout-Out: The Couch Gag for this episode.
• Closet Gay: One of the parade floats celebrates people who make the choice to not come out:
  From behind the door of a "closet" on the float
  Smithers: We're gay, we're glad!
  Patty: But don't tell mom and dad!
• Comically Missing the Point:
  • Marge's reaction to the "Stayin' In The Closet" float in the gay pride parade mentioned below under Foreshadowing is commenting how nice it would be if the man and woman inside the closet ended up together.
  • Duffman shows up at Moe's to challenge everyone to a trivia question to identify a certain beverage based on how he describes it. Homer is the only one who figures out it's beer but is unable to speak so he has to figure out another way to convey the answer. He goes as far as to push one of Moe's beer taps but the only reaction he gets is a complaint from Moe, who doesn't even bother to mention the name of the liquid Homer is wetting him with.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Homer's X-Ray shows the crayon in his brain that was discovered in "HOMR".
  • The float honoring the Gay Steel Workers of America.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: A masked driver in the demolition derby absolutely trashes every car, including Marge's, without ever getting hit. It gets ridiculous as said vehicle is still shown beating the already wrecked cars in "beating a dead horse" fashion.
• Department of Redundancy Department: When Lisa realizes that Homer really wants to hear about her day, Homer wipes the blackboard and writes 'Yes' twice.
• Destination Ruse: Luanne got Milhouse to go on a talk show with the segment entitled "My Son Still Wets The Bed" by telling him they were going to Red Lobster. When Milhouse finds out, he's not happy.
• Disrupting the Theater: Homer leads the other moviegoers into a riot when the movie seems to be taking forever to start, prompting the employees to chase him out with oversized candy bars.
• Edible Bludgeon: When Homer causes a ruckus at the theater, the Squeaky-Voiced Teen and his fellow ushers threaten and pursue Homer wielding "movie-sized" Kit Kat bar pieces.
• Everyone Has Standards: Even Flanders joins in with Homer's ruckus decrying the numerous trailers.
• Foreshadowing: One float in the gay pride parade is "Stayin' In The Closet", where a man (obviously Smithers) and a woman (sounding like Patty or Selma) say "We're gay, we're glad!" and "But don't tell Mom and Dad!". In Season 16's "There's Something About Marrying", Patty finally comes out as a lesbian.
• Heel Realization:
  • Parodied in a scene where Bart talks with head-braced Homer and expresses his disgust with the realization that he's expected to be a trouble-making class clown.
  • Homer himself realizes what a Jerkass he's been and becomes a quiet, well-mannered person. It doesn't last.
• Heh Heh, You Said "X": Bart tells Homer that his class had a substitute teacher named "Mrs. Doody", and everyone expected him to make fun of her name. Homer listens to Bart's story, but still can't resist giggling to himself.
• Hidden Depths: Homer discovers a few of these in his family members when he has no choice but to listen to them. Marge, like him, finds Ned Flanders annoying, and Bart is unhappy in his role as designated Class Clown.
• Hope Spot: After many previews, the narrator says "And now, our feature presentation..."
  Homer: (sighs in relief)
  Narrator: If that's a phrase you like to hear, then you'll love MovieCall!
  Homer: (screaming in fury) Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh!
• Intentionally Awkward Title: An in-story example. When Marge hears Homer angrily shout "I'm gonna kill you!", she assumes he lapsed back into his old habits, only for it to turn out that he and Bart were rehearsing a play that just so happened to be titled I'm Gonna Kill You.
• Jerkass Has a Point: As crazy as it was to incite a riot at the theater, Homer did have a right to be infuriated with how long the theater was holding up the movie.
• Liquid Courage: Homer says that he can't rescue Marge until he has beer.
• Movie-Theater Episode: The first act of this episode has Simpson family go to the movie theater to escape a Gay Pride parade marching by their house. Homer becomes impatient waiting for the movie to start due to the cheesy trailers and useless trivia, and leads the theater audience into a riot, prompting the employees to chase him out with oversized candy.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: One of the talk show hosts is modeled on Barbara Walters, complete with Elmuh Fudd Syndwome.
• No More for Me: Upon seeing a gay dog parade, Maggie stops drinking her milk bottle and tosses it aside.
• "No Talking or Phones" Warning: There's a pre-movie Itchy and Scratchy short called "To Kill a Talking Bird", in which a duck can't stop chattering on his cell phone, leading Itchy to switch it out with a dynamite stick which blasts the duck down to a skeleton. Itchy then slices Scratchy's stomach open and pulls out his intestines to write "Please no talking" on the movie screen.
• Noodle Incident: Whatever happened at the last Annual Springfield Formal Event. We see a picture of it in the "Local Man Ruins Everything" image, and Marge implies the donkey was responsible, but we get no further details.
• Public Domain Soundtrack:
  • "Flight of the Bumblebee" plays when Maggie's pacifier gets stuck in the wiring of Homer's head brace and he swings her around, attempting to get her off.
  • Two of the music pieces that play during the formal are Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, and Johann Strauss' "Beautiful Blue Danube".
• The Quiet One: Homer while in the brace which prevents him from talking, aside from a few instances where he groans understandable words like "Broken jaw?!" through his teeth. In a way, it's subverted in that we hear his thoughts.
• Sad Clown: Homer discovers that Bart is this.
  Bart: So the substitute teacher comes in and says her name is Mrs. Doody. And everyone's lookin' at me like, "Take it, Bart! Run with it!" Then it hits me. I've become a clown. ...A Class Clown. And it sickens me!
• Shout-Out:
  • The "Lesbians of the Caribbean" float in the gay pride parade is an obvious parody of the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction at the Disney Theme Parks.
  • Bart squeezes some beer out of a can into Homer's mouth so his father can have the courage needed to save Marge from the Demolition Derby, just like Popeye squeezing spinach out of a can to become much stronger. The Popeye theme plays in the background while this is happening, which is followed by Homer flexing his bicep with an image representing power (though unlike Popeye, who usually has a tank or a turbine, Homer has a beer in a glass). He even talks like Popeye after doing so. Homer later gives a donkey some beer and music resumes until the donkey falls down. When Homer comes to save Marge, she jiggles her arms and cries for help like Olive Oyl in the classic cartoons.
  • Bongo from Matt Groening's comic Life in Hell makes a cameo appearance in the Itchy and Scratchy short as part of the moviegoing crowd.
  • The title is a reference to the 1999 film Eyes Wide Shut.
  • One of the movies on the theater marquee is Final Chapter: A New Beginning.
• Suicide as Comedy: Apparently, Dr. Hibbert has a suicide machine (a wooden chair with syringes fixed to it) which Homer tries to use once fitted with the brace but apparently it only causes "sexual release" for a man Homer's size.
• Take That!:
  • One of the reasons the film they intended to see at the beginning of the episode is rated PG-13 is due to brief rudeness and scenes featuring Garry Shandling.
  • Ed O'Neill being the star of a crummy kids' movie is a burn against him starring in Dutch and a burn against Ed O'Neill's difficulty in trying to find another acting job after Married... with Children's cancellation.
• Troll: The cineplex the family goes to does this to the audience. See Bait-and-Switch above.
• Uptight Loves Wild: Homer giving up his wild card behavior leaves a void in Marge's life.
• We Want Our Jerk Back!: Marge can't stand mild-mannered Homer. Played With when it comes to Bart.
  Bart: Isn't it great to have the old Dad back?
  Lisa: I thought you liked the new Dad.
  Bart: Whatever.

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