Original air date: 12/1/2002
Production code: DABF-21
The family ends up on a 1900 House-type reality show after Lisa's newly-obtained hockey stick from a Russian player infests the house with termites.
Tropes:
- Accidental Murder: Marge and Lisa push a TV crew member down a cliff. Only they find out the cliff was too tall and the man can be heard screaming a long while, making both gasp.
- Americans Hate Tingle: In-universe. If the opening is to be believed, hockey is very unpopular in Springfield.
- Anachronism Stew:
- Bart complains about how Mutt and Jeff isn't funny. The reality show is set in 1895, and Mutt and Jeff was first published in 1907.
- Apu claims that Oreos were first made in 1896. They were actually introduced to the market in 1912. Even Hydrox cookies, which Oreos were an imitation of, were first sold in 1908.
- Bait-and-Switch: Bart has to wear a very feminine outfit, complete with curly wig, on reality TV, which he fears will get him beaten up. Marge says that his classmates will be jealous. Pan to the bullies standing outside, with Jimbo getting ready to jump Bart.Jimbo: God, I wish I had that little outfit.
Kearney: Yeah, those golden curls are to die for. - Big "NO!": The Simpsons' reaction upon realizing that they're going to a hockey game and not a basketball game.
- Celebrity Casualty: After TV ratings for the family's reality show begin to decline when the family stops fighting with one another, the producers send actor David Lander as his character Squiggy from Laverne & Shirley to stir things up. When that fails to get anybody fighting again, the producers deliberately set out to make the family miserable by relocating the 19th Century house to a river and watching it float downstream and over a waterfall, destroying the house and killing "Squiggy" in the process.
- Continuity Nod: Marge dyes her hair and doesn't want the secret to get out, as seen in "Secrets of a Successful Marriage."
- Disproportionate Retribution: Among the past things Homer will strangle Bart for, he's punished for "whistling on the Sabbath".
- End of an Age: This is the final episode aired to be animated with cels before permanently transitioning to digital ink and paint ("How I Spent My Strummer Vacation", which aired 3 weeks earlier, was the last produced episode using cel animation); digital animation had been experimented with before in a few preceding episodes (e.g. season 7's "Radioactive Man"), but after this episode, the technique became a mainstay.
- Epic Fail: Several people don't realize they're going to a hockey game until they see the sign at the stadium.
- Garden-Hose Squirt Surprise: At the end, Homer attempts to drink from the garden hose and gets squirted in the face three times (twice onscreen, and once offscreen).
- The Gay '90s: The Simpsons sign up for a reality show where they have to live like it's 1895.
- Gilligan Cut: When a pipe fell on Homer's head at the plant, Burns was afraid he'd hold out for millions. Cut to the next scene with Homer and the family going to a hockey game to enjoy the skybox. And Homer didn't even realize it was a hockey game before Lisa pointed it out. In fact, several people didn't realize they were going to a hockey game until they read the sign at the stadium.
- Good Is Boring: The Simpsons soon become much nicer after living a 19th-century lifestyle, but ratings plummet. Cue the network attempting to save the show by bringing in Squiggy.
- House Amnesia: A variant when Homer falls through the kitchen ceiling while on the toilet. Upon seeing Marge and Bart, he exclaims, "Hey!! Get out, I'm in here!" before it sinks in who's in the wrong room.
- Hypocritical Humor: Homer refuses to live as if it were 1895, saying they’d be unable to save Lincoln and Kennedy from being assassinated. When Moe points out he could save McKinley, Homer declares “It’s not a time machine, Moe.”
- Immediate Self-Contradiction: When the Simpsons ask the writers of the show for food, they comment they're not allowed to interfere with the show, just after they had put the Simpsons' house in a river. And just to rub salt in the wounds, he orders all the leftover food will be burned.
- Immoral Reality Show: The reality show that the Simpsons signed up to drops them without warning in the jungle (which destroys everything they own at the moment and kills actor David Lander ("Squiggy")) and the Simpsons team up at the climax with former contestants of a Survivor rip-off that were left behind by another production team... because the prize for the final challenge was being taken back to civilization.
- Inadvertent Entrance Cue: When termites start to infest the Simpsons' house, Bart complains that their "crap shack's going to hell," causing Marge to tell him, "Bart, watch your potty mouth!" Cue the upstairs toilet dropping through the ceiling with Homer on it.
- Laser-Guided Karma: The Simpsons team up with other groups that had also been abandoned by the television executives to get revenge on the writers.
- Of Corset Hurts: On the reality show, one clip shows Marge wearing a tight corset, and the camera zooms down to her horribly swollen feet.
- Oh, Crap!: Marge reflexively blurts out a personal secret when she's introduced to the confessional camera.Marge: (suddenly shuts herself into the confessional room and faces the camera) ... uh... heh heh... my hair isn't really blue... (Beat) GASP! I NEED THAT TAPE! (attacks the camera)
- Pop-Culture Pun Episode Title: The title is a reference to the song "Helter Skelter" from The Beatles' White Album.
- Shout-Out:
- The exterminator company's name was "A Bug's Death" and their truck had a design that resembled A Bug's Life.
- While the Simpsons' house is being fumigated, they act out the opening credits to King of the Hill, complete with theme music.
- Bart complains that his outfit for the reality show makes him look like Buster Brown.
- Teeth Flying: At the hockey game, an Ice-otopes player knocks out an opposing player's tooth. Cletus catches it and gives it to his daughter Gummy Sue, saying that it's her lucky day.
- Toilet Humour: One of the more interesting and literal examples in the series:Bart: [opens the kitchen door and the termite-damaged knob comes off] Hey Mom, our crapshack's going to Hell.
Marge: [offended] Bart, watch your potty mouth!
[Homer suddenly falls through the ceiling onto the kitchen table while still seated on the toilet]
Homer: [notices Marge and Bart] Hey, get out! I'm in here! [Beat] Oh. - Too Dumb to Live: Jimbo, Dolph, and Kearney sneak into the Simpsons house as it's being fumigated because they think it's a circus.
- You Monsters: Homer calls the television executives this through the confessional camera after learning they had put the house into the river, turning the show into a Survivor clone.
