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“Homer Defined” is the fifth episode of The Simpsons’ third season, airing on October 17, 1991. The episode marks the first appearance of Milhouse’s mother and the first time his surname, Van Houten, is used. It is also the second Simpsons episode where it is suggested that Smithers might be gay, with “The Telltale Head” being the first.

The episode featured the first appearance of a professional athlete in the series, Magic Johnson. At the end of the episode, he slips and lands by the feet of several beautiful women who admire him. Shortly after this episode aired, Johnson went public with the fact he has HIV as the result of having had extramarital relationships with over 200 women.

On this episode’s original airing, Burns tells Smithers “there’s nothing left but to kiss my sorry butt goodbye”, and Bart says “Bad influence, my ass!” to Milhouse. On the repeat on February 27, 1992, Burns’ line changes to “there’s nothing left to do but kiss my sorry ass goodbye”, and Bart’s changes to “Bad influence, my butt!”.

Plot
Meanwhile, at the power plant, as Homer eats jelly donuts, one of them splatters onto a dial nearing the red zone. The plant is on the verge of a nuclear meltdown, and Homer seems to be the only person who can stop it. He has no skills and cannot remember any training, however, and in desperation chooses a button via eeny, meeny, miny, moe. Miraculously, Homer presses the button that averts the meltdown; Springfield is saved, and Homer is honored as a hero.

Mr. Burns rewards Homer for saving the plant with an “Employee of the Month” award (displacing longtime holder Smithers), a ham, a plaque, a discount coupon book, Burns’ personal “thumbs-up”, and a call from Magic Johnson. Even Lisa begins to admire Homer as a role model, but Homer’s conscience haunts him. He knows (and fears that everyone else will realize) that his “heroism” was nothing but luck. Burns introduces Homer to Aristotle “Ari” Amadopoulos, the owner of the Shelbyville Nuclear Power Plant. Ari wants Homer the hero to give a pep talk to his plant’s lackluster workers. Homer is hesitant to accept, but Burns forces him into it.

As Homer gives his fumbling “motivational” speech, an impending meltdown threatens the Shelbyville plant. The crowd marches Homer to the control room, asking him to perform his heroic deeds once again. In front of everyone, Homer repeats his juvenile rhyme and presses a button blindly. By sheer dumb luck, he manages to avert this meltdown as well. He is even more widely derided as a lucky imbecile than he was hailed as a hero, and “to pull a Homer” becomes a widely-used phrase meaning “to succeed despite idiocy” (even entering the dictionary illustrated with a small portrait of Homer).

Subplot
On the bus ride to school, Bart gives Milhouse one of a pair of Krusty walkie-talkies as a birthday present. Bart is crushed to discover that Milhouse had held a birthday party the previous Saturday, but he had not been invited. Milhouse seems unwilling to talk to Bart and avoids him for the rest of the day.

Milhouse finally tells Bart why he was not invited to the party: Mrs. Van Houten thinks Bart is a bad influence on her son. She has ordered Milhouse to stay away from Bart, which he has reluctantly done. Suddenly deprived of his best friend, Bart resorts to playing with Maggie.

Marge visits Milhouse’s mother to try to repair their children’s friendship. Marge admits that Bart really does influence Milhouse badly, but begs Mrs. Van Houten to let Bart and Milhouse be friends again. Upon realizing that both Bart and Milhouse are miserable without each other, his mother relents. At that rate, Milhouse invites Bart over to his house, and Bart happily pulls out a BB gun to “play” with.

Cultural references
Homer Defined features many references to nuclear incidents. The news coverage of the crisis at the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant parodies the coverage of the Three Mile Island accident in 1979. The children duck under their desks in a fashion taught to elementary school students during the early years Cold War in the 60s. When Homer stops the first meltdown, the timer stops on 007. This is reminiscent of Goldfinger at the end where James Bond stops a timer on a bomb and the timer ends on 007, his agent number. The timer in the plant also looks exactly like the one in the movie.

While desperate, Homer looks back to his nuclear plant training and sees himself attempting to solve the Rubik’s Cube. He then blames the puzzle for distracting him. Otto hums Frankenstein by The Edgar Winter Group while driving the bus to the Kwik-E-Mart.