The Seemingly Never-Ending Story is the thirteenth episode of the seventeenth season of The Simpsons, and the ninth Emmy Award-winning episode. It originally aired in the United States on March 12, 2006. The title is a take-off from the novel The Neverending Story, by Michael Ende, and the 1984 Wolfgang Petersen film of the same name.This episode was rated TV14-DL in the US, the ninth time for The Simpsons.
Couch gag: The couch and family are delivered on a conveyor belt. Homer is added with a metal claw.
Chalkboard: none
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While Homer is trapped in a cave, Lisa tells him a story from her past, vaguely similar to the episode “22 Short Films About Springfield.”
Synopsis
While visiting a cave (called “Carl’s Dad Caverns, a parody of Carlsbad Caverns), Homer meddles with a very fragile stalactite, with the result that the whole family ends up in a hidden cavern below the main tour—with Homer stuck in a narrow hole, half in and half out of the cavern. Noting that this cave is not on the tour’s map, Marge and Bart go off to find an exit. Homer is afraid to be left alone in his position, so Lisa stays with him. To pass the time, she begins to tell a story.
Lisa tells how, the week before, she had been out for a walk when a big-horned goat inexplicably attacked her; she ran to the nearest shelter, Charles Montgomery Burns’ house. The animal bursts in, and she and Mr. Burns wind up in the attic and block the entrance with boxes. There, Lisa finds a photo of Mr. Burns as an employee at Moe’s, and he tells her the origins of it.
Mr. Burns explains that once, he and the Rich Texan were involved in a scavenger hunt, the winner of which would get all the possessions of the loser. The items consisted of ridiculous things like Frank Grimes’ tombstone. Mr. Burns was unable to find the last item on the list—a picture of himself with a smiling child. (Every child was terrified of him. Milhouse exclaimed “It’s the boogeyman’s grandfather!”) The Texan won, and Mr. Burns had to go and work at Moe’s. While there, he found a note hidden under a pickled egg jar to be opened when Moe Szyslak died, which led to Moe’s story of a hidden treasure.
The summer before Edna Krabappel began teaching, she and Moe meet when he is hit by a bus. They fall in love, without Edna knowing he owns a bar (at the time, she hated bar owners since her ex-husband was an alcoholic). Scared that Edna will find out the truth about him, Moe wants to leave Springfield with her but has no money. He then discovers that Snake Jailbird — who used to be an idealistic archaeologist — had discovered a large batch of Mayan coins he was going to donate to the museum. Moe steals them, turning Snake to a life of crime. Moe is then about to leave town with Edna, but when she goes to school to explain that she is quitting, she sees Bart. (This leads to her story.) Bart explains he had all-summer detention, and feels he is a lost cause because no one believes in him. Edna declares that come the next year, when she teaches fourth grade, she will help him to succeed. (It turns out, however, that Bart was actually just distracting Edna while he and Nelson steal microscopes and computers.) After explaining her decision to Moe, he flies into a rage and screams at her while dumping out her luggage before driving away to his tavern.
Utterly depressed, Moe puts priceless coins in his jukebox, playing their love theme over and over again. Mr. Burns (here ends Moe’s story) opened up the jukebox and gave the coins to the Texan to buy back his things, but the Texan demanded that Mr. Burns produce a picture of himself with a smiling child before he could get the plant back. (The Texan, he explained, has Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, thus feeling the need to complete the scavenger hunt.) Mr. Burns ends his story and he explains to Lisa that he cannot get the plant back.
Just then, the goat bursts into the attic. Mr. Burns hurts himself defending Lisa by placing himself in front of Lisa. It turns out that the goat doesn’t want to kill them—in its story (which lasts but a few seconds) it explains that it found Lisa’s pearl necklace on a branch and was merely trying to return it. Lisa, in gratitude to Mr. Burns for his attempted rescue, takes a photo of the two together with her smiling. This exits to the cave scene.
Homer breaks free of his trap, and reveals that he had an ulterior motive for bringing the family to the caves. He tells a story, explaining that while in the woods (hiding from babysitting duty), he saw the Texan hide the gold coins in the cave while singing a song, and brought the family so they could search for the gold to pay an operation for Bart, (about which no one knows, including Bart). Just then, the Texan shows up, and the gold is found behind a rock by Mr. Burns, Moe, and Snake (in that order), and they enter a Mexican standoff. Everyone has guns except for Moe, who makes gun noises with his mouth. Snake had also brought his son as it is their weekend together. Marge grabs the bag and threatens to drop it down a deep pit if they don’t end their standoff. When she discovers the depth of their greed, she drops it—and instantly, everyone realizes how greedy they had been, and go out to volunteer as a way of atoning for their sins, with the exception of Mr. Burns, who attempts to climb down to get the gold.
Suddenly, it is revealed that the whole episode has all been a story by Bart, being told to Seymour Skinner as an explanation for why he didn’t have time to study for a geography test. The principal finds this ridiculous — until he sees Moe and Edna kissing outside, meaning they’ve finally got back together.
The Stories
Lisa’s Story 1
- Lisa was walking home from school when a goat came up to her. She ran to Mr. Burns’s house and he let her in. The goat got through the window and chased them through Mr. Burns’s house. They run up the stairs and go up the attic. Lisa finds out that Mr. Burns worked at Moe’s.
Mr. Burns‘ Story 1
- Mr. Burns was a member of a club. A new member, The Texan, came in and he challenged him to a duel. They both get a list of 10 items. The first person to get all the items is the winner and gets all the other person’s stuff. The last item was a photo with a child smiling. Mr. Burns went in the school bus to get the picture. He couldn’t get it. The Texan wins all Burns’ stuff. Mr. Burns started working at Moe’s as a bar boy. He wasn’t getting enough money. One day he was cleaning Moe’s bar when he found a letter beneath the jar with those eggs.
Moe’s Story 1
- Moe was walking downtown and was hit by a bus. Edna came out and helped him. To impress her, Moe steals a bag full of rare, antique coins from Snake Jailbird, who was not yet a criminal, but an archaeologist. Moe closes the tavern. He and Edna decide to leave town. Edna goes to the school to tell them that she wouldn’t be teaching there in the fall.
Edna’s Story
- Edna went into the school and found Bart with detention all summer. She decides to stay at Springfield Elementary School as a fourth grade teacher.
Moe’s Story 2
- Edna tells Moe that she is staying in Springfield to teach the children. Moe gets angry at Edna and drives off. Depressed, he uses the coins he stole to listen to the jukebox in his bar rather than spend them.
Mr. Burns‘ Story 2
- Mr. Burns finishes the letter and steals the money out of the jukebox. He then goes to the Texan and gives him the money but the Texan won’t give everything back until he gets a photo of Mr. Burns with a smiling child.
Lisa’s Story 2
- The goat gets up to the attic and attacks Mr. Burns. The goat gives Lisa her pearl necklace.
The Goat’s Story
- The goat was walking one day and found Lisa’s pearl necklace on a tree.
Lisa’s Story 3
- Lisa gets the camera and takes a picture of her with Mr. Burns and Mr. Burns gets his plant back.
Homer’s Story
- Homer discovers that the Texan has hid the gold in the caves and brings the family with him so they can help him search for the gold to pay for an operation for Bart.
Bart’s Story
- Bart explains the reason he was sitting in the desk when Edna Krabappel found him there, it was because he was helping Nelson.
Cultural references
- The episode’s title, “The Seemingly Never-Ending Story”, is a parody of the book The Neverending Story by Michael Ende.
- Commander McBragg (Maurice LaMarche), a character from the 1960s cartoon Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales, calls the scavenger hunt duel. He had pink skin in the original version, but of course in the Simpsons’ world, was recoloured yellow.
- When we see the club Mr. Burns was a part of for the first time, you can see Rich Uncle Pennybags, mascot of the game Monopoly. He was previously seen in “Thirty Minutes over Tokyo” and “A Hunka Hunka Burns in Love.”
- Moe and Edna’s love theme song (which Moe played in the jukebox) is “Fly Me to the Moon” by Bart Howard, as sung by Frank Sinatra.
- Numerous scenes feature music from Beethoven’s 6th Symphony (when Lisa has to deal with the big horn sheep) and Aaron Copland’s “Hoe Down.”
Reception
This episode won an Emmy in 2006 for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour), beating out South Park’s “Trapped in the Closet” and Family Guy’s “PTV.”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seemingly_Never-Ending_Story
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