Diatribe of a Mad Housewife
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| The Simpsons episode | |
| "Diatribe of a Mad Housewife" | |
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| Episode no. | 323 |
| Prod. code | FABF05 |
| Orig. Airdate | January 25, 2004 |
| Writer(s) | Robin J. Stein |
| Director(s) | Mark Kirkland |
| Chalkboard | None |
| Couch gag | The family members each pop out of an apple pie. |
| Guest star(s) | Tom Clancy, Thomas Pynchon, and Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen |
| SNPP capsule | |
| Season 15 November 2, 2003 – May 23, 2004 |
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| List of all Simpsons episodes... | |
"Diatribe of a Mad Housewife" is the tenth episode of The Simpsons' fifteenth season, first aired on January 25, 2004. The title word plays off of the book and film "Diary of a Mad Housewife."
Contents |
[edit] Synopsis
Homer's at the local Krusty Burger drive-through window, ordering nearly everything on the menu—he even asks for the paper bag to be deep-fried—accompanied by a Diet Coke . . . deep-fried. As he drives to work, food in hand, he realizes his lack of adequate lap and tilts his seat back . . . back. Suddenly, while biting into a burrito, the filling flies out and splatters all over his windshield. Unable to see the road (and trying to see it using the glass on his wristwatch), he swerves towards the power plant. Meanwhile, at the plant, Mr. Burns seems to have finally impressed a government inspector with his security arrangements. Homer promptly crashes through the wall, crushing the inspector. Homer is fired immediately and thrown out unceremoniously, his car close behind.
Meanwhile, Marge, Bart and Lisa are at the local Bookaccino's, which contains a lot of advertising on DVDs, software, etc, but little on books. While Lisa runs off to look at books (tucked away on the fourth floor) and Bart "psyches" the Ph.D.s by facetiously announcing there's a university looking for a professor's assistant, Marge sees one of her favourite bestselling authors giving a book reading of her latest love stories. After the reading, Marge asks her if she can also be a writer. The author encourages her to try and Marge decides to give it a shot.
Homer has been walking around dejectedly. He comes upon a "Help Wanted" sign at a Used Car Lot, and takes up auto sales. The owner tells him that after they give all the financing details to the customers, they go in the next room and watch them through a One-way mirror to find out their true situation. Homer meets with his first two customers, and laughs a little bit too diabolically when he says he'll leave them "alone". The customers are spooked - they discuss Homer's flatulence (and his peculiar habit of turning up the radio to hide the smell) and decide to leave. Homer gloats to his new boss: "They'll be back." As the waiting begins, Homer once again reaches for that volume control. Later, as he tours the used car lot, Homer spots an ambulance from the 1960s. The owner tells him that nobody wants it and that nothing works correctly except the siren. Homer succumbs to the temptation, buying the ambulance after hearing the siren (which he hears saying "Buy Me! Buy Me Buy Me!").
He drives home, blaring the siren, and tells his family that he has left his job as a used-car salesman and has become an ambulance driver. Marge is none too pleased to hear that he has lost two jobs and bought an ambulance, without consulting with her. She asks him to take care of the kids while she writes her first novel, so Homer takes them along in the ambulance. Bart teases Lisa with a defibrillator, while Lisa retaliates with a morphine-filled syringe. Homer takes them away from the kids and then inadvertently uses them on himself.
Marge has begun work on her novel. She takes inspiration from the familiar boat painting behind the sofa (it transforms into a yacht before her eyes). Marge decides to write a story about whaling times (which she feels has never been done before) and thanks the painting, which carries a nameplate: "Scene from Moby Dick". She starts and finishes her first few sentences and runs off for a brownie break. That evening, Homer is running his ambulance service. Unfortunately for his customers (patients), he loses his way and refuses to accept that he is lost, driving in circles.
Marge sits at the computer and writes: she visualizes (via the magic of television) the dutiful lady (Temperance, inspired by herself) providing for her family, when her loving whaler husband (inspired by Homer) returns with a great catch. At that moment, in real life, Homer and the kids return and Homer starts demanding his dinner. Marge gets annoyed: her fictional spouse has become a great brute, who returns with a seagull instead of a whale, which died of natural consequences, no less. Marge's plot needs a desirable stranger: after a kitchen window visit by Ned Flanders, who suggests she could use a new "stud . . . detector" (they were on sale two for one), she bases her new character, Cyrus Manly, on the wholesome (and more hirsute) Ned.
Marge completes the book, titled The Harpooned Heart. She gets rave reviews for her pre-published material from the pros, and moves to get it published. But before she does that, based on Lisa's advice, she wants Homer to read it and approve it first. Homer tries to do so, but falls asleep. He later tells her he loves it anyway, despite a discernible ocular dither which betrays the truth (out of Marge's sight). She goes to press.
The novel is an unexpected success, with acclaim from Tom Clancy and Thomas Pynchon (with a paper bag on his head, ready to have his pictures taken). Springfieldians, who read the book, begin to gossip around, saying that it is a reflection of Marge's life. Rumours spread fast and wild.
One day, when Homer visits the Kwik-E-Mart, Apu teases Homer about being the cuckolded husband and Ned being Marge's actual love. Homer gets mad and decides to read the book. He buys an audiotape version read by the Olsen twins. When he hears the full story, he explodes at Marge (who is starting the sequel) for having humiliated him. She shoots back that he did not read the book. He runs over to Ned's house, but Ned takes off in his car. Homer follows in his ambulance.
Lisa tells Bart that this seems very similar to the ending of Marge's novel, where Temperance's husband corners Cyrus on a cliff and then harpoons him after he found out that Cyrus have made Temperance pregnant. Temperance comes there too late. Cyrus falls over the cliff and the harpoon embeds itself into a whale. Temperance's husband gloats to Temperance, but his leg gets tangled in the harpoon's rope and he gets pulled underwater by the whale, leaving Temperance to brood alone.
Meanwhile, in real life, Homer chases Ned and tells him to pull over as he is driving an ambulance. Ned pulls over and runs towards a cliff (which looks identical to the one in the book's ending). He is cornered there by Homer. Homer tells him that he is about to do what he should have done a long time ago and that is... to get on his knees and beg to be told how to be a better husband. Marge arrives and sees them and is happy to hear that Homer is interested in being a better husband. They reconcile and Homer said that they are going to go home to do a little project of their own. They aren't kidding, as they start work on a book called "Who Really Killed JFK?". Homer feels that Lee Harvey Oswald killed JFK to steal the Jack Ruby, but that theory is shot down by Marge, who says that Jack Ruby is a man. Undeterred, Homer keeps looking.
[edit] Trivia
- Dr. Marvin Monroe was killed off in 1995, but he appears in this episode saying he has been sick.
- Marge is inspired by a picture she herself drew, as shown in The Trouble With Trillions.
- Homer sings a song to the tune of "Cars" by Gary Numan.
