The Wettest Stories Ever Told
The Wettest Stories Ever Told is an episode of The Simpsons that aired on April 23, 2006.
Contents
Synopsis
A dinner at the Frying Dutchman gone wrong turns into an excuse for another anthology show, this time with a nautical theme - Lisa tells about the Mayflower voyage, Bart tells about mutiny in Tahiti, and Homer tells about capsizing cruise ships.
Lisa's Story
Marge, Bart, and Lisa board the Mayflower to head for the new world, but just as they do, Homer runs ahead of them and hides in a barrel. They see the police looking for him, and they take pity on him as they hear him praying (he is actually praying that the police kill them instead of him). Even so, they take him with them and dress him up like them. Marge immediately grows on Homer, but Moe likes her as well and is instantly jealous of their friendship. To get Homer out of the way, Moe takes him down to the storage room where all the beer is held and tells him to drink whenever a wave hits the boat. He gets drunk, and Captain Flanders and Reverend Lovejoy find him and other passengers partying. Moe blames Homer, and they place him in a stock. Then, a storm approaches, and Flanders gets knocked out. Homer claims that he steers better when he is drunk, and while drinking a bottle of wine, he leads them safely out of the storm. He and Marge get together, and they all make it to the New World. While having the first Thanksgiving with the Native Americans, Flanders says that he's almost sorry for what the Pilgrims will do to them later.
Bart's Story (Mutiny on the Bounty)
The HMAV Bounty sets sail from England, commanded by Captain Bligh (Skinner). Bligh severely mistreats his crew, tossing off their mail. They arrive in Tahiti, where the crew has a wonderful time (Bligh later orders them to forget the vacation). Willie warns him of a mutiny, but Bligh ignores him. Eventually, First Mate Bart Christian leads a mutiny and sends Bligh and Willie off in a lifeboat. Bligh mistreats Willie and is sent away on a sea turtle. Captain Bart orders the crews to set sail for Tahiti...then he throws away the ship's wheel and they crash into Antarctica.
Homer's Story (The Neptune Adventure)
Homer's story takes place on the luxury liner Neptune on New Year's Eve. At midnight, Captain Burns fails to notice a massive freak wave and the ship capsizes. Led by Selma, survivors Homer, Bart, Lisa, Marge, Lenny, Carl, Comic Book Guy, Old Jewish Man (and his wife), and Sideshow Mel ignore Purser Wiggum's advice to stay put in the ball room and decide to climb up the decks to the engine room. While climbing up through the smokestack, Lenny panics and falls to his death. They encounter rooms in flame, tigers, and Homer doing his business in an upside-down bathroom. Jeff Albertson (Comic Book Guy) swims through a flooded deck to help the others get to the engine room, but he has a heart attack and dies. The group makes it to the engine room, but Sideshow Mel's hair is set on fire because of a blowtorch from the rescue team and he dies. The rest of the original group makes it off the ship, at which point they encounter the walking skeletons of the Bounty crew, who are still trying to get back to Tahiti.
Trivia
- In the US, a trailer for the film Poseidon aired during the episode's commercial breaks before Homer's story (a remake of the original film The Poseidon Adventure).
- Among the people on the Neptune are Moe, Disco Stu, Krusty, Kirk (Milhouse's dad), Luigi, Agnes, Apu, Miss Hoover, Barney, and Dr. Hibbert.
- This episode is the third in the seventeenth season to have the word 'stories' or 'story' in it, the other two being Simpsons Christmas Stories and The Seemingly Never-Ending Story.
- After only six weeks, this is another episode in the seventeenth season to be a multi-story episode, or to be split into three sections. This is like the Treehouse of Horror series or other similar three-part episodes like Trilogy of Error, from season 12.
- The fourth wall is broken when Moe tells the audience that Old Englishmen spoke with th at the end of sentences, along with the inclusion of thee, ye and thou. Moe has similarly addressed the audience in one of flashback scenes in, The Way We Weren't.
- Homer and Moe's aggressive competition over Marge's love (as shown in Lisa's story) has been an ongoing gag in the show that especially references to Season 16 (Mommie Beerest).
- At the end of "The Neptune Adventure," we see the crew of the HMS Bounty coming out of the mist, only for them to look like skeletons, a possible reference to Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
- Bart appears twice in "The Neptune Adventure"; as himself throughout the story, and as Bart Christian/"Capt. Bart-bossa" at the end.
- The original North American airdate was intended to be April 16; however, it was replaced by The Last of the Red Hat Mamas.
- Homer, Marge and Bart are the only characters to appear in all three stories.
Cultural References
- This episode also references Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner". In the first story, after the storm breaks off, Homer notices an albatross which he eats. Unlike the poem, this action does not lead to unfortunate incidents. The final act with the appearance of the Bounty could possibly be a reference to the appearance of the ghost ship.
- Homer's story is a parody of The Poseidon Adventure, an action film. There are several similarities between Homer's story and The Poseidon Adventure. Several characters die in ways similar to the movie: Lenny falls off a ladder into surging water and Comic Book Guy dies while trying to tie a rope underwater, both quite similar to the deaths of major characters in the movie. This episode also aired just weeks before the remake of the movie, titled Poseidon, premiered.
- The song played at the beginning of Homer's story is "Rock The Boat" by the Hues Corporation.
- Comic Book Guy's "inspirational music" is "Alone Again (Naturally)" by Gilbert O'Sullivan.
- "Island in the Sun" by Weezer plays during the montage of the Bounty crew in Tahiti.
- When the Bounty crew is in Tahiti, the theme instrumental music that is played is similar to that written in the musical movie South Pacific.
- At the end of Homer's story, the crew of the Bounty reappears as living skeletons, parodying Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
- Lisa sings a parody of "The Morning After" from The Poseidon Adventure, which foreshadows the upcoming destruction of the S.S. Neptune.
- Burns makes references to Earthquake, The Towering Inferno, The China Syndrome, and The Apple Dumpling Gang, which were popular disaster films of the 1970's (except for The Apple Dumpling Gang).
- The ship in Homer's story is called the Neptune. "Neptune" was the Roman god of the sea; the Greek name for the same deity was "Poseidon".
- Scenes of Bart standing on the mast of the Bounty, and the use of music by Luigi Boccherini, are references to the film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World.
Quotes
The Mayflower
- Sea Captain: Sorry about the delay. The chef is having trouble with tonight's special. (camera shows the chef fighting an octopus with knives in the kitchen) Meanwhile, I can send a bus boy out to get you something from a better restaurant.
Marge: Red Lobster?!
Sea Captain: Not that good. Until then perhaps an old sea yarn might pass the time. (pauses for a moment) Too bad I don't know any.
Lisa: I know one, about the most important sea voyage in American history — the journey of the Mayflower.
Sea Captain: Aw, yes. The ship that brought prostitutes to America.
Lisa: Not Prostitutes, Protestants! - Homer (hiding in a barrel on the Mayflower, praying): Oh, Lord, please let the soldiers kill this family instead of me.
- Homer: What kind of a booze cruise is this? Where's the hooch?
Ned Flandish: We puritans have no place for drunkenness. Or colorful clothes, or dreaming, or poetry. So if you write a sonnet, keep it under your bonnet! Be... Oh no! That was a poem! (whips himself on the back) Forgive me Lord! A little salt on the wounds... (pours salt) And I'm good. - Ned Flandish: Such bad language from a woman. Oh no! I just thought of you as a woman! (begins whipping himself again)
- Homer (after strangling Bart): I'm so sorry, Marge.
Marge: Don't worry. You're choking him the way his father used to. (holds up a locket with a picture of her first husband strangling Bart) Good times. - Homer: I thought you guys didn't party on the Gayflower.
Moe: Stop calling it that! - Bart: Aw, when we landed I was gonna denounce my sister as a witch.
Lisa: I keep telling you, the ability to add two digit numbers is not witchcraft!
Bart: Thirty-one plus forty-three.
Lisa: Seventy-four.
Puritans: Witch! Witch! Witch!
Homer: People, this is madness! We can burn the witch later! - Homer: Land ho!
Marge: What did you call me?
Mutiny on the Barty
- Homer: Let me tell the second story!
Marge: You can tell the third one. Bart will tell the second because it is usually the weakest. - Captain Seymour Bligh (over speaker): Welcome to Day 718 of our voyage. First off, in an attempt to preserve water, you will not be given any water. (crew groans) And also, because of a sketch of myself making out with a mer-man (shows the offending picture) I am dumping all your mail from home. (Willie does so) I can assure you that there were cookies in that mail. Good cookies, the kind only a loving mother or Milhouse's father could bake.
Second Officer Milhouse: My father's alive?!
Seymour Bligh: No, he died while baking. It's all in the letter. - Dolph: I hate this job. It's nothing like the brochure. (holds up the brochure, which has a British sailor with two women)
Kearney: Maybe that's what happens on the last day. - Willie: I warn ya, Captain. Push this crew too far and there'll be a mutiny!
Seymour Bligh: Mutiny?! On the Bounty? What have you been smoking?
Willie: Opium.
Seymour Bligh: Besides from that. - Chief Homer: Welcome to Tahiti. Enjoy our beaches, luaus, ladies, and remember — what happens in Tahiti stays in Tahiti.
Marge: Because we have no way of communicating with the outside world. Tell me, has Robert Fulton invented the steam boat yet?
Jimbo: Any day now. - Captain Bart Christian: Well boys, you doubted me, but there they are — the most beautiful women in the world. (camera shows the Bounty trapped in a glacier with hundreds of penguins around)
Dolph: Those are penguins.
Captain Bart Christian: Look on the bright side. We'll be credited for discovering the North Pole.
Kearney: South Pole.
Captain Bart Christian: Boy, do I suck.
Dolph: Yeah you do.
The Neptune Adventure
- Lisa: I'm starting to think the Sea Captain isn't coming back.
Bart (looking out a window): He's out there playing basketball.
(camera shows the Sea Captain playing basketball with three employees)
Sea Captain (slam-dunks): Yes! In yar face, Julio! (notices the Simpsons looking at him) I'll be getting your food in a moment. (to employee) Six more games.
Homer: Time for my tale of moist adventure! It takes place in a dark time for mankind when madness and ignorance ruled—the 1970's! - Disco Stu (aboard the S.S. Neptune): Disco Stu has some troubling news! (everyone looks scared) The ship's doctor has reported an outbreak of...Disco Fever! The only cure is to do a little dance, make a little love, and get down tonight!
Lenny (with a notepad and pencil): Wait, what was the second one?
Disco Stu: And now, please welcome the Leroy Neiman of seamen, your captain, Montgomery Burns!
Lenny: Ten-four, good buddy!
Carl: I'm Chevy Chase and you're not!
Barney: Willie Stargell!
Captain Montgomery Burns: Yes. Welcome to the maiden voyage of the Neptune, the world's most unflippable (winks) luxury liner. Help yourself to some pineapple upside-down cake and apple turnovers. And you will all be getting free hats, so be sure to give us your cap size! - (while at the ship's wheel, Captain Burns and First Officer Waylon Smithers fail to notice the approaching freak wave)
Captain Burns: I love the sea, Smithers! There are no earthquakes, towering infernos, China syndromes, appling dumpling gangs...
(the wave hits the Neptune. Burns and Smithers drown as the bridge fills with water) - (as the ship capsizes, Homer's hair falls off)
Homer: (screams) My wig! I mean, my natural hair! - Krusty (after the ship capsizes, he sees a pair of legs on his chest): Hey, you schmock, get off of me! (the camera pulls out, showing that the legs are his and his torso is severed) Going out with a sight gag. Nice. (dies)
- Selma: Attention everyone! I've spent the entire cruise reading these maintenance brochures because as a lonely single woman, I had nothing better to do.
Male survivors (Barney, Lenny, Carl, Jeff, Sideshow Mel, and 3 other guys): Aww...
Selma: "Aw"s are cheap. I lookin' for some action.
Male survivors: (nonchalant whistling and looking in different directions)
Selma: That's what I thought. It says here that we gotta climb upwards towards the hull before the ocean starts filling the ship.
Chief Purser Clancy Wiggum: Don't listen to her! She'll get us all killed! The safest thing to do is to resume our normal activities. Now where's the rumba instructor? (sees the instructor's legs sticking out of the mouth of a great white shark) Okay, so that's left, left, right. Come on, people. (begins dancing, humming rumba music) - Homer (emerging from the wreck): Oh my God! Our boat is upside-down!
(the Bounty appears out of a thick fog and the crew becomes skeletons)
Bart-bossa: You guys know the way to Tahiti?
Dolph: Way to go, genius! You sailed into someone else's tale of the sea!
Bart-bossa: At least I'm not gay for skeleton Kearney.
Kearney: Our ribs got tangled seventy-five years ago! That's not gay!
Bart-bossa: Right, you keep believing that.
Goofs
- Marge is allergic to fish and probably shouldn't be in The Frying Dutchman. Even if she doesn't eat anything, inhaling fish particles in the air and on the tables or dishes might make her very ill.
