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Following his conscious, Homer snips the ill-gotten cable, but not before he cuts the wrong wires, plunging his neighborhood into total darkness. A really funny episode from the 2nd series, with some nice deeper messages too, as Lisa/Homer centred episodes tend to. This is an honorable mention for favorite episodes of Season 2. It's true there not much to it, this episode is what you would call one of the shows Christian/Preachy episodes but the execution of it is good as it has subtlety, let alone it's always good seeing Simpsons showing and exercising a moralistic side to them. Free cable proves “even more wonderful” than Homer had dared to hope, but it comes with a heavy moral penalty.
When he wakes up he sees Ned Flanders angrily reject an offer from a dim-witted man to get an illegal cable hook-up for $50, Homer chases after the cable man, who agrees to hook up the Simpsons' television for free. Homer likes the new channels and spends a lot of time watching the television along with his family. Following a Sunday School lesson regarding the existence and nature of Hell, Lisa becomes terrified of violations of the Ten Commandments, the adherence to which she is assured will keep one's soul safe from Hell. She fears that because Homer violated the Eighth Commandment, he will go to Hell when he dies.
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Seasons are the mainstream episodes, the seasons that were the best and the most comfortingly familiar and the funniest. This is a morality tale with Homer being comically guilt-tripped by Lisa over breaking the law in what feels like a trivial way most people in Springfield. In The Gospel According to The Simpsons, Mark I. Pinsky writes that the episode has "the structure of an exquisitely crafted twenty-two minute sermon". The episode won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program . Another is the Boxing promo where one of the boxers dramatically dedicates a fight to his late Manager. And then there is this Mike Tyson like character that does the same and of course it results in the cliched prefight roundness.
The films that are watched by the family on the new cable are Jaws, Die Hard, and Wall Street. One of the X-rated films Bart and his friends watch on cable is called Broadcast Nudes. The title parodies Broadcast News, which was written by Simpsons executive producer James L. Brooks. Towards the end of the episode, Bart mentions Atlanta Braves Baseball in reference to their frequent appearances on TBS in the 1980s. In its original broadcast, "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment" finished 25th in ratings for the week of February 4–10, 1991 with a Nielsen rating of 15.2, and was viewed in approximately 14 million homes. It did better than the show's season average rank of 32nd, and was the highest rated program on Fox that week.
Couch Gag
The episode was written by freelance writer Steve Pepoon and directed by Rich Moore. It is based on the Eighth Commandment ("Thou shalt not steal"). The episode marks the debut of Troy McClure, who was voiced by Phil Hartman and based on the typical "washed up" Hollywood actor. "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment"The Simpsons episodeLisa hallucinates what Hell is like because she fears her family is violating the Eighth Commandment ("thou shalt not steal") by watching stolen cable television. "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment" was written by freelance writer Steve Pepoon and directed by Rich Moore.
From one creepy encounter with the shady cable guy again that wants to sell him a stolen car stereo, which shows how much bad karma juice the stolen cable has produced in their home. Afterward, Homer installs bars on his home afterward which brings out uncomfortable irony as it shows how close Homer is to sealing his fate. At Mount Sinai in the year 1220 B.C., a thief listens to Moses as he reads the Ten Commandments. Homer gets cable TV hooked up illegally when neighbor Ned Flanders disgustedly confronts a pirate installer. With 68 channels to choose from and thousands of hours of programming to view, Homer is in paradise. Even his boss, Mr. Burns, decides to come to Homer's house to watch the bout.
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It was originally going to be named "Homer vs. the 8th Commandment", but the writers decided to include Lisa in the title because they wanted the cast to feel as if all their characters were equally represented on the show. The episode is based on the Eighth Commandment ("thou shall not steal"), which is one of the Ten Commandments. The episode marks the debut of Troy McClure who was voiced by Phil Hartman and based on the typical "washed up" Hollywood actor. What I also like about the Simpsons is their values about needing faith and believing in God and attending church sometimes. Homer may've had some moments where he didn't want to get all into church (such as episode "Homer the heretic"), but he wasn't trying to completely go athiest. Even in "Homer the heretic", he doesn't stop believing in God, he just doesn't want to go to church.
Despite the family's enjoyment of the new channels, Lisa becomes suspicious that they are stealing cable. Meanwhile, Bart manages to tune into a sexually explicit adult movie channel, and Homer invites his friends over to watch a boxing match, but Lisa's protest gets to him. After observing Ned Flanders reject an offer to get an illegal cable hookup, Homer chases after the cable man and wants to be hooked up for free. He likes the new channels he gets, which the family watches with him. At home, Lisa imagines her house melting, and the devil sits at their couch with them.
Though of course you know that the cable party is over once Lisa and Bart learn about Hell and the "Ten Commandments" I don't blame Lisa for being really scared, the concept of Hell, as a Christian myself I don't doubt nor deny its existence. Whether any of you believe it or not one thing is always certain, everyone that violates Ethics in one fashion, or another eventually suffers the consequences. The Simpsons season 2 DVD commentary for the episode "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment" .
He finally gives in to Lisa's protests, begrudgingly choosing not to watch the last minutes of the fight, and Marge and Maggie join them as well. Bart, on the other hand, does not care, wanting to see the fight, but Homer drags him outside by force. After seeing Ned Flanders reject an offer from a crooked cable man for a $50 illegal cable hookup, Homer chases after the cable man and takes the offer.
In a joke about Mr. Burns' age, Burns recalls watching a bare-knuckle match between Gentleman Jim Corbett and "an Eskimo fellow." The films that are watched by the family on the new cable are Jaws, Die Hard, and Wall Street. There are a lot of funny moments, from the beginning of the episode seeing "The Ten Commandments" read off, it was cool seeing Phil Hartman doing his Charlton Heston impersonation. But what really made that scene funny was seeing each of the specific sinners night completely ruined from each commandment read, all I can say to that is serves them right.
Some of the verbal humor as usual is funny, clever, and memorable. One scene is when Bart says the word Hell a lot and he brings up a good point on the usage of the word and then Marge completely contradicts herself to get Bart to stop using the word and we see only a look of confusion in Bart and Lisa after she says it. Homer gets a crooked cable guy to install free cable in the Simpson home, and as a result, Lisa faces an ethical crisis over her family's stealing. Though he’s able to buy and sell the sum of humanity many times over, he inexplicably prefers to endure the sights, sounds, and smells of his fellow man, but only while watching a spirited round of fisticuffs. The thirteenth episode in the second season of the Simpsons takes a great look at religion and the use of cable, which was popular back in the day. It has some memorable cultural references like the Ten Commandments and films like Jaws and Wall Street.
The family begins to disintegrate, and our hero can't avoid overstepping his bounds. The best part of the show is a scene from Mt. Sanai as Moses brings down the Ten Commandments. The plotline is simple as the Simpsons inadvertently have Cable illegally. It's understandable as to how each of the Simpsons get seduced by Cable TV. You must realize way before the Streaming, in the 80's and 90's cable was a really big thing. The concept of just having more channels than the usual standard meant more decisions and access to programing you can't always get on your standard channels. Like this little montage we see as to how addictive cable truly is as we see the big dent Homer has made on the couch.
The episode marks the debut appearance of the character Troy McClure, voiced by Phil Hartman. McClure was based on the typical "washed up" Hollywood actor, and B movie actors Troy Donahue and Doug McClure served as inspiration for his name and certain character aspects. According to show creator Matt Groening, Hartman was cast in the role due to his ability to pull "the maximum amount of humor" out of any line he was given. McClure's visual appearance is similar to that of Hartman himself. McClure became a recurring character on the show after "Homer vs. Lisa and the 8th Commandment", but was retired in 1998 after Hartman's death.
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