The Simpsons episodes 55 through 59

Colonel Homer

This episode premiered on March 26, 1992. It was followed by reruns of Drexell's class and opposite America's Funniest Home Videos, NCAA Basketball and The Cosby Show.

The title of the show is a reference to Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis Presley's manager and there is even an Elvis bit about how the suit Homer wears is made from fabric designed for Elvis in his later Vegas years.

The chalkboard gag is "I will not conduct my own fire drills" and the couch gag is a repeat of the cushions collapsing and the family getting stuck. 

Homer takes the family to the movies but squeezes the car into a compact spot, they have to crawl out the windows.  Homer talks through the movie Stockholm Syndrome and pisses off Marge. Bart and Lisa go to see Space Mutants. Homer gets angry when Marge tells him to shut up and nobody cares what he thinks. Homer goes for a long drive and winds up at the Beer-N-Brawl. Lurleen sings a song that pretty much is about Homer, except for the pickup truck flipping off the interstate. Homer takes Lurleen to Lucky's Records, Your Voice On Compact Disk 25¢. Radio station Fudd 570 AM in Weevileville plays song. Marge becomes jealous of Lurleen. Lurleen hires Homer as her manager, she gets him a set of cowboy duds. Lurleen sings a baseball song about hitting a Homer. Lurleen sings a song to seduce Homer. After appearing on TV Lurleen attempts to kiss Homer but he thinks of Marge. Homer sells his contract with Lurleen to Rebel Yell records and goes home for "snuggling".

Introduction of Lurleen Lumpkin, country singer. She is voiced by Beverly D'Angelo.

Movies at the Springfield Googleplex Theaters. 

I'll fry your face III

The smell in room 19

Space Mutants VI

Honey, I Hit A School Bus

Look Who's Oinking

The Stockholm Affair

Earnest vs. The Pope. (Bart wants to go see Earnest Cuts The Cheese)

Flaming Pete's 75 Miles, 30 Miles, Next Exit, burned out remains of Flaming Pete's. 

Homer drives to The Beer-N-Brawl bar is in Spittle County, they serve Fudd instead of a Duff.  The first act is Yodling Zeke. Someone bashes him with a chair and throws a pig at the stage. 

Sign at the Royal King Trailer Park, 14 days without a tornado. Later the sign is changed to 2 days.

Pop Culture Reference: Homer drives by banjo playing kid from Deliverance when he goes back to Spittle County.

Homer gets his suit at the Corpulent Cowboy western store. (Corpulent meaning fat)

Lurleen records her song at the Hicksville USA Recording Studio

Springfield Variety headline, Hix In Stix Love Chix Lix.

TV Show Ya Hoo, a versions of Hee Haw. The cast (in alphabetical order) Yodlin Zeke (whose head is bandaged from being hit with a chair at the Beer-N-Brawl), Butterball Jackson, Freddie Boy and Yuma (a pig), Cloris Moselle, Big Shirtless Ron, Orville and Hurley, Gappy Mae, Hip Diddler, Rudy, The Ya Hoo Recovering Alcoholic Jug Band, 

Homer sells Lurleen's contract to Rebel Yell Records, a division of Togasake Corporation.

Homer's childhood dream, eat the world's biggest hoagie and he did at the county fair. 

Black Widower

This episode premiered on April 9th, 1992 in it's usual time slot. It ran opposite Columbo 91, Top Cops and The Cosby Show. 

The chalkboard gag is "Funny noises are not funny" and the couch gag is a repeat of the couch getting stolen. 

Selma shows up at the Simpsons with her new boyfriend, Sideshow Bob. He tells the story about how he reformed in prison but Bart doesn't trust him. At dinner he proposes. Bob insults MacGuyver and the wedding is off. Bob comes back to apologize but Homer tells them how to compromise. Selma vows to give up smoking except for after MacGuyver. Bob insists on a honeymoon suite with a fireplace. Bart figures out Bob is out to kill Selma. Cut to the room exploding but Bart is waiting and Selma is in the doorway, she wants a trial separation. Bart explains that he figured out that Bob turned on the gas from the fireplace, that Selma couldn't smell due to her damaged nose. After MacGuyver she would light up her cigarette and the room would explode. After saving Selma chief Wiggums tosses his match into the gas filled room. Bob goes back to jail. 

The show starts off with the Simpsons watching a version of Dinosaurs, a short lived TV series on ABC that copied the format of The Simpsons 

The families imagination about Selma's new boyfriend: Lisa, The Elephant Man, Homer, a head on life support, Bart, a twin of Homer. 

Pop Culture References: When Sideshow Bob is picking up trash on the side of the highway they do the music of Cool Hand Luke. When Bob is cutting the turkey for dinner in prison it's a version of Norman Rockwell's Freedom From Want. When Bob says "Goodbye Cutter, Ice Pick, and Snake I'm going to miss you most of all" its paraphrased from Wizard of Oz. Krusty holding telethon for motion sickness, a take on the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon. He raises 385 thousand dollars. During the Telethon Krusty introduces The Chairman of the Company, a spin on The Chairman Of The Board a nickname for Frank Sinatra. Homer says "To The Simpson Mobile" and they do a take on the Batmobile starting up. Bob spins the chair around and sees Bart, hits the lightbulb that starts to swing and Selma is standing in the doorway, this is a take on the Psycho basement scene.

Bob's prison number 24601

Shelbyville is 34 miles away in this episode.

The Otto Show

This episode premiered on April 23rd 1992. It ran in it's regular time slot and opposite the regular programs.

The chalkboard gag is "I will not spin the turtle" and the couch gag is a repeat of SLH sleeping on it.

Bart and Milhouse goes to a Spinal Tap concert. Homer remembers the good times, in the back seat of his car eating. When the under inflated devil ballon drops and then the stage floods due to the place being a hockey rink the band walks out. The audience gets mad and a riot breaks out. Homer misses it because he's singing in the car. Bart and Homer come home, Marge asks them about Milhouse, he's trapped under a pile of chairs at the stadium. Bart imagines himself as a rock star including his eventual burn out. As he's trying to learn the guitar Lisa teases him with her sax. Bart takes his guitar on the bus and Otto starts jamming out. When he discovers he's late Otto tries to make up time, he takes a shortcut through the burning tire yard and runs Spinal Tap off the road. He races through the police picnic, and winds up crashing into the statue of Jedediah Springfield. Otto loses his job as the bus driver and Skinner takes over his job, he gets stuck trying to get into traffic. Otto goes in for a driving test and sees Patty, he asks if she was always a chick and so she tosses her green (passing) pen and keeps the red (failing) one. Otto fails the driving test and gets evicted. Bart finds him living in the dumpster behind the Kwik-E-Mart and has him move into the garage. After being insulted by Homer Otto goes to retake the test and when he starts telling stories about Homer Patty passes him. 

Dated Reference: Homer finds a can of Billy Beer in his leather jacket pocket. Billy Beer was a brand created by Billy Carter, brother of President Jimmy Carter. Milhouse gets a leather jacket with 50,000 Bazooka Joe comics, back in the day you saved up your gum wrappers and sent them in for prizes. Spinal Tap t shirt shows the band kicking Muammar Gaddafi in the butt. He was assassinated in 2011. When talking about Otto Homer says "This isn't Happy Days and he isn't The Fonz", a reference to the 70's TV show.

Spinal Tap World Tour: London, Paris, Munich, Springfield. 

Gold bars between floors in Simpson house. 

According to his license Otto was born on January 18th 1963

Christopher Guest and Michael McKean do the voices for their Spinal Tap characters.

Bart's Friend Falls In Love

This episode premiered on May 7th, 1992 and was followed by In Living Color, the sketch comedy show created by the Wayans brothers. It ran opposite the regular programs. 

The chalkboard gag is "I will not snap bras" (I wonder how that would go over in the Me Too era) and the couch gag is a repeat of the family falling through the wall. 

The show starts out with Bart stealing Homer's penny jar, the entire scene is a parody of Indiana Jones. Milhouse gets a Magic 8 Ball, Bart asks if he and Milhouse will be friends at the end of the day, the ball says no. A new student, Samantha Stanky, shows up and Milhouse falls in love with her. At the end of the day Milhouse walks Samantha home instead of riding on the bus and then brings her to Bart's treehouse. Bart goes to see what comics Lisa has, when he returns with Doomed Romance Comics he finds Milhouse and Samantha kissing. Lisa worries about Homer's weight so she orders subliminal diet tapes. The warehouse is out of weigh loss tapes so they send vocabulary builders instead. He still eats too much but is using big words. Bart finds the only open seat on the bus is next to Martin. Bart, Milhouse and Samantha go to see Space Mutants VII. After Milhouse tells Bart to stop being a third wheel he rats out Milhouse and Samantha, her father catches them and she gets sent away to an All Girls School. Milhouse is terribly depressed, Bart goes and confesses so they get into a fight, Bart hits Milhouse with the Magic 8 Ball and breaks it. Once Homer quits the language tapes he still overeats and now can't think of common words. Milhouse visits Samantha at the convent run school with a bucket of gummy worms. 

First mention of Skinner in Vietnam. 

Sex ed film. Fuzzy Bunny's Guide to You Know What copyright 1971. Boat Show 4 PM Bob Denver., Ezekiel And Ishmael step out in the hall to pray during sex ed film. A very 70's Troy McClure is featured in the sex tape, You might know me from such educational films like "lead paint, delicious but deadly and Here comes the metric system." 

Bart offers Samantha a copy of Radioactive Man vs. The Swamp Hag since it's the closest to a romantic comic book they have.

Samantha asks if they have any girl comics like Bonny Crane: Girl Attorney, Punkin and Dunkin, The Twinkle Twins or Li'l Knee Socks. 

The topic on Smartline is I'm OK, You're Too Fat.

Lisa imagines Homer's head stone.

Born 9lbs 6oz

Died 492lbs 1oz.

She imagines him being buried in a piano box. 

The Good Morning Burger: 18 oz. beef, soaked in creamery butter, bacon, ham, cheese, fried egg. 

Candy bar commercial, Chocolate, Honey, four kinds of sugar, dipped in creamery butter,

Dr. Marvin Monroe Subliminal Tape Club numer KL5 3700

Itchy and Scratch show "I"m getting buried in the morning" Itchy cuts off Scratchy and his brides heads and ties them to the back of his car. 

Other movies at the Googleplex: Sing Monkey Sing and Hot Grits A Flyin'

The first appearance of Kirk Van Houten, Milhouse's dad.

Milhouse has a Spinal Tap poster on his wall, a reference to the last episode.

At the end of the episode:

Homer Sez: Increase your wordiness.

Satiety: Belt-popping Fullness

Triumvirate: There guys giving orders

Gourmand: Lisa. gourmet, only fatter

Machiavellian: I don't know

Boudoir: Where A French guy does it.

Brother Can You Spare Two Dimes?

This episode premiered on August 27th 1992. It was followed by Martin (Starring Martin Laurence) and ran opposite Who's The Boss?, Top Cops and A Different World (The Cosby Show spinoff). The show was going to be the first of the new fall season but Fox claimed it was from the previous season, which ran three months earlier. The idea was to promote the new show Martin.

The chalkboard gag is "I will not fake seizures" and the couch gag is a repeat of the gymnastics routine.

It's the annual Plant Physical and the sign reads No Jokes. Lenny was going commando so he's standing in line naked. Mr. Smithers discovers that Homer is sterile from radiation exposure. Burns's lawyers tell him to offer Homer $2000 and get him to sign a release paper. Meanwhile Uncle Herb is living under the railroad tracks. Bart tries to vault across couch and crashes into it. The kids lie about it just falling apart. Herb sees a woman having trouble with her baby and has a great idea. In order to convince Homer to sign the form Mr Burns claims Homer won the Montgomery Burns Award For Outstanding Achievement In The Field Of Excellence. Homer asks for a big trophy and an award ceremony so they throw one, similar to the Oscars. Bart insults the Emmys. Homer is so excited he falls out of the balcony. Joe Frasier (former boxer and emcee of the award show) goes to the bar with Homer and gets into a fight with Barney, who ends up in the trash can. Herb sees a headline story about Homer's award and hops a train to Springfield. In Springfield Herb goes to Ned's house where he goes a hot meal and a new set of clothes. The Simpsons play Monopoly and Herb goes broke, when Homer mocks him Herb punches him. Everybody has plans for the award money, Homer wants a chair, Lisa wants to buy books, Bart wants a machine gun and Marge wants a new washer and dryer. Herb asks for the money to build his baby translator. At the Baby Expo Herb sells his invention to the Precious Baby Discount Store and leaves a rich man again.

Mr. Burns says "mother of pearl" 7 years before the premier of SpongeBob.

Disney Joke, Mickey Mouse massage parlors, offers to put pants back on Mickey on the signs.

Hobo camp hobo's, Charlie Chaplin (eating a shoe like in the movie Gold Rush) Emmett Kelly, and the inventor of New Coke. 

Homer's couch memories, Who Shot JR, Hands Across America (which goes through the Simpson's living room for some reason), the fall of the Berlin Wall )Homer changes the channel to Gomer Pyle). 

Smokin' Joe Fraser makes a guest appearance as the person announcing Homer's award.

Train cars going to Springfield, Toxic Waste, Circus Lions, Krusty Brand Sulfuric Acid (in a leaking tank), Emil's Fluffy Pillows.

Homer's chair, the Spinemelter 2000, $1999.99

Pop Culture Reference, Homer asks Sulu looking furniture salesman for "full power" Sees mental trip from 2001 A Space Odyssey. "Excuse me while I kiss the sky" Purple Haze drug reference.

Homer shows Herb the light switch although he doesn't know what it does. When he flicks it on the Christmas lights come on spelling out Merry Christmas and a Happy 1985. The Simpsons have lived in the house since 1984 so Homer must have put up the lights.

Marge gets a dinner recipe from the Utility Grade Beef Council. Utility beef is generally used in canned and heavily processed foods.

New Republic For Children Great Books of Western Civilization Lisa wants to buy books, Paradise Regained, Martin Chuzzlewit, Herman Melville's Omoo and Typee.

Convention signs: Baby Expo. Tu-Fr. Twin Convention, No Triplets! Wackey Wipes, Toy Insurance, Dog In A Ball. Professor Frink has a remote controlled baby in a plane (accidentally flies it out the window)

Herb's gifts to the family: Lisa gets a book subscription, the first one is Ethan Frome and she'll get other books like Beowulf and Less Than Zero. Instead of a machine gun Herb gives Bart a membership in the NRA (I wonder how that joke would go over in the modern world), Marge gets a new washer and dryer and he sells the old ones to Moe, who starts using them for gambling. Herb forgives Homer but he still gets his vibrating chair.

Furniture store name, The Seatery. 

This is the official end of Season Three, even though it was in August. I've managed to get through 60 episodes, only 690 to go.