Zompist Bboard Again

Part I: CHER-[ANNOYED GRUNT]-BYL. The Springfield nuclear reactor melts down. The hospital staff throws the firefighter coats in the room because they’re radioactive, but they are too heavy for the floor and fall through. The Mayor needs to get a truck to broadcast a message to evacuate, but the only car that has a working megaphone is Krusty’s clown car. Chief Wiggum enlists the local schoolchildren to do the animal cull, and Bart has to shoot his own dog.

Part II: IN NED FLANDERS FIELDS. Basically Springfield is in the middle of World War I.

PART III: THE OBSOLETE HOMER. (As the name implies, this owes a great debt to the Twilight Zone episode of a similar name.) At his birthday celebration, Homer is transported to an interdimensional tribunal of Homers. He, Homer Prime, is declared obsolete because he has managed to basically wreak havoc on the Simpsons Multiverse. The Homers try to attack him, but he escapes the courtroom only to find himself in a maze. But…just when all is lost, the tentacled, floating Homer from that one extended couch gag pauses. He has Memories. We see the memory section from that couch gag, and Tentacle Homer decides that this is Wrong. His tentacles expand and grow, like a fractal or a gorgon star, and he basically absorbs/melts/surreally destroys the Multiverse Homers until he is left dying in front of Homer Prime. Homer Prime asks why. “I have…memories…you have…family…goodbye.” And Tentacle Homer sends Homer Prime back to his home universe.

Part IV: [ANNOYED GRUNT]-VINE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY. The nuclear reactor is down for maintenance and Springfield is without power. Homer decides to grill some hamburgers before the meat spoils. He reënters the house to find the power back on, and the news is playing. Some meat is being recalled due to mad cow. Homer looks at the packaging. He has eaten of the meat. “D’oh.” We cut to the newscast explaining further what BSE is. Smash cut to Skinner and Chalmers in the Steamed Hams scene. Skinner is looking at the Krusty Burgers in shock. “SEYMOUR!!!!” bellows Chalmers.

This next part would be mostly ad-libbed with Dan Castellanetta and…Marge’s VA…responding in-character to an IRL doctor. The doctor explains that Homer is infected with prions. Marge asks “Is there anything we can do?” The doctor says “Pray…that it takes him quickly.”

We see a montage of Homer as time goes on. Gradually we see the light going out in his eyes, his faculties leaving him. (Ideally, Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s “Moya” would start during the doctor’s visit, the montage starting around 3:40 before fading to a whine around 7:40.) It fades out into the shrill whine of tinnitus as we finally see Homer slumped over in a chair like Michael Corleone in The Godfather Part III.

With one final annoyed grunt, he falls out of the chair. Homer Simpson is dead. Lisa finds him first; she wanted to play her saxophone for him. She summons Bart, who is in denial and keeps trying to get his dad to “stop the joke”. Marge comes in with a tray of dinner, but slowly drops it as her hand goes up to her mouth. All is silent. Then, smash cut to a wide shot of Springfield as the piercing wail of her grief echoes.

Because this is Springfield, Mr. Burns gives the eulogy. He ruthlessly mocks Homer. The audience laughs. Cut to Ned Flanders. Ned Flanders is not laughing. He is staring at the cross over the pulpit. He slowly rises to his feet and approaches the lectern, staring down Burns with a furious gaze that could melt steel. Burns backs down. Flanders assumes the lectern.

Flanders begins by saying that the Bible tells us that a man who abandons his family is not appreciated. He then goes on about what Homer did for his family—“Who rescued you from the well, Bart?” (“Sting!” Lisa elbows him. “Dad!”) “Who supported your saxophone playing, Lisa?” (“Dad.”) “Who got you that Balenciaga dress and got us in Paris for Fashion Week, Marge?” (“Homie.”) Flanders then bitches Springfield out for how they treated Homer, saying that surely he is in Heaven now.

Smash cut to Homer standing at the gates of Hell, as imagined by Rodin (the Thinker was for that project), except every figure is Homer. “The wages of sin is death” is writ in flaming capital letters in an arc around the gates. They open, and a phantasmagoric hand composed of writhing, agonized Homers reaches out to claim him.

A hand touches Homer’s shoulder, and all is silent. “Who are you?” Homer asks. “On the night He was betrayed, I denied Him three times,” says St. Peter, “and yet there was still a place prepared for me. Come, there is a place for you too.” The Pearly Gates silently open, and St. Peter escorts Homer into the eternal. Roll credits.