Saddlesore Galactica

"Saddlesore Galactica"
The Simpsons episode
Episode no.	Season 11
Directed by	Lance Kramer
Written by	Tim Long
Original air date	February 6, 2000
Episode features
Chalkboard gag	"Substitute teachers are not scabs."
Couch gag	The family act as karate students and chop up the couch and photographs. Homer does a karate flip as he turns the TV on via remote control.
Commentary	Matt Groening Mike Scully George Meyer Ian Maxtone-Graham Tim Long Matt Selman Tom Martin Lance Kramer

"Saddlesore Galactica" is the thirteenth episode of The Simpsons' 11th season. The episode, which aired on February 6, 2000, was Tim Long's first solo writing credit and Lance Kramer's first episode directed.

Plot

Mr. Largo is helping the Springfield Elementary School band prepare for their big performance at the state fair. After a suggestion by Lisa that they are doing the same old songs, they perform a different song, which is James Brown's "Living in America". They perform the song, but lose to Ogdenville Elementary School, who performs John Philip Sousa's old "Stars and Stripes Forever" using red, white, and blue glowsticks, forming a flag, which was against the rules as the competition forbade use of visual aids. After they win, Lisa accuses Ogdenville of cheating, later writing a letter to President Clinton, complaining that was a "state unfair". At the fair, Homer and Bart see Duncan, the diving horse, who dives into the pool. The Simpsons take Duncan home after his sleazy owner is accused of animal cruelty and flees, but not before the Comic Book Guy points out that the Simpsons have already taken in a horse as a pet, and “the expense forced Homer to work at the Kwik-E-Mart, with hilarious consequences”.

Just as the Comic Book Guy predicted (and how it played out on "Lisa's Pony"), the Simpsons end up having financial issues while keeping Duncan: it costs them $500 a week to keep him. Homer and Bart try to think of a way that Duncan can make money to help offset the costs of keeping him. Duncan makes an excellent placekicker, but National Football League rules forbid horses from competing. After Homer denounces the rules, Bart discovers that Duncan is fast and suggests that he should be a racehorse. Homer enters Duncan at Springfield Downs, with Bart as the jockey; they lose as Duncan, frightened, refuses to leave the stall until all other horses have actually finished.

Homer and Bart find a new strategy for Duncan to win, by making him into a Dennis Rodman look-alike, "Furious D", complete with dyed-purple hair and one of Lisa's bracelets for a nose ring. He intimidates the other horses (and headbutts several of them) and wins the next races. They go on to win a series of races until Homer is invited to have a beer in the jockeys' lounge, but instead, discovers the secret lair of the losing jockeys. They reveal themselves to be murderous elf-like creatures who want him to have Duncan lose the upcoming race. They threaten to eat Homer's brain if he does not comply. Though intimidated at first, Homer cannot bear to tell Bart about it, and instead vows to deal with those "murderous trolls". At the Springfield Derby, Duncan surprisingly wins the race, and the furious jockeys chase after Homer and Bart. Keeping his word to deal with them, Homer gets Marge and Lisa to foil the jockeys by spraying them with a hose and a water gun, and Homer stuffs the jockeys up in hole-proof garbage bags to get them sent to the dump. Afterwards, they search horse pictures for mates for Duncan.

President Clinton comes to see Lisa at home and presents her with a plaque, saying that Ogdenville was wrong to use glowsticks and that Springfield Elementary's band is the true champion. He also breaks the fourth wall when he thanks Lisa for giving a moral lesson to children in the audience: "If things don't go your way, just keep complaining until your dreams come true", but when Marge complains that this is a lousy lesson, the President simply replies "Hey, I'm a pretty lousy President".

Cultural references

• An instrumental version of Cakes song The Distance is played during the montage.
• The episode title is a reference to Battlestar Galactica.
• The episode stars the band Bachman–Turner Overdrive and refers to ELP.
• In the recital, the Springfield elementary school band played James Brown's "Living in America". Bart said about Lisa "she's a sax machine", referring to her saxophone, but sounds like "Sex Machine", another of James Brown's songs.
• The sequence with the elf-jockeys living near the chocolate cascade are a parody of the Oompa-Loompa from the book (and films) Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. It is also similar to the dream sequence in Fiddler On The Roof. Their tree house resembles the Keebler Elf tree.
• After winning another race, Homer comments that he has more trophies than Wayne Gretzky and the Pope combined.
• Homer says he fought at 'La Choy', 'Chung King', and 'Margaret Cho' during the Vietnam War. La Choy and Chung King are in fact brands of Chinese-American food, and Margaret Cho is a Korean comedian.
• The scene where Duncan the diving horse is being hoisted up resembles the album cover of Hoist by Phish.
• When Lisa complains that her bracelet has been used as Duncan's nose-ring Homer states, "Possessions are fleeting," a reference to the Latin phrase Sic transit gloria mundi.

Reception

"Saddlesore Galactica" received negative reviews and is considered one of the worst episodes in the show's history due its nonsensical, poorly-written plot and tired jokes.

External links

• "Saddlesore Galactica" at The Simpsons.com
• "Saddlesore Galactica episode capsule". The Simpsons Archive.
• "Saddlesore Galactica" at IMDb