Cultural References
The Leonard Nimoy segments are a send-up of the paranormal documentary series In Search Of..., which Nimoy hosted. In addition to the appearances of Mulder and Scully, the episode features several other references to The X-Files. Mulder's FBI badge has a picture of himself only wearing a speedo on it; this is a reference to a scene in The X-Files episode "Sleepless" in which David Duchovny wore just a speedo. Also, in the scene where Scully gives Homer a lie detector test, the Cigarette Smoking Man is in the background. There are also numerous film references. The music played by the Springfield Philharmonic comes from Psycho (1960). The narration sequences are based on Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959). In one chapter title, the phrase "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" being printed out ad infinitum is a reference to The Shining (1980). Mr. Largo conducts five of his students in playing the famous five-note tones from Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977) with marching band instruments. Homer recounts seeing Speed (1994), but believes it was called "The Bus That Couldn't Slow Down". Milhouse plays a Kevin Costner's Waterwold arcade game, moving just a few steps before having to insert another forty quarters, a reference to the budget overrun on Kevin Costner's 1995 film Waterworld. Marvin the Martian, Gort from The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Chewbacca from Star Wars, ALF, and one of the Kang and Kodos siblings make up the FBI line-up. The Budweiser Frogs appear in the swamp, chanting their names, "Bud... Weis... Er." They are then eaten by an alligator who growls "Coors!" Homer's suggestion that he and Bart fake an alien encounter and sell it to the Fox network is an allusion to the Alien Autopsy hoax.
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Famous quotes containing the word cultural:
“The primary function of myth is to validate an existing social order. Myth enshrines conservative social values, raising tradition on a pedestal. It expresses and confirms, rather than explains or questions, the sources of cultural attitudes and values.... Because myth anchors the present in the past it is a sociological charter for a future society which is an exact replica of the present one.”
—Ann Oakley (b. 1944)