The War of The Simpsons - Production

Production

The episode was written by John Swartzwelder, and it was the last episode Mark Kirkland directed during his first year on the show. Kirkland and his animation team were relatively new to animation when they began working on the show, and to make the animation in this episode the best they had ever done, they incorporated all the techniques they had learned during their first year into it. Kirkland said animating Homer drunk was a challenge for him as he had to analyze how people behave when they are intoxicated by alcohol. He said of the animation: "I shifted eyes open and close, they're not working in sync. And of course Homer can't keep his balance so that's why he's shifting back and forth." Kirkland was raised in New York in an environment similar to the one where the marriage retreat was held. He therefore enjoyed drawing and overseeing the scenery for the episode, and the bait shop was based on the bait shops he visited when he grew up. Snake Jailbird, Springfield's resident recidivist felon, appeared for the first time on the show in this episode, though he was not named until season three's "Black Widower". He appears at Bart and Lisa's wild house party. A woman named Gloria who seeks marriage counseling at the retreat was voiced by Julie Kavner. It is one of the few times in the history of the show that Kavner has voiced a character other than Marge and her relatives. Gloria's hair was based on Kirkland's assistant director Susie Dietter's hair.

The Simpsons writer Mike Reiss said on the episode's DVD audio commentary that while the episode was "full of funny moments", it caused "nothing but trouble" to the staff of the show. One of the troubles was that after the episode had been written by Swartzwelder, an unsolicited writer sent the staff a script that was almost perfectly the same story line. To avoid a lawsuit, the staff paid him US$3000 and went forward with the episode. Material cut from the episode's script included many couples who were supposed to be at the retreat instead of the Flanders family, such as Mr. Burns and his mail-order bride, and Mrs. Krabappel trying to reunite with her estranged husband Ken Krabappel. Reiss said the scene played out "horribly badly", and it appeared as if Mr. Burns's mail-order bride was a prostitute. The Ken Krabappel character was supposed to be based on American actor Dean Martin, but somehow he ended up with a southern accent that made him sound like a hick. The whole scene was rewritten with help from producer James L. Brooks and it was completed after several hours. A scene in which Moe asked Dr. Hibbert to cure his discolored feces was also removed during the first reading of the script after a complaint by Brooks.