All's Fair in Oven War

"All's Fair in Oven War" is the second episode of The Simpsons' sixteenth season. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 14, 2004.[2] In the episode, Marge gets her kitchen remodeled and the dishes she makes inside it get rave reviews. The suggestion of Ned Flanders leads her to enter a cooking contest. However, Marge realizes the competition is harder than it seems. Meanwhile, Bart finds Homer's vintage Playdude magazines and decides to adopt the lifestyle he sees within the articles.

"All's Fair in Oven War"
The Simpsons episode
Episode no.Season 16
Episode 2
Directed byMark Kirkland
Written byMatt Selman
Production codeFABF20[1]
Original air dateNovember 14, 2004[2]
Guest appearance(s)

Thomas Pynchon as himself[3]
James Caan as himself[3]

Episode features
Couch gagThe couch is seen outside in a clearing and mounted on a catapult. The Simpson family sits down and get launched over a mountain range.
CommentaryMatt Groening
Al Jean
Matt Selman
Ian Maxtone-Graham
Tim Long
Michael Price
Mike Scully
Joel H. Cohen
Mike B. Anderson

Matt Selman wrote the episode, and Mark Kirkland served as director. Thomas Pynchon and James Caan guest starred as themselves.[3] The episode features cultural references to songs such as "Separate Ways", "Boplicity", and "Take Five", as well as references to the film The Godfather and various fictional food mascots. The episode received positive reviews from critics.

Plot

Marge and Homer discover the house next to them is up for sale, and marvel at the extensive kitchen inside the house. After realizing the poor quality of her own kitchen, she asks Homer to hire a contractor. Not wanting to pay the price of hiring one, he decides to remodel it himself. While remodeling the kitchen, Homer unearths his old collection of Playdude magazines. After Marge sees them, he innocently tells her he kept them only for the articles, and she decides to make sure by cutting out all the nudes from the magazines. After this, Homer decides that they are now of no use, and throws them away, only for them to be found by Bart and Milhouse. After reading the 1970s magazines, they are inspired to renovate their treehouse. After Homer's attempts of remodeling the kitchen fail, Marge finally decides to hire a contractor herself.

Despite the contractor assuring that the renovation will be done in three weeks, it takes two years of renovation. Marge's kitchen is finally remodelled, for the price of $100,000. She then cooks her first dish in the kitchen, which gets rave reviews from many Springfieldians, as well as author Thomas Pynchon. At the Kwik-E-Mart, Marge encounters an advertisement for the Ovenfresh bake-off, in which the grand prize is being Ovenfresh's spokeswoman, "Auntie Ovenfresh". Under Ned Flanders's advice, she decides to enter the bake-off with her "dessert dogs" and she wins, beating Ralph's "Grilled crayon sandwich." At the bake-off, most of the competitors cheat by ruining Marge's dessert dogs on purpose while insulting her, so while alone in the judging room, Marge retaliates by tainting all of the competitors' entries with Maggie's ear medicine. This was witnessed by Lisa, who then loses her faith in her as a result.

Meanwhile, Chief Wiggum and other concerned parents talk to Homer about Bart spreading Playdude to the other children. Realizing that Bart has got the magazines he threw away, Homer decides to have a talk with him about sex. After the talk, a horrified Bart quickly spreads the talk to Milhouse and the other children, horrifying them as well. Meanwhile, Lisa confronts Marge for cheating, but she defends her actions by stating that the competitors pushed her into doing so with their antics. At the bake-off finals against Brandine Spuckler, Marge considers cheating again, but then discovers a note from Lisa and admits to her foul play, restoring Lisa's faith in her. Not long afterwards, the new Auntie Ovenfresh flour bag with Brandine on it comes out and her husband, Cletus mentions that she has left him for James Caan. In response, Cletus's friends ambush Caan at a toll booth and gun him down in a scene reminiscent of the death of Sonny Corleone, Caan's character in the film The Godfather. He survives and complains about the scene.[4][5]

Production
James Caan guest starred in the episode as himself.

The episode was written Matt Selman, his eleventh writing credit for The Simpsons. The episode was the first season sixteen episode that Mark Kirkland directed.

Reclusive novelist Thomas Pynchon guest stars as himself in the episode, wearing a paper bag over his head.[6] His role is reprised from the season 15 episode "Diatribe of a Mad Housewife". According to executive producer Al Jean, Pynchon helped write the jokes for his appearances.[7] James Caan also guest stars in the episode, first seen in Bart's treehouse. He is then shown dating Brandine Spuckler, and he is later shot by hillbillies at a toll booth. Thomas Pynchon offers insight on Marge’s cooking. Pynchon contributes his own jokes—including a pun he made on his best-known work, The Frying Of Latke 49.[8] Pynchon refused to call Homer a "fat-ass" as he did not want to speak ill of him.[9]

In the original version of this episode, after Homer tells Marge that she is the "best chef in the house", Marge grumbles, "Eh, BFD", which stands for "big, fucking deal". On Sunday night FOX repeats, the "F" in "BFD" is muted out. The original line can be heard in syndicated and UK reruns. The syndicated version also credits Russi Taylor, who was not credited in the original version of the episode.[10] The Godfather parody was cut short in the UK version, and several sexual references from Bart's "playdude" plot were removed. The show in the UK is broadcast at six and needed to be appropriate for children.[11]

Cultural references

The episode's title is a play on the saying "All's fair in love and war", a proverb found in John Lyly's 16th-century book Euphues[12] that is commonly used to justify cheating. The episode features three different songs. The song "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" by Journey is played in the background during Homer's fantasy of him living next to himself.[13] "Boplicity" by Miles Davis is listened to by Bart and Milhouse,[13] and "Take Five" by The Dave Brubeck Quartet is played in the background at Bart's treehouse.[13] The episode's final scene, showing James Caan being ambushed by hillbillies at a toll booth, is a parody of a scene in the film The Godfather when Sonny Corleone, portrayed by Caan, is shot and killed at a toll booth. The scene was also parodied in the episode "Mr. Plow", in which Bart gets pelted by snowballs by Nelson and his gang of bullies.[4][14] Marge suggesting that the pope has been letting things slide lately, is a reference to the sex abuse scandal of the early 2000s.[15]

Reception

In its original American broadcast, "All's Fair in Oven War" garnered roughly 11.64 million viewers.[16] The episode received a 6.4 Neilsen rating.[17]

The episode has garnered positive reviews from critics. Eric Messinger of Springfield Weekly gave the episode a positive review. He gave the episode a B-, stating the Marge segment "needed a bit more fine-tuning". However, he praised the Bart segment, stating that it saved the episode, and that Bart not seeing nudity in the Playdude magazines worked well in every joke, and the segment was almost reminiscent to the season three episode "Bart the Murderer". He also praised the James Caan guest appearance, stating it "worked quite well, especially with the Godfather ending pay-off."[18] In 2012, New York magazine named "All Fair's in Oven War" as one of the ten best later Simpsons episodes.[19] Ellwood Hughes of Entertainment Focus considered the episode a highlight of the season.[20] Chris Morgan of Cinema Sentries praised the episode and commented "It is, arguably, the best episode to air after the turn of the millennium, and, in fact, is one of the top episodes of the show, period."[21] A review of the season 16 DVD on alternativeaddiction.com listed it as one of "some incredibly fun episode ideas".[22] On Rolling Stone's top 150 Simpsons episodes they placed "All's Fair in Oven War" at #89.[23]

References
  1. "Production Code". www.lardlad.com. Retrieved August 7, 2018.
  2. "All's Fair in Oven War". The Simpsons.com. Archived from the original on June 14, 2009. Retrieved June 16, 2009.
  3. "All's Fair in Oven War" at TV.com
  4. "Simpsons World Commentary". Archived from the original on January 24, 2018. Retrieved August 6, 2018.
  5. "S16 E02 – All's Fair in Oven War". PUZZLED PAGAN PRESENTS. November 23, 2016. Archived from the original on December 21, 2016. Retrieved August 7, 2018.
  6. Glenn, Joshua (October 19, 2003). "Pynchon and Homer". Boston.com. Archived from the original on June 20, 2009. Retrieved June 16, 2009.
  7. Sell, Otto. "Pynchon Index". www.ottosell.de. Archived from the original on July 26, 2009. Retrieved July 5, 2009.
  8. Vago, Mike. "Thomas Pynchon edited his own Simpsons dialogue". The AV Club. Archived from the original on September 13, 2017. Retrieved August 7, 2018.
  9. "Read Thomas Pynchon's Handwritten Edits to His Simpsons Script". thomaspynchon.com. Archived from the original on November 4, 2014. Retrieved August 7, 2018.
  10. Garvey, Matt (June 23, 2008). "Simpsons Syndication Cuts Guide Season Sixteen". The Simpsons Archive. Archived from the original on June 27, 2009. Retrieved July 2, 2009.
  11. "The Simpsons UK Cuts, Season 16 — Simpsons Crazy". www.simpsoncrazy.com. Archived from the original on July 6, 2017. Retrieved August 7, 2018.
  12. Titelman, Gregory Y. "Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings", Random House, N.Y., 1996.
  13. "Music from The Simpsons S16E02". Tunefind. Retrieved July 23, 2018.
  14. Loughrey, Clarisse (February 11, 2016). "The Simpsons' film parodies seen side-by-side with their references". The Independent. Archived from the original on January 16, 2017. Retrieved January 14, 2017.
  15. Pinsky, Mark I. (2007). The Gospel According to the Simpsons: Bigger and Possibly Even Better! Edition with a New Afterword Exploring South Park, Family Guy, and Other Animated TV Shows. Westminster John Knox Press. p. 130. ISBN 978-0-664-23160-6. Retrieved August 7, 2018. simpsons pope letting a lot of things slide.
  16. "Weekly Program Rankings". ABC Medianet. November 16, 2004. Archived from the original on October 10, 2014. Retrieved November 27, 2011.
  17. "TV Listings". www.tvtango.com. Archived from the original on July 24, 2018. Retrieved July 23, 2018.
  18. "Springfield Weekly – Season 16 Reviews". Archived from the original on March 17, 2012. Retrieved July 2, 2017.
  19. Seitz, Matt Zoller (February 10, 2012). "Nine Latter-Day Simpsons Episodes That Match Up to the Early Classics". New York. Archived from the original on February 14, 2012. Retrieved February 11, 2012.
  20. "The Simpsons: Season 16 DVD review – Entertainment Focus". Entertainment Focus. Archived from the original on July 24, 2018. Retrieved April 18, 2016.
  21. "The Simpsons Season 16 Blu-ray Review: It Delivers What It Promises – Cinema Sentries". cinemasentries.com. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved April 18, 2016.
  22. "Review of The Simpsons: The Complete Sixteenth Season". alternativeaddiction.com. Archived from the original on April 19, 2016. Retrieved April 18, 2016.
  23. "Springfield of Dreams: 150 Best 'Simpsons' Episodes". Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on April 21, 2016. Retrieved April 18, 2016.
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