Marge on the Lam

"Marge on the Lam" is the sixth episode of the fifth season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 4, 1993. After Marge invites her neighbor Ruth Powers to attend a ballet recital, they become friends. Homer grows jealous of their friendship and pursues them, resulting in a police chase led by Chief Wiggum that ends in near-disaster.

The episode, which serves largely as a parody of Thelma & Louise and the Dragnet franchise, was written by Bill Canterbury and directed by Mark Kirkland. Phil Hartman, Pamela Reed and George Fenneman were the guest stars.

Plot
After donating money to a telethon, Marge receives complimentary ballet tickets. Marge guilts Homer into accompanying her by reminding him of how he once volunteered as a test subject in a United States Army experiment to avoid visiting Patty and Selma with her. However, Homer gets both of his arms stuck in a pair of vending machines at work. Disappointed and doubting Homer's story, Marge invites her neighbor, Ruth Powers, to go with her instead. Ruth and Marge enjoy themselves and agree to spend time with each other again. The next night, Ruth and Marge visit several bars and clubs in Springfield and Ruth teaches Marge how to use a pistol, using a forlorn farmer's "precious antique cans" for target practice.

To show he can have a good time without Marge, Homer visits the hilltop where he and Marge used to spend time before they got married, but finds it is no fun without her. While tending his moonshine still on the hill, Chief Wiggum spots Homer and offers him a ride home. At one point, Wiggum decides to perform a routine traffic stop on the car Ruth and Marge are in. Ruth speeds up and reveals to Marge that she is driving her ex-husband's stolen car in retaliation for his failure to pay child support. Still in Wiggum's backseat, Homer realizes Marge is in Ruth's car and believes she has turned to a life of crime because of his neglect. Ruth then successfully evades Wiggum by turning off her headlights.

After seeing Marge and Ruth again the next morning, Homer and Wiggum continue their pursuit as they are joined by all of the latter's fellow officers. The duo then start to unknowingly drive towards a cliffside leading into the Grand Chasm and Homer mistakes this for a suicide attempt. Using a megaphone, Homer apologizes to Marge for all of his shortcomings and urges them not to drive into the chasm. Now aware of the danger she and Marge are in, Ruth stops the car near the cliff's edge. Homer and Wiggum fail to stop in time, fly off it and land in a mountain of landfill debris. They emerge slightly soiled from its waste but otherwise unscathed.

Because of the incompetence of Ruth's ex-husband's lawyer, Lionel Hutz, whom Homer had paid to babysit his children the night before, the charges against Ruth are dropped and her ex-husband is forced to pay his missed child support. Marge is ordered to compensate the farmer for destroying his cans and Homer is remanded to the United States Army's Neurochemical Research Center for extensive testing, to his delight.

Production
Dan Castellaneta actually used a bullhorn to record his part when Homer used one to get Marge's attention and apologize to her. The sunset shown when Marge and Ruth are at the café was airbrushed in, although the episode was done before computer animation was put into practice.

Cultural references
Much of the plot, including the scene when Homer is in Moe's Tavern and the climax where the stolen car and Homer and Wiggum's fall over the chasm, is a parody of Ridley Scott's Thelma & Louise. The music played during Homer's visualisation of the term ballet is Entrance of the Gladiators by Julius Fučík. Crystal Buzz Cola is a reference to the fad drink Crystal Pepsi, and when Homer reaches into the vending machine, a can of Fresca is seen in the grasp of a skeletal hand stuck in there. The comedian who performs at the telethon that the Simpsons watches at the beginning of the episode and does not find funny is a parody of Garrison Keillor. Ruth mistakenly inserts Lesley Gore's song "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows" into her car stereo before beginning her and Marge's wild night out; after extracting it, Ruth pops in "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses. Later, Wiggum plays the former on his police cruiser's stereo as car chase music. Quimby dancing in a night club is in reference to the Kennedys. When Marge gets hit on in the bar, the guy who does not talk is a caricature of show runner David Mirkin. The old man that comes out when Marge is shooting his cans is a parody of Walter Brennan. The episode's closing sequence is a reference to the Dragnet franchise. George Fenneman recorded the ending in the same style he did on that series.

Reception
In its original broadcast, "Marge on the Lam" finished 32nd in ratings for the week of November 1–7, 1993, with a Nielsen rating of 13.1, equivalent to approximately 12.2 million viewing households. It was the highest-rated show on the Fox network that week, beating Beverly Hills, 90210.

The authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, said "Marge getting to let her hair down is always a treat, and in Ruth Powers she seems to have a real friend. A pity we don't see more of her".

The A.V. Club named Homer's line "Stupid TV! Be more funny!" as one of the quotes from The Simpsons that can be used in everyday situations.

Legacy
On their album And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out (2000), Yo La Tengo has a song entitled "Let's Save Tony Orlando's House"; the song is named after a telethon in Troy McClure's fictional CV in this episode.