Helter Shelter (The Simpsons)

After Homer is hit by a falling girder at work and suffers a mild head injury, Mr. Burns gives him luxury skybox tickets to a hockey game in order to keep him from suing the power plant.

Finding themselves without any suitable lodgings, they learn from Barney and Carl about The 1895 Challenge, a reality show in which a family must inhabit a Victorian era house and adopt a lifestyle consistent with the title year.

When the ratings begin to fall as a result, the producers introduce Squiggy from Laverne & Shirley into the show, even allowing him to use a Taser as a means of disrupting the peaceful situation.

Squiggy is killed in the crash, but the Simpsons emerge unhurt from the wreckage and must forage for food and shelter in the wilderness, since the crew refuses to give them lunch.

They soon encounter a group of savage-looking people who turn out to be a tribe of contestants from another reality show, left to fend for themselves after they lost their final challenge.

"Helter Shelter" was written by Brian Pollack and Mert Rich and directed by Mark Kirkland as part of the fourteenth season of The Simpsons (2002–03).

[1] Actor David Lander, who portrayed Squiggy in Laverne & Shirley, guest starred in the episode as that character, while boxer Larry Holmes appeared as himself.

In "The Heartbroke Kid", the family actually convert 742 Evergreen Terrace into an youth hostel in order to pay for Bart's weight loss camp bills.

[7] On December 6, 2011, "Helter Shelter" was released on Blu-ray and DVD as part of the box set The Simpsons – The Complete Fourteenth Season.

[8] Staff members Al Jean, Dan Greaney, Carolyn Omine, Kevin Curran, Mark Kirkland, David Silverman, J. Stewart Burns, Allen Glazier, and Steven Dean Moore participated in the DVD audio commentary for the episode.

The show plods through its scenario without much life, mostly because parodies of reality TV just aren't very interesting; the programs they mock are already so absurd that there's not much room for satire.