Kirk Douglas guest stars as Chester J. Lampwick, Alex Rocco as Roger Meyers Jr., Jack Sheldon as an anthropomorphic constitutional amendment, Suzanne Somers as herself, and Phil Hartman as Lionel Hutz.

The end of the episode features Lester and Eliza, who resemble Bart and Lisa Simpson as they appeared in The Tracey Ullman Show in the 1980s.

's "I'm Just a Bill" segment, Bart and Lisa try to bring back Itchy & Scratchy by studying copyright laws and legal precedents.

DVD Movie Guide and the Los Angeles Daily News enjoyed the episode's focus on The Itchy & Scratchy Show.

He shows Bart his 1919 animated short, Manhattan Madness, to prove he created Itchy, but the nitrate film catches fire and is destroyed by the projector.

Bart buys the cel from Comic Book Guy and shows the courtroom its inscription, proving that Lampwick is the creator of Itchy.

[3] After failing to persuade Lampwick to finance Meyers's production of Itchy & Scratchy (for which he would receive royalties), Bart and Lisa find a legal precedent that could help resurrect the cartoon, but they discover that two other kids, Lester and Eliza, have beaten them to it.

Lester and Eliza secure a large cash settlement for the studio when they realize that the design of Mr. ZIP, the post office mascot, was stolen from Roger Meyers Sr, in addition to exonerating Apu from a public nudity charge and reuniting Krusty with his estranged wife.

Despite being happy that Itchy & Scratchy are back on the air, Bart and Lisa are disturbed that their spotlight has been stolen by two children who closely resemble them.

[3] During their tenure as executive producers of The Simpsons, Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein tried to include one episode related to The Itchy & Scratchy Show in every season.

[4] "The Day the Violence Died", written by John Swartzwelder and directed by Wes Archer,[1] was The Itchy & Scratchy Show-related episode for the seventh season, and became a vehicle for jokes about animation.

[4] In Swartzwelder's original script, the "Amendment to Be" segment was a cartoon called Homage Alley that was consciously a parody of the humor style of The Simpsons, but the producers felt that it was not funny.

[4] In Nancy Cartwright's autobiography My Life as a 10-Year-Old Boy, she comments that the episode's script was a "gem" and recalls that Kirk Douglas's recording session, directed by Josh Weinstein, was fraught with interruptions.

[4] The episode's title alludes to the line "the day the music died" from Don McLean's 1971 hit song "American Pie".

DVD Movie Guide's Colin Jacobson enjoyed the episode and called it a "hoot", praising Harry Shearer's impression of David Brinkley.

[16] Jennifer Malkowski of DVD Verdict said that the best part of the episode is during The Itchy & Scratchy Show copyright trial, when lawyer Lionel Hutz "stalls for time by calling all of his surprise witnesses again: a ventriloquist and his dummy, Santa Claus with a broken leg, a caricature of John Swartzwelder, Ralph Wiggum, and the fattest twins in The Guinness Book of World Records".

[17] The episode was considered a classic by The Rockford Register Star, which enjoyed the "perfect parody of the old 'Schoolhouse Rock' cartoon, 'I'm Just a Bill'".

[14] In the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Unofficial "Simpsons" Guide by Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, they comment that "The Day the Violence Died" is "a great episode, with some clever observations on ideas and copyright, and a superb – and sinister – twist ending featuring the return of both Bart and Lisa from their days on The Tracey Ullman Show".