Trivia / The Simpsons S 8 E 6 A Milhouse Divided

• First Appearance: Of Kearney Jr.
• Orphaned Reference: The finished episode still contains a few traces of a scrapped B-plot which would have had Bart envying Milhouse his new situation and wanting to similarly break up Homer and Marge (which would have cumulated in him attempting to drink during the party at the end since he's technically from a "broken home," only to be disappointed when his parents finish remarrying before he can get the bottle open). These include Nelson sympathizing with Milhouse (a scene that was going to end with him inviting him to participate in some mayhem and leaving "family boy" Bart out), Milhouse getting spoiled by his mom with a kid-sized car that he's allowed to ride in the house, and Bart meeting Luann's stunt-double boyfriend and subsequently trying to break a chair on Homer.
• What Could Have Been:
  • According to the DVD Commentary, the episode was supposed to have Bart try and separate Homer and Marge after learning that divorced kids get more sympathy from others than kids with married parents. A few of the deleted scenes actually lead up to this plot.
  • Sheryl Crow was supposed to guest star as herself to sing at the second wedding, but she declined.
  • The original draft had a slightly different conversation between Kirk and the cracker factory manager and a gag about Kirk losing his "severance package" - a box of crackers - to seagulls.
  • Josh Weinstein posted cut pages from the script with an extended version of Kirk and Luann's break-up at the party, while also revealing some key elements which would've made Luann a lot more sympathetic. Alongside him mortgaging their house to pay for hair plugs that didn't work, Luann reveals that Kirk's incompetence at the cracker factory involved him talking her father out of debuting the original peanut butter cracker, arguing the combination would somehow lead to fires and costing them a sure thing. She also reveals he apparently burned the factory down to compensate for his own ideas (a cracker with a pocket of salt in the middle and "Trout Thins," a knockoff of goldfish crackers) being failures. Although the fact that it's implied Kirk was responsible for accidentally killing his father-in-law when he set that fire might be the reason why this was ultimately cut, as it would've pushed Kirk from being an incompetent husband to an outright murderer.

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