History Recap / TheSimpsonsS2E15OhBrotherWhereArtThou

* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: Abe and Jasper's complaints to the movie theater manager involve a small screen, a sticky floor, and a tacked-on romantic subplot. Obviously, the theater manager can't do anything about that third item and he don't seem to care about the other two.

* ArsonMurderJaywalking: Abe and Jasper's complaints to the movie theater manager involve a small screen, a sticky floor, and a tacked-on romantic subplot. Obviously, the theater manager can't do anything about that third item and he don't seem to care about the other two.

* ArsonMuderJaywalking: Abe and Jasper's complaints to the movie theater manager involve a small screen, a sticky floor, and a tacked-on romantic subplot. Obviously, the theater manager can't do anything about that third item and he don't seem to care about the other two.

* NeverMyFault: Herb blames Homer for ruining his company despite putting him in charge, shelving all other projects and outright ignoring his employees' warnings, who despite being 'Havard dead-heads' as he put it still know enough about business to be on the board of a car company.

* BlatantLies: When Herb disowns Homer at the end, Marge tries to comfort him by saying "I'm sure he said it to make conversation".

* CassandraTruth: The engineers try to warn Herb that Homer's decisions are counter productive and even harmful to company's well-being, though due to their own ineffectiveness at making good designs themselves, their earlier petty unwillingness to work with Homer, and [[NotHelpingYourCase generally rude way of consulting Herb]], he ignores them.
-->'''Herb:''' Well you know what, I'm ''glad'' you're nervous, [[AntiAdvise cause that means we're on the right track!]]

* AreWeThereYet: The TropeNamer. Bart and Lisa annoy Homer with that question during the car ride to Detroit. Marge tells them they'll turn around if they don't stop, Homer complains that he wants to see his brother, an annoyed Marge tells him it was an idle threat.

* EpicFail: Herb asks Homer to help his company design a car for the "average American man". Homer instead designs an '''$82,000''' [[note]]equal to about ''$168,000'' in 2021![[/note]] HummerDinger that gets Herb laughed straight into bankruptcy. Herb didn't really make things easy on himself by 1) believing '''Homer''', with his immense stupidity, could actually represent an "average American" and 2) Herb decided not to listen when the rest of the research team tried to warn him.

As the company expresses little support for Homer's crazy ideas, Herb gives him complete creative control over the product, which ends up becoming "The Homer", an extremely ugly and expensive car, with an '''''$82,000''''' (nearly $176,000 in 2022 dollars) price tag (consider that, in 1991, few if any luxury cars sold for over $70-75,000). The ensuing PR chaos ends up with Powell Motors in bankruptcy (its assets being taken over by Komatsu Motors) and with Herbert losing everything he had, angrily telling Homer that his life was good until he knew he was a Simpson, an opinion shared by Lisa. Immediately after, Abe arrives in a taxi to see Herb, only to make a hasty retreat. On the way home, Bart compliments Homer for his car.

* DownerEnding: Homer is left heartbroken after a bankrupt Herb disowns him. Some fans were so upset by Herb's downfall that the producers would ultimately do [[Recap/TheSimpsonsS3E24BrotherCanYouSpareTwoDimes "Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes"]] to give Herb a happy ending again (though a much later episode ["Changing of the Guardian"] reveals that Herb went broke again, and viewers don't get any information as to what happened).

As the company expresses little support for Homer's crazy ideas, Herb gives him complete creative control over the product, which ends up becoming "The Homer", an extremely ugly and expensive car, with an '''''$82,000''''' (nearly $176,000 in 2022 dollars) price tag (consider that, in 1991, few if any luxury cars sold for over $70-75),000). The ensuing PR chaos ends up with Powell Motors in bankruptcy (its assets being taken over by Komatsu Motors) and with Herbert losing everything he had, angrily telling Homer that his life was good until he knew he was a Simpson, an opinion shared by Lisa. Immediately after, Abe arrives in a taxi to see Herb, only to make a hasty retreat. On the way home, Bart compliments Homer for his car.

* IncompetenceInc: Powell Motors is shown to be this. The company's products don't appeal to consumers and are implied to be cheap and low quality, their marketing is so idiotic that they name new cars after Myth/ClassicalMythology references, the board of directors are a bunch of clueless {{Upper Class Twit}}s and Herb has an extremely bad relationship with them and with his lead engineers, especially due to being a SelfMadeMan who loathes people born into success. Things are so bad that Powell Motors is losing more and more ground to its Japanese competitors every day. Homer's car is just the final nail in the company's coffin - Herb put all his hopes on Homer's new miracle product, and he ignored his engineers' and executives' warnings about the lemon Homer was designing, since he believed anything they hated ''must'' be an improvement.

* IncompetenceInc: Powell Motors is shown to be this. The company's products don't appeal to consumers and are implied to be cheap and low quality, their marketing is so idiotic that they name new cars after GeniusBonus Myth/ClassicalMythology references, the board of directors are a bunch of clueless {{Upper Class Twit}}s and Herb has an extremely bad relationship with them and with his lead engineers, especially due to being a SelfMadeMan who loathes people born into success. Things are so bad that Powell Motors is losing more and more ground to its Japanese competitors every day. Homer's car is just the final nail in the company's coffin - Herb put all his hopes on Homer's new miracle product, and he ignored his engineers' and executives' warnings about the lemon Homer was designing, since he believed anything they hated ''must'' be an improvement.

-->'''Homer:''' Since I'm the one you kept, that must mean you really love me.\\

* JerkassHasAPoint: The design team makes some valid points about fuel efficiency and automobile designs, but how they express them ultimately demeans everything.

* IHaveNoSon: Or in Herb's case, "I Have No Brother" It took the next season for Herb to forgive Homer.

As the company expresses little support for Homer's crazy ideas, Herb gives him complete creative control over the product, which ends up becoming "The Homer", an extremely ugly and expensive car, with an '''''$82,000''''' (nearly $176,000 in 2020 dollars) price tag (consider that, in 1991, few if any luxury cars sold for over $70-75),000). The ensuing PR chaos ends up with Powell Motors in bankruptcy (its assets being taken over by Komatsu Motors) and with Herbert losing everything he had, angrily telling Homer that his life was good until he knew he was a Simpson, an opinion shared by Lisa. Immediately after, Abe arrives in a taxi to see Herb, only to make a hasty retreat. On the way home, Bart compliments Homer for his car.

As the company expresses little support for Homer's crazy ideas, Herb gives him complete creative control over the product, which ends up becoming "The Homer", an extremely ugly and expensive car, with an '''''$82,000''''' (nearly $176,000 in 2020 dollars price tag (consider that, in 1991, few if any luxury cars sold for over $70-75),000). The ensuing PR chaos ends up with Powell Motors in bankruptcy (its assets being taken over by Komatsu Motors) and with Herbert losing everything he had, angrily telling Homer that his life was good until he knew he was a Simpson, an opinion shared by Lisa. Immediately after, Abe arrives in a taxi to see Herb, only to make a hasty retreat. On the way home, Bart compliments Homer for his car.

As the company expresses little support for Homer's crazy ideas, Herb gives him complete creative control over the product, which ends up becoming "The Homer", an extremely ugly and expensive car, with an '''''$82,000''''' *nearly $176,000 in 2020 dollars price tag (consider that, in 1991, few if any luxury cars sold for over $70-75,000). The ensuing PR chaos ends up with Powell Motors in bankruptcy (its assets being taken over by Komatsu Motors) and with Herbert losing everything he had, angrily telling Homer that his life was good until he knew he was a Simpson, an opinion shared by Lisa. Immediately after, Abe arrives in a taxi to see Herb, only to make a hasty retreat. On the way home, Bart compliments Homer for his car.