Spoiled
It's Inception, soap style.
Crypt Keeper: (dressed as a golfer and wiping off a club; he's seated at his table, which is decorated with grass, tees, golf balls, and a second club) Hello, golfing fiends, and welcome to the Crypt. (takes note of a skeleton dressed as a golfer with a golf ball lodged in its skull) Oh, don't mind him. That's just my caddie, Juan. He got me teed off while I was playing a round... so I shot a hole in Juan! (cackles) Which brings to mind the young woman in tonight's tale. She's also playing around, except that her game isn't golf. It's love. I call this disgusting drama: Spoiled.
Janet (Faye Grant) is a frustrated housewife whose husband Leon (Alan Rachins), a prominent doctor, bluntly ignores her to focus on his research in a new anesthetic. To cope with the neglect, Janet loses herself in her favorite soap opera, There's Always Tomorrow, which revolves around Fuchsia Monroe (Anita Morris), a no-nonsense businesswoman who embarks on entering a steamy affair with one of her husband’s employees when he's too busy making a complex business deal work out. When her set loses picture at a critical moment in the show, Janet decides to follow her friend Louise's advice to fix up her set with cable. She soon meets Abel the cable man (Anthony LaPaglia), and upon noting how attractive he looks and having had enough of Leon's neglect, Janet decides to follow in her idol's footsteps and embarks on a passionate affair with Abel. All seems well with the arrangement, until Leon accidentally catches the duo in the act.
Tropes:
- Adaptational Name Change: In the original comic, Abel was the husband and Leon was the man Janet was sleeping with. Here, the names are swapped.
- Animal Testing: Leon owns a rabbit named "Mr. Cottontail", who he uses as a test subject for his new anesthetic. He also weeps to Mr. Cottontail when he finds out what Janet's been doing behind his back, prompting him to make her and Abel his latest test subjects.
- Awful Wedded Life: Leon is thoroughly obsessed with his research and throws Janet aside at every opportunity. It's thanks to this neglect and abuse that their sex life is no more, and thus why Janet decides to embark on her affair with Abel.
- The Bad Guy Wins: It's downplayed, but the abusive and dismissive Leon doesn't receive any onscreen comeuppance for what he does to Abel and Janet.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Janet and Abel constantly moan about how much they want each other's bodies in the midst of love-making. Once he finds out about their affair, Leon is more than happy to oblige.
- Breaking Old Trends: This is the first episode in the series where the Crypt Keeper's framing segments have nothing to do with the episode, unless you count the stereotype of doctors playing golf.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: In order to convince Leon that he was fixing the bedroom TV, Abel turns it on. Immediately, it starts playing the tail end of the series' opening.
- Catchphrase: Abel usually introduces himself to people by telling them "I'm Abel. With the cable."
- Cheating with the Milkman: Janet begins cheating on Leon with Abel, the hunky cable guy who provides her house with a hookup.
- Chekhov's Gun: The basement door has a red light above it, which Leon switches on to let Janet know that he's busy and she isn't allowed to disturb him. When he takes a leave of absence to focus on the anesthetic, she and Abel learn to watch for when the light turns off so the latter knows to get out of the house. When Leon finally perfects the anesthetic, he's so excited to tell Janet the news that he forgets to turn the light off, leading him to discover the affair.
- Daytime Drama Queen: Janet is obsessed with There's Always Tomorrow, using the soap opera as a coping mechanism to deal with her husband's insensitivity towards her and his obsession with his work.
- Desperately Craves Affection: Janet has been ignored by her husband for many years, and desperately wants sex with him in the hopes of rekindling their marriage. When he doesn't bother to give her any attention, she turns to the hunky Abel to satisfy her diminished sex drive.
- Digital Head Swap: Janet and Abel have their heads and bodies switched by Leon, and the effect is accomplished in this manner.
- Double Entendre: Janet and Abel's lustful dialogue with each other is absolutely loaded with cheesy double entendres, to the point where one can make a drinking game out of all the times they trade suggestive wordplay.
- Double-Meaning Title: The episode's title refers to both the spoiled content of Janet's favorite soap opera, and how her marriage itself has spoiled due to Leon's abrasive workaholic nature.
- Downer Ending: Leon discovers his wife's adultery and subsequently punishes her and Abel by switching their bodies.
- Everybody Lives: One of only three or four episodes in the series where all the main characters make it to the end, though not all of them are left quite the same.
- Evil Laugh: Leon gives a nasally laugh of triumph in the end, after his experiment is a success.
- Fake-Out Opening: The episode opens on an In-Universe showing of There's Always Tomorrow. While it's made to let the viewers believe this setting is the whole plot, the camera zooms out to reveal Janet and Louise watching the episode in the living room.
- Foreshadowing: In her opening rant to Louise, Janet claims that she wants to "lose her head" in romance. By the end of the episode, that's exactly what happens.
- For Want Of A Nail: If Leon had perhaps taken the time to remember shutting his light off, he would've remained unaware of what his wife was up to.
- Groin Attack: Louise tells Janet that in the episode of There's Always Tomorrow she ended up missing, the ending had Evian shoot Quebec below the belt.
- Homage: The episode is one of daytime soap operas, with the general plot repeating their passionate and melodramatic nature. It's lampshaded by the fact that Janet loses herself in a soap opera to cope with Leon's abuse.
- Hypocrite: Leon has the gall to accuse Janet of "hurting him" when he discovers she's been cheating on him with Abel, while he completely disregards the fact that it was he himself who drove her to cheat on him in the first place.
- Ignore the Fanservice: Leon doesn't even bat an eye when Janet strips down to the lingerie he bought her on their wedding night.
- Imagine Spot: Janet has a fantasy where Leon realizes what a fool he's been and passionately makes out with her, but it's revealed from Louise's point of view that Janet is making out with thin air.
- Instant Sedation: Janet and Abel are instantly knocked out when Leon holds chloroformed rags in front of their faces.
- It's All About Me: Leon is obsessed with perfecting his anesthetic and kicks Janet to the curb whenever she tries to get his attention. When he discovers her affair with Abel, he has the audacity to call her out for her betrayal when it was his own Jerkass attitude that led Janet to cheat on him in the first place.
- Karma Houdini: Leon doesn't get any comeuppance for swapping the heads of his wife and her lover.
- Large Ham: Being the soap opera addict she is, Janet is loud and brash about having the same life her heroine has.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Janet's friend Louise advises her to have cable installed by saying she can get HBO, the series' network, which she imagines will improve the quality of her life.
- Left Hanging: We get to tune into quite a bit of There's Always Tomorrow along with Janet, but the episode ends before we know what happens after Fuchsia discovers that her husband Evian has apparently turned gay while in prison.
- Lighter and Softer: This episode is a comedic parody of daytime soap operas, with elements of a cheesy porno and a large amount of meta jokes thrown in. The blood and guts are virtually nonexistent, and everyone lives in the end.
- Loony Fan: Janet is religiously devoted to There's Always Tomorrow, particularly Fuchsia and her no-nonsense nature, because she uses the show to cope with Leon's atrocious attitude towards her. It gets to the point where she copies Fuchsia and enters an affair with Abel to restore her extinguished sex drive.
- Mad Doctor: Leon's research involves developing an anesthetic that "freezes the brain" and allows for highly complex surgical procedures to be completed without any complications. When he discovers what Janet and Abel have been up to, he goes insane with grief and makes them the next test subjects of said anesthetic.
- Married to the Job: As Janet herself says, Leon is far more obsessed with his research than her, and he insensitively reminds her of that fact all the time.
- Missing the Good Stuff: Janet's TV loses picture right at the especially tense climax of There's Always Tomorrow's latest episode. By the time she clears up the static, she despairs when she finds herself watching the credits. It's this moment that ultimately pushes her to get cable.
- Never My Fault: When Leon finally discovers Janet's adultery, he becomes determined to make her and Abel pay, completely ignoring how it was his own insensitivity toward her that drove her to cheat on him in the first place.
- Offscreen Teleportation: After returning to the basement in sorrow and debating what to do with Janet and Abel, Leon immediately reappears upstairs and drugs them.
- Plot Parallel: The plot of There's Always Tomorrow has the same plot as the episode itself... for the most part.
- Prison Rape: It's very subtly hinted that Evian underwent this when he was locked up for shooting Quebec. As Fuchsia learns, the experience is hinted to have turned him gay.
- Proscenium Reveal: After seemingly establishing There's Always Tomorrow as the central storyline and setting, the episode reveals that it's actually a soap opera being watched by Janet and Louise.
- Product Placement: Janet's friend Louise shills HBO, the network that produces and airs the series, along with CNN, C-SPAN, and the Weather Channel, to convince Janet to have cable installed.
- Pun: Janet and Abel trade many a corny entendre in their romantic banter, to the point where they might rival the Crypt Keeper himself on the cheesiness scale.
- Recursive Canon: The ending of the Tales from the Crypt intro plays on the TV set in the bedroom, when Abel shows off the new cable.
- Self-Deprecation: When Leon comes across Janet and Abel in the bedroom, Abel shows off the new cable he installed by turning on the TV, which displays the tail end of the Tales from the Crypt intro. A grumpy Leon instantly tells Abel to turn the set off.
- Shout-Out:
- Along with all the soap opera homages, this episode also contains elements from The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The housewife who desperately craves hot sex with her husband is named "Janet", her husband looks like a cross between Brad and Dr. Scott, and she even cheats on said husband with a total hunk she's only known for a few hours.
- Janet also refers to Mr. Cottontail, Leon's test rabbit, as "Bugs Bunny."
- Soap Within a Show: There's Always Tomorrow, where no-nonsense businesswoman Fuchsia Monroe has an affair with Quebec, an employee of her husband Evian. Janet is utterly obsessed with the show and relies on it to take the edge off of her diminishing marriage with Leon.
- Speaks in Shout-Outs: At one point, Janet acts like Fuchsia, repeating the lines she spoke and the actions she made to get Leon to notice her.
- Spanner in the Works: Louise, who advises Janet to have cable installed and allows her to meet Abel.
- Sympathetic Adulterer: Considering how Leon spends much more time with his work than her and how abrasively he treats her, Janet is one of the most sympathetic cheating wives in the series.
- "What Now?" Ending: After Leon switches Janet and Abel's bodies, we don't know whether he gets away with it, or what Janet and Abel plan to do now. It can be said that this ending is left up to the viewer's interpretation.
- Workaholic: Leon is interested only in his work, pushing Janet aside to make time for it. When his anesthetic is perfected, he suddenly remembers that he's married and runs to his wife, only to discover Janet's making love with Abel.
- World of Ham: Given how it's a soap opera spoof in a similarly spoof-heavy episode, every character in There's Always Tomorrow has a hefty level of ham in their dialogue. The same can be said for everyone in the "real" world as well.
Crypt Keeper: (at the 18th hole of his "golf course") Well, looks like Janet and Abel have become rather attached. Talk about being stuck on each other! (cackles) I guess the next time Janet wants to cable up, she'll be a little more careful about it. Anyway, I've got to get back to my game. (he putts his ball, sinking it into the hole; a skull on top of the hole shuts on it) What do you know? Par for the corpse! (cackles)
