This episode is considered non-canon, and the events featured are not part of the timeline of the series' continuity.
Poorhouse Rock is the twenty-second and final episode of Season 33.
Synopsis[]
After Bart humiliates him at church, Homer finally teaches his son to admire his dad - til a visit from a magical, singing janitor (Hugh Jackman) changes everything they thought they knew.
Full story[]
On a Saturday night, Marge invites over Sarah Wiggum, Luann Van Houten, Elizabeth Hoover and Bernice Hibbert to watch a British drama series, Tunnelton, over Helen Lovejoy's Netflix account that Sarah Wiggum stole the password of. The guests also bring alcohol, and the next morning, Marge has a hangover, so she asks Homer to go to Church without her. At the Sunday School, Helen Lovejoy asks Bart to present his presentation regarding "Honor thy mother and father". Bart shows his presentation, which is a supercut of Homer acting out. When Homer hears outside Bart saying that he is "not not not not a loser", he jumps to the conclusion that since it was an even number, Bart sees him as a loser. Later at night, as he vents to Marge, Marge tells him that she felt really proud of her father once he took her to his job, so Homer decides to do the same.
Homer then brings Bart to work with him, showing him the good parts of his job, and Bart is impressed. The next morning at the breakfast table, Bart walks in, wearing similar blue pants and a white shirt and a tie as Homer, and tells that he really looks up to Homer and also wants to become a nuclear safety inspector when he grows up.
However, when Bart next comes to Homer's workplace (just as Homer is sleeping in a radiation suit), getting through the gate with a self-made ID, he encounters a janitor, who however tells him that he won't get to work a job like Homer, to explain his point, he invites Bart over to a musical number, showing Bart the booming post-WWII middle class created by easy good-paying jobs, also former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich joins in, explaining that eventually the decline in unions and corporate greed killed the middle-class. Unfazed, Bart says he still wants to be like Homer, to which the janitor also has Lisa rap to him the realities: the middle-class jobs are increasingly becoming automatized and if Bart wanted to take over Homer's job, he'd now need a PhD, but then would be crushed by student loan debt and would not be able to afford a brand-new car, fancy house and hot dinners cooked by a stay-at-home spouse, instead would have to choose between paying for healthcare or rent. Then the episode goes on commercial break, with Lisa breaking the fourth wall, saying "We can't even afford what they sell in this commercial."
Returning from the commercial, Bart then counters that he can instead mine cryptocurrency, perform jokes and stunts on YouTube and TikTok and become an Instagram influencer, and should it all fail, also "shake his cans" on OnlyFans. However, the janitor explains him that he has a mere million-to-one chance of actually making any money with it, to which Bart gives up and walks out dejectedly. Lisa follows him and asks if he isn't infuriated by all this, and also gets Moe to join in, singing that greedy politicians write bad laws, and make the rich richer and the poor poorer. Lisa further explains with senior citizens joining in that these politicians were voted in by easily misled people through cable news and Facebook scaremongering.
Bart then runs off to his treehouse, where the janitor has followed him, telling him that he should burn it all down. Bart comments that he likes destroying things, takes off his clothes and throws them on the barbecue, to which the janitor says he meant it as a metaphor and Bart should instead burn the system down and then reform it, only for Bart to respond that he never learned what it is thanks to the poor education system, then he lights the clothes on fire. However, the fire begins to spread and Bart is trapped in his treehouse. Deciding that he now wants to live to see the future, he cries out for help. The Fire Department then arrives and rescues him, and Bart finds out that they have well-paying stable jobs with many good benefits, due to climate change the planet always being on fire, so Bart decides he wants to be a fireman. Marge supports his decision, saying that the fires aren't going anywhere, and the episode ends with the cast singing together, declaring the firefighters "the last men standing in our middle class".
In the tag scene, Homer and Marge clean the backyard of the damage, discussing what had just happened. They consider taking advantage of the situation to upgrade the backyard and get a gazebo, only for Lisa to come outside and tell them that she read from their homeowners' policy that they are not covered for musical numbers, to which both Homer and Marge yell "D'oh!"
