Wabbit Season is the eighth episode of Season 5 of Married... with Children, also the 88th overall episode in the series. Directed by Gerry Cohen and written by series creators Ron Leavitt and Michael G. Moye, the episode originally aired on FOX, premiering on November 11, 1990.
Synopsis[]
After suffering a nervous breakdown at work, Al gets into gardening to relieve his stress, but must deal with a rabbit stealing his carrots.
Description[]
As the eighth episode of the fifth season opens, Al has just been informed by the doctor that he is suffering from stress, and should take up a nice relaxing hobby, such as growing a garden, to calm his nerves. Peg ridicules the idea that there is anything which might cause stress in his life, but can't derail Al's determination to start a vegetable garden, not including Kelly. However, Al's relief is short-lived as he soon unearths a new nemesis - a rabbit with designs on the produce of his garden. Not unlike the episode where Al tries to catch and kill the mouse, Al will stop at nothing to hurt the rabbit; even if it means flooding his neighbor's living room by putting a hose down the rabbit's hole, killing everything (including a rare bald eagle where Marcy reports seeing one twitching and hacking its guts up all over her front lawn) by spraying poison gas, shooting himself in the foot with a shotgun and flamethrower, and even blowing up the neighborhood by "accidentally" putting dynamite next to a gas main. Just when he thinks he's won, Al has lost, because even with the Bundys' and Marcy's houses both devastated, the rabbit survived.
Cast[]
- Ed O'Neill as Al Bundy
- Katey Sagal as Peggy Bundy
- Amanda Bearse as Marcy Rhoades
- Christina Applegate as Kelly Bundy
- David Faustino as Bud Bundy
- Buck as Buck the dog (Uncredited)
Quotes[]
- Bud: [referring to Al's "trump card", consisting of TNT in a carrot] …Now, Dad, you're sure you've taken every precaution here...?
- Al: Son, if dynamite was dangerous, do you really think they'd sell it to an idiot like me?
- Bud: ...Like making sure that TNT is nowhere near a gas line?
- Al: [breaks the fourth wall and mouths "Gas line!?", then deadpans] Hit the dirt, everybody. [cut to stock footage of the mushroom-cloud from a hydrogen bomb-test]
- Al: Oh, Peg, it was horrible. 16 straight hours of shoe-selling mayhem. The last thing I remember that that I was down on one knee, waiting on an overflowing glacier of a woman. The first thing they teach you when you're a rookie shoe salesman is when you've got a fat one in the chair, never look up... I looked up, Peg. I saw underwear. It said "Saturday."
- Peggy: So what?
- Al: Today's Wednesday! [breaks down and sobs] Anyway, the next thing I knew, I was insane!
- Kelly: [turns to Bud] Take a good look at your future, Rat Boy!
- [Bud, Kelly, and Peg are watching Al kneel by the rabbit hole and trying to flood the rabbit out of it with a garden hose]
- Peg: We're all getting cranky, Al. Did you get that rabbit yet?
- Al: [stops the water flow and gets up] Are you kidding me? I must have poured a million gallons of water down that hole. I flooded the whole block and every living thing in it. [walks over to Peg] Now, if that rabbit’s still alive,.. [smiles] I'm yours tonight. [laughs]
- [the rabbit pops out from its hole and Al dashes back to it, trying to reach in and grab it]
- Peg: [turns to the kids] You know, the sad part is I don't really want him. Hmm... [grins] But, a promise is a promise.
- [Peg gets up and walks over to Al, who is frantically trying to get the rabbit with his bare hands. She then grabs him and drags him into the house for sex as he promised]
- Al: [yelling at the rabbit] Now look what you've done! You'll be screaming worse than me, I'm telling you! I'll get you for this! I'll make you pay for this, I'm telling you!
- Peggy: Honey, do you think its wise to indiscriminately spray poison on a windy day?
- Al: Peg, if you want to make a rabbit omelet, sometimes you gotta break some eggs. But don't worry about it, I read the directions very carefully. Its non-toxic to everything but rabbits. [Marcy walks in with her hair smoking and a large cloud of smoke behind her]
- Marcy: Hi there! Anyone been spraying poison?
- Al: [hesitantly] Why do you ask?
- Peggy: What's he doing now?
- Bud: [looking through the sliding door] Well, he's got the flamethrower. He's aiming it at the hole. He shoots...[the backyard lights up in flames] and misses.
- Peggy: Garden on fire?
- Bud: Yep. And so is Mrs. Rhoades's fence. Whoa, look at her big tree go! Well, at least he didn't shoot himself in the foot.
- Peggy: Hmm, give him a minute. [a burst of flame passes the window]
- Al: Ah, my foot! Ah, my... [opens the sliding door and hops in with his foot smoking] Ah, I'm on fire! Ah, I'm on fire! Ah, God!, ah, no, ah no...! [runs up the staircase]
Notes[]
Title[]
- The title of the episode is a reference to cartoon hunter Elmer Fudd and his pronunciation of "Rabbit Season", above all in the 1952 classic "Rabbit Seasoning".
Trivia[]
- The scene at the beginning of the episode, with Bud working out shirtless and kissing his biceps, would be used to introduce David Faustino in the opening credits for season 6.
- Al confirms again that he loves pizza with extra cheese when he starts to list off things that he will grow in his garden.
- The picture of Peggy used for the scarecrow appears to be a headshot taken from an earlier season. It can be seen again in A Man's Castle and the inspiration behind the painting that horrifies Al in God's Shoes.
- At the beginning of the episode, Al is brought home after going insane from doing a midnight madness sale. In "Something Larry This Way Comes", Al is forced to work a midnight sale, though in that episode, he didn't go insane.
- Kelly implies that Al is 43 years old in this episode, as she sarcastically sings "Killed him a bunny when he was 43".
- At one point Bud quips that they'll having nothing in the will after Marcy promises to sue Al for the damage to her house. In later episodes, notably, "Calendar Girl", it is noted that the Bundy Will is actually a punishment, and whoever is put onto it will inherit Al's debts.
Cultural References[]
- Aside from the title, there are other references to cartoon character, Elmer Fudd:
- Throughout the last half of the episode, Al begins to dress and talk like Elmer Fudd.
- When Al comes down in his hunting gear and Kelly offers some advice she's learned from cartoons, she is making a reference to typical scenes between Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd.
- When Al eats a carrot at the end of the episode, the screen shrinks into an iris and Peggy says "That's Al, Folks". This is a parody of the typical ending of Warner Brothers cartoons, where Porky Pig comes out of an iris and says "Th-Th-Th-Th-Th-...That's all, Folks".
- When Al tells the kids that the garden will someday be all theirs, Bud says "Well, golly!" in the same manner as the titular character from the television series Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C..
- At one point, Peggy sarcastically compares Al to French military leader, Napoleon.
- Al asks Peg is she "want[s] a cheek of 'Red Man'?", referring to the brand of chewing tobacco, Red Man.
- As of 2022, the brand has been renamed to "America's Best Chew" and also removed the depiction of a Native American chief on the packaging.
- The episode also mirrors the 1980 comedy film, Caddyshack, and specifically, the character, Carl Speckler, in the following ways:
- Both Al and Carl are mentally unstable chasing after a furry animal who is wrecking havoc on the yard they tend to. In Carl's case, it is a gopher while Al has to deal with a rabbit.
- Both Al and Carl try to kill their animal with a rifle and a water hose. However, in Carl's case, it was a high pressure water hose while Al's was simply a water hose that caused damage to Marcy's living room.
- Finally, an explosion causes problems for both Al and Carl but fails to kill the unwanted critter.
- Kelly confuses the idiom "Forewarned is Forearmed" with "To be forewarned is to have four arms".
- After hearing Kelly's advice to Al, Bud says "Well, Princeton's loss is The Gap's gain!".
- Princeton University is a private Ivy League school in Princeton, New Jersey and one of the oldest universities in the United States.
- The Gap is a chain of clothing retail stores typically found in malls. It also operates several other divisions including Banana Republic and Old Navy.
Music[]
- Al sings to the tune of the Bonanza theme song when singing about what he'll plant in the backyard.
- Al sings "Old MacBundy Had a Farm" while working in the backyard.
Locations[]
Sets[]
- Bundy Living Room / Kitchen
- Bundy Backyard
Goofs[]
- Al grows a vegetable garden in this episode, even though later in the episode (as well as in past and in later episodes) Al states that he hates vegetables.
- Bud and Kelly don't seem too thrilled about Al growing vegetables (before the rabbit problem) despite being in a house where there's zero food and they have to eat crumbs out the toaster.
- Marcy comes by and hits Al noting that her house has overflowed because of the water Al used in the gopher hole. For that amount of water to travel from his yard to Marcy's yard and also overflow the indoor plumbing to the point were the water reaches near waist level inside and yet, Al's yard and house is completely dry seems rather impossible.
- After Marcy tells the Bundys about the Bald Eagle that died in her backyard due to Al spraying toxic chemicals, Peggy sarcastically quips that he should try throwing out his sock to kill the last dodo. In reality, Dodos are believed to have been extinct since the 17th century.
External Links[]
Wabbit Season at the Internet Movie Database- Wabbit Season on Bundyology
- Wabbit Season - Transcript on Springfield! Springfield!
- #89 Wabbit Season - MWC Podcast on Horrorphilia
