After
Homer is hit by a falling girder at work and suffers a mild head injury,
Mr. Burns gives him luxury skybox tickets to a
hockey game in order to keep him from suing the power plant. Homer,
Marge and
Bart ignore the game in favor of enjoying the amenities, while
Lisa leaves the box in order to watch the game from rink-side. One of the players gives her his stick in gratitude for her useful advice, and Homer mounts it on the wall above her bed that night. In so doing, though, he releases a swarm of
termites that cause severe damage to the house overnight. The Simpsons are forced to move out for six months so the house can be fumigated. The family tries a number of options like staying at hotel but all the hotel rooms in town are booked. Finding themselves without any suitable lodgings after trying to stay with Lenny, Comic Book Guy, and Moe, they learn from
Barney and
Carl about
The 1895 Challenge, a reality show in which a family must inhabit a
Victorian era house and adopt a lifestyle consistent with the title year. Homer is reluctant at first, but takes the family to audition for the show. The producers select the Simpsons after watching Homer's overreactions to trivial things. The family has trouble adjusting to the drastic changes in daily life at first, leading to high ratings among viewers who enjoy watching their misery. However, Homer soon rallies their spirits and their attitudes improve as they begin to adapt to 1895 life. When the ratings begin to fall as a result, the producers introduce Squiggy from
Laverne & Shirley into the show, even allowing him to use a
Taser as a means of disrupting the peaceful situation. After this ploy fails to boost the ratings, the producers secretly airlift the house off its foundations and drop it in a river while the Simpsons are sleeping. The crew films the house's plunge over a
waterfall and its collapse after running aground. Squiggy is killed in the crash, but the Simpsons emerge unhurt from the wreckage and must forage for food and shelter in the wilderness, since the crew refuses to give them lunch. They soon encounter a group of savage-looking people who turn out to be a tribe of contestants from another reality show, left to fend for themselves after they lost their final challenge. They team up with the Simpsons to overpower the crew and return to civilization. With the family back in their newly fumigated house, Homer decides he will only watch scripted television shows, but can find nothing good to watch. He eventually falls victim to Bart's pranks with the garden hose outside, to the enjoyment of Marge and Lisa. ==Production==