We recently touched a bit on the THX logo and their somewhat spotty history of intermittently bringing in popular characters to weather the trademark terrors of Deep Note. I couldn't walk away from that without acknowledging that there is another trailer out there in which The Simpsons once again showed their twisted affection for THX iconography. The catch being that this one wasn't an official promo, but a queer little thing lurking deep with the crevices of the DVD release of The Simpsons Movie. It didn't play in theatres, and to see it all (before multiple uploads made their way onto YouTube) required some nifty manipulation of the DVD menu. If you ever found yourself curious as to who would win in a fight between Homer Simpson and Tex the THX robot...you got your answer right here.
How do you access this on your Simpsons Movie DVD? From the main menu, select Language Selection, then navigate left to English 5.1 Dolby Digital, and then left again. You should now see a red vertical bar besides the Language and Audio title. Select this and you're all go.
The trailer goes to lengths to stress, in its disc presentation, that it's merely a parody and that THX had no involvement. There, it's accompanied by the following disclaimer:
Spoof Trailer Disclaimer
The THX sound process was not used in The Simpsons Movie or on this disc.
Still, even without the disclaimer, there are ample clues as to the unauthorised nature of the promo. A number of wily tricks have been deployed to keep the THX lawyers at bay, notably that the THX lettering has been deliberately rendered incomplete, with the X short of its upstroke (Tex himself, though, has been quite faithfully recreated, albeit in 2D). Also discernible is the total lack of Deep Note, which has been replaced with a striking yet considerably less discordant sound. This Not-Deep Note actually sounds quite agreeable to my ears, with less of the sensory assault factor, and when Tex activates the blue lighting (a nod to the original Tex promo from 1996 - see below - although there Tex turned on the lighting when the THX logo needed repairing, not after), I think the whole transition looks rather pretty. It says "dramatic" without resorting to any of the characteristic THX aggression, and I can't help but feel that this could have been quite splendid if developed into a legitimate theatrical promo. The visual and audio disturbance is nevertheless enough to send Homer into a fervid rage, for it's at this point that he vacates his hammock to pursue the hapless robot and pound him into a metallic heap, a cascade of cartoon violence that seems drolly at odds with the beguiling character of the sound. Seeing Homer reduce the inoffensive Tex to a pile of dented scrap metal is certainly disconcerting, but can you imagine how much more traumatic it would have been if this were an official THX trailer, and we witnessed Homer beat up Tex to the bowel-mangling sounds of Deep Note? I suspect it would have looked as if that nightmarish leitmotif was activating Homer's inner Cujo, compelling him to tear that robot limb from limb less out of vengeance for disturbing the peace than by his being possessed by that hellish noise and having no choice but to carry out its diabolical machinations.
(Note: another nice nod to the original Tex trailer are the hammering sounds when both Tex and Homer are off-screen. Obviously, we have the disturbing implication that Homer is beating Tex with his own severed limb, but it also recalls the hammering noises made when Tex disappeared from view in his own promo.)
The obvious question posed by this fake trailer is why does it even exist? A parody such as this can exist purely for amusement purposes, of course, but I find it strange to think they would have gone to the trouble of animating this sequence simply for it to be squirreled away as a hidden extra on a home media release. Surely there is more of a backstory here? Is it at all possible that it was salvaged from proposed plans for an actual theatrical promo that wasn't given the go-ahead? I've no idea, but I have to wonder how thrilled THX would have been either way about the prospect of seeing their beloved mascot get slaughtered like that. We can only hope that someone out there in that ominous black/blue void was merciful enough to carry out a few repairs on Tex himself after Homer was done pounding him.
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