Television’s Influence: 5 More Awesome TV Homage Episodes

I love television in a major way. Like most Xennial kids, you could say it raised me. Television was my constant, reliable companion, and I got very attached to some of my shows in a way that bordered on obsession. However, it did lead to a lifelong love of media and pop culture that has stuck with me. 

As I covered in my previous article, I especially loved the special episodes that strayed from the sitcom 3-act formula. Because I love all forms of media, homage episodes are some of my favorites: They pay tribute to all forms of media — TV shows, movies, and even musicals.

What Makes for a Good Homage Episode?

If you’re wondering what an homage episode even is, check out my first article, where I go into more length on that! The measurement of a good homage episode comes by way of a feeling, and what makes one episode great in one setting will not work for another. These episodes are usually works of love dedicated to a creator that the writing staff admires. 

That said, an homage episode is most common in sitcoms, but can appear elsewhere, including in sci-fi. For today’s article, we’ll explore five episodes, one each from 30 Rock, The X-Files, Dawson’s Creek, Community, and Supernatural. And remember, there are many more of these episodes out there to find!

30 Rock: “Succession” Season 2, Episode 13

30 Rock was going strong by the end of Season 2: They’d established all the main characters, and the viewers had become familiar with the supporting cast as well. The ensemble had gelled, and the scripts were tight. So, towards the end of Season 2, they decided to do an homage to the movie Amadeus. 

That movie focuses on the rivalry between Mozart and his contemporary Salieri. A celebrated film in the 1980s, few people missed seeing it, and many raved over its incredible cast, lush soundtrack, and excellent writing.

In a ploy to copy the composers’ rivalry, 30 Rock cleverly split its homage between two stories that would eventually interlock. In the first, Jack wants to become CEO of his company, and the current CEO is about to choose his successor. The choice comes down to Jack and his rival Devon Banks, who happens to be the current CEO’s soon-to-be son-in-law. 

Meanwhile, in a second duo battle, Tracy hopes to leave a mark in the world that his children can be proud of, and he settles on creating a pornographic video game. Told this is impossible,  Tracy decides to push forward anyway. 

There are minor nods to the Amadeus homage in both these two acts, but it really comes together in the 3rd act: Lutz, following Tracy’s progress, expresses skepticism but finds Tracy able to accomplish what he cannot, much to Lutz’s frustration. This scene directly correlates to Salieri’s reaction to Mozart’s work, and makes the homage clear. 

This homage episode offers a great balance between reference and story writing. While a person who has seen Amadeus will certainly get the references, someone who has not can still understand the episode itself, as the bulk of the storytelling stands alone as a 30 Rock episode. That is the sign of a great homage. 

The X-Files: “The Post-Modern Prometheus” Season 5, Episode 5

By Season Five, The X-Files was hitting its stride. It had gone from just another monster-of-the-week show to an immersive world full of lore and history. More and more episodes centered on the conspiracy angle of the show and fewer featured monsters. Chris Carter decided that because the lore had become so heavy, a lighter episode was necessary. 

That episode, “The Post-Modern Prometheus”, is a love letter to the 1950s horror comics and Universal’s 1930s monster movies, particularly the 1931 James Whale version of Frankenstein. It borrows heavily from the imagery of that classic film, a fact made more prominent by the director’s insightful choice to record in black and white. 

The episode begins with an image of the face of “The Great Mutato”, a mutated man, on a comic cover. It then cuts to a cold open of a mother in Indiana watching The Jerry Springer Show. While she watches, a man who looks like Mutato attacks her. 

Afterward, she calls Mulder and Scully to her little town, having heard, through that same show, that Mulder might be able to help. Her description of the attacker soon garners his full attention, as he believes it might be alien in nature.

As he and Scully investigate, they find that the whole town seems to know about this “monster”, but no one has ever reported it. Their investigation first leads them to a local scientist, Dr. Polidori (the name is a great touch from the story of Mary Shelley), played to smarmy perfection by John O’Hurley, who is known to perform unethical experiments. 

They also encounter an older man who insists that no monster exists and tells them to stop looking. Undaunted, the duo proceeds with the investigation, soon discovering that Polidori once performed experiments in his youth that led to a child. He rejected it — Dr. Frankenstein style — but his father, the older man, took the child in and raised him.

When Polidori discovers that this child has grown to manhood, he snaps. He strangles his father, then leads a mob to the house to kill the “monster”, whom he blames for the death. Just as in Frankenstein, the confrontation between monster and creator proves itself to be a powerful climax. 

In what some write off as a cheesy plot point, we learn during this episode  that the man they call “Mutato” loves Cher. He watches her movie Mask on repeat, and sees in her, as her character dotes on a deformed child, the mother he never had. Silly? Perhaps. But character building? Absolutely, and I don’t mind it.

I will admit this is one of the sillier episodes in the X-Files history, but I remembered it fondly before my re-watch for this article. As a big horror fan, I love the Universal monster movies. Frankenstein is one of my favorite stories, in all of its iterations. Chris Carter choosing to pay homage to it is a great thing. 

Dawson’s Creek: “Detention” Season 1, Episode 7

Dawson’s Creek proved itself a phenomenon when it first aired in 1998. Hollywood was turning back toward teen culture after the popularity of Scream and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so naturally, Kevin Williamson, the writer of Scream, created Dawson’s Creek. In doing so, he brought us a show based around teen culture instead of horror. 

The main character, Dawson Leary, is a movie buff, and he decorates his room with Steven Spielberg posters. As a moon-eyed, sheltered teenager in a small Capeside town in Massachusetts, Dawson is naive and a self-identifying “nice guy”.

This homage episode points to what is probably the most famous teen movie of all time, John Hughes’ The Breakfast Club. A seminal work for Gen Xers and Xennials, which our characters are, it is all about cliques, growing up, and fitting in. The movie works because every character is stereotypical enough that any viewer can relate to one of them.

Because “Detention” is only the seventh episode of the first season, the characters are still unfamiliar enough that we can feel comfortable stereotyping them, while still understanding what the main character conflicts are. Using the forced proximity trope, as The Breakfast Club does, helps to move the plot along toward resolution. 

Act one focuses on building the tension and getting each character into the detention scenario. Jen, Dawson’s girlfriend, receives Saturday detention for cursing at a teacher. Joey punches a popular boy for antagonizing her. 

Dawson and Pacey, at odds since the beginning of the episode, see their arguments escalate quickly. Dawson reacts to perceived slights, then watches Pacey hit on Jen, and earns a Saturday detention after launching a basketball at Pacey’s face. 

Saturday detention arrives, and we find Pacey there, although he refuses to say why. And, to round out our fivesome, Abby Morgan, the resident mean-but-popular girl, sits there too, waiting to make more trouble. After a lecture from the world’s most stereotypical librarian — a trope that I personally hate — their eight-hour detention begins. 

Much like The Breakfast Club, the librarian goes to hide in the media room, leaving the teens to their own devices. After some of Kevin Williamson’s trademark witty banter, they begin playing a game of Truth or Dare — television’s tropiest game. 

With the resulting, lengthy kisses as the “Dare” part of that game, emotions soon run high, and it all goes downhill from there for the characters. However, the action follows the script for The Breakfast Club pretty solidly, with each character clearly representing one from the movie.

• Dawson is Brian, the nerd;
• Jen is Claire, the princess;
• Joey is Allison, the basketcase;
• Pacey is Andrew, the jock; and
• Abby is the gender-swapped Bender, the loser.

The episode ends with less optimism than the movie, which I can appreciate, as the film’s happy ending always felt coerced to me. And Williamson, for his part, leaves the group messier, more exposed and raw than when it came in. The forced eight-hour group activity solves nothing, and the show ends in a far more melodramatic mood than I remember. 

Community: “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas” Season 2, Episode 11

Community thrived as the king of parody and homage episodes. Its creator, Dan Harmon, excels at this trope and relies on it often. “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas” is an homage to a genre near and dear to my heart: stop-motion animation, and particularly, the Christmastime mainstays of Rankin/Bass Animated Entertainment.

Viewers will find Abed at the forefront of many of Community’s homage episodes for a strong reason: His established character relates to the world primarily through television. As he is also neurodivergent, this quirk infiltrates his life and can cause issues for his friends and the way he relates to the world.

In most stop-motion animation, the characters remain unaware, going on with their lives as normal while the audience adjusts to the different art form. However, when Abed learns that Christmas break starts that day, he remarks on the stop-motion, acknowledging it as being due to a special Christmas episode. 

This surprises the rest of the cast, which in turn cues us to know that only Abed can see what we see. We have become privy to his inner world in a way the other characters cannot. This turns the concept of a stop-time animation episode on its ear, because someone inside it is aware of it. 

Abed’s announcement turns the episode into an impromptu group therapy with the psychology professor Dr. Duncan, who is chomping at the bit to write a paper about Abed’s hallucination. Duncan does many unethical things to “help”, but Abed sidesteps the tricks and ends up leading the session himself.

Toward the end, we find out that Abed has a Christmas tradition of watching Rankin/Bass’s Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer with his mother every December 9th. However, this episode first aired on that date, and shows Abed alone — his mother has a new baby and has decided to spend Christmas with her new family instead of with him. 

Since Abed is Muslim through his father, the only parent he could have celebrated Christmas with is his Polish mother. By her choosing not to come, he has to deal with the possibility of not having Christmas. Luckily his friends, through the therapy session, help him to realize they are his chosen family. 

The episode offers the rare script where there are no “B” or “C” plots, as well. The whole ensemble exists as a part of the main “A” story, and it is the only story they tell. This is another thing Dan Harmon excels at: subverting expectations. 

I love the way this episode is handled, as it offers a Christmas episode that is not pure schmaltz. “Abed’s Uncontrollable Christmas” deals with more profound issues than many other Christmas shows, yet provides a funny and digestible storyline toward understanding people like Abed.

Supernatural: “Monster Movie” Season 4, Episode 5

Supernatural is a hugely popular show that I missed the entry point on due to the significant time investment it required, and my busyness during its airing. They did many special episodes, but “Monster Movie” is their homage.

Like the X-Files episode, this one pays homage to Universal’s monsters of the 1930s — those classic monsters we all know, including Dracula, the Mummy, and the Wolfman. Like X-Files, it is also shot in black and white to fit the theme and has a tongue-in-cheek approach to its writing.

This episode takes place while the brothers, Dean and Sam Winchester, are preparing for the end of the world. By this fourth season, the show had hit its stride, diving deep into the lore-building, so “Monster Movie” worked as a breather from the tension. It returned audiences to the old monster-of-the-week episodic structure. 

The brothers visit an Oktoberfest in Pennsylvania to investigate a murder that appears to have been a vampire attack, but they quickly determine that it is not their kind of case when another attack occurs — this time by a Wolfman. Both witnesses describe the perfect images of Dracula and Wolfman as we know them from the old films. 

A third murder, which takes place on the docks, is claimed as the work of a Mummy creature that arrived in a sarcophagus. The Winchesters decide to stay and investigate. They find evidence that the sarcophagus and the costumes worn both came from rental facilities. 

Meanwhile, Dean has been spending time with a local waitress. She soon becomes the focus of the monster, a shapeshifter played by Todd Stashwick, who is obsessed with old horror movies and has decided to make them his reality — and he wants the waitress to be his Mina. 

The showrunners’ love for the old monster movies shines through on the screen, with the Dracula costume being especially well done and a beautiful tribute — and, I hope, a gateway for interest — to Bela Lugosi’s original film, one of my favorites. I also loved the monster’s backstory about why the monsters mean so much to him, as they helped him to feel seen. 

Homage Episodes — Many More Are Out There!

There are hundreds of other homage episodes out there, waiting to be acknowledged and admired. Homage episodes can often be cheesy or gimmicky, but the variety of artistic expression they permit make them a wonderful way for both audiences and actors to “escape from the norm”.

They allow us to enjoy new obsessions mixed with old, with the nostalgic overtones drawing us in to appreciate both at once. And if the producers happen to enjoy the same media we do, our loyalty to the show will rise that much more quickly. 

In the end, homage and parody allow us to interpret our world in new and exciting ways. They keep our experiences fresh, and offer us that chance to sit back and take life a little less seriously.

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Looking for more great TV content? Check out some reviews, retrospectives, and other deep dives.

• Miranda, an Obscure TV Show for All the People Who Are “Too Much” – A television show review.
• The Neighborhood: Sitcom with Heart but Uneven Humor – A TV comedy review.
• 8 Exciting POC Directed/Produced TV Shows – A roundup of several interesting television shows.
• Hanson Opperknockity – A humorous fiction that offers an homage of its own.

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