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Bart vs. Australia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| The Simpsons episode | |
| "Bart vs. Australia" | |
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|---|---|
| The episode's promotional image. | |
| Episode no. | 119 |
| Prod. code | 2F13 |
| Orig. Airdate | February 19, 1995 |
| Writer(s) | Bill Oakley Josh Weinstein |
| Director(s) | Wesley Archer |
| Chalkboard | "I will not hang donuts on my person" |
| Couch gag | The family swims to the couch |
| Guest star(s) | Phil Hartman as Evan Conover |
| DVD commentary by | David Mirkin Bill Oakley Josh Weinstein Wes Archer |
| SNPP capsule | |
| Season 6 September 4, 1994 – May 21, 1995 |
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| List of all Simpsons episodes... | |
"Bart vs. Australia" is the 16th episode of The Simpsons' sixth season; the episode marks the first time the family has visited another country. While some people in Australia were offended by this episode,[1] it was generally received there in the light hearted way it was intended to be.
Contents |
The episode begins with a bathroom products race between Bart and Lisa in the bathroom sink. Lisa wins and Bart suggests she won because her shampoo was in the "inner lane" to his toothpaste. Lisa explains the Coriolis Effect to Bart (not entirely correctly), but he does not believe her. He makes collect calls around the world until he calls an Australian boy, and asks him about which way the water drains. The line is kept open for several hours. When Bart does not hang up, the boy's father is billed AUS$900.00 ("Nine hundred dollaridoos"). The man wants Bart to pay, but Bart mocks him. Bart receives dozens of collection letters in the mail, but does nothing about them.
Eventually, Australia indicts Bart for fraud. The United States State Department wants to send him to prison, but settles upon having Bart personally apologize in Australia. The family is sent to Australia, where they start exploring the culture. Bart makes his apology, but they want to give the additional punishment of a boot to his buttocks, using a giant boot (a parody of the Michael P. Fay caning incident in Singapore). Bart and Homer escape the booting and they try to run back to the embassy. Bart agrees to have them do the booting anyway, but as he is about to receive his punishment, he moons the Australians. The Simpson family leaves the outraged country in a helicopter in a scene similar to the Fall of Saigon.
In the subplot, Bart brings his pet frog past customs into Australia where it reproduces and spreads rapidly throughout the country eventually ruining its ecology (a reference to the actual introduction of non-native Cane Toads into Australia and similar events like the famous Australian rabbit plague). As the family is being flown home they happily remark upon the destruction that can be caused by introducing a foreign species into a new environment ... as the camera pans out to reveal a koala hanging from one of the helicopter's struts.
- The supposed scientific knowledge that drains flow differently in the Southern Hemisphere because of the Coriolis effect is actually a myth - the Coriolis effect does influence the direction of the flow, but other factors (such as how the water is injected into the bowl) have a much greater impact, making the Coriolis effect negligible. In fact, because of the way it enters the bowl, water in Australian toilets does not normally swirl in either direction. Whereas toilets in America flush with the bowl being first emptied of its wastes and then refilled with fresh water, Australian toilets are flushed by having fresh water rush into the bowl from all around the inside rim, and displace the waste by washing it over the S-bend and down the drain. In other words, the toilet is emptied and refilled simultaneously, and the fresh water meets the waste water at the bottom in a tumultuous mass.
- The Australian prime minister is referred to as "Andy". Australia's prime minister in 1995 was Paul Keating. However, this may be a reference to Andrew Peacock, an Australian politician who in Foreign Affairs in the mid-1990s, and later (after the airing of this episode) an ambassador to the United States.
- The parliament house is in Canberra, a large city and not a town as is portayed in this episode. Moreover, if the Simpsons did indeed travel by airplane, they would have landed in either Melbourne or Sydney, both of which are major Australian cities with residential, industrial and business areas.
- The Parliament incription reads: Parliament-haus der Austria with "al" and a caret inscribed between "r" and "i".
- The "knifey-spoony" scene is a reference to Crocodile Dundee.
- ^ See The Age, Simpsons' secret is eternal youth (Interview with writer Mike Reiss). Retrieved on 2007-03-07.
- "Bart vs. Australia" episode capsule at The Simpsons Archive