Tennis the Menace

The Springfield Retirement Castle holds a talent show, which the Simpsons attend. Grampa wins the show after doing a bad version of "What's New, Pussycat?" His prize is a free autopsy, so the Simpsons go to a funeral salesman. Instead, Homer realizes that a certain kind of cemetery monument uses the same amount of cement as a tennis court, and so Homer decides to get the house a tennis court, even though they can hardly afford their own house. The court is very popular with Springfield's residents, and yet, these residents mock Homer and Marge for losing all the time due to Homer's absent-mindedness. (Lou calls them the "L.A. Clippers of backyard tennis"). Homer tries to please Marge by entering Krusty's celebrity tournament, the "Krusty Kharity Klassic". However Homer is a hopeless tennis player and so Marge "dumps" him and enters with Bart as her new partner. Homer is outraged that he was abandoned for a ten year old. He receives a nightmare where Bart and Marge are married and he is a wall trophy, after being shot at a guillotine factory. He gets even by entering the tournament with Lisa as his partner. Marge and Bart antagonise Homer and Lisa, who play it cool (well, Homer panics at the thought of losing).

The tournament takes place and in the stands are leading tennis pros Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Venus Williams and Serena Williams. At the tournament, Homer dumps Lisa for Venus Williams. In response, Marge replaces Bart with Serena Williams as her partner. Ultimately, Serena and Venus replace Marge and Homer with Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi, respectively. This forces the family to go back to the bench and resume their normal places in the family; as they enjoy the exhibition of top-class tennis, they agree that it is better to watch things than to do things.

[edit] Production

It was the second episode of The Simpsons to be made with digital coloring, with a complete transition to digital animation made in Season 14.

[edit] Continuity

In this episode, Homer thinks tennis is similar to foxy boxing (or as Homer calls it, "the sport where the chicks wail on each other"). Homer mentioned foxy boxing before (although he knows the name, it is clear he does not necessarily know what it is) in the season six episode Lisa on Ice, when he tells Lisa that "...if the Bible has taught us anything -- and it hasn't -- is that girls should stick to girl sports, such as hot oil wrestling, foxy boxing, and such and such..."
In this episode, it's revealed that Bart has a fear of getting locked inside caskets. This would come back in the season 19 episode Funeral for a Fiend when Sideshow Bob locks Bart in a casket on a conveyor belt that's headed for a cremation oven.

[edit] Cultural references

The title is a play on the comic strip and movie Dennis the Menace.
The episode is notable partly for the competition that emerges between Homer and Bart over Marge, and Lisa indeed makes a reference to Oedipus.
When Andre Agassi introduces himself at the tennis match, Homer comments "The wrestler?," confusing him for professional wrestler André the Giant.
Grandpa sings the "What's New Pussycat?" theme by Tom Jones at the talent show, replacing "whoa whoa whoa" with "ow ow ow," having injured himself attempting to dance.
When Homer is in the shower, Bart makes him scream in the style of Mary Had A Little Lamb.