Two Bad Neighbors
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"Two Bad Neighbors" is the 13th episode of The Simpsons' seventh season. This episode was inspired by the animosity towards the show by the Bushes from earlier in the series' run.
In September 1990, Barbara Bush said in an interview for People magazine that The Simpsons was the dumbest thing she had ever seen. The Simpsons Complete Fourth Season DVD set includes a special feature that presents an exchange of letters between the First Lady and show staff. In another address, Bush said that America needed to be more like The Waltons than The Simpsons, causing Bart to say they were a lot like the Waltons, since they were both praying for an end to the Depression.
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[edit] Plot
Evergreen Terrace holds a garage sale. As Homer dances on the tables selling his junk, there is a diversion: the empty house across from Homer's is being moved into. It is occupied by Former President George Bush with his wife Barbara. Bart decides to visit, and Barbara takes a liking to him. However Bart's habit of calling adults by their first names and his overall annoying attitude does not do much for George. Eventually, after Bart accidentally shreds George's newly typed memoirs, the former President takes Bart across his knee and spanks him. Homer, who was already annoyed at George Bush for stealing his thunder at the garage sale, is outraged and confronts George. Both men vow to make trouble for each other.
Homer sends bottle-rockets at George's window. George puts up a banner saying "Two Bad Neighbors", which he meant to be in reference to Bart and Homer, but Ned Flanders and Dr. Hibbert believe it was in reference to George and Barbara (Hibbert) or the Flanders family (Ned), so it is taken down. Homer then glues a rainbow wig on his opponent's head just before he is to give an important speech to a local club. George retaliates by chewing up the Simpsons' lawn with his car. Despite Barbara urging her husband to apologize, the confrontation continues. Homer and Bart are just making their way through the sewers to release locusts in George’s house, but he spots them and climbs down to fight, during which Homer learns about the destroyed memoirs, but refuses to make his son apologize. They fight in the sewers and as George is about to finish with a garrote concealed within his watch (remarking "Here's a little trick we learned in CIA") Homer and Bart release the locusts which attack George. Finally, after pressure from his wife and from Mikhail Gorbachev, who was there to visit George, George apologizes, but sells the house as the neighbourhood clearly brought out the worst in him. The vacated house is immediately bought by Gerald Ford, who invites Homer to watch a football game with him, and to enjoy some beer and nachos at his house. The two quickly get off to a good start, due to sharing common ground.
[edit] Debut appearances
Characters making a first appearance in this episode are:
[edit] Cultural References
The The Bee Gees' disco standard *Stayin' Alive is parodied when Homer sings about "Table 5" to the tune. Also, Homer parodies the song Big Spender from the musical play Sweet Charity when singing about "Table 3."
- Grampa saying he was spanked by Grover Cleveland on two non-consecutive occasions is a reference to Grover Cleveland serving two non-consecutive terms as US president.
- Bush says that he will ruin Homer "like a Japanese banquet", a reference to an incident that happened on January 6, 1992, when - during a state dinner - then-president Bush vomited into the lap of then-Prime Minister of Japan, Kiichi Miyazawa.
- While fighting in the sewers, Homer demands that Bush apologize for the tax hike, a reference to Bush's infamous broken promise No New Taxes.
- Bart's interactions with Mr. and Mrs. Bush, including his saying "Hello Mister Bush," are closely modelled on the 50's TV series Dennis the Menace with the Bushes standing in for Dennis' elderly neighbors, the Wilsons.
- Homer's reference to George W. Bush as "George Bush, Jr." was deliberate, as the producers were vaguely aware that George and Barbara Bush actually had a son named George. The George Bush Jr. line was meant to mock the stupidity of Homer and Bart's plans.
[edit] Reception
"Two Bad Neighbors" was named by Vanity Fair as the show's fifth best episode in 2007. John Orvted said, "Conservatives ended up loving The Simpsons, because the show extolled the importance of family, church attendance, and distrust of institutions. But George H. W. Bush and his family-values cronies were originally against the show. Barbara Bush once called it 'the dumbest thing I've ever seen.' While the Simpsons people have always claimed evenhandedness in their satire, the show is, after all, hardly right-leaning, and it is hard to miss how gleefully the former president is mocked here."[1] In the DVD commentary, Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein mention that the episode is often misunderstood. Many audiences expected a political satire, while the creators made special effort to keep the parody apolitical. The episode is described as a companion piece to the Frank Grimes episode Homer's Enemy in that a character from the "real world" is juxtaposed alongside Homer and does not get along with him. Instead of criticizing him for his policies, the show instead pokes fun at his crotchetiness. Oakley stresses, "It's not a political attack, it's a personal attack!"
[edit] Notes
- ^ John Orvted. "Springfield's Best", Vanity Fair, 2007-07-05. Retrieved on 2007-07-13.
[edit] External links
- "Two Bad Neighbors" episode capsule at The Simpsons Archive
