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"The Italian Bob" is the eighth episode of The Simpsons' seventeenth season.

Plot

After Mr. Burns gets teased about his old car by the kids at Springfield Elementary School, he sends Homer to pick up a brand new Lamborgotti Fasterossa car in Italy. The rest of his family goes along with him and they fly over on Alitalia. After they pick up the car, they have a great time touring the country. During the trip, Homer and Bart manifest limited knowledge of the history of Italy and the Italian language. After a huge wheel of Mortadella lands on their car, they slowly push it into a small Tuscan village nearby called Salsiccia, which means sausage in the Italian language. When they get there, they ask an elderly woman for help, and she tells them that the mayor speaks English. The Simpsons find out the mayor is none other than Sideshow Bob (voiced by Kelsey Grammer). They are shocked to find him there, and he feels the same way. Bob explains to them that after he attempted to kill Bart, he decided to get a fresh start elsewhere by settling on his new destination of Italy. After a rough start, the natives warm up to him after he helped them crush grapes into wine (using his enormous feet). After that, they elected him mayor of their tiny village. Bob no longer has any intention of killing Bart, and it is revealed that he has a wife and son, Francesca and Gino, who know nothing about his past life in America. Bob begs the Simpsons not to tell anyone, and they agree in order to have the car fixed.

The Simpsons enjoy spending time in the village, and they continue to keep Bob's past a secret. However, when Lisa gets intoxicated at a party, she starts to spout off about him being an attempted-murderer. He leads her away from the table, but as she stumbles backwards, she rips off his suit and everyone can see that underneath is his prison uniform. The village finds out the Bob is an attempted killer, and they sack him as Mayor. The Simpsons take off in the fixed car, and Bob swears vendetta on them.

When the family flees, Bob follows them on a motorcycle. Homer drives into a ditch and drives onto a Roman aqueduct. When they fall off the end of the aqueduct, the car lands on top of Trajan's Column in Roman Forum. Bob's wife and son meet him, and Francesca tells him that they will kill the Simpsons together as a family.

Meanwhile, the Simpsons are wondering what they should do next, since they are in a foreign country, have no car and no money whatsoever. Lisa spots a bus with a poster advertising Krusty the Clown's performance in Pagliacci. They meet up with him at the Colosseum, and he puts them in as un-noticed extras. However, Bob, Francesca and Gino find them and corner them on the stage while Krusty, who went through a trap door, flees the stage, allowing Bob to perform the climax of Vesti la giubba. Before Bob and his family could finish off the Simpsons, though, Krusty's limo picks them up. Krusty needs them to smuggle an ancient artifact back to America. The Terwilligers walk away, grinning maliciously and plotting revenge.

Reception

Kelsey Grammer won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance for his voice portrayal of Sideshow Bob in this episode. This marks the third time a credited guest star for the show has won an Emmy, the other two being Marcia Wallace and Jackie Mason. This episode won the 2007 Writers Guild Awards in the animation category.

The episode has become study material for sociology courses at University of California, Berkeley, where it is used to "examine issues of the production and reception of cultural objects, in this case, a satirical cartoon show", and to figure out what it is "trying to tell audiences about aspects primarily of American society, and, to a lesser extent, about other societies." Some questions asked in the courses include: "What aspects of American society are being addressed in the episode? What aspects of them are used to make the points? How is the satire conveyed: through language? Drawing? Music? Is the behavior of each character consistent with his/her character as developed over the years? Can we identify elements of the historical/political context that the writers are satirizing? What is the difference between satire and parody?"

References

1. Thomas B. Gold (2008). "The Simpsons Global Mirror" (PDF). University of California Berkeley.

Cultural references

The name of the car Mr. Burns purchases, a Lamborgotti Fasterossa is a play on the names of supercar maker Lamborghini and the iconic supercar, the Ferrari Testarossa. The episode's name is a reference to the 1967 film The Italian Job.

Notes

When Lisa pulls Sideshow Bob's shirt off, the Italian police pull a book out titled Criminals Americano that has Snake (wanted for home invasion), Mayor Quimby (wanted for driving under the influence of alcohol), Peter Griffin from Family Guy (wanted for plagiarism), and Stan Smith from American Dad! (wanted for plagiarism of plagiarism).

External links

• "The Italian Bob" at The Simpsons.com

• The Simpsons episodes, season 17
• 2005 television episodes
• Italy in fiction