Simpsons – Bart the Murderer (s03e04)

Download: 40 MB (rapidshare.com) Found it on forums, too. Get it while it is up.

“Bart the Murderer” is the fourth episode of the The Simpsons’ third season. The episode aired on October 10, 1991, marking the first appearance of Fat Tony, Legs and Louie. Fat Tony is voiced by Joe Mantegna, who played Fat Tony in Blood on the Blackboard: The Bart Simpson Story. Fat Tony is drawn to look much more like the real Joe Mantegna, and uses a more casual voice than the one he does for Fat Tony. The episode is slightly based off of the movie Goodfellas, which was in fact not released until after this episode began production. Bart mirrors Henry Hill who went to work for the Mafia at a very young age and in his later years, testified against his friends.

Plot
After he crashing his skateboard into the stairwell of the Legitimate Businessman’s Social Club during a bad day, Bart falls in with a particularly bad crowd: the Springfield Mafia. He befriends Fat Tony, Louie, Joey and other Goodfellas, who take him on as their bartender and errand boy. As Bart adopts more and more gangster-like traits, Marge grows anxious, so she tells Homer to meet the Mafia, but he actually felt okay with them. Once Principal Skinner catches Bart doing graffiti at school, Bart gently pays him with the cash he earned working as a bartender.

An angered Skinner puts Bart into detention, making him late for a meeting within the Mob and he frustratedly tells Fat Tony that Skinner caused it. Fat Tony and his friends leave to confront Skinner, who disappears away, presumed to be murdered. The police strongly suspect that Bart and his new friends are responsible and arrested them. During the sensational trial, Fat Tony turns stool pigeon and rats out Bart as Skinner’s killer. Bart is sent to prison, sharing a cell with Sideshow Bob.

No one can save Bart but Skinner, who emerges from his hiding place as a disheveled man to explain that neither Bart nor the Mob did anything to him. After talking with the Mob, he became trapped beneath tons of newspaper in his garage, living off rations nearby. As a result, Bart and the Mob are released. Outside, Fat Tony explains that he didn’t want Bart to get into any trouble, but Bart decides to resign because “crime doesn’t pay”. In the end, the Simpsons watch a new show called “The Bart Simpson Story”, starring Neil Patrick Harris as ‘Bart’. Bart seems to like it, and Homer wonders when the producers will send a check to the family for the show, but Marge says that they don’t have to.

Cultural references

All of the horses in the race are named after a famous animated character’s quotes. These include:

• “Ain’t I a Stinker?” (Bugs Bunny)
• “Yabba Dabba Doo” (Fred Flintstone)
• “Sufferin’ Succotash” (Sylvester)
• “That’s All Folks” (Porky Pig)
• “I Yam What I Yam” (Popeye)

Bart’s quotes “Eat My Shorts” and “Don’t Have a Cow” are also horses.

After Bart suffers a nightmare, he wakes up screaming. The camera shots during Bart’s scream match those in a scene from The Godfather, when Jack Woltz wakes up with a horse’s head in his bed and screams. The Itchy and Scratchy Episode portrayed in this episode starts with Itchy dressed up as a policeman as a variety of cats including Scratchy line up along a brick wall. Itchy then pulls out a Tommy Gun and kills all the cats. Lauging at the show, Fat Tony remarks that “It’s funny because it’s true”, a reference to the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre

The scene at the chocolate factory where the kids are watching an old film narrated by Troy McClure, the Aztec who smokes the cocoa bean, mimics the Cleveland Indians’ mascot, Chief Wahoo.

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