Guess Who's Coming to Criticize Dinner?/References

Cultural references

 * The title references the 1967 film, .
 * Homer's song about food resembles, in part, the tune "", from .
 * The restaurant name "Pâté LaBelle" is a parody of singer.
 * The typewriter without an "e" refers to the film .
 * Props seen at Planet Springfield: from ', the coffee mug from ', the cane from Citizen Kane (though Lisa poinnts out, there was no cane in Citizen Kane), a script from  (Which Homer proceeds to tear apart for nearly ruining Jim Carrey's career), an alien resembling one from Mars Attacks! (but pink), a model of the Titanic, models of an  and, and a statue of C-3PO from Star Wars.
 * When Lisa and Homer discuss the language to use in his first review Homer attempts to augment nouns with "groin-grabbingly". Lisa offers the word "transcendent" to which Homer replies, "What about groin-grabbingly transcendent?" "Groin Grabbingly Transcendent" is the name of a song by on his album .
 * With the stand named "French Confection," this episode was the second episode of The Simpsons to feature a reference to the movie  (The first was "The Springfield Connection").
 * Luigi references the "horse head" scene from The Godfather.
 * Homer typing the same thing over and over spoofs the 1980 film The Shining.
 * Citizen Kane is referenced multiple times throughout the episode, such as the "cane from Citizen Kane" and the scene where Homer tells Lisa "people will think what I tell them to think," and that she "can't do this to me, I'm Homer Simpson!" as she leaves the room.

Trivia

 * This is the first Simpsons episode to directly break the . Homer tells the audience "We'll be right back" as it cut to a commercial break while gloating about not getting his comeuppance after the second act. In previous episodes such as "Duffless" and "Who Shot Mr. Burns? (Part One)", they only semi-broke the fourth wall: that is, the characters first appear to be talking directly to the audience, but were in actuality pointing at another character (Dr Hibbert and Chief Wiggum, respectively).
 * This episode has a television rating of TV-PG D (dialogue), while in reality it deserves to be TV-PG LD (language and dialogue) for what Homer said to the ambulance while driving the kids.
 * Characters that chased Homer and Lisa:
 * 1) Luigi's Chef
 * 2) The Critics
 * 3) A Fat Mr. Burns
 * 4) A Fat Sideshow Mel
 * 5) Captain McCallister
 * 6) The Zoo Animals
 * 7) Hans Moleman
 * 8) Akira Kurosawa
 * 9) Butcher
 * 10) Rainier Wolfcastle
 * 11) Luigi
 * In the German version of the scene at Luigi's where Homer critizes the chef, the chef says "Porco Dio", a blasfemy in Italian.

Continuity

 * "The PTA Disbands": Uter's disappearance is mentioned a couple of times.
 * In Marge Simpson Living Marge reminds Homer that he has tried snowplowing ("Mr. Plow"), webhosting ("The Computer Wore Menace Shoes"), trucking ("Maximum Homerdrive"), fortune cookie writing ("A Hunka Hunka Burns in Love"), cartoon voiceovers ("The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show"), food critic ("Guess Who's Coming to Criticize Dinner?"), screen writer ("Beyond Blunderdome"), mixologoist ("Flaming Moe's"), bootlegger ("Homer vs. the Eighteenth Amendment") and astronaut ("Deep Space Homer") when he was searching for a new job.
 * Several food franchises from previous episodes are seen at the festival:
 * Ah Fudge! from "Bart the Murderer".
 * Ugli from "A Fish Called Selma".
 * The Hungry Hun from "Burns Verkaufen der Kraftwerk".
 * Much Ado About Muffins from "My Sister, My Sitter".

Goofs

 * Marge says that the letter 'E' doesn't work on the typewriter, but in Homer's review that he wrote with the typewriter, it says Screw Flanders at the end, which has two 'E's in it.
 * He probably would've written it "Scrw Flandrs".
 * When Akira Kurosawa asks Horatio McCallister why he put Homer's review on him on the window ("Yar, she blows"), we see the review stuck on the window. When the French chef comes out with the poison eclair idea, the chefs all laugh. We see the outside of the restaurant, and the "Yar, she blows" review is now nowhere to be seen.
 * When Ned goes to the French Confection stand he's normal but earlier in the episode he gained weight.
 * He may have lost the weight though.