Bart vs. Australia
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"Bart vs. Australia" is the 16th episode of The Simpsons' sixth season; the episode marks the first time the family has visited another country. In Australia, the episode was met with criticism due to its hugely inaccurate and stereotypical portrayal of the country, although it has been accepted as typical American satire and is still aired as a re-run as often as all other episodes. Some Australian fans of the series rather consider it an honor that Australia was featured so much in an episode at all. Subsequent Simpsons episodes exploited existing stereotypes of other countries, but this episode actually fabricated things about Australia wholesale, as the Simpsons producers admit in the DVD commentary for this episode.
Contents
Synopsis
Template:Spoiler The episode begins with a bathroom products race between Bart and Lisa in the bathroom sink. Lisa wins and Bart suggests she won because her shampoo was in the "inner lane" to his toothpaste. Lisa explains the Coriolis Effect to Bart (not entirely correctly), but he does not believe her. He makes a collect call to an Australian boy, and asks him about which way the water drains. The line is kept open for several hours. When Bart does not hang up, the boy's father is billed $900.00 ("Nine hundred dollareydoos"). The man wants Bart to pay, but Bart mocks him. Bart receives dozens of collection letters in the mail, but does nothing about them.
Eventually, Australia indicts Bart for fraud. The United States State Department wants to send him to prison, but settles upon having Bart personally apologize in Australia. The family is sent to Australia, where they start exploring the culture. Bart makes his apology, but they want to give the additional punishment of a boot to his buttocks (a parody of the Michael P. Fay caning incident in Singapore). Bart and Homer escape the booting and they try to run back to the embassy. Bart agrees to have them do the booting anyway, but as he is about to receive his punishment, he moons the Australians. The Simpson family leaves the outraged country in a helicopter in a scene similar to the Fall of Saigon. A subplot through the episode where Bart brought his pet frog into the country past customs. where it reproduces and spread rapidly throughout the country and ruins Australia's ecology (a reference to the actual introduction of non-native Cane Toads into Australia.) As the family is being flown home they happily remark upon the destruction that can be caused by introducing a foreign species into a new environment... as the camera pans out to reveal a koala hanging from one of the helicopter's struts.
Quotes
- Bart: I can't get a straight answer out of this crazy hemisphere. (he calls another number and reaches a car phone in Argentina)
Adolf Hitler: Eine Minuten, eine Minuten! Ach! Das Wagen-phone ist ein...Nuisancephone!
Man: Buenas noches, mein Führer!
Hitler: Ja, ja. - Homer: (looking at globe) There it is! Aus-tra-li-a. I'll be damned. (laughs) Look at this country! "U-R-Gay!"
- Conover: Mr. Simpson, shush! Disparaging the boot is a bootable offense! It's one of their proudest traditions! (he points it out using the flag of Australia, which inaccurately shows a boot kicking the buttocks)
- Lisa: Bart, water will only go the other way in the Southern Hemisphere.
Bart: What the hell is the Southern Hemisphere?
Lisa: Haven't you ever looked at your globe? (tears off wrapping paper on a gift with a tag reading "Happy Birthday! Love Grampa" on it). See, the Southern Hemisphere is made up off everything below the equ... (stares at Bart) this line.
Bart: So say in Argentina, and Rand McNally (pointing at Rand McNally logo on globe), all their water goes backwards?
Lisa: Uh-huh. In fact, in Rand McNally, people wear hats on their feet and hamburgers eat people.
Bart: (impressed) Cool! - Marge: I'll just have a cup of coffee.
Bartender: Beer it is.
Marge: No, I said coffee.
Bartender: Beer.
Marge: Cof-fee.
Bartender: Be-er.
Marge: (spells) C-O...
Bartender: (spells) B-E... - Aide: Please to repeat again and I will translating for the el Presidente.
Bart: [slowly] Which way does the water turn in your toilet?
Aide: [in Spanish] He says the tide is turning!
Presidente: [in Spanish] Ay, caramba! Then the rebels will soon take the capital. I must flee! [dives out window] - Bart: Hey, I think I hear a dingo eating your baby.
- Homer: Hey, do we get to land on an aircraft carrier?
Helicopter pilot: No, sir, the closest vessel is the USS Walter Mondale. It's a laundry ship. They'll take you the rest of the way. - Australian man: You call that a knife? This is a knife!
Bart: That's not a knife. That's a spoon.
Australian man: Alright, alright, you win. Heh. I see you've played knifey-spooney before. - Homer: When will you Australians learn? In America, we stopped using corporal punishment, and things have never been better. The streets are safe. Old people strut confidently in the darkest alleys. And the weak and nerdy are admired for their computer-programming abilities. So, like us, let your children run wild and free! 'Cos as the old saying goes, "let your children run wild and free".
Inaccuracies
While the Simpsons is prone to some errors simply for comic effect, in this particular episode, the supposed scientific knowledge of drains flowing differently in the Southern Hemisphere is actually a myth.
See Coriolis Effect
