My Fair Laddy
"My Fair Laddy"
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Episode Information
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"My Fair Laddy" is the twelfth episode of The Simpsons' seventeenth season.
Synopsis
When the old gym teacher announces that she will be gone until fall because of her sex change operation, a substitute takes her place. Every gym class, he has them play a game called "Bombardment," which basically just includes him throwing dodgeballs at the students. When Bart gets sick of the constant bullying, he fills a ball full of water (Nelson calls it an Ice-ball) and sticks it in the freezer overnight. The next day, he throws it at the gym teacher, who ducks, and the ball crashes through the window and hits Willie's shack and destroys it. When Marge picks up Bart from school and sees Willie homeless, she offers to let him stay at their house, and he accepts. When there, Lisa has Willie realize that his life could be much better, and she decides to turn him into a proper gentleman. Bart, however, doesn't believe that she can do it, but Lisa bets that she can do it in time for the school science fair.
Meanwhile, Homer comes home with his last pair of blue pants ripped and torn after his seat breaks at the go-cart track. As he searches through town for a new pair, he finds no store that sells his favorite type of pants. When he goes to the factory that sells them, the manager tells him that they don't make blue pants anymore due to poor sales, but Homer tells him that he'll get more customers. Not surprisingly for him, he does this by writing "Buy blue pants" on the back of his head. However, it works, and soon everyone is wearing blue pants.
While this is happening, Lisa is struggling to get Willie to act sophisticated. Soon, it is the day before the science fair, and he is still his same old self. When he sees how disappointed Lisa is, he suddenly surprises both Bart and Lisa by correctly (and with a 'proper' accent/dialect) saying a sentence she gave him. At the science fair the next day, he impresses everyone with his politeness. However, no one actually knows that it is the old groundskeeper until Lisa announces it to everyone. Once again, she wins the science fair, and the bet along with it.
Even though he is respected by everybody, Willie misses his old life, but his job and his shack were both taken by the music teacher. He explains to Lisa that he wishes to go back to the way things were, and she understands. Soon, he's back to cleaning and living in his shack.
Trivia
- In the show's entire 17-year run, this is the very first full-length episode centered around Groundskeeper Willie. He was, however, the central character in "Nightmare on Evergreen Terrace", one of the three segments of "Treehouse of Horror VI", and had a large amount of screentime devoted to him in "Girly Edition"—in which his shack was also destroyed by Bart's shenanigans and left him temporarily homeless.
- Connections: This episode covers the same topic as "My Fair Lady." This episode is also somewhat similar to the season 11 episode "Pygmoelian", in the sense that it features another secondary character getting a 'makeover' or 'new look', last time it was Moe Szyslak. "My Fair Lady" is also a retelling of Pygmalion.
- In the gym teacher's datebook, "Double Bombardment" is listed on Christmas.
- The episode was rated TV-PG for drug references, violence, coarse language and sexual references.
- In this episode's end credits,instead of the normal music there was a mix-up of the songs (without words)"Wouldn't it be adequate?", "What flows from the nose does not go on my clothes", "I could be indoors all night" and "I miss being a groundskeeper".
- The man in the commerical sits down and the music stops, but when homer and Eli Stern VI are have stopped talking, he is up again and the music is playing
Cultural references
- The title is a take-off of My Fair Lady. Also, the episode features songs similar to the style featured in the play.
- The gym teacher saying "What is your major malfunction, Simpson?" is a reference to Full Metal Jacket. In fact, the entire scene is modeled after a similar scene in the film, from camera angles to Bart's facial expression.
- The wager that Jimbo Jones makes with Kearney is a reference to Around the World in 80 Days, by Jules Verne.
- The music heard in the Super Bowl commercial for Blue Pants is "Baby Elephant Walk" by Henry Mancini, composed for the film Hatari!. This song was also used in Dancin' Homer.
Quotes
- Willie: (talking about the "Home, Sweet Home" sign Lisa made for him) You made that for me? (sniffles) I think I need a moment alone.
Lisa: I understand. (leaves)
(when she's gone, Willie takes the sign off the wall and smashes it)
Willie: I liked it the way it was! - (Marge is shocked by the ad on Homer's head when he turns out the lights)
Marge: It glows in the dark!
Homer: (nervously) It's not supposed to. - Gym Teacher: Bombardment! Bombardment! Bombardment!
- Jimbo: Look at her, trying to civilize Willie! That's as unlikely as Kearney going around the world in eighty days!
Kearney: (has a thought) Eighty days? More than ample time to circumnavigate the globe.
Jimbo: Would you care to wager on that?
Kearney: You're on!
Dolph: I shall hold the money!
(pays Jimbo some money and then bikes off screen right. A few seconds later, a hot-air balloon appears going the opposite way)
Kearney (in balloon): To Istanbul!
Jimbo: Wrong way, dingus! - Gym Teacher: Today we will be playing a game as old as pain itself, BOMBARDMENT
Milhouse: I'm intrigued! How do you play?
Gym Teacher: DUCK OR DIE!! - Gym Teacher: VAN HOUTEN!
Milhouse: (sheepishly) Here, sir, but my doctor says no more bombardment
Gym Teacher: WELL HERE'S A SECOND OPINION! (the gym teacher chucks a dodgeball at Milhouse) MUNTZ!
Nelson: Do your worst! I'm drunk!
Gym Teacher: Well welcome to A.A., ALWAYS ATTACKING! (the gym teacher chucks a dodgeball at Nelson) - Lisa: Good night, Willie!
Willie: Good night! (hits himself on the head with a hammer, then falls asleep) - Gym Teacher: (after he hits Bart with a ball) Son, are you all right?
Bart: I think so...
Gym Teacher: Bombardment! (hits Bart with a ball again) - Bart (puts a water dodgeball in the freezer and takes out Lisa's saxophone): Why did I put this in here?
Lisa: My saxophone! (begins playing, but her lips get stuck)
Bart: Oh, now I remember!
Lisa (muffled): You jerk! I'm telling Mom! - (Homer is on a go-kart when his seat collapses, causing his butt to scrape the ground)
Puberty Guy: Sir, your go-kart's broken!
Homer: No! I paid for fifty laps and I'm taking them!
(Homer then has brief moments of laughter followed by brief moments of pain. He passes the lap sign, which goes from "2" to "3".) - Groundskeeper Largo: Oh for God's sake! (camera pulls out, revealing his tractor is on the school roof) How did I get up here?
- Willie: I feel like I..(singing)could be indoors all night, could use a fork and knife, and never soil my suit! I could be so polite, start not a scene nor fight and still not feel like a fruit! How very nice that there's no lice in my hair, and my toenails I don't bite! Now that I've reached the stage where I'm not full of rage, I could be indoors, indoors, all night!
- Willie: (sings to the tune of "wouldn’t it be loverly") All I want is a place somewhere...
Lisa: (pause) And?
Willie: That's it.
Bart: Maybe you should aim a little higher.
Willie: Hmm...Let's see... (continues singing) Oh, to have me shack rebuilt, Get my rotten teeth all drillt, something on underneath my kilt, oh, would'nt it be adequate? Matching shoes for both me feet, dining on untainted meat, a toilet what still has its seat.
(zoom to Homer sitting on the toilet reading a newspaper)
Homer: Oh,would'nt it be adequate?
Bart and Lisa: Adequate? Adequate?
Willie: Would'nt it be adequate?(tries to close the living room's window's curtains but they fall down) - Homer (watching Super Bowl ad for blue pants): How long is this ad?
Executive: I don't know. I've never made it to the end. - Willie: (singing) What flows from the nose does not go on my clothes.
Lisa: I think he's got it, oh yeah, he's got it.
Willie: (in front of Lisa's mirror) What flows from the nose-
Willie's mirror reflection: -Does not go on my clothes.
Willie: Gah! A talking mirror! (takes a chair and smashes Lisa's mirror) Gah! (takes Bart and Lisa's noses and swoops them)
Lisa: Where is that ghastly flow?
Willie: The nose,the nose!
Lisa: And where should it not go?
Homer: Blue pants, blue pants!
Lisa: (stops singing) Dad,get your own song!
Homer: Fine. (goes away singing) I'm getting blue pants in the morning, ding dong, the zipper's gonna shine! - Willie (singing): I've a fancy suit,and a clean white shirt, but I miss the days when tractor fumes blew up my skirt. I was freezing cold, and I slept in mold, but I long for the shack where I lived. She was true to me, my own home of wood, and when I passed out drunk from turpentine she understood. Life was so sublime-
Groundskeeper Largo: -Well Boo-Hoo,'cause I'm hanging ferns in the shack where you lived!(stops singing). If I had your voice I'd talk-sing everything! - Marge: Willie, do you want to stay at our house?
Willie: I don't need your charity, just as long as I've got a pan over my head.
Marge: That's a colander.
Willie (sees that Marge is right): So that's where all the soup went.
Broadcasting information
USA/Canada
- 1st Airdate: Sunday, February 26, 2006
- 2nd Airdate: Sunday, May 14, 2006
- 3rd Airdate: Sunday, August 13, 2006
UK
- 1st Airdate: Sunday, March 26, 2006
- 2nd Airdate: Friday, March 31, 2006 (Encore Screening)
- 3rd Airdate: Sunday, April 23, 2006
- 4th Airdate: Monday, June 5, 2006
- 5th Airdate: Saturday, August 5, 2006
- 6th Airdate: Friday, August 25, 2006
Australia
- 1st Airdate: Tuesday, June 27, 2006
