Cape Feare
The episode features guest star Kelsey Grammer in his third major appearance as Sideshow Bob, who attempts to kill Bart Simpson again after getting out of jail, spoofing the 1962 film Cape Fear and its 1991 remake.
The production crew found it difficult to stretch "Cape Feare" to the standard duration of half an hour (minus commercials), and consequently padded several scenes.
In one such sequence, Sideshow Bob continually steps on rakes, the handles of which then hit him in the face; this scene has been cited as one of the show's most memorable moments, becoming a recurring gag.
After encountering Bob at a local movie theater and realizing he sent the letters, the Simpsons join the Witness Protection Program, which relocates them to a houseboat in Terror Lake and changes their surname to "Thompson".
While suspended there, Bob is hit with speed bumps, has hot coffee poured on him by Homer, and is driven through a large cactus patch.
Having noticed a sign saying Springfield is fifteen miles away, Bart quickly has an idea: to stall for time, he compliments Bob on his beautiful voice and asks him to sing the entire score of H.M.S.
Delighted by Bart's compliment, Bob grants his request by delivering a performance that includes several props, costumes and backdrops.
As the musical concludes, Bob prepares to murder Bart until the boat runs aground, knocking him off his feet and preventing him from doing so.
With Bob defeated once more, the Simpsons return home and discover that Grampa has grown breasts and long hair because he had left his medications inside the formerly abandoned house.
Since season three's "Black Widower" (1992), the writers have echoed the premise of Wile E. Coyote chasing the Road Runner from the 1949–1966 Looney Tunes cartoons by having Bob unexpectedly insert himself into Bart's life and attempt to kill him as revenge for the events of the Season 1 episode "Krusty Gets Busted" and the numerous other times Bart foiled his plans.
Executive producer Al Jean has compared Bob's character to that of Wile E. Coyote, noting that both are intelligent yet always foiled by what they perceive as an inferior intellect.
"[5] In Planet Simpson, author Chris Turner writes that Bob is built into a highbrow snob and conservative Republican, so the writers can continually hit him with a rake and bring him down.
[6] In the book Leaving Springfield, David L. G. Arnold comments that Bart is a product of a "mass-culture upbringing" and thus is Bob's enemy.
The board members are impressed and release him because "no one who speaks German could be an evil man" (an allusion to Adolf Hitler).
[4] Additions to the end musical number, including visual gags such as Bob appearing in uniform, were added after the animatics.
[4] The Simpsons creator Matt Groening was surprised when he saw the additions because he originally thought they were silly and would not appear in the final cut, but he has grown to like them.
References to the 1991 remake include Sideshow Bob's tattoos; the shot of him leaving the prison gate; the scene with him smoking in the movie theater; part of his "workout" scene; his hiding under the Simpson family's car; Wiggum's rigging wire around the house to a toy doll as an alarm; his suggestion that Homer can do anything to someone who enters his home; Bob, strapped under a car, pulling up beside Bart for a conversation; and Homer's hiring a private investigator who attempts to persuade Bob to leave town.
[4] The episode also contains elements of Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960 ), with Sideshow Bob staying at the Bates Motel.
[14] Homer's surprising Bart with his new hockey mask recalls the film Friday the 13th Part III[2] and Sideshow Bob's tattoos on his knuckles are similar to those of Robert Mitchum's character in The Night of the Hunter.
While singing "Three Little Maids From School Are We" from The Mikado during the car trip to Terror Lake, Homer's and Bart's hats recall I Love Lucy.
[21] Karl Åkerström of the Swedish newspaper Borås Tidning called it his "all-time favorite" episode of the show.
[22] Michael Moran of The Times and Emily VanDerWerff of Slant Magazine both ranked "Cape Feare" as the fourth-best in the show's history.
Club noted that the episode "turns limitations into strengths by spinning the need to fill out time into some of the series' sharpest, funniest and weirdest gags.
[35] The "Treehouse of Horror XXXIV" segment "Ei8ht" begins with an alternate ending to this episode in which Bob successfully kills Bart, spurring Lisa to become a criminal psychologist.
