The main event with the Simpsons and where I'm from (Ireland) is their trip to Ireland in the episode
In the Name of The Grandfather.
I think I'll go through the episode, and note down all the Ireland references.
[You can skip through to the end to see my thoughts on The Simpsons referencing Ireland]
No exaggeration: We have an airline that looks exactly like this. It’s called Aer Lingus (you might've seen it before).
Fairly stereotypical Irish name if a town. Place names are generally not translated from Irish into English, but rather are spelled in such a way that the same sound of the name in Irish can be pronounced closely enough in English. For example: The county "Cork" comes from "Corcaigh" (pronounced "Cork-ee"), which basically means "marshy" (yep, we were imaginative back then). Also, the town Downpatrick (where St Patrick is buried) comes from the Irish “Dún Pádraig” (pronounced “doon Paw-drig"). The word "Dún" means "Fort" in Irish, and other English adaptations include Dun, like in the made-up town. Other common prefixes in Irish place names include "Kil" or "Kill," which comes from the Irish "Cill" (pronounced the same. Fun fact: There is no "K" in the Irish alphabet), and it means "Church." The other common prefix they put in the town name here is "Derry," which comes from the Irish "Doire" (pronounced "Dur-ah"), and it means "Oak Grove."
So
"Dunkillderry," means
"Fort Church Oak Grove." Okey-dokey then. This gets a laugh out of me anyway.
Also the use of kilometres shows that they're in the Republic Of Ireland. Also the accents. I can't place them for sure, but maybe they're in County Cork somewhere, plus the Cork accent is generally the stereotypical Irish accent that people think of.
Grandpa: "Filled with... unending troubles."
If that's a reference to the The Troubles, then that's supposed to be in Northern Ireland Grandpa.
We don't all have freckles, but this was funny nonetheless.
This was funny, but U2 are pretty much American now. I‘m sure the caption is a U2 reference I don’t know as well.
Lisa mentions Ireland being at “The forefront of the tech boom.”
I don’t know too much about this, but I know that a lot of companies like Microsoft have set up shop in Dublin. Personally I think they’re in Ireland because the weather’s cold enough here for their computers to run properly, as opposed to in Silicon Valley.
And that’s the other thing: The weather in Ireland is rarely this nice (we can get all four seasons in the space of one day). Where’s the rain, coldness, and grey, overcast skies? Ah well, I guess constant rain would have been harder to animate.
Oh ha ha. Taco Belfast = Taco Bell. Very punny.
Irish pubs are a lot more cramped and dark than this. Also at the tables there’s never enough seats, so everyone ends up sitting uncomfortably on 1ft high stools, squashed between your friends at the tiny table (where all the drinks get mixed up if you’re not watching it constantly), and also pinned in by everyone at the tables next to you.
Also, all the old advertisements, pictures, and maps crammed into the wall space in the background of the bar is a fairly accurate look of an Irish Bar. And I love the ads for Guinness in which they have the picture of a puffin (it’s quite a famous ad from years ago), as well as the ad for Barry’s Tea: Gold Blend. It’s basically the tea that everyone in Ireland drinks. Also there’s an ad for “Paddy: Old Irish Whiskey,” that one’s a real company, they’re not made up.
I like the Irish names you see in the background, like “Flynn,” “Colleen,” etc. It’s a nice touch. Also, the name of the Pub is “O’ Flanagan’s pub.” Funny for me, because my surname is Flanigan (mine is an unusual spelling, so obviously some ancestor spelled it wrong at some stage, and here I am), so there’s a bit of a laugh for me there.
Side note: Irish surnames with the prefix “O’” means “descendant of” in Irish. Also the prefix “Mac-” (sometimes abbreviated to “Mc-” in some surnames) means “son of.” So it’s why you can get surnames with or without “Mc-” or “O.’”
So, this is a proper Irish drink when the bartender spits in it out of hate? It’s probably universal in bars around the world. But, Bushmill’s whiskey (note the correct way to spell “Whiskey”), and Guinness (known affectionately as ‘the black stuff’). Pretty much spot on.
This is way up in county Antrim in Northern Ireland. If they’re travelling from Cork, that’s like a five-hour car drive. I’m also surprised they didn’t go for the Irish legend to as to how the causeway was formed (it’s called “The
Giant’s Causeway” after all), but I guess that would have taken too much time.
Speaking of car drives, Random fact: Decades ago (I think this might’ve been the forties, fifties and maybe early sixties) in the ROI, you didn’t need to do any kind of driving test whatsoever. You just walked into the post office or whatever when you were 18 or so, asked for a drivers licence and they gave you one. So there’s an entire generation of people who have never done a driving test in their lives. My grandfather for example has never done a driving test, and he still drives.
You can’t really see it, but this is pretty much a picture of the gates into the Guinness distillery in Dublin (again, roughly a two hour drive from Cork or Antim). They were pretty much spot on with this picture. The “Ireland’s most cried-into beer” is a nice touch. I think they mean “famous” by that. Also 1759 is the correct year for when it was founded.
This is... probably not how they make Guinness. But good guess.
Kissing the Blarney stone is supposed to give you the gift of eloquence (this attraction’s in Cork by the way). Bart’s prank was quite funny, but he should have said “póg mó thóinn.” This means “kiss my ass” in Irish, and while most people in Ireland don’t know any Irish (I know very little myself), pretty much every citizen knows this line for some reason.
Fun fact: You know the London-Irish band
The Pogues from years ago? Well that phrase is where they got their name from. Apparently when the BBC figured that out, they refused to show
The Pogues on their shows.
Crafty Irish bastard... ah, who said that?
The south of Ireland deals in euros. There are no green euro notes.
That’s better.
What the hell is a London bus doing in Ireland? They don’t even have them in London anymore!
Homer: “It’s terrible! The Irish have become hard-working and sober!”
That’s quite a funny line actually. In reality, yes we are hard-working, but sober on a Friday night? Umm...
“Da” to mean “dad” doesn’t sound right when said without an Irish accent. Homer saying this was weird to hear.
This is southern Ireland, so that should say “Garda” instead.
They were probably going for the mascot of Tayto Crisps but they weren’t allowed. It’s another very Irish product.
Judge: “It got a lot nicer since we sent all our incompetent half-wits to America.”
Random fact: The population of Ireland is really low: Only about 4.8 million people (6.6 if you include Northern Ireland) live in Ireland, so it’s pretty sparsely populated (in comparison the population of London alone is like 12 million). Around the 1840s, the population was about 8 million, but then the Irish Potato famine hit, and between people dying of starvation and emigrating to America, the population reduced drastically in the space of a few years.
I’ve never felt offended by any reference the The Simpsons to Ireland. I mean The Simpsons is based on stereotypes, and they’ve gone straight to the stereotypes, which is always a bit of a laugh for us I think (just look at any episode of Father Ted. Lots of stereotypes about priests etc in that Irish sitcom, and everyone loves that show). So I really like it when they do a reference to Ireland. Also it looks like they did their research for this episode, but I think you’ll need to have at least visited Ireland to fully enjoy this episode to be honest.
The only people who I can see getting offended are maybe American SJWs, who think that they’re Irish-American, hearing a line from the St Patrick’s day scene in Springfield where everyone is drunk and having one massive punch-up, and Kent Brockman says “All this drinking, violence, and destruction of property: Are these the things we think about, when we think of the Irish?” And then you get idiots overreacting saying something like “You can’t stereotype Irish people like this,” Or “Where’s the meaning of St. Patrick’s Day?”
While there is some significance to St. Patrick’s day, and deep down all the Irish respect it a lot: I’m sorry, but if any of those kinds of people spent
any time in Ireland for St. Patrick’s day, they will find that it’s just one massive excuse for the population to get absolutely blocked. Destruction of property usually follows too.
But I’ve never heard of anyone being offended by the Ireland episode, or the St Patrick’s day scenes - so it’s all good!
Also:
Have The Simpsons been to Scotland as a family? They should definitely go. It’s very much like Ireland, only colder.