Poppa's Got A Brand New Badge - Production

Production

"Poppa's Got a Brand New Badge" was written by Dana Gould and directed by Pete Michels. It was first broadcast on the Fox network in the United States on May 22, 2002. The idea for the episode was also pitched by Gould, who had just moved to southern California with his wife. After moving in, the two decided to install an alarm system because, Gould quipped, "the police aren't enough. Too many people wanna kill you." When meeting the other writers, Gould pitched an episode in which Homer becomes the owner of a security company, which then became "Poppa's Got a Brand New Badge." Although current showrunner Al Jean found it "very funny," the episode's first draft was heavily altered after the first table-read, a process in which the script is read out loud to the other writers. During the blackout, Lenny and Carl accidentally crash their cars into a store, causing a riot to erupt. The sequence was conceived by Gould who, after the 1992 Los Angeles riots, was "somewhat obsessed" with civil unrest issues. In the DVD commentary for the episode, he said "I love the idea of, 'All you need is for the power to go out and slowly the fabric of society unravels." While trying to determine who stole Lisa's Malibu Stacy car, Homer holds Bart as his prime suspect. Unbeknownst to Bart, who is eating an apple, Homer tells Lisa "Look at him over there, eating that apple. What is he planning?" Originally, the scene would show Homer being suspecting of Lisa, but because it bothered the character's voice actor, Yeardley Smith, the scene was changed. American actor Joe Mantegna guest-starred as Fat Tony in the episode.

In another scene in the episode, Homer shows his family an advertisement for his security company. In it, a monster is seen breaking into an elderly woman's house. When the woman screams, the screen freezes and Homer is composited to the screen, instructing the audience about SpringShield's telephone number. In order to composit Homer into the screen, director Michels made use of a greenscreen. The advertisement resumes and the monster is subdued by Homer, Lenny and Carl. Confused, the monster turns to Homer and asks, "friend?" to which Homer replies "the only friend you need is SpringShield," and holds a business card in front of the camera. The monster then puts the card in his wallet and says "monster put in wallet." The monster's last line was written during one of the episode's rewrites, but none of the writers on The Simpsons' writing staff has taken credit for it. The line has since become very popular with the series' writing staff; Jean said that it was "very funny and unusual for a television show," and Gould considers it to be his favorite joke in any episode he has ever written. At the end of the episode, Maggie saves Homer by shooting Fat Tony's gang members with a rifle. The scene was conceived by series co-creator and executive producer James L. Brooks while writing notes during the episode's first table-read.