Krusty Gets Busted

Homer stops by the Kwik-E-Mart on the way home from work and sees a masked clown resembling Krusty committing a robbery. After Homer identifies him at a police lineup and in the courtroom, Krusty is convicted and sentenced to prison. Bart is upset because he idolizes Krusty. Reverend Lovejoy urges the town's residents to destroy Krusty's merchandise.

Krusty's sidekick Sideshow Bob becomes the host of the clown show, renamed The Side-Show Bob Cavalcade of Whimsy. Bob retools the show to focus on education and classic literature while retaining The Itchy and Scratchy Show. Refusing to accept that his hero could have committed the crime, Bart enlists Lisa's help to prove Krusty's innocence.

At the crime scene, Bart and Lisa recall the robber read a magazine and used a microwave oven; Krusty is illiterate and has an artificial pacemaker which requires him to avoid microwave radiation. When Bart and Lisa visit Sideshow Bob to learn whether Krusty had any enemies, he gives them tickets to his show. During the live broadcast, Bart is invited on stage with Bob, who dismisses Bart's points about the microwave and magazine; Bob claims that Krusty never listened to doctors and that you can enjoy the cartoons in a magazine without being able to read.

When Bob says he has a lot of "big shoes to fill", Bart remembers how the robber screamed in pain when Homer stepped on his foot during the robbery. Despite wearing large clown shoes, Krusty has small feet and would not have felt Homer stepping on his toes. Bart deduces that Sideshow Bob is the real robber since he had the most to gain from Krusty's downfall, and that his big feet literally fill his long clown shoes. To prove this, he hits Bob's shoes with a mallet, making Bob scream in pain and exposing his large feet. While watching the show, the police realize they failed to notice this piece of evidence and head to the studio to arrest Bob.

His crime exposed, Bob confesses the reason he framed Krusty: he hated spending years on the receiving end of his humiliating gags while Krusty "squandered a fortune on his vulgar appetites". Bob vows revenge on Bart while being led away.

Krusty is freed after the charges against him are dropped. He regains the trust of the town's residents and Homer apologizes for fingering him in court. Krusty thanks Bart for uncovering the truth and sticking to his convictions. Bart hangs a picture of himself shaking hands with Krusty in his bedroom, which he refills with Krusty decor and merchandise.

Kelsey Grammer is the voice of Sideshow Bob.

Director Brad Bird wanted to open the episode with a close up of Krusty's face.[5] The staff liked the idea and he then suggested that all three acts of the episode, defined by the placement of the commercial breaks, should begin with a close up shot.[5] Act one begins with Krusty's face introducing the audience at his show, act two begins with Krusty's face being locked up behind bars, and act three begins with Sideshow Bob's face on a big poster.[5] Krusty's character is based on a television clown from Portland, Oregon called Rusty Nails, whom The Simpsons creator Matt Groening watched while growing up in Portland.[6] The original teleplay, written by Jay Kogen and Wallace Wolodarsky, was 78 pages long and many scenes had to be cut.[7] One scene that had to be cut down was the scene where Patty and Selma show the slideshow of their vacation; it originally contained images of them being detained for bringing heroin into America.[7]

Sideshow Bob's first major appearance on The Simpsons was in this episode, but he first appeared in the season one episode "The Telltale Head".[8] In that appearance, his design was simpler and his hair was round in shape. However near the end of the episode he appears with his more familiar hairstyle. Bob's design was updated for "Krusty Gets Busted", and the animators tried to redo his scenes in "The Telltale Head" with the re-design, but did not have enough time.[8] The script for "Krusty Gets Busted" called for James Earl Jones to voice Bob, but the producers instead went with Kelsey Grammer, a cast member on Cheers at the time.[4] Kent Brockman, Judge Snyder, and Scott Christian make their first appearances on The Simpsons in this episode.[9]

Chief Wiggum's order during the suspect line-up to "send in the clowns" is an allusion to the Stephen Sondheim song "Send in the Clowns" from the 1973 musical A Little Night Music. The Sondheim musical took its name from Mozart's Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major, Eine kleine Nachtmusik, which is the theme tune to Sideshow Bob's show.[1] The close up shot of Krusty's face behind bars in the beginning of act two is a reference of the closing credit motif of the British television series The Prisoner from the 1960s.[1] The background music in that scene resembles the theme of the television series Mission: Impossible at one point.[1] The line "The Day the Laughter Died", shown during the newscast, is a reference to the Andrew Dice Clay album released the previous month. Sideshow Bob is reading The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexander Dumas to the studio audience.[10] The song "Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye" by Cole Porter is featured in the episode.[1] Following Sideshow Bob's arrest, he mutters: "I would've gotten away with it too, if it weren't for these meddling kids.", which is a reference to a catchphrase from Hanna-Barbera's animated television show Scooby-Doo which was airing on ABC as A Pup Named Scooby-Doo when this episode aired.[6]

In its original American broadcast, "Krusty Gets Busted" finished thirteenth in the ratings for the week of April 23–29, 1990, with a Nielsen rating of 16.4. It was the highest rated show on the Fox network that week.[11]

The episode received generally positive reviews from critics.

Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, the authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, praised the episode: "The invention of the Simpsons' arch enemy as a lugubrious yet psychotic Englishman in dreadlocks succeeds wonderfully in this super-fast, super-funny episode that works by constantly reversing the audience's expectations."[1]

In a DVD review of the first season, David B. Grelck rated this episode a 3 (of 5).[12]

Colin Jacobson at DVD Movie Guide said in a review that "throughout the episode we found great material; it really seemed clear that the show was starting to turn into the piece we now know and love. It's hard for me to relate any deficiencies" and added that "almost every Bob episode offers a lot of fun, and this episode started that trend in fine style."[13]

Screen Rant called it the best episode of the first season and the tenth greatest episode of The Simpsons.[14]

Series creator Matt Groening listed it as his ninth favorite episode of The Simpsons and added "I have a peculiar love of TV clownery".[15]

Wikiquote has quotations related to: Krusty Gets Busted

• "Krusty Gets Busted" at The Simpsons.com
• "Krusty Gets Busted episode capsule". The Simpsons Archive.
• "Krusty Gets Busted" on IMDb
• "Krusty Gets Busted" at TV.com