A knighted British music star (Paul McCartney/Elton John) performs a private concert at Apu's rooftop garden.
"Homer's Barbershop Quartet": Running joke of the Grammy Award being worthless (Homer gets one thrown at his head/Homer throws Elton John's in the garbage).
"Realty Bites": Sideshow Mel has a wife named Barbara.
"Brother From the Same Planet": Homer gets into a climactic fight with someone that takes them all over Springfield (Bart's older brother mentor, Tom/Fantastic Dan)
"Bart the General" and "Bart Carny": Reference to unwritten codes ("The Code of the Schoolyard"/"The Carny Code"/"The Skywriter's Code")
Jimbo may be a stoner (says that the guy's guitar is talking during the concert/thinks aluminum foil is amazing to look at)
"The Otto Show" and "Team Homer": A fat character is compared to "Poppin' Fresh" (The Pillsbury Doughboy) [Otto calls Homer "Poppin' Fresh"/Mr. Burns is so high on ether he thinks Homer is "Poppin' Fresh"/Chief Wiggum's pet nickname for his wife is "Poppin' Fresh"].
"Fear of Flying": reference to the famous scene in North by Northwest where Cary Grant's character is pursued by a biplane.
When Apu is talking to Elton John, the logo on the tail of the aircraft next to them is similar to that of United Airlines.
After Apu saves Elton John from the plane gone awry, he references a number of Sir Elton's songs in the form of puns, much to the latter's annoyance. They include, "Take Me to the Pilot", "Your Song", "Someone Saved My Life Tonight", and "The Bitch Is Back". Additionally, Elton closes the episode with "Your Song" but with different lyrics.
On a related note, Apu saying "The Bitch is Back" after Elton John snapped at him to lay off the puns to his various works references the namesake of the aforementioned song, where Bernie Taupin's wife at the time, Maxine Feibelman, would use that phrase whenever Elton John was in a bad mood.
After Homer kicked off and detonated the cloudwriting canister from Fantastic Dan's plane with each of the wives of Springfield (barring Marge) giving their own interpretations of what the cloud explosion could mean, Sarah Wiggum interpreted the cloud as being Poppin' Fresh, aka the Pillsbury Doughboy, the mascot of the Pillsbury Company, with it being implied that this was a common pet name that her husband Chief Wiggum issues to her. Sarah also proceeded to chuckle upon this discovery in a similar manner to the aforementioned character.
There was a King of the Hill episode with the same title. It too is a Valentine's Day episode, though it aired three years later.
When Apu meets Elton John, the latter, after confirming that's his name, sheepishly says "not really" under his breath, referring to how Elton John was initially a stage name and that his birth name was Reginald Dwight. However, the reference was technically inaccurate due to Elton John being his legal name since 1972 (see Goofs section).
Elton John references his 1998 knighting when Homer forces him to enter a dog carrier.
Marge's necklace and neck not aligned correctly
Goofs[]
When Marge is excited to have received roses from Homer, for a frame her head is misaligned with her necklace so that some space is between some of the beads and her neck, and parts of her neck cover parts of her beads.
When Apu is surprised to learn Elton John's in Springfield, after confirming that's indeed his name, Elton John says "not really" under his breath. In actuality, at the time the episode aired, he had legally changed his name to Elton John, having changed it in 1972.
Production Notes[]
The final draft for this episode was published on October 2, 1998.[1]
