What if Disney would've first start making animated TV series since the 1950s?/The Simpsons/Funeral for a Fiend

"Funeral for a Fiend" is the eighth episode of the nineteenth season of The Simpsons. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 25, 2007. It was written by Michael Price and was directed by Rob Oliver. It features Kelsey Grammer in his tenth appearance as Sideshow Bob, as well as David Hyde Pierce in his second appearance as Cecil Terwilliger. John Mahoney makes his first appearance as Dr. Robert Terwilliger, Sr., the father of Bob and Cecil. Keith Olbermann also makes a guest appearance as himself.

In this episode, Homer buys a TiVo that allows Marge to skip commercials, but after a dream in which Keith Olbermann chastises her for doing so, she starts watching the ones she skipped, one of which is for a new barbecue rib restaurant that turns out to be a trap set by Sideshow Bob; once again, the trap fails and Bob is arrested, but at his trial, Brian throws away a nitroglycerin vial that Bob needed for his heart condition, and Bob falls dead.

Plot
Itchy and Scratchy accompany Homer to Circuit Circus to purchase a battery. The cashier who rings up Homer's purchase explains that if he signs up for a $200 TiVo and a two year subscription, he will receive his battery for free. Homer quickly complies and in almost a couple of hours, Brian is busy installing the new TiVo system at home.

The family quickly realizes the capability of their new TiVo device as they skip through the commercials (Mostly from former episodes) during a Quentin Taratino film. Marge especially takes a shine to their new TiVo, and becomes a pro at skipping all the commercials and recording all her favorite shows. Her TiVo watching passion quickly becomes an addiction, to her family's annoyance, and late one night after falling asleep on the couch watching TV, her guilty conscience gets the better of her in her dreams. Marge dreams of Keith Olbermann speaking to her through the TV and making her feel guilty for skipping all of the television commercials. She makes a vow to Keith that she will be sure to catch up and her advertisement watching.

During a marathon commercial watching session, Marge catches an ad for a "Wes Doobner's World Famous Family Rib Huts" restaurant. With a menu that appeals to everyone in the family, they excitedly head out to visit the new restaurant that night.

The family begins to sense that something is amiss when they see an empty parking lot and a restaurant void of any tables or chairs, once inside. The doors and windows close and latch behind them and Wes Doobner himself steps in through another door and emits a maniacal laugh. Wes reveals himself to be Sideshow Bob and gloats about his ingenious plan to trap and then kill Homer and his family.

With the Simpsons tied up, Sideshow Bob provides a slide show to explain what he's been up to since when he tried to kill Brian and Stewie in Road to Italy (to the family's suprise, as Brian had not told them about it because he through Sideshow Bob would not returning to America). Sideshow Bob then shows the family how he plans to kill them. He places a laptop computer with a defective battery on top of a pile of TNT so that when the battery overheats and explodes, it will ignite the TNT causing it to explode as well. Bob quotes some Shakespeare and then makes his exit, but Lisa calls out to Bob, teasing him for getting the Shakespeare quote wrong. Sideshow Bob, not wanting to be upstaged, quickly reenters and uses the laptop to check Wikipedia about the accuracy of his quote. But while waiting for the website to load, the defective battery explodes in his lap knocking him unconscious. Within minutes Kent Brockman is reporting on the scene and Sideshow Bob is taken down.

At his trial, Sideshow Bob confesses that he did try to kill the Simpsons, but that his plot was a product of his insanity caused by Bart and Lisa's constant persecution. He calls his father, Dr. Terwilliger, to the witness stand. Bob's father testifies that Bob was a peaceful, weak and sickly boy due to a congenital heart defect, until Bob's first failed attempts to kill Homer, as well Bart and Lisa being responsable for his fourth arrest, led Bob to full-blown dementia. Sideshow Bob pleads with the jury and begins to successfully win sympathy from the court.

An outraged Brain snaps and in an outburst tries to convince the court that Bob is lying. Sideshow Bob then reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a small vial of nitroglycerin, but before he can do anything with it, Brain snatches the vial out of Bob's hand and flings it out the window. Bob screams, clutches his heart in horror and collapses. Dr. Terwilliger rushes from the witness stand to his son's side and Sideshow Bob's mother emerges from the gallery to explain that the nitroglycerin was actually for Bob's heart defect. Dr. Hibbert rushes forward to check Bob's pulse and then confirms everyone's fears, telling them that Sideshow Bob is dead, blaming Brain in the process.

Nearly the entire town attends for Sideshow Bob's funeral (including Bob's parents, wife Francesca, son Gino, and younger brother Cecil, whose been let out of prison to attend) and Kent Brockman covers the scene with live coverage. Krusty leads the funeral in song as well-wishers pay their last respects to a peaceful Sideshow Bob, who is lying in a tailor made coffin that accommodates his tremendous feet. The Simpson family enters the church to hostility and Brain storms off, refusing to pay his respects to Bob.

Later Brain sits alone out on the sidewalk grumbling about how everyone hates him for supposedly killing Sideshow Bob, when Cecil, accompanied by two police officers, approaches. Cecil tells Brain that he shares the same disdain for Bob, but tells Bart of felling better if he makes his peace with Bob. Brain reluctantly agrees and heads off to the funeral home to say goodbye before Bob is cremated.

Milhouse makes his rounds delivering newspapers and at the Simpson home Marge asks if he has seen Brain. Milhouse tells her of noticing Brain a few minutes earlier and that he was going for the funeral home to see Sideshow Bob one last time. When Milhouse asks to sit down because his feet are killing him, Lisa suddenly realizes that Brain is in danger and convinces Bart and Stewie to rush to the funeral home before it is too late.

At the funeral home, Brain approaches as Sideshow Bob's coffin, which awaits the furnace, and confesses that he was very sorry for ruining his life in Italy and causing his death. Just then, to Brain's surprise, Bob jumps out of the coffin, alive and well, and quickly throws Brain in. He laughs maniacally as he throws a switch that starts the coffin on its slow journey down the conveyor belt to the furnace.

As the siblings rushes to the funeral home Lisa explains how she figured out Bob's plan: she chronicles the fact that Bob would have never misquoted Shakespeare accidentally--due to his mom being a Shakespearean actress--and that his real plan had been to be caught so that he could stand trial. She also explains that when Bob collapsed in the courtroom, his father must have injected him with a drug to make him appear dead when he quickly rushed to Bob's side, and that all Bob's family was involved in his plan, which turned to be a plan to kill Brain as revenge for ruining his life in Italy.

Back at the funeral home Bob gathers with his entire family, including Cecil and his police escorts, who peel off their latex masks and turn out to be their parents. Bob then plans for Brain's ashes to be mistaken for his, and by the time police figure it out, Bob and his family will be away scot free. As they watch Brain slowly head to the furnace, Bart, Lisa and Stewie suddenly burst in to rescue Brain in the nick of time. Bart throws some hobo ashes into Bob's eyes, distracting him, and Lisa reverses the switch and stops the conveyor belt, while Stewie releases Brain.

Once Bart is safe, Chief Wiggum and the real police arrive on the scene to arrest Sideshow Bob and his family. As Bob and his family are being led away to prison, Bob questions how Lisa could've figured out the plan he and the rest of his family had come up with. Lisa admits that she actually started getting suspicious when she noticed that the coffin at his funeral had extra room to accommodate his large feet--Lisa figures that Bob's family most likely wouldn't have bothered to pay for something like if he actually was dead. This gets Cecil and Francesca mad at Bob for having that done despite (presumably) being advised against it.

In a prison cell with the rest of his family, all sentenced to 87 life sentences in prison, Sideshow Bob sits in a corner, restrained by a straight jacket, and laughs evilly as he imagines himself in the Simpsons' house for his revenge on and kills Homer, Bart and Lisa, while his father, son and brother play cards with Snake who constantly torments them.