Original air date: 3/10/2002
Production code: DABF-09
Grampa dates an old woman who only likes him because he has a driver's license.
Tropes:
- Bait-and-Switch:
- One would expect that Abe would drive all the way to Branson to get back Zelda's love. When they finally reunite, Abe tells Zelda that he hates her, and calls her a "hoochie".
- When Abe, Zelda, Homer and Marge go to a drive-in for a double date, the brakes keep getting hit and one would expect Abe to be the one responsible for it. While Abe is the one driving the car, it's Homer who keeps hitting the brakes because he doesn't trust Abe to know when to do it.
- Borrowed Catchphrase: Abe uses "Woohoo!" multiple times in this episode.
- Call-Back: Bart had previously visited Branson as part of his, Milhouse's, Martin's, and Nelson's road trip to the Knoxville World's Fair in Season 7's "Bart on the Road."
- Calvinball: Bart and Homer's game of "Scrabbleship", a combination of Scrabble and Battleship.Bart: B-6.
Homer: You sunk my Scrabbleship!
Lisa: This game makes no sense.
Homer: Tell that to the good men who just lost their lives. Semper fi! - Does This Remind You of Anything?: Obviously Homer banning Abe from driving after he and his friends abuse his driving privileges is basically Homer treating his father like a parent disciplining his teenage rebel son.
- Enmity with an Object: For his license, Abe chooses a newspaper photo of him with the headline "Old Man Yells at Cloud". He then shows the license to the same cloud and says "How do you like that?"
- Full-Name Ultimatum: When Homer tells "Abraham J. Simpson" that he's lost his driving privileges.
- Gold Digger: Zelda, who only wanted to date Grampa because he had a driver's license. The moment Grampa is banned from driving, Zelda dumps him.
- Hollywood Board Games: Homer and/or Bart are often seen creating weird game hybrids with nonsensical rules. Both of them are Book Dumb but also occasionally creative, especially if they want to have fun. They do this with Scrabble and Battleship in this episode. Comically, Homer takes it way too seriously, mourning the soldiers who die when a ship is sunk.
- Honking Arriving Car: After Lisa comments that they have no way of traveling to Branson, Missouri, a novelty horn interrupts, and a bus headed to Branson, MO stops directly in front of the Simpsons' house. However, when Ned, Rod, and Todd Flanders get on the bus, Homer insists that they "wait for the next one."
- Humiliation Conga: Abe publicly calls out on Zelda for only liking him for his license, and dumping him when Homer bans him from driving. He even gets the crowd to chant "Hoochie, Hoochie" to further twist the knife.
- Inexplicably Identical Individuals: In Bronson, Missouri, everyone looks and talks like Charles Bronson.
- Just the Introduction to the Opposites: Abe acts like a wild teenager while Homer acts as the stern father.Homer: He's gotta learn, Marge. The way my dad made me learn!Marge: He is your dad!Homer: (beat) Cosmic.
- Literary Allusion Title: The title is an obvious reference to The Old Man and the Sea.
- Logo Joke: "This has been a Gracie Films pray-sen-tay-shun."
- Mock Hollywood Sign: The stage backdrop for the musical revue in Branson.
- Not So Above It All: When Homer complains about Abe staying out all night with "some hoochie" while borrowing his car.Abe: She's no hoochie! Her name is Zelda, and she understands me!Marge: ...Grampa, I gotta tell ya, she's a stone-cold hoochie!
- Puff of Logic: Abe finds Tennessee Ernie Ford backstage and claims that [Abe] knows for sure that [Ford's] dead—when Ford claims, "No you just think I'm dead," Abe claims that he was one of Ford's biggest fans and shows that he even clipped his obituary. When Abe shows Ford his own obituary, Ford suddenly crumbles into dust.
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: "Abraham J. Simpson, you are ''never! Driving! Again! EVER!" And for added effect, the camera cuts closer to Homer's pith with each punctuation to the point that when he say "EVER" his mouth covers up the whole screen.
- Riddle for the Ages: How did Abe develop an enmity with a cloud, of all things?
- Revenge: This turns out to be Abe's motivation for following Zelda to Branson.
- Road Trip Plot: The third act has Abe and Bart drive thousands of miles to Branson to follow Zelda because Abe hates her, and wants to publicly humiliate her for being a hoochie.
- Russian Reversal: Yakov Smirnov says "In Soviet Union, revue watches you!".
- Shout-Out:
- The end credits is one to The Beverly Hillbillies, with the Simpsons waving at the camera throughout and Lisa imitating the Filmways sign-off as "This has been a Gracie Films pray-sen-tay-shun".
- The death race between Abe's friends and the Souvenir Jackitos spoofs the race in Rebel Without a Cause, while their confrontation at the Kwik-E-Mart is from West Side Story.
- The Souvenir Jaquitos' jackets are of Jurassic Park, Taz, Planet Hollywood and Hard Rock Cafe.
- To The Munsters when the family finally finds Abe in Branson.Marge: It's Grampa!
Homer: Munster?
Marge: No, Simpson.
Homer: Oh, darn, darn, darn! [stomps foot like Herman, complete with sound effects, screen shake and plaster falling from ceiling.]
- Skewed Priorities: One of Los Souvenir Jaquitos refuses to take off his jacket even when it's on fire because he'd rather die than having people not knowing where he does his shopping.
- Special Guest: Olympia Dukakis as Zelda and Bill Saluga (a.k.a. the "you can call me Ray, or you can me Jay" guy) As Himself.
- The Voiceless: Gloria, Snake's girlfriend, doesn't speak this time due to Julia Louis-Dreyfus' absence.
- Who's Laughing Now?: Abe asks the cloud "who's laughing now" while showing it his license.
- Wink "Ding!": Abe explains to Patty at the DMV that his right eye is his "winkin' eye." Cue perfectly executed wink, complete with "ding" noise.Patty: I'll give you your license if you never do that again.Abe: Oh, everything's the last time I do everything.
- Worst News Judgement Ever: Abe yelling at a cloud somehow made the headlines.
