The BBC Does Not Have Adverts But Some Programmes It Airs Originally Did: A Case Study

The BBC occasionally buys programming from other countries. And those programmes were probably originally made for channels with commercial breaks... which the BBC, as established in the rather eccentric title of this post, don't have. The solution was generally to edit out the fades or cuts to black where the adverts would originally go. But sometimes things would be a bit more complicated than that. What if the programme had something designed to lead in to an advert break - such as a cliffhanger, or a bit of leaning on the fourth wall acknowledging the gap? The Simpsons, which the BBC aired the first 11 seasons of between 1996 and 2004, is a good test subject for this, so let's take a look at what got cut.

Three Men and a Comic Book

BBC premiere: 28 April 1997

Status: CUT

At the end of Act One, during the Wonder Years homage, Bart stares at the audience whilst "Turn, Turn, Turn" plays for the last time. This was cut from the BBC's version, so the act ends with Bart saying "sorry!", and we cut to the beginning of Act Two.

When Flanders Failed

BBC premiere: 1 December 1997

Status: CUT

This one is pretty simple. When Homer starts choking on his burger at the end of Act One, there's a cut to black and we hear him continue to choke, before he breathes again with a sigh of relief, then adverts. The BBC cut out all the blackouts, so this goes, audio and all.

Separate Vocations

BBC premiere: 14 November 1997

Status: NOT CUT

The "to be continued..." and "Act II: Death Drives a Stick" cliffhanger material was apparently all allowed to stay in; it's obviously a spoof, and is perhaps even funnier without an ad break, so perhaps that's why this is allowed to survive, although it does still seem to be something of a double standard compared to the above examples.

And Maggie Makes Three

BBC premiere: 6 December 1999

Status: NOT CUT

Act Two ends with the show knocking pretty heavily on the fourth wall, as the family interrupt the flashback Homer's telling to go to the bathroom, maybe get a snack, or think about products they might like to purchase. Despite obviously being in reference to an ad break that isn't there, this was apparently never cut.

Bart vs Australia

BBC premiere: 20 December 1999

Status: CUT

Act One ends on a cliffhanger, with a musical sting as Marge says "oh my..." after Bart announces he's being indicted for fraud, and Act Two opens again on the same scene some time later. To make the adless version flow better, the cliffhanger is cut, along with Homer's line "that's no reason to block the TV"; we go from Bart's "just so you don't hear any wild rumours..." line to the beginning of Act Two.

Treehouse of Horror VI

BBC premiere: 18 August 2000

Status: NOT CUT

Kent's news report that closes "Attack of the 50-Foot Eyesores" ("The next advert you see could kill you and all of your loved ones!") is interrupted by Homer saying "We'll be right back." This survived the BBC's scissors.

The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular

BBC premiere: 1 September 2000

Status: NOT CUT

In fairness, you'd have to remove a lot of this episode to disguise the ad breaks or lack thereof, and the trivia questions and all of Troy's links were allowed to stay in. Perhaps this season marked a change in policy?

Guess Who's Coming to Criticize Dinner?

BBC premiere: 15 December 2003

STATUS: NOT CUT... but read on for more!

Act Two ends with Homer randomly turning to camera and saying "We'll be right back!" The BBC had clearly changed their mind on pretending the show never had ad breaks by this point, as this line was allowed to survive. However, this episode had of course already first aired on Sky four years previously. Sky do have ad breaks, but only one in a half-hour programme, as opposed to the three you get in a single episode of Our Favourite Family in the US. Sky generally put their break at the end of Act One, and they did cut Homer's line above from this episode, even though prior to this it was only the BBC cutting such things. A few years earlier Sky had also made minor cuts to the Futurama episodes "A Flight to Remember" and "The Honking" to get rid of advert break cliffhangers, not dissimilar to the way the Beeb had edited "Three Men and a Comic Book" above - had they had some kind of change of policy? Maybe it was just down to different people looking at, and editing, different episodes with no communication between them?

Behind the Laughter

BBC premiere: 20 January 2004

STATUS: NOT CUT... but read on for more! Again!

And it was a similar story here. The Beeb left both the 'advert break bumpers' in, but Sky cut the second one (the one with "was the dream really over?" and Homer's new passion for dusting and polishing mixing boards). In fairness, that makes sense: they'd had their advert break after the first bumper ("I thought the cop was a prostitute") and it'd be odd to have a second bumper but no break. Although then it's perhaps odd they didn't cut the 138th Episode Spectacular similarly. I may be overthinking this. (I understand the US broadcasts have a commercial break between the title sequence and the first act - didn't anyone in the UK editing suite think the beginning of the first act of BtL looked a bit odd, beginning as it does with the beginning of the title sequence again? Maybe it was difficult to make a clean edit? Maybe I'm just overthinking this?)

One other thing worth noting is the end of the first act of "Lost Verizon", where there's a rather good metatextual gag about the ad break: Bart says of his new cellphone, "oh cool, you can even watch commercials on it!" as he holds it up to fill the screen, and cue commercial. Unfortunately Sky manage to completely ruin this because the title screen fades in every time they go to a break. Otherwise, if any similar reference is not mentioned here, you can presume it wasn't cut in the UK.