“The National Bank of Iceland” (the name of Landsbanki Bank in English) and furious Icelandic protestors were the theme on the latest episode of The Simpsons shown on American television on Sunday. Approximately 6.3 million people watched the show.
Landsbanki in real life. Photo by Páll Stefánsson.
On the show a group of angry Icelanders is seen barging into “The National Bank of Iceland” holding placards with supposed Icelandic phrases (probably translated by Google) and “IMF” crossed out, Fréttabladid reports.
The storyline goes something like this:
Springfield, the hometown of the Simpson family, is encountering fiscal trouble and the mayor announces savings measures. Following the announcement, the real estate market collapses and most of the Simpsons’ neighbors are forced to sell their houses.
Lured by the scent of baking cookies, Homer takes out a mortgage to buy one of the houses and explains to the real estate agent that the mortgage has already been sold to a bank, a hedge fund and loan institutions all around the world.
Then, the spotlight is on the protestors outside “The National Bank of Iceland” where angry Icelanders want to kill Homer and burn a replica of him. The Icelandic flag can be spotted in the background.
One protestor says: “At least we have Beowulf,” but another quickly replies: “No we don’t.”
The Simpsons is the most successful television series of all time. No show has been shown on prime time on American television for as long. The first episode was aired on December 17, 1989.
Iceland has been mentioned on an earlier episode of The Simpsons, when viewers learned that Homer’s colleague Carl grew up there.
