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| Ah, yes, France. |
When you hear a tagline for this episode, say, "Bart goes to France!", you'd probably think "Oh man he is gonna raise some hell over there!" not unlike the episode Bart vs. Australia. Bart, whose acts of terror plague both Homer and Principal Skinner in this episode, would seem primed to destroy poor ol' France. Except, well, France fights back. Kinda.
Speaking of those acts, Bart's uncleanliness allows Homer to slip and hurt his back. A short time later, a cherry bomb Bart throws into a school toilet throws the whole system into dismay, which adversely affects Skinner's mom. (As an aside, this marks the first appearance of Agnes Skinner, but in this episode she's a kind old lady who calls Seymour "Spanky". Neither that name or her demeanor are part of her character later on.) Skinner inquires with Homer and Marge about sending Bart to France for three months as part of a student exchange program. In return, the family would host an Albanian boy for the same time period. Everyone agrees, and Bart is on his way.
The episode then splits into two halves. It turns out Bart's adopted "family", an shady wine maker and his nephew, also their donkey, intended to have Bart do all the menial work of wine making, allowing the two of them, also their donkey, to rest and relax. Meanwhile, the family greets the Albanian boy, Adil, and things start off great, with Lisa and Adil getting into somewhat heated political arguments which passes as dinner conversation. However, Adil is actually "Sparrow", a spy for the Albanian government who acquires information from the nuclear plant, which Homer is more than happy to provide.
Bart's troubles reach a climax after being forced to drink down wine mixed with anti-freeze, then being told to go buy more anti-freeze. He attempts to inform a nearby police officer about the shady men, but only does so after miraculously learning French right there and then. The two men are arrested and Bart's last month in France goes by wonderfully. Meanwhile, the Adil is tracked down by the feds, and is returned to Albania in exchange for an American kid spy. Bart returns home and all is well.
Quick Review
This is among the best episodes of Season 1. The beginning of the episode in particular, both Homer's peril as well as Skinner's, brought a lot of laughs. Homer giving all of that top secret information to Adil was funny as well. Bart's story, once he was in France, wasn't too funny, but as Bart says, he did meet one nice French person, so it ended up being a great episode.
Final Score: 8.0
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