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| Its okay to steal cable from faceless corporations! |
Homer sees Flanders run off a guy offering to install cable for free, and immediately gets that same guy to do that service for him. Everyone in the family is initially happy with this, even Marge gives in despite initial hesitations. Homer watches it all day and night, and suddenly the next day its time for church. While there, Bart and Lisa get a Sunday School lesson about hell. They're told that they would go to hell if they were to break one of the ten Commandments. Lisa immediately takes notice of the 8th Commandment: "Thou shalt not steal", and now fears that she and her family will go to hell for the cable line unless she does something about it.
After some advice from Reverend Lovejoy, Lisa decides to protest by actively not watching cable, but still telling everyone she isn't, which bugs Homer. Also complication matters is Bart who finds "the Top Hat Channel", an adult network, and after Homer gets him to knock it off, Bart wishes he could grow up so he can break rules too, which frustrates Homer as well.
Despite all of that, one of the cable networks is going to broadcast a big time boxing match, and Homer invites friends, co-workers and even his dad to come see it. He panics, though, as when Moe arrives, Homer has to hide all the mugs he's stolen from Moe's, and then when Mr. Burns makes a surprising visit to watch the fight, Homer has to quickly hide all the things he stole from work. All the while, Lisa looks at him almost accusingly. Ultimately, just before the fight begins, Homer gives in, and joins Lisa and the rest of the family outside, promising to cut the illegal line following the fight's conclusion, though he actively laments missing what turns out to be a great fight.
Quick Review
This is a weird episode. First of all, its the first episode I've come across in this run that really seems dated, and the episode just previous to this one had Homer and Marge as teenagers in the 70s. This episode seems dated because it deal with the piracy of cable, which may or may not of been a big deal in its original form twenty years ago. Nowadays, though, thanks to our friend the internet, cable piracy is but one of the many 'illegal' options available to nearly everyone with a fast broadband connection. So for this episode to make a big deal about stealing one cable line, nowadays, seems a bit out of place.
Another odd thing this episode has going for it is that, as basically a Lisa episode, it expands on her character a little more, but it also kinda meshes with later Lisa episodes which set her character up somewhat differently. In this episode, Lisa is against stealing, but because she's been scared by religion into thinking that stealing would send you to hell. Its weird seeing her like that as in later episodes she wouldn't be swayed so quickly by Sunday School teaching like that. Or even be in Sunday School.
So, like I've said, its a weird episode to watch nowadays. Stealing a cable line, and being against stealing for religious reasons rather than financial ones, it all seems out of place in this day in age. Ignoring that, however, the episode had itself several good laughs and its a solid episode when it comes to hilarity.
Final Score: 7.7
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