 |
| Ah, the old pastime of laughing at the elderly. |
After Homer & Marge do the All in the Family opening, Homer and Bart are trying to watch a new documentary on Krusty when Lisa's saxophone practicing gets on Homer's nerves. He sends Bart to get Lisa to knock it off, but the two have a confrontation, leading Lisa's saxophone being thrown out the window, subsequently run over by a car, a truck and Nelson.
As Lisa cries over her loss, she notes that she's had the saxophone for as long as she can remember. Homer is astonished that Lisa doesn't remember getting her sax, and begins to tell the tale about how Lisa got her sax... by talking about Bart's first day of school five years ago (in 1990, which is weird because the episode aired in 1997), which was terrible for him. Homer & Marge do another All in the Family bit, with Apu brought in to finish a rhyme.
Marge takes over the storytelling, though the story still focuses on Bart. Struggling in school with a downer of a teacher, and having no friends or fun, Bart becomes depressed, and scarily so. Homer and Marge seek advice from the school's counselor, bringing Lisa along because they have nowhere else to leave her. As the counselor advices that Bart stop trying to be an individual, he notices Lisa complete a complex jigsaw puzzle. After asking a couple of questions, the counselor tells the parents that Lisa is gifted, and that they should find some way to nurture that gift as soon as possible. However, most things that allow said gifts to nurture cost a lot of money, and the Simpsons just do not have much at that time. However, Homer had saved up $200 for an air conditioner, just in time for an intense heat wave, but Marge has him hold off on buying one until they can figure something out for Lisa.
A short time later, Bart, still depressed, realizes that he can make other people laugh with jokes and such. Gathering a crowd, Bart makes a five-year old ass of himself, and as Principal Skinner tries to set Bart back on the right path, Bart tells Skinner to 'eat my shorts', thereby turning Bart into the rapscallion we're familiar with today.
Meanwhile, as Homer takes Lisa to buy an air condition, spying one for $200, Lisa points out a shop for musical instruments. Learning that musical instruments can encourage a gifted child, he takes Lisa in. Lisa becomes enamored with a saxophone, but it too costs $200. Homer waffles between the sax and the air conditioner for a few moments, but decides to buy the sax. In the present day, Marge reveals that they have money saved up in the air conditioner fund again which can buy Lisa a new sax. Despite Homer's initial protests, he buys a new saxophone for Lisa anyway, and afterward he, Marge and Apu take a moment to laugh at Grampa's temporary blindness. Good times.
Quick Review
Lisa's Sax is an exceptional episode. Bart's kindergarten days were fun to watch, with the bullies all wearing such neat shirts, and the appearances of Apu and Grampa really enhanced the comedy as well. It all combines to make one of the best episodes of the season.
Final Score: 10
No comments:
Post a Comment