 |
| I bet they were disappointed to learn that wasn't real moonshine. (It wasn't, right?) |
After Homer fails to give the kids any actual lunch for school, Bart comes up with a plan to get some food come lunch time. He starts to spread a tale across school about the "Dark Stanley Murders", a cafeteria worker who went mad over kids mocking his lack of a college degree, killing those kids and putting them in his stew. Kids across school start to freak out, and it culminates at lunch time when Bart fakes his own murder at the hands of Stanley, causing every other kid to freak out and flee, allowing Bart to eat their left-behind food. Principal Skinner and Superintendent Chalmers get caught up in the chaos as the kids all flee school. As Skinner catches Bart, quickly realizing he's behind this, he also orders Groundskeeper Willie to round up and return all the fleeing kids. Willie does so, but also brings in seven yokel children who do not attend the school, all of whom are "fathered" by Cletus. Skinner reveals that if he let those children go to school, test scores would plummet and the school would lose its already limited funding. Lisa, who overhears this, doesn't care about that, though, and demands those children get a proper education. Skinner and Chalmers quickly formulate an idea to make everyone happy: have Lisa tutor the kids!
Bart is sent to a professional psychiatrist, whom the school has paid for five sessions. Bart isn't interested in what the woman, Dr. Stacey Swanson, has to say, but she hooks him in with a video game he likes, and soon he's willing to reveal all of his pain to the woman. However, before he can finish, the five sessions are up, leaving Bart unwilling to move on, thinking about Swanson all the time. Marge picks up on this, and pays for one more session for Bart. There, Bart is able to finish airing out his problems, and is happy upon finishing. He leaves with 20 minutes left in the session, leaving Swanson unwilling to part (perhaps because she was using Bart as a fill in for her son who died from the Dark Stanley murders, the episode claims?).
Meanwhile, Lisa begins to teach the seven Spuckler kids, but with their knowledge coming along slowly Lisa decides to take them to downtown Springfield to soak in some culture. The kids get into a song and dance routine in the process, which catches the eye of Krusty the Klown. Despite Lisa's protests, Cletus signs the kids to a contract with Krusty, where they sing as a group of yokel kids while Cletus blows his money on nothing. Frustrated, Lisa decides to bring in the kid's mother, Brandine, who was apparently stationed in Iraq until now. Brandine reveals that Cletus is only the father of the two untalented kids, essentially voiding the deal. The kids thank Lisa for teaching them about the world, and the Spuckler family is back to normal.
Quick Review
The episode starts off strong in the first few minutes with Bart's tale and the resulting consequences. Krusty's appearance and Bart's sudden need to get psychiatric help were fairly good as well. Still, the comedy died off as the episode came to a close, with the rather odd ending of war veteran Brandine coming in to put a stop to the problem. If it wasn't for that, this episode probably would've been the best of the season. As it stands, it's still better than most other episodes found this season.
Final Score: 7.0
No comments:
Post a Comment