With the first two seasons behind us for this round, it’s on to seasons 3 and 4. First up, “Stark Raving Dad” & “Separate Vocations”. Two episodes in which the sibling rivalry between Bart and Lisa takes center stage, and we learn that maybe, just maybe, Bart’s not such a bratty brother after all.
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- Episode: Stark Raving Dad
- Writers: Al Jean & Mike Reiss
- Aired: September 19, 1991
Leon: Hi. I’m Michael Jackson, from the Jacksons.
Homer: I’m Homer Simpson, from the Simpsons.
In “Stark Raving Dad”, Homer is committed to a mental institution, where he meets up with an overweight white man named Leon who thinks he is Michael Jackson.
Homer’s journey to the nut house begins when Bart leaves his lucky red cap in a load of washed white shirts, turning all of Homer’s whites pink. Why you little….
Homer has no choice but to wear a pink shirt to work. In a crowd of white collar shirts, Homer sticks out like a sore thumb. For wearing a pink shirt, Mr.Burns comes to the conclusion that Homer must be insane.
After he is shown a rorschach test that looks like Bart, Homer bursts into a fit of rage! The doctors declare Homer insane and have him and his pink shirt shipped off to the loony bin.
Meanwhile, back home it’s little Lisa’s birthday and she has a case of the birthday blues.
I had a cat named snowball,
she died, she died
mom said she was sleeping-
she lied, she lied!
Why, oh why is my cat dead?
Couldn’t that chrysler have hit me instead.
-Lisa Simpson
Marge gets the call that her Homie has been institutionalized. While on hold, she’s forced to listen to a muzak version of “Crazy” by Patsy Cline.
Amid all the commotion involving Homer being sent to an insane asylum, everyone has forgotten about Lisa’s birthday. With only Maggie around for company, a depressed Lisa sits at the kitchen table in her party hat singing Happy Birthday to herself and quietly sobbing.
While Lisa sings Happy Birthday to herself back home, across town Leon sings Homer to sleep at the Mental Institution.
Marge: Doctor, if you just talk to him for five minutes without mentioning our son Bart, you’d see how sane he is.
Doctor: You mean there really is a Bart?! Good Lord!
After Marge’s talk with the doc, Homer is released and certified NOT INSANE.
Homer phones the house and informs Bart that he’s coming back home and that he’s bringing Michael Jackson with him. At first, Bart doesn’t believe him but after talking to “Michael” he becomes convinced that he really is Michael Jackson.
It doesn’t take long for Bart to blab to everyone in town that Michael Jackson is coming to his house. Word gets around and soon everyone in town is flocking to 42 Evergreen Terrace to catch a glimpse of the King Of Pop. Even Apu closes the Kwik-E-Mart for the first time ever. Unfortunately for Apu and all the screaming teens, the man they all came to see is clearly not Michael Jackson.
Everyone in town is angry at Bart for not delivering the real Michael Jackson, but one member of the angry mob is mad at him for a different reason. Lisa doesn’t care about the phony King of Pop, all she cares about is that her only sibling didn’t even bother to remember her birthday.
The disappointed crowd disperses, leaving Bart all alone on the front lawn, feeling like a fool. Perhaps now he knows how his sister felt sitting all alone at the table on her birthday. Notice the similarities in the top down camera angles used in both scenes.
That night, Lisa writes a letter to Bart saying that she has disowned him as her brother. Leon, or “Michael”, or whoever he is, overhears her and approaches Bart and tries to convince him to write a song for his sister to make up for forgetting her Birthday. At first, Bart dismisses Leon as a fraud and wants nothing to do with the man who made him look foolish in front of everyone. But once they get past that, they get down to some song writing. First, Leon tells Bart to observe his sister and write what he feels, his true feelings for his sister. Lisa is fully aware she is being watched, but it is too depressed to do anything about it.
Bart’s first draft isn’t exactly what Leon, or “Michael”, had in mind.
Lisa, her teeth are big and green!
Lisa, she smells like gasoline!
Lisa, ta-ra-ra Lisa!
She is my sista’, her birthday I mista’.
-Bart Simpson
The next morning Bart grabs hold of Lisa’s nose, and she wakes up snorting and disoriented to find Bart and Leon in her room. Bart plays an upended wastebasket like the bongos while Leon plays the piano. Not sure how they got the piano up the stairs and into Lisa’s room without her hearing. I guess she’s a really really deep sleeper. Anyhoo, they perform a song Bart wrote just for her.
Homer, trying to sleep, covers his ears with his pillow. I think we all felt like doing that the first time we heard this sappy repetitive song. While I may not have loved the tune, I do love Lisa’s “End Apartheid Now” poster on her wall.
Leon: I wish you love and good will, I wish you peace and joy
Bart: I wish you better than your heart desires
Leon: And your first kiss from a boy.
Leon/Bart: Lisa, it’s your birthday. Happy birthday, Lisa. Lisa, it’s your birthday. Happy birthday, Lisa
Bart: Yeah!
Needless to say, Lisa loved the song. Me, not so much. But hey, it’s her birthday not mine. Personally I preferred Bart’s earlier version. But I suppose that wouldn’t have been a very thoughtful gift.
Not only did I not care for the song Leon wrote, I really didn’t care for the way Leon’s character was designed. He’s basically just a bald Barney Gumble. Very little thought seems to have gone into the look of his character. I will however, give props to Michael Jackson for playing an actual character instead of just an exaggerated version of himself. This may be the only television show Michael Jackson has ever appeared on, and so for everyone involved to resist the temptation of just having an animated version of Michael Jackson visit Springfield and sing his latest hit, which is the route they usually take with every musical guest star, they deserve some props for that.
In the earlier seasons, everyone involved with the show clearly had enough faith in the quality of the product they were producing, that they didn’t need to shove it in our face that Michael Jackson was going to be on the show. Nowadays it reeks of desperation every time Lady Gaga or Katey Perry pop in for a meaningless, shameless plug of whatever it is they’re doing at that time. Much like Dustin Hoffman in “Lisa’s Substitute”, Jackson doesn’t even use his real name in the credits. The character Jackson plays is not nearly as interesting or effective as Dustin Hoffman’s Mr.Bergstrom, but I give them points for creativity. So while I didn’t much care for Leon’s look, I did like the concept they were going for and appreciated them not taking the obvious route. Just wish the same kind of thought had been put into Leon’s overall look.
“Hey, we’re just like the Waltons. We’re praying for an end to the depression too.” -Bart, to George Bush’s speech that America needs to be more like the Waltons than the Simpsons
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Episode: Separate Vocations- Writer: George Meyer
- Aired: February 27, 1992
Skinner: I have never seen a good student take such a tumble. Lisa, what are you rebelling against?
Lisa: Whaddya got?
Lisa, channeling her inner Marlon Brando in “Separate Vocations.”
Mrs.Krabappel informs her class that she has a big surprise for them. Bart, dreaming of what it could be, imagines Edna peeling off her skin to reveal that she is in fact a space alien underneath. Unfortunately for Bart, Edna is not about to reveal to the world her extra terrestrial origins, but rather that the class will be taking a surprise test. A Career Aptitude Normalization Test, or CANT, to be precise.
“Some of you may discover a wonderful vocation you’d never even imagined. Others may find out life isn’t fair, in spite of your Masters from Bryn Mawr, you might end up a glorified babysitter to a bunch of dead-eyed fourth graders while your husband runs naked on a beach with your marriage counselor.”~Edna Krabappel.
Bart and Lisa are both disappointed with the results of their career aptitude tests. Lisa is in full crisis mode after the test has predicted that her future career will be “homemaker”, while Bart is puzzled to find out he will become a Police Officer. A defiant Lisa feels she is destined to be much more than just a happy homemaker, while Bart always envisioned himself being on the wrong side of the law as a no good drifter. “Coooool.”
“Well I AM going to be a famous Jazz musician. I’ve got it all figured out. I’ll be unappreciated in my own country, but my gloomy blues stylings will electrify the french. I’ll avoid drug abuse, but I do plan to have several torrid love affairs. And I may or may not die young.” ~Lisa
Unfortunately for Lisa, her dreams of playing the saxophone may go unfulfilled seeing as how she has her fathers stubby fingers.
Things are going a little better for Bart. Ed and Lou take Bart for a ride-along to show him what a day in the life of a Springfield Police Officer is like.
“Well, it’s about time”~The old lady next door, watching Bart be put in the back of the police car.
Bart is expecting police chases and gun fire, but Ed and Lou inform him that it’s not like it is in the movies.
“They only come out at night.” ~Lou, after seeing Sideshow Mel rollerskating down the sidewalk with his dog.
Right on cue, fresh from another robbery of the Kwik-E-Mart in which he appears to have stolen the entire cash register and a box of lottery tickets, Snake speeds past the Bart and the cops in his trusty Little Bandit. Soon Ed, Lou, and Bart are in hot pursuit.
Eddie: We’re in pursuit of a speeding individual, driving a red….car. License number Eggplant, Xerxes, Crybaby, Overbite, Narwhal.
It’s safe to say, that after this experience, Bart is going to like being a cop after all. Lisa, however, is not taking to the idea of being a homemaker nearly as well.
“Dear log: This will be my last entry, for you were a journal of my hopes and dreams. And now, I have none.” ~Lisa, writing in her journal for the last time.
The next morning, a dejected Lisa comes down for breakfast, grumbling to herself. Marge attempts to convince her that being a homemaker can be a very creative career by pointing proudly to the smiley faces she has created on Bart and Homer’s plates using bacon, eggs and toast.
Lisa: What’s the point? They’ll never notice.
Marge: You’d be surprised.
Naturally, Homer and Bart storm to the table and obliviously scarf down their food without so much as a word to Marge. So deep in denial is Marge, that she only allows herself the smallest murmur of disappointment. Even though Lisa accurately predicted Bart and Homer’s reaction, she is the one who is truly aghast at the thanklessness of housework.
But it’s not all bacon and eggs smiley faces for Marge, she also bakes a cake. Unfortunately she finds her freshly baked cake half eaten on the counter. She initially blames the dog, that is until Detective Bart enters the crime scene and shows her the evidence exposing the real culprit.
Marge: You know your father wanted to be a policeman for a little while, but they said he was too heavy.
Homer: No, the Army said I was too heavy. The police said I was too dumb.
While Bart is encouraged by his parents to follow through on his potential as a policeman, Lisa is becoming more and more discouraged with life both at home and at school. Soon Lisa’s depression turns to rebellion. It all begins with a visit to the “bad girls” restroom at school.
I like how the bad girls at school wear skull earrings that look exactly like the skull chain Snake has hanging in his car. Perhaps representing a glimpse into the girls’ future, as well as Lisa’s, if they take the wrong path.
Without any motivation to do her best, Lisa quits playing her saxophone and doing her schoolwork.
Miss. Hoover: Now sprinkle your sparkles on your paste. Lisa, you’re not sprinkling your sparkles.
Lisa: Shove it.
Love it!
Skinner: I have never seen a good student take such a tumble. Lisa, what are you rebelling against?
Lisa: Whaddya got?
That shot of Lisa is one of my all time favorite images in the history of the show. I had to post it twice.
While Lisa is called into Skinner’s office for her recent bad behavior, Bart is called into Skinner’s office for his recent good behavior. Skinner assigns him the job of Hall Monitor.
Bart and Skinner form something of a dynamic duo, ushering in an era of law and order never before seen in Springfield Elementary. To show his appreciation to Bart, Skinner offers Bart any item of his choosing from the room where all the confiscated material ever collected in Springfield Elementary’s history is held. I myself would have chosen the plastic derriere but Bart opts for a crossbow.
As Bart’s love for authority grows, Lisa sinks further and further into her sulky, rebellious attitude. While in detention for another sarcastic remark at Miss Hoover’s expense, it dawns on Lisa that her teacher wouldn’t be so smart if she didn’t have the answer key in her precious “Teacher’s Edition”, so Lisa steals every copy of the “Teachers Edition” in Springfield Elementary and hides them in her locker. I’m not sure if it’s a Springfield thing, or an American thing, but growing up in Canada we never had lockers in Elementary school.
With the entire teaching staff in full panic mode, Skinner enlists the help of his trusty Hall Monitor to help find the culprit. One by one, Bart and Skinner search every locker in school to the tune of “Axel F” from Beverly Hills Cop. Ultimately, Bart finds the textbooks in Lisa’s locker.
Realizing his sister is the culprit, and that she could be expelled for what she did, Bart takes the blame.
Lisa: Bart, why did you take the blame?
Bart: Because I didn’t want you to wreck your life. You got the brains and the talent to go as far as you want. And when you do, I’ll be right there to borrow money.
Lisa: (touched) Oh, Bart.
Bart mocks “Principal Sucker” for not being able to figure out that the theft of the textbooks was an inside job the whole time. Bart is whisked away by the new Hall Monitor, Milhouse. “Let’s go, Simpson.”
As Bart serves his time in detention, Lisa keeps him company by playing her saxophone outside his classroom.
“Sounding good, Lis!” Bart, encouraging his sister.
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VERDICT
Both episodes have very similar endings. In one, Bart surprises his sister with a birthday ballad he wrote just for her on her special day, while in the other it is Bart’s surprisingly selfless act that saves his sister from potential expulsion. I prefer the latter ending for several reasons. One, Lisa’s saxophone playing at the end of “Separate Vocations” is a far better musical number to go out on than the somewhat sappy song Bart and Leon sung to her at the end of “Stark Raving Dad”. But more importantly, the latter ending is far more effective. A birthday song is all well and good, but Bart potentially sacrificing his own future for Lisa’s is a far greater gesture.
And to think both of these episodes aired at a time when then President George Bush criticized the show for not setting a good example of family values, and that Bart Simpson was a poor role model for children. As far as I’m concerned Bart’s about as good a role model as you could ask for in both of these episodes. But only one can move on and that’s “Separate Vocations.”
And if there was ever any doubt as to which episode should come out victorious, the parody of “The Wild One” with Lisa in Marlon Brando’s role pretty much sealed the deal for Separate Vocations.
In closing, Lisa has a message to any episode that wants to challenge “Separate Vocations” in the next round…
…”Whaddya got?”
For up to date tournament results, click here: The Best Episode Thingy There Ever Was
TRAMAMPOLINE! TRABOPOLINE! 