The Simpsons Project #5

The Simpsons Project Case #5 (Season 1, Episode 5)
Bart the General
Original airdate: 2/4/90

Welcome back to another Simpsons Project! Today, we look at “Bart the General”, which may be the only episode in the history of the series not to start with its trademark opening. We’re coming up on the end of the Simpsons Project; only about 5,000 more episodes to go!

“Bart the General” opens with Lisa preparing cupcakes for her teacher, Ms. Hoover. Both Homer and Bart attempt to snipe a cupcake from Lisa unsuccessfully, and Bart bickers with her throughout the bus ride to school about it. Bart’s attitude changes, however, when they arrive at school and the cupcakes are stolen by one of school bully Nelson Muntz’s henchmen. Bart defends Lisa’s honor and tries to get the cupcakes back, which draws the ire of Muntz, the toughest and meanest kid in the school.

Nelson pledges to administer a beating to Bart at the end of the school day while Principal Skinner looks on uncaringly. Two brilliant dream sequences follow. In the first, Bart envisions his afternoon showdown with Nelson. He dreams of Nelson as an unstoppable, invincible giant who finishes the confrontation by swallowing Bart whole. In his second dream, Bart sees his friends and family at his hypothetical funeral (Homer, characteristically, is happy because he gets the day out of work). Both sequences are very well done. They really served well, in the early days of the show, in displaying Bart and Lisa’s vibrant yet juvenile imaginations. Like most children, both Bart and Lisa daydream about ridiculous scenarios that are couched in reality, like the ones mentioned above.

Bart takes the beating that afternoon, and Nelson pledges to beat him up every day at the same time. Bart turns to his parents for help. Marge tells him to reason with the bully and try to be understanding. Homer begins his long run of hilariously shitty fathering by imploring Bart not to tell the principal (“What? And violate the code of the schoolyard? I’d rather Bart die!”) and trying to train him in the art of fighting dirty. Needless to say, Homer’s advice fails, and the beatings continue.

Bart then visits Grampa Simpson to ask what he thinks. Grampa, in turn, introduces Bart to one-armed Herman, owner of the military surplus store in Springfield. Herman, who coincidentally never really had another starring role on a Simpsons episode, save for the episode when Marge became a police officer, provides some real gems here. He immediately begins planning how Bart can defeat Nelson in combat, complete with military training for the neighborhood kids and detailed tactical strategies.

The plan is simple; Bart and his army will essentially corner Nelson and bombard him with water balloons. It works to perfection. Nelson is defeated and humbled by the neighborhood kids. Herman develops an armistice treaty to prevent Nelson from killing Bart in the future (“Though Nelson has no official power, he shall remain a figurehead of menace in the neighborhood”), and the episode ends with Nelson, Herman and the Simpsons family eating cupcakes together, with Nelson and Bart apparently friendly.

I really enjoyed the military strategy of the episode and the juxtaposition of complex maneuvering being carried out by ten year old kids. The models that Herman creates of downtown Springfield are fantastic, and Grampa has a great soliloquy about how he feels alive again watching the young children participate in neighborhood warfare.

The episode has a lot of great lines; too many for me to list in this review. There weren’t a lot of belly laughs, but Homer, Grampa and Herman all had some strong moments. “Bart the General” also builds well on “Bart the Genius” and continued to show us that Bart is not simply the wise-ass wild child that he was thought to be. All in all, a strong episode.

B+

“The key to Springfield has always been Elm St. The Greeks knew it. The Carthaginians knew it. Now you know it.” – Herman, to Bart

John Lacey