In this week’s episode of the Simpsons, Bart Simpson IS Jack Nicholson in “The Debarted”!
 
Kredit Kookies: Chalk Board Gag: “The Art Teacher is Fat, Not Pregnant” Couch Gag: A Light Brite portrait of OFF on the couch is assembled.

We open on the Simpmobile, which is headed down Main Street. Bart, perhaps bored with the quiet of the road trip, accuses Lisa of smacking him with her book. Marge tells them to calm down – she’s nervous, as she’s driving Homer’s car. Glancing down, she lets out a frustrated groan as she realizes he’s been using it as a cab – there’s a fare meter in the chassis and a look in the glove compartment reveals a gun.

Bart demands Lisa stay on her side of the car – Lisa demands likewise from Bart. He tries to create a division between them only to get a faceful of Lisa’s soccer cleats. Marge swivels in her seat to stop the violence, only to plow her car into Hans Moleman’s.

Cut to Springfield Elementary. Bart enters his classroom only to discover someone’s in his chair. He’s introduced to Donnie, a transfer student. Missus K. instructs Bart not to worry, he’ll still have a seat – enter Willie with a chair made out of a toilet bowl, which is places between Donnie and Nelson. Bart is, quite naturally, filled with dread at this development, but he takes his seat.

Cut to recess, where Donnie demonstrates the principal of leverage by creating a trash catapult out of a picnic bench. Bart immediately realizes his popularity may be in jeopardy as Milhouse and Ralph express their admiration for the newcomer. He tries to copy Donnie’s antics, only to receive a mouthful of trash.

Cut to Homer at the repair shop. He learns it’s going to be awhile before his car’s drivable again, and is given a loner car to use in the meantime. This new car is such an improvement over the Simpmobile that he begins to laugh hysterically and directly calls the repairman a sucker for letting him take it.

Homer’s soon driving down the street, happily enjoying his cushy seats as he sings a celebratory tune to Yes’ “Owner of a Lonely Heart.” He sees Bart skating down the street and offers his son a ride; they get to talking and Bart admits he’s worried about Donnie. Homer perks Bart up with a quick pep talk, telling him that he needs to win the respect of his fellow students. Bart is freshly determined to make himself a presence in Springfield Elementary once again. To cheer his kid up even more, Homer initiates a “battle” between the air conditioning, rear window defroster and heating units in the new car, which causes a mini “perfect storm” in the car to the mutual delight of son and father.

Cut to Springfield Elementary, where Skinner and Willie are sparring on the basketball court. Bart sneaks into his locker and hides a set of large magnets, laughing wickedly to himself. The following day there’s a school assembly. As Skinner tries to clarify the now completely inexplicable new school lunch program, his legs begin to wildly move beneath him. We quickly see that Bart’s hiding under the stage, guiding Skinner around with the magnets he’d hidden earlier - combined with the metal in Seymour’s shoes, Bart now has complete control over his movements. He ends up diving head-first into a lost-and-found bin for retainers as the entire student body bursts into laughter.

Suddenly, Bart’s the most popular kid in school, and he emerges to revel in the applause and cheers of his peers. Skinner surfaces from the retainers and angrily demands to know who’s responsible, throwing away the school’s guideline for punishment and proffering forth the “Catholic School Punishment Guidelines” handbook. The audience, taken aback, sits silently. Before Bart can speak up, Donnie takes responsibility. Bart is surprised that his once-rival is suddenly protective of him, and Donnie tells Bart that he likes his style. Bart tells him to come find him after Skinner’s finished punishing him – Bart Simpson takes care of his friends.

Skinner angrily drags Donnie away, but once they’re behind closed doors, he congratulates the youngster on a job well done. It turns out Donnie’s a double-agent for Skinner; it’s his job to become part of Bart’s inner circle and shut it down. Many have tried and failed where Donnie has succeeded, and all three of them are determined not to make another mistake like “Doug the Hip Guidance Counselor”, who now counsels pigeons. Principal Chalmers joins in on the celebration – the plan is to put Bart in detention for a long, long time. Ten days. Gulp!

Cut to the afternoon, where Bart and Milhouse are hanging out with Donnie in Bart’s treehouse. Bart reveals his secret stash of illegally imported Blue (Not Red!) Vine liquorice (“I have a guy in Europe…”), and the three of them share a bit, putting Donnie in apparent ecstasy (“You can really taste the blue!”). They all have blue tongues (PLOT POINT) and show them off to each other. Bart gives him a little “hair of the dog” to take home and shows him his secret stash of excuses and gags. Milhouse starts a juice box fight and Lisa is soaked when she pops her head in and asks if she can join. The threesome are now happily bonded and laugh gleefully.

Inside the Casa De Simpson, Marge is cutting financial corners by squirting packets of ketchup into a larger jug. Homer invites her out for a joy ride in the loner car. They’re soon travelling through the Springfield night, enjoying the romantic ambiance the car provides – candles, champagne and the dulcet tones of Smoky Robinson and the Miracles. Homer puts the car on auto navigate, wraps his arms around Marge and begins to make out with her – the in-dash phone rings and Homer answers. It’s the garage – The Simpmobile is ready to be picked up. Homer mocks the repair man – he’s never bringing back the loner car, which is the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

Bart and Donnie, meanwhile, have planned another prank - swiping the keys to the faculty lounge and planting crickets in his coffee pot. Once they’ve successfully distracted Skinner and gotten the keys, however, the door they unlocked traps them in detention.

In a musical montage set to “I’m Shipping off To Boston” by the Dropkick Murphys, we watch every prank Bart and Donnie try to pull fall short thanks to Donnie’s ratting Bart out to Skinner. Post-montage, Bart is confused as to how Skinner knows of his every move.

When his back’s turned, Donnie quickly turns his head and splatters Skinner with a spitball – unrolling it, Seymour receives a message telling him to keep an eye on the band candy.

Cut to Bart and the bullies trying to tamper with said band candy – only to be met with a box filled with carrots. Bart definitely knows something’s wrong now, but remains clueless until Groundskeeper Willie pulls him aside to let him know that the leak is coming from within his clique.

Bart looks up, startled, to see a figure lurking in the shadows eavesdropping on his conversation with Willie; he chases him through the school but the snitch escapes out the back door.

Later that night, Milhouse, Bart, Donnie and Nelson ride their bikes to an abandoned field. Bart informs them that he knows one of them is a snitch – and he thinks it’s Milhouse, who’s thrown into a locker-like structure (Cletus is also in there, thinking it’s an outhouse sent from the future). Now that Milhouse is out of hearing range, he tells the rest of the gang that he’s planning one final, huge prank on Skinner – egging his house with ostrich eggs.

The following day, Lisa’s with Homer in the loaner car – Lisa is happily listening to Terry Gross on NPR, and the car is so advanced that it allows her to donate directly to the radio foundation. They happen to pass by the repair shop, where Homer’s old car is in the process of being sold. The takers are a group of redneck types who want to shoot it full of holes, a plot that horrifies Homer, who suddenly realizes that he loves his car as much as his kids. He pulls over, gives the repairman a piece of his mind, and drives off in his old car – leaving Lisa behind in the loaner. Yeah.

Meanwhile, as part of his detention, Bart’s helping Skinner decorate the school with a banner announcing that they’ve been “prank-free for fifteen days”. As Skinny Boy hangs the banner he sticks out his tongue – which is blue. Uh oh.

Later that night, Bart and the boys are biking to Skinner’s house with their supply of eggs. Bart announces he wants to stop off at the school, and this they do. They pull to the back of the school and a storage shed, which Willie allows them access to. Alone with his fellow bullies, Bart announces that he knows Donnie’s a rat.

Donnie tells Bart about his past as a tough orphan, who was recruited by Skinner and Chalmers due to his promisingly violent nature.

Nelson grabs Donnie and asks if they’re going to deliver the ultimate punishment –a “fizzing”, which would involve shoving diet Coke (a brand name!) and Mentos into his mouth. We now see that the room is filled with cases of Mentos and Diet Coke; Bart announces that he had planned to combine the two substances in Skinner’s office.

The door swings open – Chalmers (brandishing a video camera), Skinner and Willie all enter. Willie’s snitched on Bart to Skinner in exchange for a grade school diploma. Chalmers now has enough evidence to send Bart to the toughest JV detention center he can find. As Bart’s being led away, Donnie has a change of heart, shoving the crates of Mentos into the crates of cola and causing the room to fill with fizz.

Bart and Donnie escape through a window near the roof – on the outside they shake hands, declaring themselves even. Donnie makes his escape and announces that he hopes he sees Bart again someday.

Bart watches him leave, and we pan to a rat progressing across the top of a chain-link fence. Ralph pops up in a trash can. “The rat symbolizes obviousness,” he tells us wisely, and we fade to black.

Red Dress Press: This episode relies heavily on the Martin Scorsese epic “The Departed” so a warning right off the bat that if you haven’t seen that film you may not get many of the events that occur. It’s enjoyable, however, on another level, that of a classic Skinner/Bart battle. While this one doesn’t result in Bart learning (much against his will) anything, there’s still some great give-and-take that happens.

It's worthwhile to note that Diet Coke, instead of Buzz Cola, is used in this episode.

A word about Topher Grace’s guest voice work in this episode - it’s rather non-existent. Grace is a good actor in other projects, but his work here felt incredibly lackluster in my opinion. He didn’t modulate his tone at all and instead simply sounds like himself.

The b-plot was rather lame – Homer was jerkassy in the extreme (leaving Lisa in the car? Really?) and hard to root for.

Did It Fail At Masonry: Unless you’ve seen the movie this is based on, your grasp on the episode may be tenuous. Some good gags with Bart and Skinner. Not worth recording but worth it on repeats. If recording, fast forward the Homer subplot.

What the Screwballs Think: This episode gained a 6.6 in the ratings, on par with Love, Springfieldian Style.

Springfield Shopper: This is a Krusty Klassik Rekap of a recently-aired episode of The Simpsons. Keep an eye out for reviews of “Dial ‘N’ For Nerder”, “Smoke on the Daughter” and “He Loves to Fly and he D’Oh’s”, coming to this site tomorrow!