In this week’s episode of The Simpsons, Bart manages to punk Denis Leary, experience life as a bachelor, and win Lisa her free dream trip to Machu Picchu. All of these things will somehow come together (or else, goldurnit!) in “Lost Verizon”.

Kredit Kookies: Chalkboard Gag: Teacher’s diet is working. Couch Gag: The family masses in front of a Mount Rushmore-esque representation of themselves. Bart: “Aye Carrumba!”

We open on the interstate. Principal Skinner and his mother happily truck along until they run out of gas. Agnes predictably sends Skinny Boy out onto the open road to get gas across the lane while she waits in the car, reading her bingo strategy guide (it’s all luck!). Seymour does manage to dodge his way across the highway, only to discover he’s left his gas can back on the hood. Dodging and ducking his way back across, he’s nearly run over by the Simpmobile (Homer: “This counts as a parent-teacher conference!”).

Witnessing all of this from an overpass is Milhouse, who calls everyone he can with his cell phone and urges them to come downtown to watch Skinner avoid his death.

Meanwhile, a sober and thus delusional Barney Gumball – dressed in prison jumpsuits and obviously on some sort of community-service related road detail mission - picks up trash and tries to suck a little beer out of an empty. No luck – and the lack of alcohol makes him more desperate. He takes a look at Skinner and decides he’s a shiny, shiny beer can, and thus begins to chase him threateningly with his picker.

Up on the overpass, Missus Krabapple’s fourth graders laugh their fannies off at Skinner’s dilemma. Nelson wonders where Bart is, and Milhouse explains that Bart doesn’t have a cell phone.

Cut to Bart and Lisa in the backyard of the Casa de Simpson, having a tea party. Bart is humiliated at having been manipulated into playing with his sister, but Lisa reminds him of his addiction to imaginary tea. Nelson stumbles upon this scene and, of course, takes Bart to task for playing tea with his sister AND lacking a cell phone. Bart, naturally, is bummed by this turn of events.

Later in the day, Bart begs Marge for a cell phone, but she tells him they can’t afford the cost (explained here to be a hundred bucks) – they’re so poor they buy frozen peas on an installment plan. In fact, she’s just gotten a collection notice from the Jolly Green Giant. Lisa advises Bart to get over it; she’s always wanted to go to Machu Picchu, herself – “In this family you get used to disappointments.” Maggie quickly scrawls a sign and holds it up: “Me Sad 2.”

Later that afternoon, Bart’s moping his way down the sidewalk when he’s whacked in the head with a golfball. He jumps a fence onto the Springfield Country Club’s golf course, where he confronts Doctor Hibbert with the ball (Hibbert’s playing golf with a suddenly-alive Dr. Nick. Make of that what you will). For returning it, he gets a dollar, and it dawns on Bart that if he collects the right amount of balls he’ll be able to buy his own phone. Unfortunately, he can’t figure out how many one dollar bills there are in a hundred dollars, allowing Doc Hibbert some snark - his kids go to PRIVATE school.

Semi-obligatory lyrical interlude time! A montage follows Bart as he collects tons of golfballs in a large bucket. Just as he’s ready to turn in his haul, Groundskeeper Willie intercepts him. Turns out he’s “Greenskeeper Willie” in the summer, and Bart’s been poaching on his territory. He snags the balls and leaves a broken-hearted Bart to pout by the water hazard. 

Further up the course - in fact, right behind Bart - actor/comic Denis Leary is playing in a charity golf tournament with Krusty the Klown and many other Springfield luminaries. Krusty delights in heckling Leary, who loses his temper on a bad stroke and tosses his cell phone down the hill…and right into Bart's grip.  He’s delighted. “Wow, you can even watch commercials on this thing!”

Soon after, Bart’s standing outside Milhouse’s place, bragging to him over the phone about his new aquisition. The boys soon busy themselves assigning each other ringtones.

Bart’s phone begins ringing – it’s Brian Grazer, who’s secured the rights to make that childhood classic “Everybody Poops” into a movie. Denis Leary’s just right for the role of the constipated ape! Bart, acting in Leary’s stead, agrees to do the part for scale. After hanging up with Grazer, Bart pipes excitedly to Milhouse that this is Denis Leary’s phone. Milhouse suggests that they order a bunch of New York Yankees jerseys and Derek Jeter hats on Leary’s dole, then worries that they’ll be caught. Bart replies that he’s sure Mister Leary won’t mind.

Title card: one week later, in Tunisia! That’d be where Denis Leary is acting out the part of the ape king in Everybody Poops. Grazer calls cut and informs Leary he’s doing an excellent job – Leary doesn’t even remember taking the role.  Grazer’s solution is to pile on more ape poop…

Cut to Bart making several international crank calls, the final one being to a bar in Sweden straight out of Ingmar Bergman’s fantasies. While he and Milhouse are in mid-cackle, the phone rings – and it’s Denis Leary! He chews them out, but Bart’s not terribly impressed. 

It takes his mother’s sudden entrance to put a little fear in him. Where did he get that phone? “The same way you got me,” Bart snides, “by accident on a golf course.” Milhouse snitches on Bart in trade for a bit of cheap adult approval.

It rings again, and Marge answers. Leary’s still ticked, and she’s completely apologetic. She offers to send the phone back, but he tells her to keep it. To get proper revenge on Bart for his shenanigans, Leary also tells Marge that the phone has a tracking device that, once activated, will allow her to watch Bart’s every move from the safety of her own home. That bit of business ended, Leary’s left alone to catch his Pop "Tahts" before they hit the ground.

The following day – GPS tracker on – Marge sends Bart out into the world with his new cell phone. She and Homer sit cackling before their laptop computer, tracking Bart’s every move.  Marge tracks his every movement, eventually following him to a construction site.  Marge Highly Dissaproves of this, and she rushes to stop him from having too much fun with Milhouse and a forklift – her sudden appearance results in him smacking Milhouse into an I-Beam and rendering him unconsious. Marge demands he come home, and Bart agrees to do so after he drops off Milhouse.

Yes, it’s time for another Semi-Obligatory Lyrical Interlude! Marge chases Bart about town, interrupting his every effort at wiseacery and tomfoolery. (For the record, she stops him from watching an R-Rated movie, from gambling at a horse race and from hurting himself while performing a skateboarding stunt in front of his friends).

Some days later, Homer and Marge spy on Bart from a computer in the laundry room. Homer can’t understand why Bart’s spinning around in circles – over his shoulder and out in the yard, Bart’s spinning in circles on his tire swing. Lisa interrupts them, somewhat amazed by the fact that they’re sitting in the laundry room together. Homer feigns doing a load of wash while Marge tries to hide the evidence of the GPS system from Lisa; she’s way too smart for that, and is horrified that her mother is basically spying on her brother. Marge defends herself by saying that she’s only trying to keep him safe, and if a little spying keeps him alive then so be it (cut to Moe listening in on Marge with a wiretapping device, drooling over her every word; cut to the FBI monitoring Moe, his every word a nail in the coffin of his freedom. Wow, I wish they’d build up on that little cut-away joke into an episode…).

That night, Lisa is unable to keep the truth from Bart – even if she has to call him to get his attention. She tells him their parents have been tracking his every move via computer. Bart’s saddened by Marge’s betrayal – but thrilled by the fact that he can order off-market Viagra to put in Skinner’s coffee (?!).

The following day in the playground of Springfield Elementary, a stiff-looking (literally) Skinner wonders what’s up with his coffee, and Bart’s a little blue as he picks through his lunch. A bird lands beside him and he suddenly gets a very bright idea – he takes out the tracking chip and straps it to the bird’s leg and urges it to fly away.

Back at the Casa de Simpson, Marge is alarmed as “Bart” seems to be running about madly. She, Homer, Lisa and Maggie take off in the Simpmobile to chase him down.

Meanwhile, Bart arrives home and immediately starts reveling in his newfound freedom. By the evening he’s grilling Twizzler sandwiches for Milhouse and Nelson. It’s a happy little party, until Nelson announces that he needs to be home by sunset – that’s when his mother wakes up. Milhouse also has to head home – before he does, remarking on the weather. “real boogyman weather”.  *Gulp* goes Bart.

The rest of the Simpsons have been driving around town all day in persuit of Bart. Marge finally “tracks” Bart to an abandoned field. Marge and Homer go out to investigate – Homer promising all the while not to strangle him while practicing a strangling motion. The bird Bart’s tagged lands upon the hood (to Maggie’s adorable delight), and an intrigued Lisa realizes Bart’s attached the chip to it – she looks up the bird’s origin and discovers it’s a Scarlet Tanager, probably on a migratory path…to Machu Picchu! Lisa shoos away the birds and cries out that Bart’s headed to the Peruvian city.

As Bart struggles with a life made half of joy and half of abject terror (nighttime is VERY scary but daytime is AWESOME), the rest of the Simpsons backpack up into the Andes Mountains on llamaback, tracking "Bart".

Everyone’s exhausted, but Marge won’t stop ‘til she finds her son. She does, however, sit down for a short rest on the throne of the Incan trickster God Konira Wirakocha… she soon dreams of the Wirakocha. He whisks her back in time, turns her into a constellation, and shows her his society. It was ruined by overprotective parenting, which never allowed further generations to learn how to deal with their own problems.

When she awakens, Homer and Lisa come up with the tanager upon the laptop – Homer is, understandably, confused. Marge says it’s time to go home.

When the rest of the clan finally arrive back at the Casa De Simpson, they find Bart curled casually on the sofa with a can of Buzz. Marge apologizes. He claims not to notice they’ve been gone. Marge shrugs, announcing that it’s been a long trip and it’s time for her to take a bath. She looks down – Bart’s hugging her leg. “Please don’t leave again,” he whimpers. She pets his head, promises not to, and waddles away, Bart still wrapped around her leg.

Lisa turns to Homer. Where’s Maggie, she asks. Cut to Maggie, still in Machu Picchu, being worshipped as an Incan goddess. Fearing the pacifier, we conclude this weeks’ installment with a tribute to the late actor Paul Newman.

Red Dress Press: An intriguing installment, Lost Verizon boasts a very pure characterization of Bart from start to finish. This is, in fact, him at his brattiest, but also it showcases his tender side. His night terrors have, in fact, been well-established and are a canonical point of interest.

Lisa is perfect here, as well – she’s quite firmly an eight-year-old in deeds and action, caring for her brother but not above twisting around the situation so that she ends up on her dream trip to Machu Picchu. It’s nice when she’s not portrayed as being overtly adult, or too PC.

Marge was also perfectly in-character – the typical overparenter to Homer’s vehement underparenter. As she realizes how she’s messed up her attempt at protecting Bart, she’s quick to apologize – all-in-all, typical self-effacing Marge.

Denis Leary turned in an excellent, properly self-effacing, guest-star turn. His VA work proved sharply rendered.

Stand-out gags include Moe’s continued fascination with Marge, and the bits on Incan culture. Perhaps the best of all is the Bergman joke in the phone call segment.

A few flaws, of course, exist. The torture Skinner goes through on the highway is, perhaps, a tad extreme. And can we chalk up Doctor Nick’s re-appearance to an animation flaw, a joke, or a misplaced appearance due to episode ordering?  Probably the most curious facet of the story relates to its place within the seasonal timeline of the show.  Bart's conversation with Willie and the fact that he manages to avoid school for a few days without being criticised hints that the episode takes place in the summer; however, Bart's also seen in the yard at Springfield Elementary.  Rather dissorientating.

Collectively, a fun little episode, not the best of the series’ run, but a solid one in general – a “whacky era” episode run through a season eight filter. And hey, it ended with a joke!

Did it Fail at Masonry?: Worth taping and watching through, but keepability depends on how much you like Bart and your tolerance for Mister Leary.

What The Screwballs Think: The episode garnered a 7.4, A full 1. Lower than Family Guy, which once again won the night for the network.
Springfield Shopper: The next all-new episode of the Simpsons, “Double, Double, Boy In Trouble”, will air on October nineteenth. Be sure to check back here on the twentieth for a full recap!