Simpsons Did It!: “Bart’s Friend Falls In Love”

Milhouse is Bart’s dorky friend, someone who comes across as a loser.

What happens when Milhouse actually scores something ahead of Bart, though?

Yes, Milhouse gets a girlfriend in the form of new girl in school Samantha Stanky.  Samantha is voiced by actress Kimmy Robertson, who was on Twin Peaks.  That’s about all I can see worth mentioning, but she got tagged as a guest star, so whatever.

Following Bart’s liberation of Homer’s change jar to the strains of some very familiar music, the sort you might need to raid a lost ark, Milhouse shows off his new Magic 8-Ball, which promptly predicts Bart will fail a test (he does), Milhouse will get beat up (Nelson takes care of that), and the two boys will not be friends by the end of the day.

That would be where Samantha comes in.  Also where some truly disturbing Principal Skinner moments come in as he discusses his time as a Vietnam vet.

Milhouse and Samantha’s idea of doing whatever it is couples do seems to be limited to kissing in Bart’s treehouse, an action Marge finds cute so long as they keep their tongues to themselves.  Bart isn’t into girls yet, so he finds the whole situation troubling, especially as he discovers this after checking out the cover from Lisa’s Doomed Romance comic.

Bart wants his friend back and Samantha gone.  He’s not particular about what order.  So he tells Samantha’s dad, who promptly puts his daughter into an all-girls school run by friendly French Canadian nuns.  Guilt, and the knowledge that man may one day evolve a fifth finger, leads Bart to confess what happens, and the 8-Ball meets its end to keep Milhouse from murdering Bart.  Better the 8-Ball than other things, considering Bart makes grabs for a brick, a pair of scissors, and a broken bottle first.  What sort of stuff does Milhouse keep in his room anyway?

In a B-plot, Lisa convinces Homer to try subliminal weight loss tapes.  The company sends a vocabulary builder instead.  That one works.  Homer gains weight.  Homer tosses the tape.  Homer forgets words he knew even before the tape.  Such is life.

Does Homer with a bigger vocabulary seem smarter to anyone else?

The episode ends with a nice shot of Homer teaching words he doesn’t know, Milhouse and Bart friends again, and Martin having no one to play the lute for.  That’s as it should be.

Until, you know, Bart falls in love.  Then he’ll get it.