Review: The Simpsons “Barthood”

Spoilers Below

At six years old, Bart is a terror. Or maybe he’s just acting out because his sister Lisa far surpasses him in the smarts column and thus gains a lot of attention from her parents? We know all about Bart at age 10, but what about at age 12? Welp, same song different story, and Milhouse is still a tool. At 15, Bart’s still riding his bike while Lisa is off to camp for SUPER smart people, leaving Bart at home with Homer…a very high Homer. Yep, Bart’s parties are rather interesting, but the two guys are just never on the same page so they decide to start over…not. From the looks of it, Bart’s bike is a bit of a career move for him, but still Lisa’s gotta hog the show.

A few years later, the kids graduate high school and Bart’s now running a bike store while Lisa and Nelson are a couple. Also, Bart and Homer seemed to have patched things up in their relationship.

Our Take

This week’s episode suffers from a short run-time in my opinion as each of the different ages were just way too short to truly appreciate Bart’s growing up. I think if this week’s episode was allowed to go an hour let’s say, we could’ve had more time invested in Bart’s life and grow really concerned about his issues with Homer and Lisa, but really Bart ends up ok in the end which is a resolution that comes so fast, you don’t appreciate the journey as much.

Still though, the premise is fascinating, but by far this isn’t my favorite movie or TV show adaptation as done by The Simpsons, but I liked that we tried something a little different than the usual norm of Simpsons episodes. I mean, we probably didn’t need another plot about about Homer screwing up with Marge or Lisa doing her best Nancy Drew impression did we? Let’s give the producers the kudos for thinking outside the box and putting together an episode that people will remember longer, even if they don’t recall much in terms of laughing.