Original air date: 2/27/1992
Production code: 8F15
When the results of Bart's vocational survey suggest he'd make a great cop and Lisa learns her dreams of becoming a professional sax player are doomed by genetics (she has stubby fingers), their roles at Springfield Elementary are reversed: Bart becomes a hall monitor who cracks down on school misbehavior (after surviving a run-in with Snake during a police ride-along) while Lisa becomes a rebel who smokes with the bad kids, gets detention, and pulls off a teachers' edition textbook heist that could get her expelled.
This episode contains examples of:
- Adults Are Useless: After Lisa steals the entire faculty's answer books, the teachers prove completely incapable of managing their class or managing a basic lesson based on their own research. Bart's chalkboard punishments even specifically outlines it."I will not expose the ignorance of the faculty."
- Big Brother Instinct: When Bart finds out what Lisa did, he takes the blame, staying in school due to his work as hall monitor. When she asked why, Bart tells Lisa that test or no test, she's the one with the makings to be a success.
- Break the Cutie: Learning that the only thing she is worthy of is being a housewife and being rejected from becoming a professional saxophone player due to her stubby fingers broke Lisa down to the point of becoming a rebellious student. She is broken further when she realizes she went too far stealing the textbooks.Lisa: Dear log: This will be my last entry, for you were a journal of my hopes and dreams. And now, I have none.
- Brutal Honesty: When Lisa ask if she could be a professional, the store seller said: "Yeah, well, I'll be frank with you Lisa, and when I say 'frank,' I mean, you know, devastating."
- Conservation of Competence: Bart's grades go up...and Lisa's go down, prompting a frustrated Lampshade Hanging from Homer.Homer: We always have one good kid and one lousy kid. Why can't both our kids be good?
- Couch Gag: The family (sans Bart) sits on the couch. Bart comes in moments later and lies stretched out on everyone’s laps.
- Cultural Translation: When the question about "Old Hickory" was translated for Brazilian viewers, he's replaced with a figure from Brazilian history.note
- Digging Yourself Deeper: When Skinner punishes him for "stealing" the teachers' answer books, Bart does this:Skinner: Now Bart, because of your recent service to this school, I've decided to be lenient. 400 days detention.Bart: 400 days. I could do that standing on my head!Skinner: 500 days!Bart: Ooh, big man!Skinner: 600 days!*beat*
- Disproportionate Retribution: Bart gets 400 days detention over some answer books being stolen that he took the fall for (Skinner then increases it to 600). And that's Skinner being lenient thanks to Bart's previous work as a hall monitor, according to Bart stealing the books is grounds for expulsion. As his chalkboard writing outlines however, this was because the faculty is completely useless without said answer books, and stealing them once again publically humiliated the school by demonstrating their incompetence as an educator.
- The Dog Bites Back: Bart takes Milhouse away after he harasses Kearney in the cafeteria. Later, when Taking the Heat for Lisa for the stolen answer books, Bart gets taken away to detention by the newly-appointed monitor - Milhouse.
- Driving Stick: Acknowledged with the act 2 subtitle, "Death Drives a Stick".
- Epic Fail:
- Snake attempts to run over Bart, only for his car to get caught in the narrow pathway and catapult him out the windshield, injuring him horribly.
- Marge tries to console Lisa by telling her a story from her childhood about how she wanted to be an astronaut, but her sisters told her women can't be astronauts because they'd "distract the men." Little Marge insisted she would too become an astronaut and in the future people would live on the moon. Marge finishes her story by saying her sisters were wrong because there are women astronauts...and that she was wrong about the living on the moon part. Lisa is not amused, especially since Marge misses the point of her own story which would've been more uplifting if she had become an astronaut herself.
- The teachers have trouble teaching without the teachers' edition textbooks, to the point that one teacher doesn't even know the multiplication tables.
- Thanks to their dog teams tracking the scent of books, the Springfield Police conclude that the Springfield Library is where the stolen teachers' editions are being kept and use an armoured car to ram the door down.
- When Bart tells Homer and Marge about his results, Marge mentions how he considered joining the police, only for them to decline him for being too heavy. He then corrects her by saying, "No, the Army said I was too heavy; the police said I was too dumb."
- Everyone Has Standards: When Bart discovers that Lisa is the one who stole the teachers' answer keys:
- Failed a Spot Check: While at a red light outside the Kwik-E-Mart, Lou and Eddie fail to spot Snake holding Apu up at gunpoint next to them.
- Fun with Acronyms:
- The Career Aptitude Normalizing Test (CANT)
- Also, the cops reading Snake's license plate (EX CON): Eggplant Xerxes Criminy Overbite Narwhal.
- Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Lisa is an In-Universe example when she describes her plans to become a great jazz musician. While Lisa won't be appreciated by her fellow Americans, she will become hugely popular in France.
- Implausible Deniability: Ralph denies eating his paste whith a mouth full of paste.
- Inept Aptitude Test: According to the CANT, Bart is best suited to be a policeman, while Lisa will be a homemaker. The machine that analyzes the tests is seen malfunctioning when it gets to Bart's test. Although, while Lisa's results are questionable, Bart succeeds as an authority figure. Had Lisa not gone bad, who knows how far he could've gone.Milhouse: "Military Strongman"!
- Informed Flaw: Lisa's stubby fingers will supposedly prevent her from being a professional saxophone player, but she's never expressed any difficulty with her fingering before or since.
- Innocently Insensitive: Lisa bemoans loudly that becoming a housewife is a Fate Worse than Death, right in front of a hurt Marge.
- Jerkass Ball: Lisa suffers the dual whammy of having a vocation aptitude test result of 'housewife' and being told she'll never be a great saxophonist because her fingers are too stubby. She turns into a Bad Girl, smoking in class, backtalking her teacher, and finally coming up with a plot to steal all the Teacher's Edition textbooks to sow chaos. Inversely, the same episode has Bart becoming a good kid after getting the result of 'police officer' on the same vocational aptitude test. Which he has to forsake to bring his sister back and induce the Status Quo.
- Jerkass Has a Point: As much of a smartass she was being, Lisa is right that Ms. Hoover is a completely incompetent teacher who relies entirely on her teachers' edition textbook to instruct the students. Once it's stolen, Hoover pulls a Screw This, I'm Outta Here rather than trying to teach without it.
- Know When to Fold 'Em: After getting 600 days of detention handed to him for constantly snarking back to Skinner, Bart concedes "Maybe I'll just shut my big mouth".
- Laser-Guided Karma: Snake attempts to mow down Bart, though the narrow alleyway causes his car to crash and him to horribly injure himself instead.
- Latex Perfection: Bart imagines Mrs. Krabappel as an alien whose human face is a latex mask.Bart:
I Knew It!! - Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: While searching lockers for the stolen Teacher's Edition textbooks, Bart finds a locker containing... wads upon wads of hundred-dollar bills. He shuts the door and continues looking.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Lisa angrily steals the Teacher’s Edition textbooks, and when Bart tells her she’s facing expulsion for it, Lisa tearfully admits that she knows that and breaks down crying.
- Oh, Crap!: Lisa when she sees Skinner and Bart searching the lockers for the missing textbooks.
- Pet the Dog: While Eddie and Lou are often shown to be ineffectual or corrupt they are genuinely supportive of Bart's aspirations to become a police officer.
- Percussive Maintenance: When the machine that analyzes the tests stops working due to Bart's test causing a malfunction, an old man in a rocking chair starts poking it with a broomstick until it starts working again. He's apparently kept on staff for that exact reason.
- Recruiting the Criminal: Skinner does this when he realizes that Bart has developed a taste for authority after his adventure with the cops. Bart proves highly effective at stopping troublemakers because he is one himself.
- The Resenter: Mrs. Krabappel slips into this territory while in front of her class briefing them about the Career Aptitude Normalizing Test.Mrs. Krabappel: Some of you may discover a wonderful vocation you never even imagined. Others may find out that life isn't fair, [turning bitter] that in spite of your Masters from Bryn Mawr, you might end up a glorified babysitter to a bunch of dead-eyed fourth-graders while your husband runs naked on a beach with your marriage counselor! [stares from the students] Ahem.
- Role Swap Plot: After the test results, Bart becomes a responsible hall monitor while Lisa becomes a nihilistic slacker.Marge: Bart's grades are up a little this term. But Lisa's are way down!
Homer: Oh, we always have one good kid and one lousy kid. Why can't both our kids be good?
Marge: We have three kids, Homer.
Homer: Marge, the dog doesn't count as a kid. - Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: Lisa very nearly plays right into predictions that she'll never achieve her dreams by giving up on them utterly and coming close to getting expelled from school. It's Bart who intervenes, demonstrating that he believes she has what it takes to do whatever she wants in life and causing her to become her ambitious self again.
- Shout-Out: When Skinner asks Lisa what she's rebelling against, she says "Whadda you got?", the same response as Marlon Brando's character in The Wild One. She also has a toothpick in her mouth like Brando did.
- Special Guest: Steve Allen as Bart's altered voice.
- Taking the Heat: Bart willingly takes the blame for the textbook theft to save Lisa from punishment.
- Tears of Remorse: When Bart finds out Lisa stole the teacher’s textbooks, Lisa realises she went too far and breaks down crying.
- Tempting Fate: Lou and Eddie remark to Bart that being a cop isn't all car chases and gunfights with robbers...only for Snake to fly past them in his car, and Lou and Eddie promptly give chase with Bart along for the ride.
- Then Let Me Be Evil: In Lisa's case, it's more like grabbing a Jerkass Ball rather than being "evil", per se. After her discouraging test results and the equally discouraging words of the music instructor, Lisa no longer sees the need to be a good student or even a good person. She essentially gives up on both and starts acting like a rude, obnoxious delinquent.
- However, it's sort of downplayed in a sense that the Music Instructor and the Aptitude Test never specifically told Lisa to be a delinquent. However, their discouraging words did serve as a catalyst for her (temporarily) bad behavior.
- In Bart's case, he goes from a fun-seeking troublemaker to the bad version of a good guy. He starts out as an ordinary hall monitor, but then he cracks down on any sort of misbehavior to the point of becoming a Totalitarian Utilitarian who makes the other students "afraid to sneeze," as Principal Skinner (proudly) puts it. Milhouse said it best when Bart took him away for punishment:Sure, we have order, but at what price?!
- Unfortunate Name: Mr. Glascock, a supply teacher, who was forced to quit because of how people wouldn't stop mocking his name.
- Vocal Evolution: Dr. Pryor no longer speaks in the nasal voice he had in "Bart Gets an F", speaking closer to how he sounded in "Bart the Genius". Later appearances of the character would have him speak in a baritone voice more akin to that of Dr. Hibbert, also voiced by Harry Shearer.
- "Walk on the Wild Side" Episode: Lisa becomes a delinquent after getting "Homemaker" in an Inept Aptitude Test and being told that she'll never become a professional jazz musician due to her stubby fingers. This culminates with her committing an expulsion worthy offense (stealing all of the teachers' guides) to which Bart takes the fall, not wanting her to ruin her life.
- What You Are in the Dark: Bart was living the good life as hall monitor, and could have easily turned his sister in for stealing the Teacher's Edition textbooks. Instead, Bart takes responsibility for the crime, proving just how much he loves his sister.
- Would Hurt a Child:
- Snake has no problems with running over a ten-year-old boy, especially in front of the cops!Snake: See you in hell, punk!!
- Willie also makes it clear in the last things he says while being taken away that he'll get back at Bart for the arrest put on him.
- Bart's courtroom fantasy sees him on being threatened at knifepoint by the accused while on the stand, complete with an I'll Kill You! beforehand.
- Snake has no problems with running over a ten-year-old boy, especially in front of the cops!
- Yellow Sash of Power. As hall monitor, Bart rules with ruthless efficiency. The image at the top of this episode's page is a scene from this episode. By the end of the episode the torch has been passed to Milhouse.
