6. Moaning Lisa

Episode Title: "Moaning Lisa"

Episode Number: 6

Original Air Date: February 11, 1990

Plot Synopsis: Lisa Simpson is deeply depressed. After getting in trouble at school for refusing to play dodge ball (which, in Lisa's defense, is complete bullshit), Homer and Marge decide to cheer her up but it doesn't work. She says that she's worried about the world's suffering. At night, she hears music coming from somewhere outside her window. She follows the music into town where she meets legendary jazz musician Bleeding Gums Murphy. She's having a good time, but Marge isn't really down with her hanging out with random jazz musicians in the middle of the night, so she gets taken back home. Marge's advice is to hide all of your sadness behind a smile, but even Marge soon sees that this is an awful suggestion and tells Lisa to "be herself." This new advice manages to cheer Lisa up. She's cheered up even more when, at a jazz club, Bleeding Gums Murphy plays one of the songs she wrote.

The episode's B-story involves Homer being super irritated that he can't beat Bart at video boxing, which he never ends up doing.

Overall Thoughts: As I've aged, I've really come to love episodes that focus primarily on Lisa. As a kid, I was the exact opposite. I *hated* Lisa episodes because they traditionally aren't as funny, but as an adult now realize that they contain some of the series' strongest emotional arcs by far. It's great to see a Lisa-centric episode so early in the series, even if it isn't one of the best. It's a nice change from the bizarre suicide episode and a few of the other jokey episodes that have been seen thus far.

What Works: All of my favorite attributes of Lisa are starting to appear. She's clearly wise beyond her years, which makes her a different kind of outcast from someone like Martin Prince, who is just smart. I also really ike the juxtaposition between a lovely and serious A-story about depression and a, well... the opposite of "serious" B-story about video game boxing. 

The relationship between the family members are also starting to become clearer. I feel like I'm watching the writers figure out the show in real-time.

What Doesn't Work: "I'm sad because there is suffering in the world" seems like a weak excuse to tell a Lisa story. The story works better on paper (I assume) than it does in execution. Certain dramatic moments don't land, like much of the first act where Lisa is just being depressed in various locations. 

She was depressed about world suffering, and then isn't depressed when she hears good jazz music, which in no way solves her original problem of "world suffering." Even if you make the argument that the song she sings with Bleeding Gums Murphy is her confession to really being depressed about the state of her family, she still accomplishes nothing that should make her less sad at the end of the story.

Though maybe I just don't understand jazz. Who knows.

Closing Thoughts: Marge's flashback to childhood is GREAT. We see her mother telling her to always put on a smile, as that's how other people can tell how "good" of a mother you have. It goes a long way towards explaining the way that Marge acts, and her "Always be happy. ALWAYS" attitude. While the episode isn't as strong as some of the series' later outings to the same territory, it goes a long way to prove that cartoons can tackle the same emotional subjects that live action shows can.

Going over the Wikipedia page for this episode, I was surprised to see that it was initially rated sort of poorly (and remains to be) due to its "schmaltz." Like I said: it isn't the strongest Lisa episode by a long shot. But call me a sucker - I liked it.

Final Grade (out of 10): 7