Make Room for Lisa

Plot

Homer participates in a KBBL-sponsored drinking contest at P.J. O'Harrigan's, an Irish pub, and wins the trophy and title of "Sir Drinks-A-Lot". Once sober, Marge reminds Homer of his promise to spend one Saturday a month with the children. Much to Homer's chagrin, Bart traded his turn to choose with Lisa for her dessert, and Lisa suggests that the family go to the traveling Smithsonian Institution exhibit. Homer attempts to punish Bart for giving his turn to Lisa by forbidding him to have any dessert, but this backfires when Bart makes another deal to give his turn to Lisa in exchange for her dessert again, much to Homer's discomfort. They arrive at the exhibit, which is sponsored by a cell phone company called OmniTouch, has Abraham Lincoln's hat, Fonzie's jacket, Archie Bunker's chair, and the Bill of Rights, which is ruined when Homer reads it with chocolate-covered hands. In an attempt to lick it clean he licks off the section that forbids cruel and unusual punishment. Homer is unable to pay the $10,000 repair bill and so Omnitouch installs a cellular transmitter on the roof of his house, with the control equipment in Lisa's room. Lisa moves in with Bart, but she is overwhelmed when Bart has made up rules and noises distract her from her homework.

When Lisa develops stomach aches, she visits Dr. Hibbert, who suggests he could prescribe 'harsh Antacids' but says herbal tea could also work. Lisa wants the tea but Homer, scoffs at the tea and demands the antacids. While leaving the office Lisa has had enough and snaps at her father for belittling everything she believes in. When Lisa sees how she upset him, she says that they are just too different and will eventually drift apart. To make things up to her, Homer takes her to a local New Age store which introduces Homer and Lisa to water-filled sensory deprivation tanks, where they experience their own spiritual journey. On her journey, Lisa sees herself from Homer's perspective, reprimanding him for snoring during a ballet recital. Lisa realizes that despite his boorish personality, Homer loves Lisa enough to take her to events and places that he does not personally like just so she can be happy. Meanwhile, a pair of repo men start to clean out the store despite the lease not being up for months, taking the tank that Homer is in. Homer's "journey" becomes a real one, as his tank falls out of the back of the van. Mistaken by the Flanders' as a coffin, they bury him, only for the tank to fall through the soil and into a pipe where it is washed up onto the beach. Chief Wiggum finds it and returns it to the store. Lisa decides to go and do something they both enjoy. But they end up at a demolition derby together, even though Homer is the only fan.

Meanwhile, Maggie's baby monitor receives transmissions from the cellular tower. Rather than report this to Omnitouch, Marge becomes obsessed with eavesdropping on private calls. Eventually Bart and Milhouse play a prank on Marge by making her think that an escaped convict was attempting to break into the house. When Milhouse opens the front door and tries to tell Marge that it was just a prank, Marge smashes the baby monitor on Milhouse's head and knocks him out. But when Marge scolds Bart for the prank, he rebukes that it was a fair punishment for eavesdropping, to which Marge reluctantly agrees.

Production

"Make Room for Lisa" was written by Brian Scully and was the first full episode Matthew Nastuk directed for The Simpsons. Nastuk had previously received a credit for "D'oh-in In the Wind", which he directed one scene for. "Make Room for Lisa" was also the second episode about Homer and Lisa that Scully wrote for the series, the first one being "Lost Our Lisa" from the previous season. "Make Room for Lisa" was first broadcast on the Fox network in the United States on February 28, 1999. When writing the episode, the Simpsons writing staff debated what to do with Lisa after her room had been rebuilt. Brian Scully eventually pitched that Lisa and Bart would have to share a room together, as it would, according to staff writer Matt Selman, comment on the feeling of having to share a room with a sibling, and how it would "incredibly suck." The writers then wrote the episode around that plot point.

Near the beginning of the episode, Homer takes part in, and wins, KBBL's drinking contest. In the next scene, Homer is seen fallen out of his car, and waken up by Marge. The scene was inspired by Scully's brother Mike Scully, who, during a date, saw his date's father "drunk and passed out" on her lawn, in the same pose as Homer in the scene. The episode's subplot revolves around Marge, who listens to phone calls by picking up their frequencies with a baby monitor. The storyline was based on former Simpsons showrunners Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein, who also used to pick up listen to other people's phone calls through airwave signals. At one point in the episode, Marge overhears a conversation between Moe Szyslak and Lenny Leonard. Originally, the conversation would be between two women, but the writers thought it would be "too cliche" to show women gossiping, and changed it to Moe and Lenny instead. While inside the isolation tank, Homer gets bored and starts singing "Witch Doctor" by Armenian-American singer David Seville. According to Mike Scully, the Simpsons staff had to pay the song's record company $100 000 for the rights to use the tune in the episode. The episode features a "prototype" of what would become the recurring character Lindsey Naegle, who is voiced by American actress Tress MacNeille.

Reception

In its original American broadcast on February 28, 1999, "Make Room for Lisa" received a 7.6 rating, according to Nielsen Media Research, translating to approximately 7.6 million viewers. The episode finished in 52nd place in the ratings for the week of February 22–28, 1999, tied with a new episode of the CBS documentary and news program 48 Hours. On August 7, 2007, the episode was released as part of The Simpsons - The Complete Tenth Season DVD box set. Mike Scully, George Meyer, Ian Maxtone-Graham, Ron Hauge, Matt Selman and Mike B. Anderson participated in the DVD's audio commentary of the episode.

Following its home video release, "Make Room for Lisa" received mixed reviews from critics. Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood of I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide described the episode as having "two distinct halves, although the second far outweighs the first." They added that Homer's adventure in the sensory deprivation tank was "inspired," in its "almost Keystone Kop humour as he gets from point A to point B and so on, finally getting back to point A none the wiser." They concluded their review by calling the episode "classic." Colin Jacobson of DVD Movie Guide gave the episode a mixed review, and described its main plot as "feeling a bit stale." He felt that there were already several episodes dedicated to Homer and Lisa's problematic relationship, and that "Make Room for Lisa" "doesn't do much to expand that theme." However, he described the episode's subplot as "interesting," and wrote "Marge's fascination with intercepted cell phone calls amuses." He concluded his review by describing the episode as "pretty average." DVD Town's James Plath gave the episode a mixed review as well, calling it "okay." Digital Entertainment News' Jake MacNeill described it as a "retread" of earlier episodes, and considered it to be one of the season's worst episodes.