YMMV / The Simpsons S 21 E 15 Stealing First Base

• Hilarious in Hindsight: Chalmers saying to Michelle Obama that Skinner is Springfield's "Joe Biden" was, and still is, a classic "Chalmers picking on Skinner" joke. In November 2020, Joe Biden became President of the United States.
• Padding:
  • The episode starts with a 30-second bit of Homer driving Bart to school using a GPS and getting stuck in a construction zone. It adds nothing to the plot (we don't really need to see how Bart gets to school) and isn't brought up again.
  • The Itchy and Scratchy segment in this episode takes 80 seconds and has no impact on the plot.
  • The movie kiss montage near the end of the episode is 40 seconds long.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • The idea of Bart's class merging into another one is rife with potential. The opening scene even sets up some potential plots, like Sherri and Terri dealing with a different set of twins (one girl and one boy) and Milhouse sitting next to a student who actually thinks he's cool. Nelson and the blind student do appear later, but ultimately aren't important to the plot. Exploring how various well-established characters work next to their new deskmates is an interesting idea, but we don't even see the combined classroom past Bart's introduction to Nikki.
  • Similarly, Grampa is the one to encourage Bart to kiss Nikki, and Chalmers is displeased at needing to hold an assembly shaming Bart for it, saying that the act would be considered acceptable years ago. An argument of whether society is becoming too restrictive, or whether schools misunderstand simple, harmless interactions between students, could be a good point to bring up. However, this is as far as it's elaborated on.