YMMV / The Simpsons S21 E2: "Bart Gets a Z"

• Alternate Aesop Interpretation: Writer Matt Selman joked on Twitter that the lesson of the episode was "NEVER EVER CONFESS TO ANYTHING. EVEN IF YOU'RE POSITIVE NOTHING BAD CAN HAPPEN – NEVER CONFESS" (which is also a pretty fair Aesop for Season 2's "The Way We Was"). Although Bart decides against righting his obvious wrong (spiking Edna's drink) by committing the same wrong against Zack, if you consider his actual mistake to be confessing to Edna, he does fix that with the same wrong: confessing a second time, to Skinner, which clears the path for Edna's rehiring.
  Bart: If someone did a really bad thing to one teacher, and then did the same bad thing to another teacher to get the first teacher her job back, would it be okay?
• Hilarious in Hindsight: The book "The Answer" was a stand-in in the episode for "The Secret". In 2016, "The Answer" become an actual self-help book◊ written by Allan and Barbara Pease.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Mrs. Krabbappel takes advice from The Answer, an obvious parody of The Secret and other self-help media that thrived in the late 2000s. Her replacement meanwhile is clearly a proto-hipster eager on technology to the point of having an iPhone. Also, everybody in Bart's class owns either phones with touchscreens or QWERTY keypads (including Nelson of all people).

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