The Old Man and the Lisa

"The Old Man and the Lisa" is the twenty-first episode of the eighth season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. It first aired on the Fox network in the United States on April 20, 1997. In the episode, Mr. Burns goes bankrupt and asks Lisa to help him get rich again. She agrees on the condition that he change his evil ways. They earn money by recycling cans and soon Burns has enough money to start his own recycling plant. Lisa is aghast when she learns the plant makes a slurry from liquefied sea creatures. When Burns sells the plant to a company that makes fish sticks, he offers Lisa 10 percent of his profits, but she declines for ethical reasons.

The episode was directed by Mark Kirkland and written by John Swartzwelder. The writing staff had thought about an episode in which Mr. Burns would lose his money and would have to interact with the outside world. In DVD commentary, the writers explained that while Mr. Burns tried to change, he "couldn't help being himself". Professional wrestler Bret Hart made a cameo as himself, animated in his pink wrestling outfit. "The Old Man and the Lisa" contains cultural references to the television series That Girl and the film Invasion of the Body Snatchers. It was positively received by critics and won the Environmental Media Award for "TV Episodic Comedy".

Plot
While Mr. Burns gives a talk to Springfield Elementary School's Junior Achievers Club, Lisa points out to him that his net worth is only half what he claims. When pressed, Smithers reluctantly tells Burns he has considerably less money even than that. As his sycophantic advisers tell him only what he wants to hear, Burns does not realize his century-old investments are no longer valid and he is oblivious to the 1929 stock market crash.

Faced with a dire financial situation, Burns makes a series of bad investments in attempt to solve the situation, but ends up bankrupt. The bank subsequently puts Lenny in charge of the Nuclear Power Plant and forecloses on Burns' Manor. Burns moves in with Smithers and attempts to help out by going grocery shopping, but confused at the ordeal the store's grocers believe him to be incapacitated and commit him to the Springfield Retirement Castle.

Meanwhile, Lisa begins collecting recyclables as part of the Junior Achievers Club, but after Principal Skinner ends their recycling program, Lisa decides to continue regardless. When Lisa asks the residents of the retirement home for recyclables she encounters Burns, who pleads with her to help him rebuild his empire. Lisa eventually agrees to help him earn money by recycling after he promises to change his evil ways.

Burns begins returning recyclables for money, promising Lisa a ten percent share of his profits. Eventually he earns enough to build the Li'l Lisa Recycling Plant, made entirely of recycled materials. Lisa is impressed by his new plant until he shows her the 'Burns Omni-Net &mdash; millions of six-pack holders fastened together to catch fish and sea creatures to make Li'l Lisa's Patented Animal Slurry. Horrified, Lisa realizes Burns has not changed and starts imploring the townspeople to now stop recycling as it is helping Burns, but the citizens appear brainwashed and carry on.

Burns is able to buy back the Power Plant after selling the recycling plant for $120 Million and offers Lisa a check for her ten percent cut. The family are in awe at the amount she has been offered, but Lisa is conflicted over whether to accept it from him. She ultimately rips up the check, which causes Homer to have four simultaneous heart attacks. Recovering in hospital, Homer tells Lisa he understands her rejecting what he thinks was $12,000; when Lisa tells him how much ten percent of $120 Million is, he is upgraded to a Code Blue situation.

Production
The episode was based on a story idea pitched by David X. Cohen, although it was written by John Swartzwelder, who had written many of the Simpsons episodes that have environmental themes. This habit led to him being called the "conscience of the staff" despite being a "self declared anti-environmentalist." It was because of this that he was given such episodes, because the staff felt that he would give them just the right amount of sarcasm. In the original script for the episode, he described the recycling center as "a couple of hippies surrounded by garbage". Two alternate original titles for the episode were Cohen's "Lisa and Burns" and Swartzwelder's "Burns Goes Broke".

The writers had wanted an episode where Burns becomes bankrupt and shows what Burns would be like as a person in the real world. The idea with the recycling plant was that Burns did not have any sort of evil plan and he just could not help being himself. Burns really was trying to change and this was reflected in the end when he tried to give Lisa her share of the profits, with Lisa refusing. Burns was drawn without his trademark scowl for this episode. The staff joked about this being a suitable series finale, due to the episode ending with Homer suffering from another heart attack after learning what 10% of Burns' $120,000,000 check really is.

Professional wrestler Bret Hart guest starred in the episode as himself, and he was very insistent that he be shown wearing his pink wrestling outfit. He explained that "It's so cool to be part of a show that makes people laugh really, really hard." In a 2009 interview with The A.V. Club's Dave Hofer, Hart explained that the reason why his animated counterpart sounds nothing like him was that initially, he was brought in to voice a generic wrestler. When Mark Kirkland realised how famous Hart actually was, he told Hart that if the artwork had not been started yet, he would be drawn in as himself.

Cultural references
Mr. Burns's walk through the supermarket was based on a false rumor that George H. W. Bush visited a store and was confused by the scanner and, in the original draft for the episode, Burns met Bush while shopping there. When bidding farewell to the hippie, Mr. Burns says "Shine On You Crazy Diamond", a reference to the Pink Floyd song of the same name. The hippie responds by saying that Burns needs to stop living in the past. The voice of the hippie is based on the character played by Dennis Hopper in Apocalypse Now. "Achy Breaky Heart", a song by Billy Ray Cyrus, is played at the old folks' home. The scene where Mr. Burns chases Lisa through the town is a spoof of the opening to the television series That Girl. The scene where Lisa runs through the streets proclaiming recycling as evil, spoofs the finales of Soylent Green and the original version of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Reception
In its original broadcast, "The Old Man and the Lisa" finished 38th in ratings for the week of April 14–20, 1997, with a Nielsen rating of 8.3, equivalent to approximately 8.1 million viewing households. It was tied along with King of the Hill as the third highest-rated show on the Fox network that week, following The X-Files and Melrose Place.

"The Old Man and the Lisa" received the 1997 Environmental Media Award in the "TV Episodic Comedy" category.

Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, the authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, called it "An odd episode with a not-too-unexpected outcome. The best bits are undoubtedly Burns learning his way around a supermarket and Lisa's realisation of what Burns has been up to."