Girls Just Want to Have Sums/References

Episode	References	Gags	Appearances	Gallery	Quotes	Credits

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Girls Just Want to Have Sums

Regarding Margie ►

Censorship

• In the promos for this episode, the gag where Bart says he can walk around with Bart Jr. hanging out, then pulls out his frog, the frog's subtitled line "I thought he meant his penis" was removed. The subtitle wasn't removed on Global, but was cut on Channel 4 in the UK.

Cultural References

• The title is a play on the song "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun", by Cyndi Lauper.
• The Broadway Version of The Lion King is completely parodied by the Itchy and Scratchy Musical, Stab-A-Lot. Its title is a parody of Spamalot. The song "It's Symbiotic" is a parody of the song "I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar.
• The book for the Itchy & Scratchy musical is said to have been written by acclaimed playwright Tom Stoppard.
• The song that Otto plays after he lets the girls off is "Breaking the Law" by Judas Priest.
• The song that Martin, "Best Flautist" plays and continues playing at the end credits is "Thick As a Brick" by Jethro Tull.
• The Waitresses' I Know What Boys Like is used in this episode.
• Seymour Skinner's remark that men are better than women at math and Science is a reference to Lawrence Summers, the president of Harvard University.
• The episode's basic storyline is similar to William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. The line "We've been Yentld!" is a reference to a film with a similar storyline.
• The music that plays in scenes featuring the boys' playground is very reminiscent of the score from Stanley Kubrick's film version of A Clockwork Orange. Both A Clockwork Orange and the episode feature somewhat apocalyptic, violent settings. Interestingly, Walter Carlos, who composed the music for that film, got a sex change operation and is now known as Wendy Carlos, and this episode deals with Lisa masking her gender.
• In the girls' section of the elementary school, paintings by Frida Kahlo and Georgia O'Keeffe hang on the walls, joined in humorous juxtaposition by a Cathy cartoon, implying an equivalent position in the female-artist pantheon for Cathy Guisewite.
• Julianna, the director of "Stab-A-Lot," is based on Julie Taymor, who won two Tony Awards for Direction and Costume Design of the original Broadway adaptation of "Disney's The Lion King."
• One Guy Named Moe parodies a Broadway comedy from the late 80s called Five Guys Named Moe.
• Homer asked Marge, if she wants to "Wang Chung tonight", before sleeping - it's a reference to Wang Chung's song Everybody Have Fun Tonight.
• The experience of Lisa, as stated in Simon Singh's book "The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets", is a reference to the life of Sophie Germain, a French female mathematicians in the 19th century, who used the pseudonym "Monsieur LeBlanc" to communicate with other male mathematicians.
• When Milhouse VanHouten calls Lisa (who is disguised as Jake Boyman) a talking toilet, that may be a possible reference to the book, Captain Underpants and the Attack of the Talking Toilets.
• Lisa disguising herself as Jake Boyman is very similar to Daniel Hillard disguising himself as Mrs. Doubtfire from Mrs. Doubtfire.

Goofs

• The left part of the school is restricted to boys, but in the girls part, there's a corridor that turns left. that would invade the boys part of the school.
• In the class scene, when Nelson finished to drawing a robot with guns for arms shooting a plane made out of guns that fires guns, the class room turned into the theater.
• When Assistant Groundskeeper Seymour catches Lisa eavesdropping on the boys math class, she is right in front of the classroom's window, but when she turns around, they are in the middle of the coutyard.
• When Bart said they didn't need to do any "girl classes", the theater behind him was full of students, but when the boys started dancing, the theater was empty.
• Lisa disguised herself and started going to the boys' school, however this would have resulted in her being marked absent for so long that the family would receive a visit from the state.
  • Also, there would be no record of Lisa's alter ego 'Jake Boyman' ever existing.