"I Will Not Waste Chalk"
And so it began- the first regular season episode of The Simpsons- Bart the Genius. Airing on January 14, 1990 it was actually the second produced episode. After the first episode fell flat, it was put on the shelf and this one put in its place. It started the show's original trend of showcasing Bart each week.
In this episode, Bart's class must take an IQ test. Bart blows it off, choosing to replace his paper with Martin Prince's test. After Bart gets caught defacing school property, Homer and Marge are summoned to the school where they are surprised to learn that Bart is extremely gifted. He is removed from his regular class and sent to a gifted school where he soon finds himself in over his head. After an unfortunate explosion caused by Bart's lack of chemistry knowledge, he confesses to the counselor. Soon all returned back to normal.
While this was a weaker episode than the Christmas special, it was good enough for Fox. As were the ratings. The series was successfully launched.
