Release
The episode originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 17, 2002. It was viewed in approximately 7.47 million households that night. With a Nielsen rating of 7.0, the episode finished 44th in the ratings for the week of November 11–17, 2002 (tied with new episodes of Becker and Boomtown). It was the highest-rated broadcast on Fox that week, beating shows such as King of the Hill, 24, and Malcolm in the Middle. On December 6, 2011, "Bart vs. Lisa vs. the Third Grade" was released on Blu-ray and DVD as part of the box set The Simpsons – The Complete Fourteenth Season. Staff members Al Jean, Tim Long, Ian Maxtone-Graham, John Frink, Kevin Curran, Steven Dean Moore, Mike B. Anderson, and Michael Price participated in the DVD audio commentary for the episode.
DVD Movie Guide's Colin Jacobson wrote that the episode "opens with a TV-based segment awfully reminiscent of Season Two's 'Homer Vs. Lisa and the Eighth Commandment' and doesn’t get much better from there. As usual, we discover a few laughs along the way – particularly when Bart tries to teach mnemonics – but these are less plentiful than I’d like. This ends up as a wholly mediocre episode." Aaron Peck of High-Def Digest called the episode "memorable".
Read more about this topic: Bart Vs. Lisa Vs. The Third Grade
Famous quotes containing the word release:
“As nature requires whirlwinds and cyclones to release its excessive force in a violent revolt against its own existence, so the spirit requires a demonic human being from time to time whose excessive strength rebels against the community of thought and the monotony of morality ... only by looking at those beyond its limits does humanity come to know its own utmost limits.”
—Stefan Zweig (18811942)
“We read poetry because the poets, like ourselves, have been haunted by the inescapable tyranny of time and death; have suffered the pain of loss, and the more wearing, continuous pain of frustration and failure; and have had moods of unlooked-for release and peace. They have known and watched in themselves and others.”
—Elizabeth Drew (1887–1965)
“The near touch of death may be a release into life; if only it will break the egoistic will, and release that other flow.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)