Ever since the Simpsons began coming out on DVD with commentary, I've been waiting for them to get to my favorite episode, 5F05, "Lisa the Skeptic." This is the one where they find the angel skeleton in season 9, but it was really a hoax perpetrated by the new mall builders.
Besides all the other reasons why this is a great episode, which was written by David X. Cohen(David S. at the time), with brilliant humor, social commentary, and insight into the human condition, it also had the best scene and piece of dialogue in all of Simpsons's history and therefore, TV history.
The scene is at the kitchen. Lisa angrily walks in after being disgusted by the town's acceptance of the angel as real when she encounters Marge.
Lisa: Oh, those morons make me feel so angry!
Marge: Maybe so, but I'd appreciate it if you didn't call
them morons.
Lisa: But they are morons! What grown person could believe in
angels?
Marge: Well, your mother for one!
Lisa: You? But you're an intelligent person, mom.
Marge: There has to be more life than just what we see Lisa,
everyone needs something to believe in.
Lisa: It's not that I don't have a spiritual side. I just find
it hard to believe there's a dead angel hanging in our
garage.
Marge: Oh, my poor Lisa, if you can't make a leap of faith now
and then, well, I feel sorry for you.
Lisa: Don't feel sorry for me mom. I feel sorry for you.Scene ends with Lisa leaving.
That last line is one of the most cold and brutal lines I've seen in any form of fiction. It violates every rule of sitcom writing where a scene has to end with either a joke or some comforting and trite statement that gives the rebellious child either their come-uppance or superficial words of wisdom to ponder.
But as you can see, that's exactly what didn't happen(You should review the scene again to get the full effect). The non-believing child had the final say, and part of the harshness was that it was said with such casual self-satisfaction. There was no intentional viciousness in the statement, because if there were, then by sitcom rules, the writers would have Lisa apologizing to Marge at the end. This moment just stands by itself, not to be addressed ever again.
And that's what makes it great. The show could still surprise me. The writers had broken the rules of a sitcom while being true to the characters and human nature. They didn't take the cowardly way out where the believers are always right, get the last word, and have the forces of divine intervention show-up the skeptic. They also didn't write it with embarrassed self-consciousness where any suggestion of atheism must be said meekly and delicately.
As for the commentary itself, I was very glad to hear that this scene made up the biggest part. There were several speakers, but the ones I focused on were David S. Cohen's and Yeardley Smith's. Unfortunately during the scene itself, Cohen decided to tell a completely unrelated story about seeing Nicholas Cage at an auction, but the others still knew that this was the most significant part of the episode and talked about it again. Of course, they mostly addressed the harshness of the statement rather than the qualities which make it so unique and profound. I'm just grateful they noticed it too though, and I invite you all to see it again and think about how special this moment is in Simpsons's history.