Making the Grade

"Making the Grade" is the sixtieth episode of The Loud House.

Plot
When Lisa is transferred to Lincoln's fifth grade class after finding kindergarten too easy, Lincoln wishes for Lisa to tone down her smartness so he can keep his social standing safe.

Synopsis
Lincoln arrives to his classroom, where he is greeted by all his friends. The moment he sits down, Mrs. Johnson announces that their class is getting a brand new student: Lisa Loud. Lincoln is shocked at this, and Clyde doesn't take the announcement so well, since he has to change seats to let Lisa sit next to Lincoln. When Lincoln asks Lisa why she's doing this, she replies that kindergarten is too much of a waste of time. In a flashback, while the kindergartners were counting monkeys in a book, Lisa was working on an antidote for strep throat. When Lincoln questions why she chose his class, Lisa remarks that she originally wanted to go to medical school, but the principal suggested that 5th grade would better suit her. Immediately afterwards, Lisa's smart attitude begins to irritate the other students, due to her reading a whole chapter in her textbook in less than a second, taking pop quizzes earlier, and her robot (named Todd) destroying the other student's robotics projects.

At lunch, Rusty, Zach, and Liam refuse to let Lincoln sit next to them, due to his sister's bothersome attitude. Because of this, Lincoln is banished to eat at the messiest table in the cafeteria, nicknamed "The Sticky Table". At the Loud House, Lincoln tells Lisa that she should try to act more like an average kid. Lisa agrees to Lincoln's suggestion, saying that acting average is "an interesting sociological challenge", much to Lincoln's satisfaction.

The next day, Lincoln is shocked to see Lisa without her glasses and a new hairstyle. Lisa explains that she looked at different sources on how a fifth grader looks, and used laser eye correction surgery to improve her eyesight. Although she got the appearance down, the attitude proves to be a challenge for her, so she invents a correction collar that squirts her with water every time she acts smart. When Mrs. Johnson asks the class several questions, Lisa tries to answer, but due to the purpose of her collar, she instead make witty remarks, that the class enjoys, causing Lisa to get praised by her fellow classmates. When Mrs. Johnson proposes a quiz, Todd comes in and destroys the quiz papers, much to everyone's happiness. At lunch, Lincoln and Lisa are allowed to sit at the table where Rusty, Zach, and Liam sit, and Lisa declares a food fight, which leads to them getting sent to the principal's office.

At night, Lincoln discovers Lisa throwing away her science equipment, due to her finding more enjoyment hanging with the crowd instead of being smart, and littered her room with Boyz Will Be Boyz posters. Luna comes in and asks Lisa to help her with her test for tomorrow, but Lisa denies, claiming that thanks to Lincoln, she found the joys of being average, causing Luna to give Lincoln the death glare. At dinner, the sisters (except Lily) are disgusted with the food they're eating. When Lynn Sr. mentions that Lisa usually helps him with the cooking, Lisa again remarks that thanks to Lincoln, she no longer helps him with the cooking, leading to the sisters to give Lincoln the death stare. While Lori, Lola, Lisa, and Lincoln are on a drive, a radio host announces free passes for the Royal Woods Spa to anybody who can name the three classifications of rocks. Eager to win them, Lola quickly dials the number and tells Lisa to give the answer. However, instead of naming the three classifications of rocks, she instead gives off three types of rock music, which costs them their chance of winning the tickets. As usual, Lisa thanks Lincoln for this, which leads to Lincoln getting kicked out of the van, and get left behind. At the house, Rita is informed by Pop-Pop that he has been waiting at the train station for over an hour, and as usual, Lisa thanks Lincoln for helping her into no longer doing that.

At school, Lisa's kindergarten teacher, Ms. Shrinivas, needs Lisa's help, due to her students catching strep throat. When Lisa refuses to help out, Ms. Shrinivas calls out on Lincoln for leading Lisa down this path, but Lincoln says he didn't have a choice. Or he would turn Lisa into an average kid, or his friends would kick him out of the crew. Realizing what he has done, Lincoln tries to convince Lisa into going back to her normal self, but Lisa refuses to due so, due to her newfound popularity. Because of this, Lincoln reminds her that the world needs her when she's smart, due to her solving anything the others can't. Although hesitant, Lisa agrees to revert to her normal self, and confiscates her correction collar.

Later, Lisa successfully creates an antidote for the kindergarteners with strep throat, and miraculously cures them all. At lunch, Lincoln and Lisa are given access to sit next to the crowd. Although she enjoys the appreciation, Lisa decides to transfer back to kindergarten, because she has to pursue her own path and claims that kindergarten does have one advantage.

In the kindergarten class, Lisa decides to get involved with the activities the kindergarteners do, but warns Ms. Shrinivas that if she attempts to wake her up earlier than usual, she'll have to face her robot, Todd, much to Ms. Shrinivas' discomfort.

Cast
Lori, Luan, Lily, Andrew, Mollie, Girl Jordan, Joy, and Papa Wheelie have no lines in this episode, but the five students later mentioned were heared cheering. However, Lori and Luan can be heard groaning.
 * Collin Dean as Lincoln
 * Liliana Mumy as Leni
 * Nika Futterman as Luna
 * Jessica DiCicco as Lynn / Lucy / Zach
 * Grey Griffin as Lola / Lana / Cheryl
 * Lara Jill Miller as Lisa / Liam
 * Caleel Harris as Clyde
 * Brian Stepanek as Lynn Sr. / Robot Todd / Jay Rock
 * Jill Talley as Rita
 * Wyatt Griswold as Rusty Spokes
 * Susanne Blakeslee as Agnes Johnson
 * Angela Malhotra as Ms. Shrinivas

​Trivia

 * The title of this episode sounds extremely similar to the Season 1 episode, "Making the Case".
 * Coincidentally, both episodes are storyboarded by Darin McGowan.
 * This episode reveals that Liam has a younger sister, who's in kindergarten.
 * This episode hides the Loud parents' faces, meaning that this episode could have possibly been in production before "11 Louds a Leapin'" was aired.
 * This is the last episode where their faces are hidden.
 * There was a deleted scene that involved Lisa changing from her new look to her old look as she headed back to her kindergarten class. The scene was most likely cut due to time.
 * This episode marks the first time Jessica DiCicco voices a minor character, but doesn't voice either Lynn or Lucy, as the both of them (along with Lori, Luan, Lana, and Lily) have no lines in this episode, although Lynn, Lucy, and Lana were listed in the credits because they were heard groaning.
 * This is Mrs. Johnson and Liam's first appearance in the second season. This is also Rusty's third appearance in the second season and Zach's second appearance in Season 2.
 * In this episode, it's revealed Lincoln's class has 14 members, including him.
 * This is the fifth time where all ten sisters appear, but most of them don't speak. The first was in "For Bros About to Rock", the second in "Two Boys and a Baby", the third in "A Novel Idea", and the fourth in "The Loudest Yard".
 * This is the second time Lisa made a robot. The first time she did so was in "Snow Bored".
 * Coincidentally, both robots have laser vision.
 * This is the second time Lori appears without any lines. The first instance was in "One Flu Over the Loud House", despite her groaning in that episode.
 * Rusty mentions having a date on Friday, meaning he could possibly be in a relationship with Polly Pain from "Dance, Dance Resolution".
 * At the dinner table scene, it shows all of the Loud siblings at the same table, and not half at the "Grownup Table," and "Kiddie Table," as shown in "A Tale of Two Tables". This could mean that all the family got a bigger table, which is why everyone sits at the same table.
 * Pop-Pop is mentioned in this episode, but does not appear physically.
 * This is the first episode where Lisa is shown without her glasses throughout the majority of the episode.
 * Luna and Lola were seen eating with their left hand.
 * Lincoln's nickname is "L-Train", according to this episode.
 * This is the fourth episode where Lisa is seen without her glasses, the other three are "Picture Perfect", "Cover Girls", and "Raw Deal".
 * Irony:
 * Lincoln should've explained to his family it was simply Lisa's decision to become average, and he never told her to give up on what she did for them.
 * Lynn Sr. and Rita could simply use internet to convert a metric system for a recipe and see when Albert's train arrives respectively. They didn't really need Lisa.
 * Karma: Lincoln convinced Lisa to act average, so everyone was mad at him.
 * Moral:
 * Never change yourself or other people just to impress people.
 * Let people make their own life decisions.
 * Don't fall into peer pressure.
 * When adapting to new social settings, be yourself and others will accept you (and possibly even admire you) for who you are.
 * Timeline:
 * Before "Cover Girls" and "Potty Mouth", because in those episodes, Lisa doesn't need her glasses to see.
 * Before "Study Muffin", because Lincoln doesn't sit in front row of his classroom, where Mrs. Johnson put him in Study Muffin.
 * After "Making the Case", because Cristina is absent, due to her switching classes.
 * After "A Tale of Two Tables", because all the siblings sit at the same table.
 * After "Picture Perfect", because in that episode, Lisa couldn't see without her glasses.
 * After "Dance, Dance Resolution", because Rusty, Liam, and Zach are among Lincoln's friends.

Errors

 * Plot hole:
 * In this episode, Lincoln says he knew Rusty for five years, despite meeting him for the first time in "Hand-Me-Downer".
 * In "The Waiting Game", Lincoln said Chandler is his classmate, but in this episode, he's not in his classroom.
 * In the scene where the Louds were eating their food (before they spit/spat it out), none of them had visible eyelashes.
 * In that same scene, Luan was able to chew her food, despite her buckteeth being exposed.
 * In the classroom, Joy is present at one point, but absent in the next scene. She was also sitting in Clyde's seat.
 * In the scene where Lincoln is explaining to Lisa's teacher about being forced to sit at the sticky table, the closed captions say "stinky table".
 * This episode seems to indicate that Lynn Sr. needs Lisa's help when preparing meals, despite being shown to cook meals without assistance in previous episodes.
 * When Lisa reads her world history textbook, she flips through it backwards.

Running Gags

 * The Sticky Table being mentioned.
 * Situations going wrong due to Lisa helping and not helping, and Lincoln being blamed for it.
 * Lisa saying "Thanks to Lincoln, I'm out of 'the ____ game' (tutoring, conversion, geology, algebra, disease control)".
 * Robot Todd's moments.

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