El Oro de Montezuma

Wow! This may get my vote for the worst episode of the series.

How can an episode about cultural sensitivity be so, well, culturally insensitive?

There's a new kid from Indonesia in class (who BTW was portrayed by an actor who was of German and Indian-American descent) and He speaks hardly any English. Lizzie treats him like a dummy for not understanding her. The teacher puts the poor kid on the spot asking him to talk about his culture and the poor dude doesn't understand what's going on at all. Honestly, I feel bad for this kid. Ugly Americans, right?

There's a Mexican game show the kids like to watch despite not understanding a word of Spanish. Miranda's cousin Carlos arrives and says that He was scheduled to be on the game show, but his family dropped out. Miranda, Gordo and Lizzie then volunteer to go on the show.

What follows is the kids acting like fools on the bizarre game show and having no idea what to do because Nobody speaks Spanish. Seriously doesn't Miranda (who's supposed to be of Mexican descent) know at least some Spanish?

The show itself feels like a spoof of Double Dare. For a Disney Channel show this show seems to have a fascination with kids getting covered in stuff and being messy and food fights. I thought that was more of a Nickelodeon thing. Seriously Lizzie McGuire could have aired on Nickelodeon and fit right in.

Back in class Lizzie sort of apologizes to the new kid for being so insensitive saying that since She embarrassed herself on a Spanish game show She now knows what it is like to be in a new country where you don't understand the language. Lizzie then decides to give a report on Indonesia and wrongfully names Jakarta as one of it's islands. Jakarta is a city on the island of Java. Why couldn't Lizzie give a report on one of her own cultures? Sam is Irish/Scottish but is not sure which one, while Jo seems to be just descended from every ethnicity in Eastern Europe.

This episode was just so dumb, not to mention culturally insensitive. The episode might have been better if they had just had the kids appear on a game show where crazy stuff happens.

Observation: The host (Erik Estrada) pronounces McGuire as if it were a Spanish name. It sounded like "muh gear". It was weird.

The "Matt" plot was amusing with Matt and Lanny playing an extreme game of hide-and-seek but it does not save this episode.