User Reviews

This episode ... it is kind of like a throwback to the good old times of The Simpsons when they thrived. However, what I enjoy about it the most is how bold and unconventional it is in terms of the story. It presents an insight to the world of a person in coma, which I personally consider interesting, and it is definitely something that The Simpsons as a series hasn't covered too extensively in the past. It doesn't propose a traditional problem or theme characters usually deal with, but goes beyond that to a person's mind where we see how they get to experience the world while being unconscious, and how they can still perceive the world around them despite being out.

This episode goes to prove to me that (fortunately) the creators of the show are still not devoid of ideas (at least sometimes), and that after nearly three decades of the same characters, they can still bring something new to the table not seen before, which I consider admirable. It is that light in the season 29, which I consider one of the weakest seasons of The Simpsons yet (despite having some good moments and episodes), that gives me hope that the series might plummet somewhat in its quality, but will always be enjoyable at least sometimes.

Out of all the finales I can remember from the new episodes of The Simpsons, this thing shines among them. It is new, unconventional, creative, appealing, and surprising. In a good way, of course.

I'm one who has grown up on the Simpsons golden era, being the first 10 seasons, so I'm a bit wary and approach with caution the much later episodes, but Flanders' Ladder is quite surreal and is bold to approach new ideas to keep the series fresh and alive after all these years.

I laughed out loud with Homer breaking into Walter Matthau (the old-timer Simpsons fans who watched Tracey Ullman would know what I mean). Anyway, the ending homage to Six Feet Under (not Six Foot Under) is pure Simpsons, and will be a delight to Maggie Simpsons fans.

The references to the internet, wi-fi, browsing and social media is hilarious.

No ridiculous celebrity cameos, the return of classic characters, this episode was great, it felt like a Treehouse of Horror segment but as a full episode, which was great because it meant the story could be fleshed out nicely. Definitely a worthy addition to modern Simpsons.

Great episode! A great episode that contains great moments, such as when Bart teases Lisa, Bart helping ghosts in his coma, and most of all, "6 Feet Under" ending parody. It's kind of funny how an 80 year old Bartholomew Simpson got run over by a recently deceased 119 year old Principal Seymour Skinner. And Maggie Simpson never died.

This might have spoilers. This was one great episode with Bart getting into a coma and getting haunted by ghost, to the very end were everybody died except Maggie.

All Bart did was humiliate Lisa by posting online pictures of her falling into his waste basket and getting tangled in his underwear. Lisa is a lot more cruel than she usually is, even during that other time in On A Clear Day I Can't See My Sister. She ignored the rule against tormenting coma patients, was meaner to Bart than he deserved while keeping a nice cover to fool her parents, and you probably know the rest. But this mean Lisa who's worse than Bart is not the same sympathetic Lisa I knew in Springfield Splendor! The only type of people I could imagine ever liking or loving this episodes are the ones who saw Lisa as a villain and don't care that they made her the opposite of what she used to be! It's the same case with Anais in The Amazing World of Gumball's The Rival, except...that was worse and even more blatant.

To make a long story short, Bart's coma dream is about killing Homer so Maude's ghost can move on. But here's what's really terrible: Bart misses Homer and doesn't want him to leave, but Homer does leave. Bart shoots the light of heaven with a T-shirt cannon, and Homer strangles Bart for saving his life because he wanted to move on, and he didn't care how the rest of the family would deal with living without him. That's just sad because it sends a terrible message. You might as well have Homer quote Oliver Sansweet on "You didn't save my life, you ruined my death!" I'm glad that Bart woke up after this, because otherwise Maude's ghost would have come after Bart again and command him to kill Homer again, and it sucks because he loses either way. And if you want us to see Flanders Ladder as payback for all the other times Bart has been pranking Lisa and this prank being the time Lisa finally snapped, you have to establish things like that by bringing up worse things Bart has done and not making him too nice in this story later on. Even so, Lisa should still know better than to be this nasty to Bart.

Between the ending of this episode mirroring Six Feet Under's final episode and Sideshow Bob realizing he should stop trying to kill Bart in Gone Boy, it feels to me like The Simpsons is finally over, even though there is going to be a Season 30. Maybe a Season 31 if they want to have Treehouse of Horror XXX. No matter how terrible Bart was in other episodes of this season, it wasn't bad enough for Lisa to almost scare him to death and the creative ideas of this episode doesn't excuse what a bad character Lisa was. The worst part is that she wasn't sorry for what she did until it was too late to mean anything. It's telling me that because Bart did one little bad thing to her, she's allowed to be 100 times worse to him.

In the words of AV Club, "It never commits to either real emotional resonance, or occasionally undercutting it. So it just bobs along, occasionally landing on a funny idea but built on a foundation of mischaracterization and gibness." You might think Lisa Goes Gaga was terrible, and sure Lisa was out of character in that, but she wasn't as unsympathetic and mean as she was in this episode! It seems like nobody cares that Lisa does mean things she would never do like Squidward in Spongebob's Little Yellow Book, or that maybe the reason why Bart gets worse is because of his undeserved lack of empathy from the rest of the characters in Radio Bart, Miracle on Evergreen Terrace and this episode. At least The Boys of Bummer had the decency to fix the problem before Bart finally killed himself to make everyone better people with better lives. The scariest part is that the general consensus on IMDB actually likes this episode for being so mean to Bart when it's one of the few times he was in the right, like Mr. Krabs in Pat No Pay.

It's really telling when what is considered one of the best The Simpsons episodes in a long time has to be one that can only bring new ideas to the table by making Lisa the opposite of her typical sympathetic moral center self and treats Bart like Stressed Eric when he isn't being a sociopath. It would be like Spongebob Squarepants being praised for having one of the most creative Squidward Torture Porns in a long time. No one should care what amazing ideas that it has when it's still a pointless torture porn/disproportionate revenge trip to begin! This is why Miracle on Evergreen Terrace sucked when it tried to avoid saccharine Christmas cliches as an end goal, and threw out any empathy for the sake of lack of empathy. The Simpsons should not try to be Stressed Eric because no one should.