What's the most depressing Simpsons episode?

[@samkon3148]

For me it's Lisa's Substitute. Nearly every Lisa centered episode ends with her being sad but learning to accept it (ex Lisa's Pony). And in Lisa's Substitute she finally has someone in her life who understands her and supports her and watching her lose that is gut wrenching.

[@bondoman006]

My brother in law worked as an animator on the Simpsons around the time of the movie. I stoped watching around that time too. Do you remember the scene in the movie where grandpa Simpson is saying EPA, EPA and running in a circle on the ground in the church? My bro in law animated that! I got to visit the studio where they animate the show and for some reason I was disappointed because the Simpsons were not there. It was weird. I’m here from TikTok, I love your content!!!

[@limberlad]

My favorite Futurama opening sub-line "Not the one with the dead dog"

[@davidloring4450]

1 - definitely here for long from content! 2 - Maude’s death takes a sourer not when you learn they basically killed her off because of a pay dispute with her voice actress 3 - loving the bonus suki content if you pay attention to reflections in the cupboard

[@thegadgetdude]

The perfect lunchtime video taking a break from talking to my co-workers about simpsons moments, to listen to someone else talk about simpsons moments.

[@january_faerie]

Everyone wanted to eat that hot cocoa marshmallow tube 🩷

[@lilpetz500]

I swear, if one of those marshmallow making small businesses wanted an idea for a weirdly specific viral flavour, "Bart's Sad Hot Cocoa Loaf" would be such a hit 😂

[@mgthestrange9098]

I wonder if any of the YT cooking channels have tried to make it.

[@Wendy_O._Koopa]

@@lilpetz500 But you'd have to do a copyright free version, like... *Punk Kid's Sad Cocoa Loafmallow,* and have like Calvin with a more Bartesque haircut. On account of Calvin & Hobbes famously can't sue anyone because there's no official merchandise, so he won't lose any money on knock-offs. For whatever reason, those are the rules.

[@marcusjackson9076]

HEY!! GIVE ME A SLICE!!

[@lilpetz500]

@@Wendy_O._Koopa I Iike the way you think 🤙

[@benpriest1418]

I had no idea you had your own channel outside of Scroll Deep. Happy I found it!

[@Lec2099]

The only one that sprung to my mind during this was the episode where Homer and Marge nearly get divorced. Loved the video

[@SeanHunterMusic]

Well this was a great recommendation on KZbin’s part. For me it’s gotta be between Bart Gets an F and Secrets Of A Successful Marriage.

[@sophiecreamer8796]

This unlocked a core childhood memory of seeing that swol coco marshmallow - man i wanted that so badly

[@lilpetz500]

I have a sibling that actually said exactly this unprompted years ago. Apparently one of those universal childhood experiences globally, is watching Bart mess up putting his own marshmallow in his hot cocoa and go "WOW I WANT THAT"

[@StephyonYoutube]

I like this side of the Simpsons because it’s realistic and I think it’s why it was so succesful because the relatability, you don’t get it that much anymore in modern shows

[@jordanread5829]

I like the episode where Krusty is reunited with his father. The scene where Krusty breaks down in tears when watching the itchy and scratchy cartoon… damn. You could also read from the episode that Krusty rejected his jewish heritage and tradition out of spite for his father. But at the end of the day he did miss him. But is too afraid or ridden with guilt to approach him on his own.

[@summerisnothere4774]

The lead up to why Maude Flanders got killed off is super fucked up but I do really enjoy that episode. Not only because of how they deal with the grief but also strangely enough because of Homer. Even though he's a little bit of a jerk at the start, he's trying so hard to make Neds adjustment easier. After the wake, he brings him home and tucks him into bed. He gets up in the middle of the night to help Ned talk through his feelings. And then in the sequel episodes to that hes trying to set Ned up. And even though none of it works out, I really think it shows that hidden friendship and care that Homer feels for Ned in his own little way. I see that episode more as hopeful. Great video though, you made some very good points

[@katiebrowner1874]

I hit subscribe but I want to be absolutely clear: that was for the cat who is a delight.

[@HelloYesThisIsDog]

Here for more solo Benedict content! Subbed! 😁

[@reallyhardy]

let's go longform simpsons vids! and whatever else you'll do, i'm subscribed, i'm seated, let's go.

[@liriohardy7240]

sibling located

[@elisa2115]

love this content!!!! also benedict and suki are the ultimate blue eyed diva duo

[@RollMeAFat1]

The Lisa is sad episode made me terrified of anti depressants for years, I put off taking them because of the sequence where Lisa had them

[@kiwibird-007]

I always find the Marge centric episodes quite sad, because as much as Marge and Homer love each other, her life is an absolute nightmare most of the time, even if not intentionally, Homer is not a great husband (although he has his moments tbf)

[@Thomas-yr3id]

I love this guy's tiktoks, now he comes up on my YT. Brilliant

[@noahjones7126]

I truly truly hope you make more videos like these i’d love longer form yt content from you!!

[@noahjones7126]

Also my own answer while it’s uplifting at the end is when homer gets the crayon stuck and does choose to have it taken out because he can’t handle being an outcast anymore 😢 the relationship he could have had with lisa will just always make me teary

[@jo55ss]

A more recent one which I found interesting (might go in the “profound” category - I’m not sure) is “Lisa’s Belly” from Season 33. Not going to spoil too much but it focuses upon how everyone has hidden insecurities and how parents can unintentionally say the wrong things. I’d personally recommend a few episodes from the more recent seasons because I do think there’s been an upturn in quality from season 33 onwards - not sure how it stacks up against the commonly accepted golden age of the earliest years but I’ve found some of the newer directions quite compelling. Cheers from another Simpsons superfan - have subscribed (I saw Suki and knew I needed to!)

[@woozleproductions9760]

There’s also the episode where Marge has to deal with the fact that her kids are growing up. I find that one interesting.

[@carolynbarnes8354]

Excited for more long form content! Love your sense of humour. :)

[@molleted]

BENEDICT TOWNSEND INDEPENDENT KZbin CHANNEL NOW THATS TENNIS 🤧🫶

[@Katie-wt3zl]

I am also a super fan of the simpsons and have watched every episode and one that sticks out to me is one in one of the recent seasons there’s an episode where Abe Simpson moves in with his new girlfriend and her son and and Homer stays with them for a bit and Abe is treating the girlfriends son very kindly and is still being a jerk to Homer and it gets a little deep about childhood trauma and father son relationships and it does have a somewhat happy ending but that one made me sad. I think the ones you mentioned were sadder tho like the one where Mona dies is the saddest one I think but I also remember miracle on evergreen terrace making me feel really upset too.

[@watchedietv]

I enjoyed this please do make more longer KZbin content :) The episode with the dead body actually caused me legit distress as a kid I remember it really upsetting me!

[@luciasari633]

Love the longer form, solo, simpsons content!!!! Best surprise of 2025 yet… but that’s tennis🤷‍♀️🎾

[@selmalarsson8920]

Have i seen most of these episodes? No. Did I still watch and enjoy the entire video? Of course, suki showed up

[@jos9116]

You’re a legend

[@frewthelookingglass860]

I’m glad this came into my KZbin algorithm- love your tik tok simpsons content. Hope this does well and encourages you to do more long form 😊

[@chrisgibb8452]

To me the ending of Trash of the Titans was pretty brutal and depressing. Other than that, the entire 3 episode story arc of homers mum has always sat with me as the saddest of them all.

[@spungo6179]

I couldn't agree more about the boys of bummer!! I literally cannot watch that episode because it makes me so angry, and it's worse because it's the entire town who's being awful? It weirdly makes you question the whole of Springfield? And to top it all off, the ending doesn't even resolve the story!! It's just another joke at bart's expense !!

[@jesssmith8650]

Would love a video about the movie!

[@erinkinsella91]

IVE BEEN SAYING THIS about the alarms/phone ringing going on way too long in films, also yes please to more simpsons long form content

[@daisieclarkson6568]

This sparked a massive conversation with me and my sister about saddest, funniest, series we dropped watching from 😅 Side note: The speed i scroll through futurama on disney+ so that I don't even have to see the Jurassic Bark thumbnail 😅😱

[@danielredmond6101]

My word, you really have come a long way since the Cupofteam days!

[@aurelianbasa]

Has to be the one with Frank Grimes

[@nataliekoya1229]

Subscribed, can't have Suki crying! :(

[@PoshMurder]

Want to be even sadder about Jurassic Bark? It was made after a real story of a dog named Hachiko, historically documented and there's even pictures of the dog. His owner died suddenly, and Hachiko would wait at the station for his owner for 10 years, every single day, until he too passed away. People would feed him, and try to get him to move elsewhere but he would loyally wait for his owner who would never come. KZbin doesn't like me posting links, though Google Hachiko for the full story. Knowing about Hachiko makes Jurassic Bark just so much more depressing... I think I'm going to go hug my pets now.

[@Wendy_O._Koopa]

And if you want to be _less_ sad, the made-for-TV movie Bender's Big Score completely undoes it and has _a version_ of Fry living in the past with Seymour all those years. It's a wacky time travel movie that ends up creating a billion Benders and a few Frys... IDK, I've probably spoiled _more_ than enough.

[@AndrewPearsonFashion]

You might already know this (and someone may have already pointed this out) but the dead body episode is an homage to the movie Stand by me... Not that it really gives any meaning to the episode 😅 Also, I like that homage looks like a mix between Homer and Marge....

[@woozleproductions9760]

There are quite a few good recent emotional episodes. I also think emotional episodes are where the modern seasons get most things right.

[@liriohardy7240]

oh there's more benedict content? yes please sign me up

[@tsnovak20]

I am SHOCKED you have not mentioned the episode The Wife Aquatic 😲 S18 E10 ... That episode has the most depressive ending EVER!

[@FuzzOctavia]

Loved the video Benedict, would love to see more like this Since you can't really put clips in these types of video, something I think would be incredibly funny, would be if you were to put a picture of the scene like you did- and then act it out by doing the voices of the characters... completely fair use and gives us more context to the scene... but it's something I feel like *you specifically* would do incredibly well lmao

[@alp8492]

THANK YOU! I always feel like I'm the only person on the planet who thinks Jurassic Bark is just mean-spirited, and not some flawless masterpiece. There were a couple of Simpsons episodes that I remember just angered me. The one where Lisa keeps getting her cats killed - I gave up watching that one as soon as I saw where the 'jokes' were going, so don't know how it ended. And the really early one where Bart is on exchange in France to some... wine smugglers , or something? Of all the 'mocking X country' episodes, that is the one that probably felt the most borderline racist - and I say that as an Australian!

[@LauraSomeNumber]

To me this is the real Simpsons. Like the Simpsons smiling is not true to their characters.

[@ce7406]

the saddest kid in grade number 2 :(

[@joebykaeby]

Out of the ones you named, "My Sister, My Sitter" is the only one that I will always skip, always. I hate that episode, and see no redeeming qualities in it. I think the biggest one you missed is definitely the one where Homer literally frames Marge for his own DUI. Same thing - absolutely no redeeming qualities.

[@geneyoon6128]

For me, it’ll always be the episode with Grimes. The only rational character in a universe where incompetence and ignorance is celebrated - feels familiar - only to lose his mind and ultimately his life. Pretty depressing.

[@devilord3271]

IMO I never really agreed with this take, like Grimes feels like success is owed to him because he had a hard life, but Homer's life was just as hard

[@geneyoon6128]

@ more like, he worked really hard to overcome obstacles and build a life from scratch. He earned a higher degree with no help. But he lived above a bowling alley while Homer had a four bedroom “mansion.” We’re always told in America bootstrapping hard work and education will be rewarded. But we all know that’s not how it works.

[@scratchjohnson4636]

@geneyoon6128 I agree. adding to your point, Grimes is also upset with Homer because of his gross incompetence. he's a safety inspector- so he's the guy who's supposed to monitor & prevent nuclear meltdowns in Springfield- and yet he sleeps on the job, and hasn't bothered to learn what any of the buttons on his control pad were. I mean, I get that we're sympathetic to Homer, because he's the main character, but did Grimes not have a point? Lenny and Carl even say that Homer doesn't have a degree in nuclear science, and just showed up at the plant one day. I feel like Gene has the right idea that it is about how the "bootstrap narrative" is a lie, and uses Homer as a foil to Grimes because Homer is the literal poster child for failing upward.

[@catdatwat9743]

Nah, idk - cause for me, Grimes’s death was atleast partly on himself. He didn’t need to trick Homer into doing a kid’s science fair just to prove Homer can lose. Hell, Homer tries to be really nice to him for the 2nd half of the episode. Grimes’s death happened because he let himself go crazy over something that was entirely preventable. He could have just accepted who Homer was, and try to be his friend. Homer was legitimately trying, and the fact that Grimes was an asshole to him for no actual reason means I don’t feel thus depressed about his death. He hated Homer for just vibing. Now, Maude’s death I would say is far worse, and easily the most depressing episode. It is so sad how they constantly shit on her very existence despite her not doing anything wrong.

[@scratchjohnson4636]

@@catdatwat9743 ​ oh, I'm not arguing that Frank Grimes didn't kill himself in a fit of rage, I'm just saying that he isn't wrong about Homer. keep in mind that Grimes was written to be an ordinary, "real world" character to contrast with Springfield's extremely wacky and cartoony setting, so while he comes across like a stick in the mud in a town like Springfield, he's not actually saying anything unreasonable--- he's just the straight man in a town of cartoon characters. put yourself in Grimey's shoes. imagine you just got a job at a nuclear power plant. it's less than 15 years after Chernobyl, and your coworkers tell you that the plant's *safety inspector* not only doesn't have a degree in nuclear science, but that accidents have doubled and meltdowns have tripled every year since he became safety inspector. When you meet the guy, he pours water on his control panel and admits to regularly sleeping on the job. he also chews your engraved pencils and eats your special dietetic lunch. and while Grimey doesn't know this, in "Homer Defined," that man was literally an eeny meeny miney moe away from blowing up the whole town. would *you* want to accept him the way he is, or would you want to immediately get him out of the safety inspector position before he killed someone? I mean I love Homer, and as much as I root for him and empathize with him in this episode, even I can admit that he doesn't deserve his job at all. and honestly I think that is part of what makes the ending of the episode so dark and so funny. Frank Grimes was entirely right about Homer and about Springfield. but we as the audience don't really care because it's a cartoon and Homer is funny. It's a bit of a downer because Frank Grimes was only really guilty of being a normal guy in a cartoon world. if he were in a less cartoony world, it wouldn't seem as out of place for him to be so angry when incompetent people fail upward. but, at least for me, that's also the source of the humor-- the absurdity and ridiculousness of Springfield driving a somewhat reasonable guy insane, and on top of that, what I think is a pretty funny and poignant depiction of someone becoming disillusioned with the "bootstrap" narrative. Sorry for the wall of text; this is my favorite episode, and I absolutely love talking about it! for me, the more pessimistic and cynical aspects of it really add some interesting layers to it. so, I don't really mean dark or depressing as a negative at all. It's simultaneously depressing and a barrel of laughs all the way from start to "Change the channel, Marge!"

[@ulti.matt04]

is this the youtube news guy holy shit

[@bwaddaz92]

I think I said this on your TikTok video, but “Home Sweet Homediddly-Dum-Doodily”. The whole premise is bleak and there are very few laughs. Plus, the way they write the Flanders is frankly unpleasant.

[@RhodriR]

The purpose of Jurassic Bark is to teach us Dolomite is very hard. Which actually helped me in my physcis A level

[@joannideezy9659]

New ones get more and more depressing, which is a shame! Have you seen the film Robot Dreams? kinda depressing but v good animated film

[@Archius9]

“Give me a slice”

[@mike.94]

Homer's life montage episode wasn't sad?

[@zenonella]

I feel like in terms of Jurassic bark, another decent Futurama episode, that did the downer but profound ending was luck of the fryrish.

[@squiishiie]

Because it’s the season I rewatched Miracle on Evergreen Terrace the other day and that one is definitely a bummer. Not the vibe 😢

[@fluffbradford]

I don’t rewatch that episode 😆. I never put it on and if it comes on, I change the channel!

[@Wendy_O._Koopa]

You can only do a review of the movie if you mention the chalkboard gag that appeared in the first episode afterwards. The one where Bart writes "I will not wait 20 years to make another movie" (s19e01 "He Loves to Fly and He D'ohs" September 23, 2007). If they _do_ release another movie in two years, his punishment was justified. If they do _not,_ then I think Bart misunderstood the meaning and interpreted it as they should _never_ make another movie. Either way... I still can't believe it's been almost twenty years...

[@fluffbradford]

Yes! Love The Simpson’s content!

[@jacobeller3377]

we need a video about the movie !

[@the10ofdiamondscard]

the season 1 or 2 thanksgiving episode was pretty sad imo

[@RobTFilms]

Did you script this or was it off the cuff?

[@felixyoung4536]

Jurrasic bark is trying to show the sadness of life and to live when you have something and appreciate it. I disagree I thibk that's one of the most special moments.i find it impressive when a show can make you laugh and then juxtapose into reality

[@paytonsme]

Of course i want u to make a video on the simpsons movie

[@lewisthemadman2263]

Spiffing brit

[@uhoh6092]

I think you could pull off eyeliner

[@arfi47]

PLEASE make a video about the movie i will pay you 10 quid 🙏

[@jpwr72]

What’s the Snapchat guy doing on my KZbin

[@ivystopia]

Choose vegan

[@yzhkkhzy]

wait ur british??