10 Moments When The Simpsons Went Too Far

5. The Whole Darn Thing - Kill The Alligator And Run (2000)

There's no single part of "Kill the Alligator and Run" that marks it as one of the worst episodes The Simpsons has ever put out - indeed, the whole package is so plainly awful that the episode might as well have been titled "This Is The Point At Which We've Completely Given Up." So the "plot" (if you can call it that) involves The Simpsons going to Florida, fighting an alligator, and meeting Kid Rock, laid out as a series of increasingly unfunny jokes. Why, then, has this been included as one of the moments in which The Simpsons took things too far? Pretty much, it's down to the lackluster and increasingly chaotic structure of the episode, in which the usually intricate narrative beats we often associate with the show's earlier years found itself discarded in favour of a unfocused mish-mash of unpolished elements; it ushered in a new era of increasingly bizarre and scatty episodes.