10 Times The Simpsons Jumped The Shark
4. The Fakeout "Major" Death Episode
In 2013, on a promotional tour for The Simpsons’ 25th season, showrunner Al Jean revealed that a major character would die in the season premiere. This made headlines for the show in a way that rarely happens these days, and speculation was rife. Further clues were doled out: the character was portrayed by an Emmy winner, and had appeared more than twice in the show.
Well. It turned out to be Krusty’s dad. This was somewhat of a letdown, stretching the meaning of a “major character” beyond breaking point (which we should have guessed when Jean defined it as a character who had made two plus appearances).
The episode itself was perfectly fine - The Simpsons still handles emotion well, even as the jokes die off - but the obvious publicity stunt annoyed some fans. Jean quickly tried to backtrack, claiming that the episode had been “overhyped”, but this was clearly his intention when generating publicity prior to the episode airing.
Previous stunts, like the “Who Shot Mr Burns” guessing game, were played for laughs. This one seemed to be an earnest attempt to get eyes on the show, then reversing their stance when it didn’t work.