Review: The Simpsons “My Way or the Highway to Heaven”

Are you there god?  It’s The Simpsons, challenging the concept of heaven.

 

Overview:

God and St. Peter are struggling to keep heaven full of residents.  While contemplating what it takes to get into heaven, they watch the citizens of Springfield remember their spiritual journeys.

Ned Flanders admits that he was not always the religious man he is today.  In a flashback, he recalls his time as a salesman who sold Homer a defect trampoline that nearly killed him.  Being struck by lightning started his path of redemption.

Marge discusses one of her ancestors who was an atheist in France during World War II.  She and her comrades helped to stop the Nazis from getting in the way of the battle of Normandy.  After, Lisa explains a young princess’s journey to enlightenment in Katmandu.

Our Take:

Before we get into anything, we need to talk about the epic couch gag of tonight’s episode.  Things progress as usual except, Homer accidentally falls into a wormhole that sends him to another dimension.  Of all the places to end up, he lands in a small little burger joint.  A place that we all know and love, Bob’s Burgers.  You have to love a good crossover, and to incorporate the main cast of Bob’s Burgers into the couch gag was a little bonus no one was expecting.  Bob and crew even get into a little discussion about what to do with the strange man in their restaurant, which may have been the best thirty seconds of the show.

Maybe not, this was a pretty good episode.

The Simpsons sure love picking on Christianity.  This episode, in particular, speaks on how elitist the idea of heaven is, and how only those that follow one religion are accepted.  However, the concept of heaven being there for good souls means that maybe they should be more accepting of others.  The discussion is opened with Marge representing atheism and Lisa representing Buddhism.  Both are as good as they come in the world of The Simpsons.  So, why wouldn’t they be accepted into heaven?  This is some pretty deep concepts brought forth from a show that took a lot of flack for having to mush racial stereotypes last year.  Which is excellent, they’re not holding back.

Besides all of the existential hubba-baloo, there was some thought put into making this feel like a classic Simpsons episode.  With all the flashbacks they managed to bring back some traditional jokes that we have failed to see in a while including the “won’t somebody think of the children?” that I feel like I haven’t heard in an episode forever.  But, what really brought me back was a throwback to Bart’s old prank calls on Moe.  To do that in a war-torn France, a pretty serious part of the episode, was such great timing.  I would love to see more of these classic Simpsons jokes continue through season thirty.

And, of course, there are scenes which include God and St. Peter.  This ended up being the most clever part of the episode as there is so many great jokes and topics brought forth.  Do you have to give it up to God for having some awesome one-liners like “atheists?  I refuse to accept they exist

This episode was something else.  It definitely broke away from the standard formula of sitcom television.  Despite that, it was still very much a Simpsons episode with a Simpson’s tone.  I mean, would a season be complete without an episode broken up into three mini-stories like this?  It was just great to see them take it in a religious tone and question what is it about religion that separates us.  Aren’t we all trying to be good people?  Well, at least most of us.

Score
8/10