30 Years Ago Today, The Simpsons Gave Fans Its Saddest Ending of All Time (With a Heartbreaking Goodbye)

30 years ago today, The Simpsons debuted an episode that broke fans hearts with the saddest ending in the series to date, and it’s a goodbye that has still left an impact all these decades later. The Simpsons is no stranger to heartbreaking moments as the long running adult animated series has ran through a bevy of all kinds of emotions through its decades long existence thus far. There have been a lot of goodbyes to its major characters in that time as well, but there’s still one that has left an impact that has yet to be topped even after all this time.

30 years ago today, on November 19, 1995, The Simpsons debuted the classic episode “Mother Simpson.” This episode was one of the strongest of the Golden Age offerings of the series, and introduced fans to Homer’s mother Mona (voiced by major guest star Glenn Close) for the first time. Believed by Homer to be dead thanks to his father lying to him all this time, Homer having to say goodbye to his mother again after all those years led to one of the saddest endings in the series’ history.

Homer Says Goodbye to His Mother in The Simpsons Saddest Ending

The Simpsons Season 7 episode, “Mother Simpson,” officially introduced fans to Homer’s mother Mona. The series had been keeping the character off-screen all this time, and Homer only discovered she was alive when looking into his own history following an incident where he faked his death. From there, he’s reunited with his mother and the two quickly patch things up. It’s revealed that she was inspired to become a hippie freedom fighter after seeing Joe Namath’s sideburns, and ended up bombing a facility run by Mr. Burns. When she was the only one caught, she was forced to go on the lam in the decades since.

Despite Homer and the rest of the family getting some more time to spend with Mother Simpson, it’s cut all too short when Burns discovers her whereabouts and attempts to arrest her again. She’s forced to go on the run once more, and that means Homer has to say goodbye to her officially. It’s an even more heartbreaking goodbye because while Homer thought his mother was dead this whole time, it’s an even worse case to have her be alive but just not able to be in his life.

Mona says goodbye to him, and Homer knows that he has a mother out there that loves him. But he can’t but sit in the fact that he’s lost her for real this time. The episode ends with him sitting on the hood of his car staring out into the night sky as this goodbye just washes over him, and it resulted in one of the most iconic images from the franchise’s history. The end credits even continue to roll over this image as fans are left to soak in this moment, and really feel the weight of it all.

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This Goodbye Ended Up Being Worse Than Mona’s Death

After her official introduction to the series, Mona appeared in more episodes in The Simpsons future seasons. Each time she had come back was yet another time that Homer had to say goodbye to her once more until she was officially killed off from the series with the Season 19 episode, “Mona Leaves-a.” This episode saw her return to Springfield one more time, but she tragically passes before Homer is able to say some of his final words to her.

She has made other appearances in The Simpsons since through flashbacks and even dreams where she is allowed to give Homer closure, but none of these future appearances match the emotional weight of her initial debut. The Simpsons really knocked it out of the park with the very first goodbye, and it’s something that they themselves were never really able to top in terms of just how heartbreaking it was. It’s why that image of Homer sitting on the hood of his car is still one of the most iconic Homer images we’ve ever gotten to see in nearly 40 seasons of episodes.

Future Mona appearances also took a much different turn as Homer started to realize that she would come and bring chaos into his life with each of her returns. It made him cautious about accepting her into his life through each new appearance, and changed how he approached her. There’s just no beating how genuine this initial guest star spot was, and how genuinely conflicting all of the emotions that such a goodbye elicited in the moment after. It’s almost like we are all still just soaking in that ending three decades after it first hit our TV screens.

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