The Simpsons: Why Bart Got Worse And Worse

The Simpsons has completed thirty-one seasons since it debuted on television way back in the 1980s. It’s one of the biggest stalwarts in all of television, but many have also noticed that it had one of the most precipitous drop-offs in the history of TV comedies, as well.

The early years of The Simpsons were gold and it has run on fumes ever since. As such, the characters who populate Springfield have undergone a ton of changes over the years. None of them could ever hope to be consistently perfect. Sadly, however, for Bart Simpson, his character became increasingly terrible over the seasons. These reasons are only a drop in the bucket Bart got worse and worse.

10 Never Learned From His Mistakes

With thirty-one seasons of over twenty episodes each, The Simpsons series was bound to repeat itself from time to time. As a result of this, Bart Simpson seems to learn the same lesson multiple times.

For example, the season twenty episode, “Double, Double, Boy in Trouble,” has parallels to the season twenty-nine episode, “Singin’ in the Lane.” In both, Bart grows greedy and materialistic. In both, Bart has to learn that money and things aren’t everything. By this point, the character never grows. He’s just spinning his wheels—as were the show’s creators.

9 Become Crueler

In the early years of The Simpsons, Bart’s pranks and mischief were always balanced out by the heart he showed when he knew he went too far. Now, though? His actions are almost always with the intent of cruelty.

When characters in Springfield are at their lowest point, Bart seems to get his kicks from making them feel exponentially worse. He never has remorse for going too far. He’s just a pure sociopath at a certain point.

8 Lost His Humor

Similarly, Bart’s pranks in the early years of the show had strong streaks of humor to them. In the 1990s, Bart Simpson was arguably the funniest character on television.

Now, that time is long gone. Most of The Simpsons hasn’t been funny in a while, but Bart has only gotten less funny over time. Now, most of the episodes that revolve around Bart tend to be outright annoying and grating.

7 Continued To Lose Respect

One of the hallmarks of late-stage Simpsons that many fans have noticed is Marge’s tendency to let people walk all over her. Over the course of the show, Bart has taken advantage of this.

Not only has he steadily become more disrespectful to the people of Springfield over time, but he has become outright mean to his parents, especially Marge. Most of the time, Bart will not even atone for his actions when Marge forgives him by an episode’s end.

6 Abandoned Loyalty

Over the years, there have been many instances in Bart’s character that seemed like major turning points. One that comes to mind comes from The Simpsons Movie when Bart recognizes that Ned Flanders is actually a good man and a respectable father figure.

However, in the season twenty-seven episode “Fland Canyon,” Bart is all too giddy to be mean to the entire Flanders family. Earlier in the show, Bart would have shown loyalty to the good people in his life. As he got worse, he abandoned all of his emotional connections.

5 Constant Failure

Time and again, Bart has come too close to outright failure for comfort. Whether this involves his shenanigans that draw the ire of Chief Wiggum and the Springfield police or his lack of motivation in school, Bart is always at risk of being held back.

Over the course of the show, though, Bart stops caring about this altogether. Just as he never grows from his mistakes, he never seems to put any effort in after his near-failures. One would think he would learn, but he’s also been ten years old for thirty-one years. Maybe he has an excuse.

4 Feels Guilty For The Wrong Reasons

Back in the day, Bart’s pranks would result in guilt for the Simpson boy because he knew when he went over the line. Now, though, his actions only produce a sense of guilt when Bart feels like he might be in trouble.

From nearly killing Martin to betraying Lisa’s trust and crying wolf for all of Springfield, Bart feels guilt for how he impacted other people. But, over time, he only had guilt for how he might have impacted himself.

3 Does Pranks For The Wrong Reasons

Just as Bart feels guilty about his pranks for the wrong reasons, so too does he do the pranks for the wrong reasons. At first, Bart would never prank someone if they were feeling down. He would only do it to mess around or to garner some sort of comeuppance.

By the third decade of the show, though, Bart seems to conduct pranks solely to see people get hurt and suffer. This isn’t funny, it’s actually downright despicable.

2 Lost His Conviction

The problem with late-stage Bart Simpson is that, whenever there is cause for a harmless little prank, Bart doesn’t go through with it. He only ends up committing to the big pranks that could harm people.

Over time, Bart lost his conviction. Instead of being fun and mischievous, he became more weak-willed and spineless. Fans didn’t want Bart to be a bully, but they never wanted to see him become a doormat, either.

1 He Whines Way More

Going off of this notion that Bart just lets characters boss him around and only provides retribution when he goes way too far, one way Bart got worse over the course of The Simpsons is that his character became way whinier.

At first, if Bart Simpson felt he had been wronged, he would act craftily to get back at the person. Now, though, when he’s not enacting dangerous pranks, he’s just whining—whining about school and about things being “unfair” from his perspective. It’s hard to root for a character that rolls over and cries when things don’t go his way.

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