All the Ways ‘The Simpsons’ Foreshadowed Moe’s Tragic Death

Warning: This article contains references to self-harm and suicide.

This week’s season finale of The Simpsons offered up a glimpse of Springfield’s future — minus the not-so-waterproof androids.

And while flash forwards are obviously nothing new for The Simpsons, the show just made the unprecedented move of killing off one of the Simpson parents and not immediately bringing them back as a clone. 

As “Estranger Things” transitions from the present to the future, we learn that Marge es away before Homer, a detail that’s revealed via song by incredulous guest star Sarah McLachlan. And while many of us were obviously focused on the death of the Simpson family matriarch, the cemetery also clearly houses a grave seemingly belonging to Moe, with a sculpture of the bartender sticking his head in an oven. 

The implication that Moe tragically took his own life didn’t come out of nowhere. Even way back in Season Eight of the show, Moe revealed to “Listen Lady” Marge that he had “lost the will to live.”

In Season 11’s “The Grift of the Magi,” the dark joke was revived with a brief epilogue in which Moe removes his head from the oven and replaces it with a Christmas goose after witnessing what the “world would be like if he had never been born” à la George Bailey. Moe’s “annual suicide attempt” would go on to become a recurring plot point.

Moe’s depression was also the focal point of “Moe Baby Blues” in Season 14, the episode in which he inadvertently becomes a hero after saving Maggie’s life during a suicide attempt.

Somehow even more bleak were the opening moments of “Whiskey Business,” which found Moe putting a noose around his neck and coming shockingly close to ending things. Although, by the end of the episode he gains a new lease on life. Yet he still keeps the noose hanging in his office. 

While Moe may have died in the world of “Estranger Things,” the good news is that none of these Simpsons episodes set in the future are set in stone, meaning that Moe’s death is only as certain as Bart’s Supreme Court gig.