The Simpsons concludes its 27th season on Sunday, and, as befits one of the most influential TV comedies of the past 30 years, people mostly refer to it now to bitch about how it’s not good any more, and how the couch gags are the best part. (“Just wait until you’re 41,” Saturday Night Live mutters, pulling from an expired bottle of Pepto Bismol.) In keeping with that unfair and dismissive attitude, The A.V. Club will now proceed to talk about the upcoming couch gag, and nothing else.
For this season’s final intro, the show has again turned to Polish animator Michal Socha, who provided one of the more whimsical couch gags in recent memory back in 2014, with a 2D/CG mix and austere red-and-black palette that approaches the near-perfect Don Hertzfeldt couch gag in terms of sheer visual audacity. This time around, Socha delivers a much more minimalist, but arguably even more inventive, offering than his first effort. It’s a complete “build your own couch gag” animated instruction manual, done in the style of your standard-issue Ikea directions. It’s charming, funny, and creative, and should provide yet more fodder for the “only the couch gags are still good” crowd—something the writers probably never get tired of hearing.