John Cena, Danny DeVito, Tom Hanks, Joel McHale, Conan O'Brien, Mark Proksch, Seth Rogen, and Amy Sedaris guest starred.
He then tasks a cutting-edge artificial intelligence chatbot called Hack-GPT (a spoof of ChatGPT) to generate a series finale.
The plot of the finale revolves around Bart needing to distribute his birthday party invitations after Homer forgets to mail them.
He passes them out at a school assembly, where Principal Skinner announces he is moving to Sacramento with Groundskeeper Willie for a new job, to Bart's delight.
Bart witnesses John Cena deliver Kumiko and Comic Book Guy's baby and he finds it strange seeing numerous people saying they will "miss this place" before turning off the lights and closing their doors.
Resisting the urges of Herbert Powell and John Cena, Bart refuses to blow out his birthday cake candles and insists "happy people don't exist in Springfield", rebuking the characters who have received spinoffs like stating that the Sea Captain isn't TV pretty, Nelson, Jimbo Jones, Dolph Shapiro, and Kearney Zzyzwicz not being able to raise a baby upon moving in with Hank Scorpio and that Bleeding Gums Murphy, Frank Grimes, and Rabbi Hyman Krustofsky are supposed to be dead.
Executive producer Matt Selman thought that The Simpsons could not have a series finale because the show reset at the end of each episode and does not have canon or continuity.
[3] The creators also used the episode to comment on art generated from artificial intelligence, which was a topic of concern during the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes.
The original artificial intelligence generated finale episode was going to have Bart performing the greatest prank, but executive producer James L. Brooks suggested a birthday party.
[1] The creators wanted to mock fans by including a scene with the real Seymour Skinner from the ninth season episode "The Principal and the Pauper" and to also mock the media, who now only discuss the series for think pieces, by having Homer strangle Bart, which became a topic after the episode "McMansion & Wife" aired the previous season.
The writers wanted someone who could "poke fun" at fans from the early seasons of the show who would serve the same role that Troy McClure filled in "The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular".
[9] The other non-speaking celebrities appeared without permission and were not paid, and Fox's legal department had the writers give O'Brien a line explaining this.
[1][3] The end credits feature images parodying the series finales of The Sopranos, M*A*S*H, Mad Men, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Breaking Bad, Frasier, Succession, Newhart, and Game of Thrones.
[12] The montage includes an instrumental version of "They'll Never Stop the Simpsons", which was written by Selman, from the thirteenth season episode "Gump Roast", which is a parody of the Billy Joel song "We Didn't Start the Fire".
[citation needed] The episode earned a 0.33 rating and was watched by 1.08 million viewers, the most-watched show on Fox that night.
[14] Mike Celestino of Laughing Place called the episode "a pretty clever way to hang a lampshade" on how anyone involved with the series will be able to end the show.