In an extended parody of Lord of the Flies, Bart, Lisa, and other students from Springfield Elementary School are stranded on an island and are forced to work together.
When Otto tries to press down on the pedal, it squirts juice into his eyes, causing him to lose control and drive the bus off a bridge into a large body of water.
While swimming for help, Otto gets swept away by the current and picked up by foreign fishermen, who plan to use him for slave labor below the deck of their ship.
The students swim to a nearby desert island, where everyone falls to accusing each other before Nelson points out that the bus accident was Milhouse's fault.
Lisa quickly imposes a rationing system on the cooler, only for the kids to awake the next morning and find that all the food has been eaten overnight.
As they prepare to lynch him, Lisa reminds them of why they travelled in the first place – the Model UN – and Milhouse is allowed a trial, with Bart as a judge.
A narration by actor James Earl Jones recounts that the kids learned to live in peace and were rescued soon after by "oh, let's say, Moe".
[1] Back at home, Homer discovers that Ned Flanders has his own home-based Internet business and decides he wants to start his own company.
When escaping from the other children, Bart, Lisa and Milhouse have to swing across a gap on a vine; Milhouse goes across first, but refuses to throw the vine back (calling out that "there's no time") in a reference to the opening scene of the 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark, where Satipo does the same to Indiana Jones (but as an act of betrayal).
[5] In a 2006 article in USA Today, "Das Bus" was highlighted among the six best episodes of The Simpsons season 9, along with "Trash of the Titans", "The Last Temptation of Krust", "The Cartridge Family", "Dumbbell Indemnity", and "The Joy of Sect".
[6] The authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, called it a "fantastic episode", adding: "Ignore the Internet business side, and wallow in the cleverness of the children trapped on the island.