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This article is about the character.
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- “"I don't judge Homer or Marge. That's a vengeful God to do."”
- ―Maude Flanders[src]
- “Neddy doesn't believe in insurance. He considers it a form of gambling.”
- ―Maude Flanders[src]
- “In many ways, Maude Flanders was a supporting player in our lives. She didn't grab our attention with memorable catchphrases, or comical accents. But, whether you noticed her or not, Maude was always there ... and we thought she always would be.”
- ―Reverend Timothy Lovejoy at Maude's funeral[src]
- “"Excuse me Edna. I don't think we're talking about love here. We're talking about S-E-X in front of the C-H-I-L-D-R-E-N."”
- ―Maude Flanders[src]
Maude Flanders was the first wife of Ned Flanders and the mother of Todd and Rod Flanders.
Maude and Ned homeless
Maude was a devout Christian who once attended a Bible camp to learn how to be more judgmental, although she wasn’t as preachy as her husband. She campaigned strongly against Itchy and Scratchy with Marge and was often partnered with Helen Lovejoy as they protest against the "evils" in Springfield. She died after being struck by a barrage of shirts fired from t-shirt cannons at the Springfield Speedway.
Biography
Although she spent much of her free time in prayer and reading the Bible, Maude was known to let her hair (and her neckline) down for the occasional dinner party at the home of her neighbors, the Simpsons.
Homer and Moe both found her attractive. Moe made anonymous phone calls to her, and Homer once ogled Maude's low-cut dress at a dinner party, which ended up with him and Marge going to marriage camp.[1].
Maude smiling
Maude liked ficus plants, unflavored nonfat ice milk, and Newsweek Magazine. In one episode, when Marge was arrested for accidental shoplifting, Maude was one of the people who missed Marge’s treats during a bake sale.
After her death, Marge was mildly surprised and concerned to discover Maude's three pairs of shoes, believing this to have been a fetish. [2]
Death
- “I know, they make you uncomfortable.”
- ―Maude Flanders's last words[src]
Maude getting hit by a T-shirt and falling to her death
In 2000, "Alone Again, Natura-Diddily", Maude died after being knocked off a grandstand by several t-shirt cannons at the Springfield Speedway. The shirts had been meant to hit Homer, who wanted one of them. However, before the shirts could hit him, Homer noticed a bobby pin on the ground, and bent over to pick it up. This caused Maude, who was returning to her seat behind Homer, to be struck instead, and fall off the grandstand to her death, at least a 20-foot drop. According to Homer, he had parked in the ambulance zone, which prevented any quick resuscitation.[3].
Her death crushed Ned and their sons, Todd and Rod, who, although used to some measure of hardship (their house getting destroyed[4]) assumed they would always be together (The actual reason her character was killed off was due to a pay dispute between the actress who voiced her character and the show's producers).
Maude's Funeral
Apparently, Homer fell in her grave, which Ned mentioned [5]. Reverend Lovejoy eulogized her as follows: "In many ways, Maude Flanders was a supporting player in our lives. She didn't grab our attention with memorable catchphrases, or comical accents. But, whether you noticed her or not, Maude was always there ... and we thought she always would be." [6]
Praiseland
After her death, the grieving Ned Flanders and the Simpsons saw in her sketchbook a series of drawings that outlined a plan for a Christian-themed amusement park named "Praiseland." Realizing this park to be her final dream, Ned acquired the defunct amusement park "Storytime Village" from Colonel Antoine "Tex" O'Hara ("The Rich Texan") and, with the assistance of Homer and other townspeople, built and opened Praiseland. He memorialized Maude there with a statue of her, and placed on its base a plaque bearing the phrase: "She taught us the joy of shame and the shame of joy."
Praiseland sold Maude memorial items such as masks. Praiseland gained popularity among the residents of Springfield when they erroneously attributed to the statue of Maude the performance of miracles providing religious experiences. The religious experiences were actually hallucinations, caused by gas that was leaking from a gas line near the base of the statue (it was revealed that Springfield natural gas was actually deadlier and more poisonous in area with good ventilation). Feeling that profiting off the memory of his dead wife was wrong, and even more so after the candles near the gas leak nearly caused an explosion, Ned closed down Praiseland [7]. Though the episode aired in February 2000, the events appeared to take place before the winter meaning that the events probably took place before Winter 1999 and 2000.
Post Death Appearances in the Simpsons
- At the start of The Simpsons Halloween Special XIII originally broadcast in the U.S. on November 3, 2002, the Simpsons and Ned Flanders held a seance and summoned Maude's ghost, who proceeded to tell them three horror stories.
- The regular episode Bart Has Two Mommies, which aired March 19, 2006, Maude was shown looking down on her sons from Heaven, and said: "My little boy's growing up." Maggie Roswell voiced her, and she was credited in the premiere airing.
- Maude was also shown to be alive in Season 6 in the episode Lisa's Wedding which was set in the future after the Simpson children had grown up, but written before Season 11 when Maude was killed. However, it should be noted that this was a vision by a possibly illegitimate psychic, and may not have been considered canonical.
- Any time the full (second) opening sequence was played, Maude could still be seen in the quick fly-by leading to when Bart landed on top of Homer's car.
- Maude appeared in flashbacks in the Season 20 episode Dangerous Curves and the Season 21 episode Postcards From the Wedge, as well as other episodes such as Take My Life, Please, The Kids Are All Fight and Fland Canyon
- There was a house in the final level of The Simpsons Game with a huge sign with Maude's name on it, which may have implied that she's literally "living with God."
- Goofingly, she was seen with Ned, Rod, and Todd when an overview of the crowd was seen in Take My Life, Please, even though she was supposed to be dead.
- She was mentioned in Kill the Alligator and Run, A Star is Torn and The Ned-liest Catch
- There are still pictures of Maude in the Flanders home.
- In The Simpsons Road Rage game, if you played as Ned and went airborne, he'll eventually yell out: "AAGH, I'm coming to join ya, Maude!"
- In Treehouse of Horror XXII, Maude appeared as a devil who was sleeping with Satan. Ned killed Homer in an act of revenge and anger, but God refused to resurrect him because Satan wouldn’t like it.
- In How I Wet Your Mother, Maude appeared in Homer's dream as a member of a crowd of women who supported drunk driving, ironically enough.
- In The Simpsons: Tapped Out, Maude's ghost could have been unlocked in the Treehouse of Horror XXIV Event in 2013.
- In the crossover episode The Simpsons Guy, while threatening to hit Peter Griffin with a large rock, Homer said: "Say hi to Maude Flanders!" (Who Peter naturally did not know).
- In "Holidays of Future Passed", Maude appeared as a ghost and remarried to Ned, interestingly claiming that Heaven doesn’t exist, where Ned revealed that Homer had killed Edna Krabappel.
- In "Waiting for Duffman", when Bart and Lisa were playing with the t-shirt cannons, Homer said that no one had ever been killed by a t-shirt cannon. One of the t-shirts hit a picture of Maude in Ned's house and Ned looked at the audience. That referenced the cause of Maude's death.
- In "Fland Canyon", Maude features heavily, appearing in a flashbacks in which her and Ned, amongst others, clean up Springfield's Skid Row, and on the Flanders's and Simpson's family vacation to the Grand Canyon.
- Maude's most recent appearance is in "Flanders' Ladder", where she meets Bart in ghost form to resolve unfinished business. She seems to be jealous of Ned marrying Edna.
- In the episode "Monty Burns' Fleeing Circus", the deceased Maude and Edna Krabappel are sat beside Ned Flanders.
Friends
- Helen Lovejoy
- Timothy Lovejoy
- Luann Van Houten
- Marge Simpson
- Julius Hibbert
- Bernice Hibbert
- Edna Krabappel
- Agnes Skinner
She was often seen with Helen Lovejoy, whom she would protest the evils of Springfield against, and after her death in Season 11, Helen is now often seen with Luann Van Houten and Bernice Hibbert.
Appearances
- Episode – "Dead Putting Society"
- Episode – "Itchy & Scratchy & Marge"
- Episode – "Old Money"
- Episode – "The War of the Simpsons"
- Episode – "Blood Feud"
- Episode – "When Flanders Failed"
- Episode – "Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes?"
- Episode – "Homer the Heretic"
- Episode – "Marge vs. the Monorail"
- Episode – "Duffless"
- Episode – "Marge in Chains"
- Episode – "Bart's Inner Child"
- Episode – "$pringfield (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Legalized Gambling)"
- Episode – "Homer Loves Flanders"
- Episode – "Bart Gets an Elephant"
- Episode – "Grampa vs. Sexual Inadequacy"
- Episode – "Bart of Darkness"
- Episode – "And Maggie Makes Three"
- Episode – "Bart's Comet"
- Episode – "The Springfield Connection"
- Episode – "Home Sweet Homediddly-Dum-Doodily"
- Episode – "Bart Sells His Soul"
- Episode – "Mother Simpson"
- Episode – "Team Homer"
- Episode – "Two Bad Neighbors"
- Episode – "Much Apu About Nothing"
- Episode – "Bart After Dark"
- Episode – "A Milhouse Divided"
- Episode – "Lisa's Date with Density"
- Episode – "Hurricane Neddy"
- Episode – "The Twisted World of Marge Simpson"
- Episode – "My Sister, My Sitter"
- Episode – "Homer vs. the Eighteenth Amendment"
- Episode – "Grade School Confidential"
- Episode – "In Marge We Trust"
- THOH – "Treehouse of Horror VIII"
- Episode – "Bart Star"
- Episode – "Realty Bites"
- Episode – "The Trouble with Trillions"
- Episode – "Natural Born Kissers"
- Episode – "D'oh-in' in the Wind"
- Episode – "Viva Ned Flanders"
- Episode – "I'm with Cupid"
- Episode – "Make Room for Lisa"
- Episode – "Mom and Pop Art"
- Episode – "Brother's Little Helper"
- THOH – "Treehouse of Horror X"
- Episode – "Little Big Mom"
- Episode – "Saddlesore Galactica"
- Episode – "Alone Again, Natura-Diddily" (Death)
- Episode – "Kill the Alligator and Run" (Mentioned and pictured)
- Episode – "I'm Goin' to Praiseland" (Seen in pictures and as a statue)
- THOH – "Treehouse of Horror XIII" (As a ghost)
- Episode – "Bart Has Two Mommies" (returned)
- Episode – "Kill Gil: Vols. 1 & 2"
- Episode – "Dangerous Curves" (Flashback) (returned)
- Episode – "Take My Life, Please" (In crowd with Ned, Rod and Todd due to an error)
- Episode – "Postcards From the Wedge" (Flashback) (returned)
- Episode – "The Ned-liest Catch" (Mentioned and pictured
- THOH – "Treehouse of Horror XXII" (returned)
- Episode – "Holidays of Future Passed" (As a ghost)
- Episode – "How I Wet Your Mother" (Seen in Homer's dream) (returned)
- Episode – "Them, Robot" (Seen in couch gag as a ghost) (returned)
- Episode – "The Man Who Grew Too Much" (Appeared in a picture)
- Episode – "Days of Future Future" (As a ghost) (returned)
- Episode – "The Simpsons Guy" (Mentioned and pictured)
- Episode – "My Fare Lady" (Seen in pixel couch gag as an angel)
- Episode – "Waiting for Duffman" (Picture and indirectly mentioned by Homer)
- Episode – "The Kids Are All Fight" (Flashback) (returned)
- Episode – "Barthood" (Tombstone)
- Episode – "Fland Canyon" (Flashback) (returned)
- Episode – "Monty Burns' Fleeing Circus" (ghost)
- Episode – "Moho House" (ghost)
- Episode – "Dogtown" (grave)
- Episode – "The Serfsons" (severed head)
- Episode – "Haw-Haw Land"
- Episode – "Flanders' Ladder" (ghost)
- Episode – "My Way or the Highway to Heaven"
Video game – The Simpsons: Tapped Out
Gallery
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Citations
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| Maude Flanders | Helen Lovejoy | Elizabeth Hoover | Luann Van Houten | Princess Kashmir | Mary Bailey | Shary Bobbins | Barbara Bush | Mona Simpson | Martha Quimby | |||