What do you consider to be the best season of The Simpsons?

Hey, I didn't grow up with The Simpsons but I always wanted to get a better sense of the iconic American staple. I'm looking to check out a season or two to start. What's your favorite season? Maybe you just remember the episodes. If so, just let me some of your favorite episodes. Thanks!

Oh lordy, this is a tough one since there's just so much Simpsons stuck in my head but picking apart episodes is almost impossible. I will say much like Star Trek TNG, start with the second season. I don't think the show really hits its stride fully until season 3, and it's pretty consistent in quality until...season 8 or 9? As for favourite episodes, these ones are pretty universally considered to be pretty great:

• Homer the Great
• Who Shot Mr. Burns (two-parter)
• Lemon of Troy
• Cape Feare (actually watch all the ones with Sideshow Bob, they're all pretty good)
• You Only Move Twice (Hank Scorpio is the best one-off character in Simpsons history)
• Marge vs the Monorail
• 22 Short Films About Springfield (steamed hams probably the most memed Simpsons bit)

There's honestly too many to list. Homer Badman is one of my favourites purely because of this scene. Also check out the Treehouse of Horror episodes. They're annual Halloween anthology episodes that usually spoof horror movies (at least the old ones did). I think my faves for those are 4 and 5.

I can't remember which seasons are which these days, and I'm too lazy to look it up, but Cape Fear and Marge vs the Monorail are arguably the best and most iconic episodes of the series, so whatever seasons those showed up in would be my pick. Generally all the episodes around that era are solid too.

Season 3! It's pretty much the point at which modern simpsons was formed

I have a smaller "Simpsons was Great" window than many people. For me after season 7 it wasn't really good anymore.

I have to agree. I thought it came into its own early and I love the tone. Lots of Homer being a huge jerk.

seasons 3-9

Well, there are essentially 5 distinct eras of the "golden era" of The Simpsons. While it's not wholly accurate, for simplicity's sake we'll be breaking them down into...

(12 and a half pages of in depth over-analysis cut for time)

So, season 8 is pretty good.

Edit: Also, it's Halloween season. Maybe just watch some of the Treehouse of Horror episodes. They're generally good.

2-11 are all great.

I'm going to say season 8, it's got some of my favourite episodes. It's where you start to see elements that would develop into the problems the later seasons have, but they aren't problems yet. It's a little more exaggerated but it still feels like it fits in naturally with previous seasons. 9 is when you start to see the problems, but they're still minor.

Season 8 has hit after hit after hit. Mountain of Madness, You Only Move Twice, The Mysterious Voyage of Homer, and more.

@brackstone: this is the correct answer - season 8. In addition to the episodes listed, it also has the Xfiles episode, the prohibition episode, the Mr Burns goes bankrupt and has an internal struggle of catsup vs, ketchup before creating his fantastic fishing machine, and the hot pepper episode with Johnny Cash as a desert wolf. Also, the burlesque house episode, which isn’t great but has allowed me to say “s-u-c-c-e-e-s, that’s the way you spell success!” and “I was only in there to get directions on how to get away from there” far more times than anyone should.

Season 5 by far.