Krusty the Clown: the greatest Simpsons character ever?

In this age of gritty, anti-hero drama, audiences have become conditioned to expect death. The primary question surrounding Breaking Bad was not if Walter White would die, but how. Same with about two-thirds of the cast of Fargo. And if a Game of Thrones actor somehow manages to get through an entire season intact, the natural thing to assume is that it's down to some sort of accidental administrative snafu.

But The Simpsons is different. The characters on The Simpsons don't just live forever, they never even age. They're eternal. And, on the rare occasion that the show has bumped off a character out of design (Maude Flanders) or necessity (Edna Krabappel), they've never actually been very central. The Simpsons universe is so vast that it absorbed these deaths without so much as flinching.

But now? Now it looks like The Simpsons is killing Krusty the Clown. And, if it's true, you're right to be outraged about it.

At a Television Critics Association panel on Sunday, Al Jean made his biggest hint yet that Krusty is for the chop. The death will occur in an episode called A Clown in the Dumps, and that the actor playing the doomed character has won an Emmy for his work on the show. This puts Krusty firmly in the crosshairs.

And, simply put, this would be a travesty. Krusty the Clown – or, to use his birth name, Herschel Shmoikel Pinchas Yerucham Krustofsky – is an institution. An icon. Almost everything the man says is a catchphrase. His laugh is a catchphrase. "Glug-glug, vroom-vroom, thump-thump," is the greatest drink-driving slogan ever written. His vast list of negligently manufactured spin-off merchandising remains the most pointed satire of The Simpsons' own rush to chuck out tat. He's a central figure. Krusty cannot die. If he does, then Gabbo will have won.

Krusty is an important narrative fulcrum, too. Without Krusty, Sideshow Bob has no reason to keep attempting to murder Bart. Without Krusty, important current celebrities such as Bette Midler, Hugh Hefner and Luke Perry have no reason to return to the show. Without Krusty, who's going to introduce new Itchy and Scratchy cartoons? Somebody has to because, while a Simpsons universe without Krusty is dreadful, a Simpsons universe without Itchy and Scratchy is legitimately unthinkable.

And it's not just viewers who hold Krusty in such high esteem, either – Matt Groening loves him so much that he pitched a live-action Krusty the Clown spin-off show starring Dan Castellaneta to Fox 20 years ago. The show never happened, apparently because the cost of buying and training a fleet of beavers to gnaw through Krusty's wooden stilts made the whole thing unfeasible, but this just proves that Krusty is too important to die. Take Barney instead. Take Disco Stu. Take Milhouse if you really must, but not Krusty. Not our dear, sweet, tax-evading, chain-smoking, sometimes-diabetic, lithium-addicted Krusty.

Then again, perhaps we're all barking up the wrong tree. The exhaustive Simpsons Wiki page states that the storyline of A Clown in the Dumps involves Krusty merely retiring as a clown. And don't forget that there are other clowns voiced by people who've won Emmys for their work on the show, too. Kelsey Grammer took one home in 2006 for his performance in The Italian Bob, which suggests that Sideshow Bob might be for the high-jump instead. And, like Krusty, Sideshow Mel is also voiced by four-time winner Dan Castellaneta. So is Krusty's monkey Mr Teeny. Could it just be that the episode will be about Krusty the Clown succumbing to the ravages of grief because he witnesses the horrible death of a loved one? Fingers crossed.

The six worst things that Krusty the Clown has ever done

1. Allowing the Mafia to kidnap Homer (Homie the Clown, 1995) Krusty's enormous gambling debts incur the wrath of Fat Tony. However, the Mafia mistakenly kidnaps Homer instead, due to his enormous resemblance to Krusty.

2. Broadcasting Worker and Parasite (Krusty gets Kancelled, 1993) When Itchy and Scratchy leave Krusty's show to join his competitor Gabbo, Krusty is forced to substitute them for "eastern Europe's favorite cat and mouse team" – an incomprehensible Priit Pärn-style piece of abstract social commentary. "What the hell was that?" exclaims Krusty as it ends. Quite.

3. Opening Kamp Krusty (Kamp Krusty, 1992) After licensing his name to the evil accountant Mr Black, Krusty ends up being associated with Kamp Krusty – a nightmarish childrens' workcamp-style getway location. However, Krusty comes good in the end. After hearing about the hideous conditions of the camp, he closes it and takes the kids on a trip to Tijuana instead.

4. Allowing Bart to eat a sliver of jagged metal (Round Springfield, 1995) Better known for being the episode where Bleeding Gums Murphy dies, Round Spingfield is also where Bart eats a contaminated bowl of Krusty-Os and has to be rushed to hospital.

5. Faking his own death (Bart the Fink, 1996) Bart accidentally reveals that Krusty is a tax cheat, which leads Krusty to fly his plane into a mountain. However, it's revealed that the death was faked and Krusty had assumed the identity of a sailer called Rory B Bellows in an elaborate insurance plan.

6. Employing Sideshow Bob (Various episodes) Of Krusty's numerous errors, the worst has to be hiring the criminal mastermind Robert Underdunk Terwilliger, PhD as his television sidekick. Almost immediately, Sideshow Bob makes a bold grab for power by framing Krusty for robbery. Then comes his obsession with Bart. Then come the rakes. The rest is history.