Santa's Little Helper for "The Tampa Tribune" listed Santa's Little Helper at number six, writing: "We admire his upbeat nature even after having his legs broken by Mr. Burns and being abandoned by Bart for another dog, Laddie." He also ranked 75th on Retrocrush author Robert Berry's list of "The 100 Greatest Dogs of Pop Culture History" in 2006. The character has attracted some criticism too, though. While reviewing the episode "Bart's Dog Gets an F" in 2010, Nathan Rabin of "The A.V. Club" wrote: "As cartoon dogs go, Santa’s Little Helper is spectacularly unspectacular. In a realm of aggressively anthropomorphic canines, some
Brother's Little Helper Meyer and directed by director Mark Kirkland. It was first broadcast on the Fox network in the United States on October 3, 1999. After the season 5 episode "Bart's Inner Child", Meyer got "a little burned out on writing scripts", so he wrote "Brother's Little Helper" in order to "try [his] hand again". While writing the episode, Meyer was going through "some psychological problems" and found the episode very difficult to write. He was initially so dissatisfied with the first draft that he turned it in with a pseudonym; Vance Jericho. Co-producer Tim Long jokingly commented that the script was