I never understood this episode,its been decades so bear with me.maude finds out a aunt is coming to visit and she remember how much she hates her, then learns the plane she was on crashed with only the pilot surviving, she then does a complete 180 degrees and remember all the good things about her.later the aunt walks through the front door, saying that because she was the only one on the plane she decided to take the bus.who flies a plane empty?? why did she take the bus if the plane was going anyway?? why not just take the bus in the first place??

I never understood this episode,its been decades so bear with me.maude finds out a aunt is coming to visit and she remember how much she hates her, then learns the plane she was on crashed with only the pilot surviving, she then does a complete 180 degrees and remember all the good things about her.later the aunt walks through the front door, saying that because she was the only one on the plane she decided to take the bus.who flies a plane empty?? why did she take the bus if the plane was going anyway?? why not just take the bus in the first place??
well let's see...maybe....there were 1 or 2 other people with reservations for the plane but they had to cancel at the last minute, and maybe the aunt didn't find out that she could take a bus to the place until after she bought her ticket for the plane.

but, it's just a sitcom-some things aren't supposed to make sense!:)

Maude's change of Harry about aunt Tinkie is totally understandable...after people die people always tend to gloss over their flaws and remember them as kindly add possible...plus there was major comedic value in seeing Maude go from hating to loving Tinkie.

Tinkie's excuse was pretty weak though, that just seems like bad writing. Why not just have her say that she got scared and decided to take the bus? That would have been a very simple and obvious explanation and would have been supported by Maude's earlier phone call with her.

LOL. It was funny. I thought the woman really died. Then the twist was pulled at the end and Maude was funny towards the end.

This is probably the funniest episode of the entire series, but it suffers from poor syndication cuts. There are two version of the episode on YouTube -- each with a different cut -- and if you watch both versions you can put together most of the information so that the episode makes complete sense.

The reason Tinkie has to specify that she would have been the only person on the flight is so that we as an audience are assured, when it is revealed that the pilot survived, that no one died in this plane crash. If we thought there were dozens of other people on the plane who died in the crash, it would be tough for the episode to end on a laugh. But if we know that there were no passengers, and that the pilot walked away, it makes it sound less serious (though of course there could still be crew, but it is mentioned that it's a tiny commuter flight...). Basically it's just some fancy footwork by the writers so that the audience feels comfortable laughing at the situation by the end of the episode.