'Reduce the alist dimension if needed'

def _simplify_shape(self, alist, rec=0):

    if (rec != 0):
        if (len(alist) == 1):
            return alist[(-1)]
        return alist
    if (len(alist) == 1):
        return self._simplify_shape(alist[(-1)], 1)
    return [self._simplify_shape(al, 1) for al in alist]
