Why Has the Show Lasted So Long?
As I mentioned at the start of the book, before The Simpsons debuted, no one thought it would last more than six weeks. Back then, an offbeat show—even a great one, like Police Squad!—lasted an average of six weeks.
It’s now been more than 1,500 weeks—going on thirty years—and The Simpsons is still in business. Thirty years—let this sink in. If the Simpsons had been aging like real people, Bart would be forty, Marge would be collecting Social Security, and Homer would have been dead for eight years.
What is the secret of the show’s longevity? Critics and scholars have proposed theories that range from the wrong to the really, really, really wrong. No one’s had a good explanation, and I finally realized we’re all asking the wrong question. The question is “Why don’t other shows last as long as The Simpsons?”
The answer is actors. Actors in live-action shows get bored doing the same role week after week. Jerry Seinfeld got tired of playing Jerry Seinfeld. The friends on Friends stopped being friends in real life. Only one live-action show lasted nearly as long as The Simpsons, and that’s because it had a star who never complained. The show was called Lassie.
But animation goes on forever: Family Guy remains a hit after fifteen years; South Park is in its twenty-second season; and Mickey Mouse is still around after ninety years of creepy unfunniness.
Which raises the question: when will it end?
My response is always the same: Stop asking. It’s rude. It’s like saying, “Grandma, when are you going to die?” She doesn’t know, and she doesn’t want to think about it.
Even our producers grapple with this question. Every five years, they’ll say, “Well, it’s been twenty/twenty-five/thirty seasons—maybe we should wrap it up.” This is like going to that same grandma and saying, “Nana, you’re seventy-five—that’s a nice round number. Drop dead.”
None of the writers want the show to end. Not as long as we have stories to tell and ex-wives to support. Furthermore, no one is quite sure how to end the series. We’ve been pondering this for decades and nobody’s had a good idea. Before the show ever came on the air, before we had any idea what it would become, Matt Groening had two ideas for a final episode:
- Reveal that Krusty is really Homer. If you look at a design of Krusty without makeup, you’ll see he looks just like Homer. Even though Bart loves Krusty and hates Homer, they’re really the same guy!
- Have Marge remove her tall bouffant hairdo to reveal long bunny ears beneath, like the long-eared rabbits in Matt’s Life in Hell comic strip.
How’s that for a series finale? Homer is Krusty and Marge is a giant rabbit. It’s a wrap-up as irritating as the final Seinfeld and as baffling as the last Lost.
In 2011, the end of The Simpsons seemed a very real possibility. Our ratings were still high, but our budget was out of control: after two decades of incremental raises, even our janitor was pulling down $700,000 a year. Just when it looked like we needed a final episode, we got one: Stewart Burns wrote “Holidays of Future Passed.” The show came back from Korean animation, and it was sweet, funny, and clever. A holiday show set thirty years from now, it revealed what the future held for all our characters. We had the perfect end to the series: The Simpsons began with a Christmas show; now it would end with one. Problem solved.
Then we got horrible news: we weren’t canceled! Everyone at The Simpsons—the actors, the writers, even that janitor—took a pay cut. Why? Because we love our jobs and we love our show. “Holidays of Future Passed” aired seven years ago, so we still have no final show.
Maybe we’ll just use our last episode to tie up loose ends: Maggie will finally talk; Grampa will drop dead; Mr. Burns will drop dead; Homer will shoot Flanders; Marge will shoot Homer. Then she’ll take off her hair and reveal she’s a rabbit.