“Stop, stop, he’s already dead.” – Adorable Child
The headline here tells you everything you didn’t want to know:
The Simpsons Renewed, Will Pass 500 Episodes
On one level, this is expected. While the show was only officially renewed through Season 22, they’ve already talked publically about a Season 23 Christmas episode that was in production. Contained within the article is both good news and bad news. The good news:
Vulture has learned that Fox has renewed The Simpsons for a 23rd season of animated adventures, taking it through its landmark 500th episode (specifically, it takes the show up to episode 515).
It’s only for one more season, whereas the last renewal was for two. But before dark hope lets you believe that our long nightmare will finally putter out with Season 23, here’s the bad news:
Jean expects the 500th episode to be broadcast in February 2012. “We’ll actually have enough episodes to go into a 24th season,” even if Fox doesn’t officially order that season.
Guh. This Sunday’s episode will be number 469, which means there will be at least 46 more after it. A February 2012 broadcast of #500 would mean they’d have fifteen left heading into the end of Season 23. They have never broadcast fifteen episodes between February and the end of a season. There will very likely be some leftovers at the end of Season 23. Whether that guarantees a Season 24 or not, I have no idea.
Given the lead time, we can push back the date at which production would halt to roughly summer of next year. If the show’s going to end with 515 episodes, that’s about when they’d stop writing new ones. Assuming the stoppage would leak on-line, next summer is the earliest at which we can hope for good news. But hey, maybe they’ll end with a half Season 24 and a 2012 Christmas special? Yeah, probably not.
Oh well, until then I’ll just go back to living in denial that this show will someday collapse under the weight of its own accumulated suck.
Thanks to Al Jean (seriously, could be a prank but didn’t feel like one) for the tip!
Dead Homer Society 
17 responses to “Bad News”
But but but but you said the ratings were baaaaaad.
As has been noted before, the show makes a lot of money through merchandising, and as long as the money keeps flowing (and Fox believes that continuing to air new Simpsons episodes helps, rather than hurts its lucrativeness) the ratings aren’t the most important factor in the equation.
Ratings mean nothing to Zombie Simpsons. It’s a ravenous, merciless beast. It devours all leaving only agony and despair and desolation in its wake.
The ratings could be a -6.2 and the show would still be renewed.
I wish I’d do the same thing with ZS writers that Krusty does with his Gabbo imitation in the quoted episode.
I was hoping The Simpsons would end at 500 episodes but I was wrong :|
Somehow I have an impression that past 500 episodes the show would start getting better again. I mean, all shit must once come to an end, right?
I don’t think this is bad news. I have a curiosity to see how low the show can sink, or, better yet, to see if it will actually improve. I really see no downside to the show going on any longer.
You’re an idiot.
Why?
The simpsons had 13 years to ‘get better’ and it hasn’t. Thinking, wishing, praying it will is just mindless / hopeless optimism.
What? I’m not hoping for it to get better. I want to see it continue just to see what it’ll do next. I’m not hoping for anything, it’s just morbid curiosity. I thought I made myself perfectly clear.
This will mean that just over a third of the episodes are “good” (under a third if you don’t count season 8), with around half of them passable. I sincerely hope it doesn’t carry on much longer, or episodes of “The Simpsons” really will be in the minority.
If you and, it seems, all this site’s readers are so down on the Simpsons being renewed, “Zombie Simpsons”, “how low can they go”, etc., why don’t you stop watching them, stop talking about them, and essentially forget about them. There are those of us out there that still enjoy the show even if it might not be as good as it once was. I still laugh when I watch it (yes, even new episodes) and I take comfort in new (or redone) adventures of familiar friends in a familiar time slot. All this undeserved negativity does is reflect badly on yourselves.
I did stop watching them. I figured the show would eventually peter out and, like a lot of long running shows, would just have a few bad seasons at the end as the network tried to milk it for all it was worth. But Zombie Simpsons has gone beyond that, there are now far more bad episodes than good ones and the greatness of the early seasons is all too easily lost. If it were just some random mediocre show, we wouldn’t do this, but the early seasons of “The Simpsons” deserve better. This site is about making the distinction between the two as clear and bright as possible.
See here for a more detailed explanation:
https://deadhomersociety.wordpress.com/2010/03/04/the-cost-of-zombie-simpsons/
Wren, bagging new episodes is something I enjoy. Much like how you still enjoy watching them.
So in the interest of fairness,if they stop creating the show, I won’t be able to criticise new episodes and you won’t be able to watch them.
Seems fair to me.
“Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.” H. L. Mencken