The Simpsons fans have resurfaced another clip to wonder “Will this horrible year never end?” Anonymous_cowar69 posted the clip to r/television and fans have been quick to joke about it being another instance of the show predicting the future. For those unaware, this clip of the family waiting for the ball to drop on New Year’s is from Season 9’s The Trouble With Trillions. 2020 has brought a lot of news to report with the Australian Wildfires, the coronavirus pandemic, the locust increases, Murder Hornets, and now worldwide protests surrounding police brutality in the United States.
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When the weird hornet clip emerged on social media last month, Bart’s voice actor Nancy Cartwright spoke to Entertainment Tonight about how the show always seems to have a way of worming into the present.
“We’ve got quite a track record, which is impressive,” Cartwright laughed, while Yardley Smith, who voices Lisa, interjected, “If you’ve been on for three decades, probably you’re going to hit it once in a while.”
The Simpsons | Will this horrible year never end? | Only halfway there, but very much the feeling across the world. from r/television
Showrunner Al Jean also chuckled, “What people are telling us now is, ‘Start predicting some good things!’ Because these have been too negative.”
Earlier this year, a 1993 episode called Marge in Chains made the rounds on social media. That’s the episode with the “Osaka Flu” and the hornets. Bill Oakley didn’t want people to use their show for nefarious purposes on social media.
“I don’t like it being used for nefarious purposes,” Oakley told The Hollywood Reporter. “The idea that anyone misappropriates it to make coronavirus seem like an Asian plot is terrible. In terms of trying to place blame on Asia — I think that is gross. I believe the most antecedent to (Osaka Flu) was the Hong Kong flu of 1968. It was just supposed to be a quick joke about how the flu got here.”
“It was meant to be absurd that someone could cough into box and the virus would survive for six to eight weeks in the box,” he added. “It is cartoonish. We intentionally made it cartoonish because we wanted it to be silly and not scary, and not carry any of these bad associations along with it, which is why the virus itself was acting like a cartoon character and behaving in extremely unrealistic ways.”
“There are very few cases where The Simpsons predicted something,” Oakley also said. “It’s mainly just coincidence because the episodes are so old that history repeats itself. Most of these episodes are based on things that happened in the 60s, 70s or 80s that we knew about.”
Will The Simpsons predict anything else this year? Let us know in the comments!
