Marvel's Simu Liu to Guest Star on The Simpsons in Key Role
Simu Liu is going from Shang-Chi to Springfield in a guest-starring role on The Simpsons. Liu, who entered the Marvel Cinematic Universe as the titular master martial artist in Marvel Studios' Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, is set to voice adult Hubert Wong, the "perfect future boyfriend" of Lisa Simpson (Yeardley Smith). The Kim's Convenience actor will guest star in an upcoming episode titled "When Nelson Met Lisa," set to air as part of The Simpsons Season 34. Joining Liu as guest stars are the recurring Joe Mantegna, reprising his role as mob boss Fat Tony, and Melissa McCarthy as a kid rival of Homer Simpson's (Dan Castellaneta).
"I'm excited about Season 34. It's probably the best 34th season of any show you've ever seen," executive producer and writer Matt Selman, who has served as co-showrunner with Al Jean since 2020, quipped in an interview with Deadline about the new season. "We have two Halloween episodes this year, two Treehouse of Horror episodes. One is three scary stories like we always do, but very scary and weird."
Along with a full-length Treehouse of Horror episode featuring an anime parody of Death Note and a spoof of Stephen King's It, Liu and McCarthy will join the pantheon of big-name guest stars to loan their voices to The Simpsons.
"We have Simu Liu from Marvel's Shang-Chi in an upcoming show as Lisa's perfect future boyfriend," Selman said. "We have our season premiere where Homer gets into a conspiracy cabal while hunting down a missing turtle. I'm very excited about one where Krusty has a kind of nice-guy-type afternoon syndicated Ellen DeGeneres talk show that surprisingly goes awry. And then we have huge guest part for iconic comedy legend Melissa McCarthy coming up. It's a really juicy, funny part where she plays a kid who's Homer's rival for love from Grandpa."
Selman continued: "She plays kind of a quirky kid who has Grandpa's love and Homer's like, 'Why does Grandpa like this kid? And why didn't he like me?' It's really emotional as well. And we have another crazy conceptual episode that explains how The Simpsons know the future. It's a conceptual episode with lots of crazy stuff in it, but it does an explanation of how The Simpsons can predict the future."
The showrunner added of Season 34, "You can't just rest on your laurels. You have to be pushing yourself and challenging yourself and making sure every episode is distinct and emotional and visual and compelling and scary and cinematic. So we do that on like 85 percent of them. That's pretty good. I always thought a B+ was a good grade."
The new season, which was announced alongside Season 33, is set to premiere September 25 on FOX.