Kieran Culkin (“Succession”), Glenn Howerton (“It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia”), Albert Brooks and Cole Escola (“Oh Mary”) are among the guest stars stopping by Springfield during the upcoming Season 37 of “The Simpsons,” the show’s producers announced Saturday at San Diego Comic-Con.
Also Danny Pudi (“Community”), Adam Pally, Brendan and Domhall Gleeson, together at last!
Also during the panel, “Simpsons” producers shared a sneak preview of one of this year’s “Treehouse of Horror” Halloween segments. Idris Elba, Michael Keaton and Viola Davis will be guest starring on that episode, which will feature an opening from guest animator Stan Kelly (from The Onion).
Among those on stage: creator Matt Groening, executive producers Matt Selman and Mike Price, director Matt Faughnan and consulting producer/director David Silverman.
“I honestly thought 36 was where we were going to end it,” Groening joked. “No, there’s no end in sight. We’re going to keep going. We’re going to go until somebody dies. When you know who dies, the Simpsons predicts the there will be dancing in the streets. Except President Vance will ban dancing.”
What’s coming up next is the show’s landmark 800th episode, which will air on Fox in February 2026. “It’s a big deal to do 800 shows, and so we’re going to be doing two brand new original episodes that night,” Selman said. “They’re top secret for now, but I promise you, they’ll be the best 800th episode of anything you’ve ever seen.”
After the recent “Coldplay” incident, in which the Astronomer CEO and its HR head were caught in a tryst, a deep fake claimed that “The Simpsons” predicted it. Selman warned fans not to fall for these “Simpsons predicts the future” memes.
“Who could be so dumb?” he said. “Of all our 800 episodes we did, that those two dumb white folks — I don’t what to call, the takes are done — like, who could think, who has such little reactive intelligence that this is in ‘The Simpsons’? And of course, the answer is hundreds and hundreds of millions of people! But when you see something that claims to be a ‘Simpsons’ prediction, just think for one second. Could that have possibly been on the show? That’s all, just think one second and then comment on the thing ‘they are magic, they’re wizards, they did it again.”
Groening joking said he had the counterpoint: “We are time travelers.” Here were some of his upcoming predictions: “‘The Simpsons’ predicts Elon Musk will be the first man to land on Mars. Amazingly, he will crash land on Mars. But he will radio back that he is marooned there forever. And most emotionally of all, he will be able to hear the cheering all the way.”
Also: “America will return the Statue of Liberty to France and North America remembers what the word Liberty means.” And most importantly: “‘The Simpsons’ predicts kids across America will liberate their Republican parents from the cult of MAGA. And here’s how you do it. Grab the TV remote, go to menu, go to controls, vertical controls, look for channel list and delete Fox News.”
As part of the event, the “Simpsons” team attempted to play a game that Selman dubbed “Simpsons Comic-Con Pictionary,” but the technology was not cooperating. Nonetheless, during that segment, guest animators/writers Michael Cusack (“Smiling Friends”) and Mike McMahan (“Solar Opposites”) came on stage to also talk and ask about “The Simpsons.”
And of course, addressed was the recent surprising uptick in online hot takes about Marge Simpson dying in the show’s Season 36 finale. As Selman recently told Variety, she had done no such thing and that what happened in the recent season finale of the series was not canon, since “there is no canon,” he said at the time. “‘The Simpsons’ doesn’t even have canon!”
“She’s like in every episode,” Selman said at the panel. “There’s a new economy of headlines that try to trick you. I call it ‘trick bait.’ The million headlines saying ‘Simpsons’ kills Marge, and then even those articles admit it, of course, ‘they didn’t do we just wanted you to read our headline.’ So again, just a little ounce of thinking after you read something make your lives a little better.”
