[Edna Krabapple] HA! [EK]
I’d think the word corpus of all the main characters is now large enough that the producers can simply robo-stitch together any lines they need for new episodes.
It would be hard to go on without Harry Shearer, but if Yeardley Smith or Julie Kavner quit, I suspect they’d be recast. It’s hard to imagine they’d stop the show for the sake of actors who voice (essentially) one character.
I’m amazed that they hven’t killed off Saturday Night Live yet. Seriously, several presidential administrations have come & gone since this show had even the tiniest bit of cultural relevancy. But it keeps plodding along, like an old forgotten space probe that will hurl thru the galaxy forever.
still good.
with Futurama crossover it will last.
I would say only the 4 Simpson family voice actors could be done without. Don’t get me wrong, Hank and Harry are great, and things would suffer without them but you can have Simpsons episodes without them and their characters. But you can’t do Simpsons without the Simpson family, and that means if Dan, Julie, Nancy, or Yeardly dies, game over man, game over.
*I would say only the 4 Simpson family voice actors could not be done without.
missed edit window, router gone batshit
The show is currently slated to go through at least one more season (2015-16) beyond the current one.
Fox has played hardball with the voice casts’ per show salary before… if the The Simpsons Wikipedia page is right, they last “renegotiated” in 2011. If it isn’t the death of one of the Simpson family voices, I figure it will be some soulless bean-counter at Fox who will decide that it’s cheaper to live with the Simpsons marathons on FXX rather than pay the cast (and writers) for new shows that will finally kill The Simpsons.
My guess: until either:
(a) Dan Castellaneta, Harry Shearer, or Hank Azaria leave the show for whatever reason
or
(b) Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, or Yeardley Smith die.
The women do so few voices that they can be replaced, but the fact that the show didn’t replace Marcia Wallace or Phil Hartman when they died (but did replace Maggie Roswell when she left before deciding to come back) leads me to believe that if they die rather than leave voluntarily, they wouldn’t be.
I don’t think that the precedent of not replacing voice actors who die means anything.
When previous actors died, the show could go on without them, and letting the character die was a way of honoring the deceased.
When one of the majors dies, the show can’t go on without them, which makes the decision quite different. I could easily see the show continuing with a replacement voice (or at least attempting to).
Would like to echo the appreciation for the recent (by whatever standard) *Book Job *episode.
This is pretty much where I fall. I hope it lasts for many years to come, for just that same comfort reason.
I hadn’t actually watched a new episode for a long time until the last year or two when I was on a long-distant flight that had a a bunch of recent Simpsons episodes as part of the in-flight entertainment. I watched a few and to my pleasant surprise they were actually pretty good - much better than I’d have expected.
I think they are going for 30 year anniversary, the last episode will be hard. Either something very special or a normal episode like Gilligan’s Island. Or go back to a Christmas episode like the first episode in Dec 1989.
During negotiations of Futurama, executives at Fox tried to float the idea of replacing all the voice actors with less expensive ones. No one in the industry bit. Sure it would have been a massive bump in scale for the lucky ones chosen, but it’s also crossing the picket line and no one was willing to even entertain the idea.
So basically if it came down to a salary negotiation, I’m confident that we either keep the same cast or The Simpsons gets cancelled. But there will be no replacements.
Now, if someone voluntarily retires that’s a different story altogether. And if someone dies, I guess it would depend on who it was and what workarounds are available. But in both situations, it’s possible you’d get a new voice actor to replace the old one.
Just think, South Park started just 7 years (+/-) after The Simpsons.
Personally, I gave up on The Simpsons back around 2000. I can’t say I’ve seen an episode in years. My favorite for a while was The City New York vs Homer Simpson. SO off the wall and funny. Then started trying to include messages. Blech.
It might be worth watching a few. I also gave up the Simpsons for many years, but recently, I’ve started watching again, and while they’re not quite as good as the best years (seasons 3-8 ish), they’re quite good again. Much better than the worst years.
And they’ve really taken their couch gags to new and amazing heights.
Count me in as saying when one of the main voice cast members (probably female since I believe they’re the oldest by a decade or two) dies.
I hope that’s when they end it at least, or relatively soon before that so that we can get a final goodbye
I still like the Simpsons, so I don’t gleefully hope for its imminent demise…
Still, the fact is that it is close to saturation point in terms of plot-lines. As has already been pointed out, Moe’s bar has had far too many makeovers already. Bart is technically older than I am. And, while I like the idea of crossover episodes with Family Guy and Futurama, the whole thing smells like a bit of a desperate cop-out…
I wonder if they could breathe a bit more life into it by zooming-out away from the Simpsons family and dedicating episodes entirely to other areas of Springfield. Sure, the fact that it has such a monstrous ensemble cast is probably key to its longevity to date - but if they stopped including Simpsons family members altogether, it might give the writers a little more wriggle-room in terms of story-telling.
Looking at the most recent ratings, The Simpsons was 11th in the all-important 18-49 year old demographic. So there is certainly financial reasons to keep it going. As far as the possibility of key actors retiring or dying, is that really important in a cartoon?