16:47 You pointing out how musical Homer was in his younger days made me realize how much random singing he does throughout the series as well as reminded me of the episodes where he goes to Rock Star camp and starts a cover band. Makes me wonder if Lisa got her musical talent from Homer.
There was a bit where Lisa says to Homer, "That doesn't make sense". Homer's reply was, "Oh honey, it's a cartoon. It doesn't have to make sense." Then after you see another Homer walking past the window in the background. Those Physisists you asked are correct.
I think what really happened was that the actual reality of the Simpsons world ended after season 8. Remember the end of season 8 "Old man and Lisa" where Homer ended up getting another heart attack? He actually passed away at the end of the episode, right after he (very weakly) said "We could've used that $12,000 dollars", then Lisa starts to correct him saying it's $12 million and we cut to the hallway hearing "Code blue! Code blue!". Homer was already weak enough, and then that last bombshell finished him off. Basically, everything that happened after that episode didn't really happen. It was someone's fever dream or imagination sequence. The reality of the Simpsons ended there. This is another reason why they called it The Zombie Simpsons after that period, and why plot lines and characters' actions got more far-out and unbelievable. And it's why the timeline began making less sense and contradicting set times of other episodes, including the timeline mind boggling "That 90s show" which completely messed up the fixed order of events in the Simpsons history such as the 1970s meeting of Marge and Homer, the 1980 and early 80s era of them getting married and then having Bart and Lisa. And the fixed present time line with Bart 10, Lisa 8, Homer late 30s, etc., during seasons 1-8 always clearly being set in the early 90s. Everything after season 8 "The old man and Lisa" did not really happen. Homer passed away at the end of the episode. I'm sure that many people don't want to go with that possibility because it's dark. But, it makes many other things that have been questioned make alot more sense
@@alvexok5523 You could also say every season after has been entirely in Homer's head, which explains why the seasons after are more outlandish than before
@@thebasedgodmax1163 writers basically have 4 choices. 1. fixed timeline, characters don’t age. sort of silly, gets unbelievable if the show goes on too long. and stale. are the critiques of the american family in 1992 still interesting and fresh if they have to still be writing new episodes about that period in 2023? hard to write, really only done to appease weird nerds on the internet who watch 18 minute youtube videos about a 30 year old cartoon. 2. fixed timeline, characters do age. what most live action shows do. weird to do with cartoons because the whole point of cartoons is that you aren’t bound by the constraints of live action. seems like it would be a deliberate kneecapping for no reason. 3. floating timeline, characters don’t age. optimal for longevity and selling merchandise as characters continue to be their recognizable selves forever. 4. floating timeline, characters do age.worst of both worlds, where the weird nerds aren’t appeased, and again you aren’t using the strengths of cartoons to their potential.
Just to say, Futurama doesn't have a floating timeline. During the newer seasons, characters actually refer to the year as the year the episode aired + 1000. If an episode aired in 2010, they would say the episode takes place in 3010.
uknownada Yeah, I always felt like the Futurama cast ages as the show goes, but they have an advantage since everyone is adults. I noticed the whole time lining up with 1000 years from now thing as well and I admire the series for it. It's almost as if they're aging without telling us because, honestly, the series could've just stayed in 3000 for it's whole run and no one would've cared because it's already in the future.
ToonrificTariq The whole "no aging" thing can also be explained by being the future. On one episode Farnsworth looked like he was 140-150 years old, but he was really 160. Maybe in 3000 they just made people age slower. I dunno.
Yes, so thankful I wasn't the only one that noticed. Futurama is fixed storyline, just look at all the messing around in the early 2000's that we get from Bender's Big Score, and the links to Jurassic Bark. The characters in Futurama aren't seen as aging because it's not that big a problem for their persona's. They are all 20-something or 30-something (Except for the Professor, who's age is frequently trotted out as a joke, much like Mr Burns).
Ah, okay, thanks for clarifying it. I couldn't remember specifically how it worked... I remember they would namedrop the year as 3010 or whatever sometimes, but they also never seem to age (appearance-wise) or act like they've all been together for 10 years, so I got a little confused.
uknownada It's much easier with Futurama to have a fixed timeline as you can explain away characters not ageing with future medical care being super advanced.
The interesting thing you really don't touch on is Bart is an accident that forces Marge and Homer to marry. Bart is ten so that means Homer and Marge cannot be married for more than ten years. Also it means that since Homer is at least 36 (though sometimes as old as 40) Bart has to be born when Homer is 26. From 18 to 26 leaves 8 years that always get lost. Much like on the Golden Girls when Dorothy says she gets knocked up in high school but none of her children are nearly old enough. Which means she has an unseen child.
Homer does explicitly give his age as 24 at the start of the flashback in "I Married Marge," so that more or less checks out, give or take a year or two. I don't think the show ever really establishes that Homer and Marge had Bart right out of high school, although later on they sort of get sloppy with the timeline; in "I Married Marge" the whole point is that they're fairly aimless young people and Bart's birth is what drives Homer to get his shit together (to the extent that he can actually do that, being Homer), rather than being fresh out of high school.
7:37 the reason for the math not lining up is because Lisa’s sax was supposed to air as part of season 7, but was held back until season 9. That’s the reason lunchlady Doris has a speaking part in the episode, despite her voice actor passing away during the run of season 7.
Holdovers are episodes that eventually air on a succeeding season that was produced within an earlier production season, e.g. Season 4 has the code 9F, but the two episodes at the start of the season use 8F as they were initially produced for Season 3. The 19th production season has the most number of holdovers, as nine episodes from the season aired during the 20th broadcast Season.@@skibot9974
@skibot9974 maybe they had too much material for season 7 that they deemed better and put that episode in 'spare' folder until they needed an extra episode to fill a gap?
There was a joke in a newer episode where Homer threw a crappy birthday party and a birthday party organization threatened to take away their birthdays to keep them the same age.
To be fair, they stopped to portrait Skinner as a veteran soldier in the newer seasons probably to not do deal with this kind of problem. They do the same thing with grandpa, never specifying which war he fought.
After doing hours and hours of research, this project was the closest I've ever gotten to just hitting the "delete" key and throwing my computer out the window. Oof, that timeline is messy. The Legend of Zelda got nothing on The Simpsons. (The sad thing is that this probably isn't the most confusing era of The Simpsons timeline.)
TheRealJims Love the Videos! Hopefully getting into the future won't be as difficult for you. By The Simpson's metrics after all, Lisa should be our very next president! 😅
do you agree the simpsons should have ended in the early 2000's before it got horrible...maybe 2002 after season 12-13.....at that point it got stale....it had a good run...wish the movie was earlier...it would have been so much funnier if it was released between seasons 4-8....the fact the kept on going after the movie surprised me...
Tony Becerra they didn't know that. That was a clip produced after Trump's announcement. But it was an amazing coincidence that Lisa's predecessor in that episode happened to be Trump.
Doesn't Work. The 300th Episode confirms One Universe. Marge: "How many times has Homer done something stupid like this?" Bart: *Clicks a hand counter* "300 now"
Had THE SIMPSONS creator and writers stayed with a consistent timeline,Bart Simpson and Lisa Simpson would be turning 38 yrs and 36 yrs old THIS YEAR!!
I think it would've been interesting. Homer was 36 in Season 1 in late '89, implying that's when all the most recent birthdays happened. So Homer is born in 1953 and is now 70. Marge is 68. Bart is 44. Lisa is 42. Maggie is 35. Mr Burns' age would never be quantified, because the "well it has 4 digits" joke is too good to get rid of. Abe was probably 80 in '89 (he's an octogenarian, after all!), making him born in 1909 and making him 114 this year. So he could still be alive, but maybe he passed away several years ago with a good sendoff, like they managed to do for the characters of voice actors/actresses that died. After all, Homer would basically be the new grandpa anyway, since the kids are all the age Homer and Marge were at the start or older. Hell, if Grandpa gets to live well into his 100s, maybe he even meets his first great-great grandchild. That'd be an interesting spot to end his story at. Much more than Apu got. Ned is apparently 60 years old, implying he was born in 1929. This is a pretty modern invention, but I think it's interesting. That'd make him very old today. Maybe dead. Age 94. That would imply that in this alternate universe, we had a resolution to his rivalry with Homer about 10 years ago. It would be a shame to let the oldies die off, like Jasper, Moleman, etc., but maybe they had children who are much the same as them. And the upside is we'd actually get a Kearney timeline that makes sense. Maybe Otto's personality develops as he ages. He was introduced in 1990 and I believe he was like 27. So he'd be born in 1963 and be 60 today. Maybe he finally realised his dreams and became monster truck driver or a host for a monster truck show, or a designer of them, or whatever. Maybe he joined Metallica. Many possibilities. I recognise it'd be a vastly different show and we wouldn't get nearly as many "cozy childhood memories"-style episodes as we did. There are no solutions. Only tradeoffs.
Gen Z was born during the years of 1996-2014. Most zoomers as we think of them now (The TikTok people with broccoli hair) were born around 2000-2005. If he wouldn't become like this until his birth year would be 2000, it'd either be in 2038 or in 2040. Sounds pretty far away, but it's only 15-17 years from now. Marge is usually 36, so that'd make her born in 1987 right now. Lisa was, by the logic of a floating timeline, born in 2015. That makes her Gen A according to most. And apparently kids born in 2013 are as old as Bart. Doesn't make sense to me. They should be toddlers. How can they ride around on skateboards and have confusing encounters with girls? I don't know. I'm only in my early twenties myself, but this stuff already doesn't feel good. Everyone is old or dead. I'm still pretty young, and I am progressing in life, but it's all going so damned fast. Some of the people I went to school with have kids now. Life is so short!
I wouldn't worry about that, many of the main voice actors are coming up for shuffling off. I don't think The Simpsons will still be making new eps involving Homer won't be a thing in 2040
These are the birth years of the characters (my opinion): Bart-1980, Lisa-1982, Maggie-1989, Homer and Marge-1956, Grampa-1907, Mona Simpson-1929, Patty and Selma-1951, Grandma Bouvier-1910, Clancy Bouvier-1920 and Mr. Burns-1886.
There was also an episode with a flashback to Mona, Abe and Homer (as a toddler) at Woodstock '69. Also, that Mona was previously shown to have left Homer and Abe in 1967. Yeah, the Simpsons timeline is messed up.
I'm a little surprised that you didn't end up a little more focused on the fact homer has aged but not his kids! That's a fun part of all this to me. Perhaps something for (the future) ? Lovely as always!
We must remember that Marge has an interesting history with timelines. Don't let her squeamishness in That 90s Show fool you, this is someone who knows how to operate timelines. And what's more, the show has given us an interesting arc with Marge's relationship with timelines. She got her first taste of it with "Marge on the Lam" when Ruth Powers shows her how to retcon precious antique cans. She honed her skills when she joined the police force in "The Springfield Connection", passing the Timeline Exam with flying colors. And let's not forget how the later episode, "The Cartridge Family", ended. After Homer gives up his timeline for good, Marge finds it too irresistible to let go and secretly keeps it for herself. This is a character who is very familiar with timelines so the notion of Marge being too squeamish to have a fixed timeline is patently absurd.
thinkingobserver In the second part of the Who Shot Mr. Burns Simpsons Mysteries episodes, TheRealJims says this monologue about guns instead of timelines. Then, in the Simpsons Mysteries episode about the drinking bird, he parodies that monologue by making it about drinking birds. I decided to do it for this episode with timelines.
@@lilylopnco : Its like the Catholics reply to anything that they cant explain in their own hodge podge religion, " the Lord works in mysterious ways!"
Thanks! Thank goodness for The Simpsons Wiki and FX's Simpsons World! :D (but it still took a depressingly long amount of time to compile all the data after watching/researching)
I'm sure even with those resources it was a major pain. But yeah man, I love your stuff. The animation, music, and analysis is all on point. Keep up the good work!
That is a good explanation... It opens up a line of questioning whether all the high schoolers adopted 70s fashions for their prom outfits and treated it like almost a costume party dance. The sense that I get from the episodes is that there isn't a layer of irony to the theme and it's being played straight, but I think it would at least be arguable. There could be an element we weren't clued in on. The vague '70s atmosphere in "Take My Life, Please" still makes it slightly messy, though. Ugh, that episode. At least that one isn't specifically given a year (despite the aesthetics/references) so that one could be arguable as well.
Okay guys, so the present day episodes all take place around the late 90s-to early 2000s, but when bender, fry, professor Farnsworth, and Lela travel back to stop bart from causing the apocalypse they accidentally cause the new technology we have now to be available about a decade or two earlier, this causes ellen to be president before trump instead of Obama accept when Obama is referenced, these episodes are in an alternate timeline homer created in that treehouse of horror episode where he travels back in time, Probably the timeline where willy gets killed accept for the episodes where willy and Obama are both referenced then that is a third timeline where there is also the mist that destroys people's skin and bart gets eaten by the dog, accept for all the episodes that bart, willy and Obama are all in which case it is in a separate timeline where the aliens take over the earth in the 30s because of of war of the worlds, accept for the episodes where, the aliens didn't take over the world in the 30s, obama is president, and and willy and bart are alive.
In ‘The Simpsons Arcade Game’, it explicitly says Homer’s age is 35 and that’s what I thought how old he was until Season 10’s “The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace” where Homer believes he’s wasted all 38 years of his life and Marge corrects him saying “You’re 39....” This was reconfirmed the next season in “Kill the Alligator & Run” where he is 39 and fears he has three years to live. These were both Shartzwelder episodes,so take from that what you will.
If they would have kept on moving, we could have seen The kids grow up. It could have been very emotional, watching an episode from Season 1, to Season 20 were they would have gone from pre-school to university.
@@SirDavid290 sitcom shows are only funny when the kids are young. That's why the simpsons has been on for so many years. if the kids grew up the show would lose its appeal. Same reason shows always have a baby season 5-6, to replace their growing children. Shows only last 10 yrs max with the kids growing.
There are many problems with the post Golden Age Simpsons seasons (basically, the past 20 seasons). But for me, the biggest problem is retconning familiar characters like the Flanders, Lenny & Carl, Moe, the Van Houtens, etc. into the flashback episodes. On the one hand, it does give Springfield that real "small town" feel where everyone grew up together and never left town. On the other hand, it makes Springfield feel much smaller that it was portrayed during the "Golden Age" period. Instead of Homer and Marge growing up with different childhood friends who we don't see in modern Springfield because they grew apart over the years, we just see younger versions of the same familiar characters. It makes Springfield feel more narrow and confined than it used to feel during the Golden Age seasons.
It would have been pretty fun to talk about the past within the "present", I mean, when did Homer jump the Springfield gorge? That is a very well known memory in the Simpson family. Even Lisas says once "We're tired of that memory" I would like a video talking about those things.
In Angry Dad the movie, they flashback to 2002, when Bart first developed the tv series. I don't have any real concern for continuity in this show though, for instance in some flashback episodes Chief Wiggum is a child with Homer and in some, he's a teenager while Homer is a child. Also, they will retcon or not address events in certain episodes like "The Principal and the Pauper" and Fit Tony taking up the identity of Fat Tony without ever being referred to as Fit Tony again.
Its funny how despite the fact they got a lot of shit for ""The Principal and the Pauper" (even Matt Groening & Harry Shearer have publicly criticised the episode), they still go and do the same "jumping the shark" formula with Fat Tony and Snowball II. Heck, even during the Snowball II one they even referenced "The Principal and the Pauper" by having Lisa refer to Skinner as Principal Tamzariam.
I was born a couple of months before the show first aired, so at least I know the show and I will always be the same age. Hopefully it dies before me though lol
Homer still has that time travel toaster from the Treehouse of Horror episode and sometimes when he wants toast he forgets it's a time toaster. The various changes to the timeline he causes changes the timeline of the show, so for example, one time he accidentally caused the 80s to never happen. Considering how messed up the timelines he entered in during the short, this is more than acceptable for him to deal with. As long as they still have donuts.
Cheers for putting in this much effort. I'm not even a big fan of The Simpsons, but I'm loving how much depth you put into these. Also, I've been wanting to write a little series where they have a floating timeline, but didn't understand how I'd do it. Your videos are helping me out heaps, cheers dude! Please make more!
Yeah, it's easier to play off in Futurama because most of the characters are adults and events are almost all in the distant future anyway. However, Cubert doesn't age and Fry and Leela sure don't *seem* like they're 40 by the end of the series.
I mean Futurama isn't that floaty is it? They always tell you which year it is. Actually if I recall correctly it went with the year the show was aired so the first season was year 3000 - 3001 and seasons 2 3002 and season 3 3003 then later when they got canceled and renewed later I remember them just skipping ahead to the actually year it was when the show was picked up again. If I recall correctly there was an episode called 3012 something being about the end of the world or something and it aired in 2012 when that was a thing.
yeah and in benders big score they are seen celebrating new years and it is mentioned that it's been some years sense the show started so some time must have passed
The Simpsons been on so long that they have had 'flash forward' events in early seasons that would exist in the real past now. Makes me wonder if Futurama was purposely formatted that way to avoid the timeline issues that would have already started cropping up, even in 1999 when Futurama released. Such a unique problem for a show to have created, born almost completely from the sheer length of the run.
“That 90s Show” was the first time I really had my nose rubbed in the fact that times I lived through and remember well have become and will continue to become historical eras, no longer remotely current.
One theory that makes the most sense to me is that The Simpsons timeline is seemingly consistent if we see the show as taken place in their own universe. Stuff that we specifically associate with the 70s , 80s , 90s and so on are stuff we see as nods rather than clues to the timeline. For example "That 90s Show" no longer confuses fans for having references that contradict that current year if we see that The Simpsons have a separate timeline and that the things that happened to us in a time era happened differently to The Simpsons. Please bare in mind that I'm more of a nostalgiac fan of the show and I stopped paying an interest to the newer episodes after a while. So if there's any inconsistencies people see in my comment I'd like to hear them and see if I can work around things that might put holes in my theory presented. Either way, good video.
In "Homer the Vigilante", Homer gives his age: "Well, Mr. Cat Burglar, you'd like to get in here, wouldn't you? There's just one little problem: 36 years ago, some lady gave birth to a mannamed Homer J. Simp -- ohmigod: underage kids drinking beer without apermit!"
So true. Yesterday a producer said that there is no such thing as Simpsons cannon and that the show cannot be analyzed in that way as the events couldn't happen in real life. By that logic, star wars and marvel don't have cannon either. I don't watch the show anymore but it's a shame to see it become creatively bankrupt like this.
Maybe they're stuck in a time loop where all the flashback and flash forward scenes happened on a linear timeline, but they operate on a floating timeline where the the years and the times change, but their ages don't. It might be due to the fact that the Futurama crew crossed over with them and escaping Springfield caused a rip in the space time contiuum.
Slightly off topic but the sheer amount of top of the head knowledge about the Simpsons you have, I thought I was well versed in Simpsons lore, but some of your videos just blow my brain out of the water
Well, in the episode 'Take my life, please' , Homer, when talking about his teenage years, refers to 'a simpler time when all we cared about was nuclear annihilation'. This fear was most significant around the time Ronald Reagan was president of the United States, (1981-'89). Furthermore, because of cooler relations between the USSR and the US during the 'Détente' of the 1970s, the flashback taking time that decade is doubtful. Based on this, the prom could well have happened in the '80s.
I keep hoping for a Treehouse Of Horror episode based on this. One segment where everybody ages to the real time ages they should be now. Another where all the still living Doctor Whos show up to investigate this anomaly, and all the characters of Springfield turn on them to keep this never changing timeline going, and in the end the Simpsons universe collapses in on itself
I really like the way you think and word things in your videos. Edit: And the Animal Crossing music that came on while I was typing this totally helped. (I'm 90% sure it's AC?)
The prom being set into he 1970s really did impact my view of "that 90s show" because it was such a early established and emotional staple of the Simpsons. The fact that they play "why do birds suddenly appear" multiple times to indicate the love blossoming between Homer and Marge, essentially making it thier song, also creates such an association of their early love with it and the Era. That part of the simplsons story went very deep with refrences to the Era, then things got more subtle as they continued the floating timeliness until that 90s show just went hard into pop refrences again that contradicted the last establishment so long before. I think it also has to do with the viewership. The people who grew up with the Simpsons like myself were born in the late 80s/90s (just realizing that his first set birth year makes Bart almost a decade older than myself.) The 80s were something we experienced the echos of so when things started to slide from 70s to 80s in flashbacks it wasn't as obvious and noticeable. Once the stuff we associated as being in the same time Era that the early Simpsons took place and were so prevalent in our own childhoods simultaneously, it creates a weird disconnect. We were playing with skip-its or beanie babies as Bart was 10 years old and all of a sudden Marge and Homer are surrounded by these items well before Bart was even born. It just stands out to us more, so I think that coupled with the juxtaposed intensity that they went with in exploring the floating timeliness concept for that episode really hit a certain uncomfortable subconscious part of our brain telling us that things weren't right. Much more than they had. I also recognize there are a couple other established things in the past that fight the floating timeline and arnt easily remedied. This has to do with Homer's parents. Homer's mom was a flower power eco-fighter which sets up a lot of plot points with his relationship to her, his identity growing up and of course his relationship with his father. Great being still stuck in a 1950s mindset while his wife was reaching out fir liberation that ultimately made her flea her life, is a huge part of why he and Homer would up the way their are. Grandpa also was part of the Hellfish in WWII which is ALSO a huge part of his character and has been used to explore his relationships with other characters like Bart. WWII is a set event that limits the age of Grandpa. We can say a good deal of his stories are senile nonsense but we know for a fact her served I'm Europe in the Great War so that can't be ignored so easily. The Rugrats solve this in their reboot by having grandpa serve in Vietnam instead but even if that could so easily be done with Grandpa (it can't because the simpsons is goes more in depths with explaining the war and certain plot points so that whole characters and events would need to be changed to accommodate unless the Simpsons also hard rebooted), it would pose an issues as eventually Grandpa would be too young to serve in that war too. We could have him be a part of desert storm or other more recent wars but that would still cause for a lot of confusion with his character on how impacting the war and the surrounding culture was. I am not trying to downplay the more recent wars or denounce the impact on its soldiers but world wars were something very different from what we have experienced in our generation. They could kill off Grandpa to avoid the topic altogether but let's be honest that that won't happen and it still leaves a lot of other main characters like Mr. Burns who lived through that Era. I do actually love though that he is shown to be YOUNGER than Grandpa in those flashbacks, despite being portrayed as older than dirt. Mr. Burns CERTIANLY lives on a floating timeline. I wrote the above when he mentioned the one thing breaking the floating timeline and was glad he brushed on some of my other points before the end. I honestly expect a Franklin Richard'sesque character to be altering reality to keep things somewhat the same that would have been introduced or altered at just the right time. Since they also seem to be altering time itself, that would be hard to pinpoint but fun to think about. I considered Magie but that would be too easy and still doesn't make sense in a lot of regards. Perhaps it's Flanders. Still not flawless, but he has a protective flare over the Simpsons and most of Springfield itself. He also has some obvious age shenanigans going on despite addmitting to be much older than he would seem. He also was shown to have gained his faith surviving near death experience he had for saving Homer. Perhaps this connection to God helps him keep things in control (something Flanders has been shown in need of psychologically) at the cost that he would be tormented by the same child who helped him find the ability to do this. It is unnatural so there would need to be an ultimate cost and would also explain why Homer is always the cause of Flanders' wives' deaths but never faces retribution that would send him away. It also explains why the two family's seem almost fated to interact so much from way back. It was that fated trampoline accident that set everything on course. Yeah..this is complete fan hypothesis, conspiracy waters with no real support at this point but it's still a fun explanation. Knowning the writing casts interests and flare for "borrowing" elements from nerdy media, I would not put it past them to go a similar direction to the Marvel explanation and have a character that is supposed to be a in show representation of themselves keeping the status quo without fully realizing their own purpose in a 4th wall break style.
Thanks for a amazing video. Love your stuff. This may have already been asked, or mentioned before, but I was wondering where you stand on the Simpsons shorts and if they fit into this timeline?
I always like the notion of the series existing over potentially infinite parallel universes. There are multiple timelines, one from each. Some episodes are from the same universe/timeline as others. Some are from nearby ones. And some are from drastically different ones. It would also go some way to explaining the ever-changing minor differences in the layout of the house. (a la "Parallels" from Star Trek TNG)
If it was set in the 80s or 90s, why would these teenagers want a 70s themed prom? There is nothing for them to feel nostalgic about, at least in terms of romance.
Well, perhaps the prom originally _was_ is the 70s until the timeline floated so far forward it retroactively became 70s-themed (presumably there'd be a transitional period, pre-nostalgia, during which Springfield was simply behind the times, fashion-wise)
An easy fix for the “it appears that Homer and Marge went to high school in the 70s” would be to say that the entire town of Springfield was *super* into the 70s at the time.
What about Grandpa and Mr Burns? Sometimes Burns implies that he was born before the Great War or sometimes after and that he bought stock in 1929 (Smithers being born 25 years later so 1964). Same with Grandpa he goes from being born in "Nineteen tickety two"[sic] to being a little kid in the Great War (1914-8) to being a competitor in the Berlin Olympics [1936]. And he's been portrayed as a war hero, to being a deserter. And Burns goes from being a slacker to being an implied Nazi collaborator. You could argue that they are senile so they don't remember their past properly though dementia usually effects the short not long term memory first.
theory with the prom. you ever think the theme was 70s? A lot of proms have themes. When I was a senior in HS the theme was America (it was the June after 9/11). The first prom was in the 70s but each retelling 70s is the theme
I DONT UNDETSTAND MARGES HAIR. In some early flash backs her hair is blue and stood up like it is now but in one of them the one where her and homer have a first kiss, her hair is brown and down like normal hair. But in one of the high school flash backs her hair is blue and straight and then she says she wonders what happens if she wears it "up" like how it is now. But its alredy been up before in early flash backs from where she was as young as grade 1. Help and theories would be appreciated thank you lmao
And in one episode Homer is teaching a class and tells everyone that "Marge has been gray as a mule since she was 17" and uses blue hair dye. I don't think it's ever mentioned again in any other episodes, though.
Slushpuppy101 when she was a kid her hair was naturally brown she's been dying it since she was little. Her mother is probably put her hair in the beehive hairdo to match her and when she was teenager she decide to let it down but picked it up again when she married Homer. Most likely the reason for dying her hair is to be like her father who she initially idolize until finding out that he wasn't the pilot but a stewardess then continue that a habit.
@@Doctor_Odin No, in that one episode her hair was brown because she burned it with a straightening iron -- her natural color is blue and presumably after going grey she just dyed it back to her original color.
It's always interesting watching the older episodes where Skinner talks more often about the Vietnam War vs. new ones where he just mentions his military career.
I'm not even kidding when I say that my brain exploded here. This was something I've long since given up on, but.... this was still so extremely interesting!!!!! Thank you for making this :D
There was one episode aired a few years ago where Bart goes back to the past, to when Homer and Marge were in high school, and accidentally changes some things. (Back to the Future, get it? HAHAHAHAHAHA MOVIE REFERENCES) Might have been a Halloween episode. Would that ever count, though?
it was a tree of horror segment, at the end of which there were like 20 homers from all of earth history, not the clone homers from another treehouse segment from 10 years prior.
I remember that episode.. I was on a roadtrip to a family friend's house in basically the middle of nowhere. Where I watched it on a crappy 1980s TV that was about to die, with it connected to a HDMI antenna using a bunch of converters and the picture looked like something from a post apoc movie. That was fun.
In terms of time with cartoons, I always think that their timeline moves slower than ours, which is why Bart and Lisa can be 10 and 8 respectively for several "years," because what we're seeing moves slower than what we experience. It's like how time moves differently in fairyland (e.g. Narnia) where spending time there makes little to no time pass here. I suppose The Simpsons would be opposite. Your theory is much better researched than my blatherings of course hehe.
There is a very good reason the timeline stops working correctly at a certain point. And that point is January 24th, 1991. In the episode "One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish", Homer eats the poisonous part of an ill prepared blow fish in a Japanese restaurant, he goes to the hospital and is told that if he did indeed ingest the poison he has 24 hours to live. The show goes on to show a lot of funny situations caused by this including Homer's bucket list which he follows pretty well. During the night Homer goes downstairs and listens to a recording of Larry King reading the bible and in the morning Marge finds him in the chair believing that he is dead.....except surprise he is Alive!, (from Homer's perspective). In fact I propose that Homer actually did succumb to the poison and that he died and the rest of the series after that has been his confused dream just before he expired. So there you have it. Homer died in season 2, so the Simpson's timeline only had to make sense for 2 years, which it did. After that it is just the dying hallucination of a man who has a crayon stuck in his brain. BTW, the following episode, "The Way We Was", is just Homer reminiscing about his and Marge's early relationship. So there!
16:47 You pointing out how musical Homer was in his younger days made me realize how much random singing he does throughout the series as well as reminded me of the episodes where he goes to Rock Star camp and starts a cover band. Makes me wonder if Lisa got her musical talent from Homer.
Don't forget Bart also has a musical talent with drumming
Checks out.
Not to mention how he knows how to write songs in the barbershop episode.
homer was a member of Sadgasm too
Something something, Burt Ward.
There was a bit where Lisa says to Homer, "That doesn't make sense". Homer's reply was, "Oh honey, it's a cartoon. It doesn't have to make sense." Then after you see another Homer walking past the window in the background. Those Physisists you asked are correct.
Remember that one. It seemed even a bit creepy to me!
nah that's just Guy Incognito
candy makes no sence, it's candy
how does the Simpsons make sen-
Simpson's did it!
Paul Gonzalez-Becerra Lisa said they dident have to make sense remember
"How does the Simpsons timeline work?" It doesn't.
Kes?
It just works
*smashes timeline like AVGN smashes Pong box with broken connector*
Rachel Lee it was fixed by a Toaster... look up the video...
@@Foxy02016 i literally JUST came from that exact video
Let's just say that Homer and Marge's prom was 70s themed and could have happened at any point in the past.
I think what really happened was that the actual reality of the Simpsons world ended after season 8. Remember the end of season 8 "Old man and Lisa" where Homer ended up getting another heart attack? He actually passed away at the end of the episode, right after he (very weakly) said "We could've used that $12,000 dollars", then Lisa starts to correct him saying it's $12 million and we cut to the hallway hearing "Code blue! Code blue!". Homer was already weak enough, and then that last bombshell finished him off.
Basically, everything that happened after that episode didn't really happen. It was someone's fever dream or imagination sequence. The reality of the Simpsons ended there. This is another reason why they called it The Zombie Simpsons after that period, and why plot lines and characters' actions got more far-out and unbelievable. And it's why the timeline began making less sense and contradicting set times of other episodes, including the timeline mind boggling "That 90s show" which completely messed up the fixed order of events in the Simpsons history such as the 1970s meeting of Marge and Homer, the 1980 and early 80s era of them getting married and then having Bart and Lisa. And the fixed present time line with Bart 10, Lisa 8, Homer late 30s, etc., during seasons 1-8 always clearly being set in the early 90s.
Everything after season 8 "The old man and Lisa" did not really happen. Homer passed away at the end of the episode. I'm sure that many people don't want to go with that possibility because it's dark. But, it makes many other things that have been questioned make alot more sense
@@alvexok5523 You could also say every season after has been entirely in Homer's head, which explains why the seasons after are more outlandish than before
If it was why would he pick the 70s especially with the context of the original flash back episode
@@alvexok5523 counterpoint: its a cartoon that uses cartoon logic and is made by people who don't care for continuity as it's not that important
@@thebasedgodmax1163 writers basically have 4 choices. 1. fixed timeline, characters don’t age. sort of silly, gets unbelievable if the show goes on too long. and stale. are the critiques of the american family in 1992 still interesting and fresh if they have to still be writing new episodes about that period in 2023? hard to write, really only done to appease weird nerds on the internet who watch 18 minute youtube videos about a 30 year old cartoon.
2. fixed timeline, characters do age. what most live action shows do. weird to do with cartoons because the whole point of cartoons is that you aren’t bound by the constraints of live action. seems like it would be a deliberate kneecapping for no reason.
3. floating timeline, characters don’t age. optimal for longevity and selling merchandise as characters continue to be their recognizable selves forever.
4. floating timeline, characters do age.worst of both worlds, where the weird nerds aren’t appeased, and again you aren’t using the strengths of cartoons to their potential.
Just to say, Futurama doesn't have a floating timeline. During the newer seasons, characters actually refer to the year as the year the episode aired + 1000. If an episode aired in 2010, they would say the episode takes place in 3010.
uknownada Yeah, I always felt like the Futurama cast ages as the show goes, but they have an advantage since everyone is adults. I noticed the whole time lining up with 1000 years from now thing as well and I admire the series for it. It's almost as if they're aging without telling us because, honestly, the series could've just stayed in 3000 for it's whole run and no one would've cared because it's already in the future.
ToonrificTariq The whole "no aging" thing can also be explained by being the future. On one episode Farnsworth looked like he was 140-150 years old, but he was really 160. Maybe in 3000 they just made people age slower. I dunno.
Yes, so thankful I wasn't the only one that noticed. Futurama is fixed storyline, just look at all the messing around in the early 2000's that we get from Bender's Big Score, and the links to Jurassic Bark. The characters in Futurama aren't seen as aging because it's not that big a problem for their persona's. They are all 20-something or 30-something (Except for the Professor, who's age is frequently trotted out as a joke, much like Mr Burns).
Ah, okay, thanks for clarifying it. I couldn't remember specifically how it worked... I remember they would namedrop the year as 3010 or whatever sometimes, but they also never seem to age (appearance-wise) or act like they've all been together for 10 years, so I got a little confused.
uknownada It's much easier with Futurama to have a fixed timeline as you can explain away characters not ageing with future medical care being super advanced.
I like that one joke in Family Guy where Peter says to Joe's wife either have the baby or don't it's been 6 years.
Why do i remember him saying 18 years
Lois: Stewie, its your first Christmas
Stewie: Again?!
fuck family guy is a show for retard and has no base
And when she was finally born, at the hospital Quagmire says “wow, hard to believe that she’s already 18”.
@@djbazinet8758 that was a dark pedophile joke, because if quagmires perverted nature.
The interesting thing you really don't touch on is Bart is an accident that forces Marge and Homer to marry. Bart is ten so that means Homer and Marge cannot be married for more than ten years.
Also it means that since Homer is at least 36 (though sometimes as old as 40) Bart has to be born when Homer is 26. From 18 to 26 leaves 8 years that always get lost.
Much like on the Golden Girls when Dorothy says she gets knocked up in high school but none of her children are nearly old enough. Which means she has an unseen child.
Markxxx I also remember that marge was visibly pregnant with bart on her wedding day
I know this replies comes too late... but this is adressed in the 90s Nirvana episode
At one point Marge is 34!
DONUTBUZZCUT yeah, in the first series she has a birthday dinner. Which screws with the timeline a lot
Homer does explicitly give his age as 24 at the start of the flashback in "I Married Marge," so that more or less checks out, give or take a year or two. I don't think the show ever really establishes that Homer and Marge had Bart right out of high school, although later on they sort of get sloppy with the timeline; in "I Married Marge" the whole point is that they're fairly aimless young people and Bart's birth is what drives Homer to get his shit together (to the extent that he can actually do that, being Homer), rather than being fresh out of high school.
The timeline is in a flex because of the nuclear power plant's energy leaks.
Radiation is Magic.
Simpson mystery idea: Mr burns age
early on they kept saying he was 108 years old
one episode put him as over 110,
Most episodes say he's 104
In one of the really early episodes (either season 1 or 2) I remember him saying he was only 81. Yeah, they really mess around with that one.
PANGAEA
7:37 the reason for the math not lining up is because Lisa’s sax was supposed to air as part of season 7, but was held back until season 9.
That’s the reason lunchlady Doris has a speaking part in the episode, despite her voice actor passing away during the run of season 7.
How does something get held over for two seasons
Holdovers are episodes that eventually air on a succeeding season that was produced within an earlier production season, e.g. Season 4 has the code 9F, but the two episodes at the start of the season use 8F as they were initially produced for Season 3. The 19th production season has the most number of holdovers, as nine episodes from the season aired during the 20th broadcast Season.@@skibot9974
eeeef,,,rff.6@@skibot9974
@skibot9974 maybe they had too much material for season 7 that they deemed better and put that episode in 'spare' folder until they needed an extra episode to fill a gap?
There was a joke in a newer episode where Homer threw a crappy birthday party and a birthday party organization threatened to take away their birthdays to keep them the same age.
Since the timeline is apparently floating, wouldn't Skinner eventually become a veteran of the first gulf war?
Or maybe, the Vietnam War moves forward too?
To be fair, they stopped to portrait Skinner as a veteran soldier in the newer seasons probably to not do deal with this kind of problem.
They do the same thing with grandpa, never specifying which war he fought.
Eventually grandpa will be a Vietnam veteran
you mean the Sin-Cong war?
xxjoeyladxx alaw
After doing hours and hours of research, this project was the closest I've ever gotten to just hitting the "delete" key and throwing my computer out the window. Oof, that timeline is messy. The Legend of Zelda got nothing on The Simpsons.
(The sad thing is that this probably isn't the most confusing era of The Simpsons timeline.)
TheRealJims Love the Videos! Hopefully getting into the future won't be as difficult for you. By The Simpson's metrics after all, Lisa should be our very next president! 😅
do you agree the simpsons should have ended in the early 2000's before it got horrible...maybe 2002 after season 12-13.....at that point it got stale....it had a good run...wish the movie was earlier...it would have been so much funnier if it was released between seasons 4-8....the fact the kept on going after the movie surprised me...
Tell me how they knew trump was going to be president in the episode with trump and his escalator scene
Tony Becerra they didn't know that. That was a clip produced after Trump's announcement. But it was an amazing coincidence that Lisa's predecessor in that episode happened to be Trump.
oh yea he has mentioned plenty of times he was going to run back in the day
Isn't every season like a parallel universe of what the Simpson's would have been like if they'd been that age in that year?
more like every single episode is a new timeline
Doesn't Work. The 300th Episode confirms One Universe.
Marge: "How many times has Homer done something stupid like this?"
Bart: *Clicks a hand counter* "300 now"
Had THE SIMPSONS creator and writers stayed with a consistent timeline,Bart Simpson and Lisa Simpson would be turning 38 yrs and 36 yrs old THIS YEAR!!
Sammy Lane true!
And- i dont know why but as i read your comment : i tasted french-fry's!.
Holy shit. They'd be the same age as their parents :|
Homer and Marge get married very young. Bart was 1990
Jessica Richards 1980
I think it would've been interesting. Homer was 36 in Season 1 in late '89, implying that's when all the most recent birthdays happened. So Homer is born in 1953 and is now 70. Marge is 68. Bart is 44. Lisa is 42. Maggie is 35. Mr Burns' age would never be quantified, because the "well it has 4 digits" joke is too good to get rid of. Abe was probably 80 in '89 (he's an octogenarian, after all!), making him born in 1909 and making him 114 this year. So he could still be alive, but maybe he passed away several years ago with a good sendoff, like they managed to do for the characters of voice actors/actresses that died. After all, Homer would basically be the new grandpa anyway, since the kids are all the age Homer and Marge were at the start or older. Hell, if Grandpa gets to live well into his 100s, maybe he even meets his first great-great grandchild. That'd be an interesting spot to end his story at. Much more than Apu got. Ned is apparently 60 years old, implying he was born in 1929. This is a pretty modern invention, but I think it's interesting. That'd make him very old today. Maybe dead. Age 94. That would imply that in this alternate universe, we had a resolution to his rivalry with Homer about 10 years ago. It would be a shame to let the oldies die off, like Jasper, Moleman, etc., but maybe they had children who are much the same as them. And the upside is we'd actually get a Kearney timeline that makes sense. Maybe Otto's personality develops as he ages. He was introduced in 1990 and I believe he was like 27. So he'd be born in 1963 and be 60 today. Maybe he finally realised his dreams and became monster truck driver or a host for a monster truck show, or a designer of them, or whatever. Maybe he joined Metallica. Many possibilities. I recognise it'd be a vastly different show and we wouldn't get nearly as many "cozy childhood memories"-style episodes as we did. There are no solutions. Only tradeoffs.
Homer's mother leaving in the sixties is portray several times throught the series, until they killed her off.
The fact that we could see Homer as a Zoomer in the next twenty years fills me with dread
Gen Z was born during the years of 1996-2014. Most zoomers as we think of them now (The TikTok people with broccoli hair) were born around 2000-2005. If he wouldn't become like this until his birth year would be 2000, it'd either be in 2038 or in 2040. Sounds pretty far away, but it's only 15-17 years from now. Marge is usually 36, so that'd make her born in 1987 right now. Lisa was, by the logic of a floating timeline, born in 2015. That makes her Gen A according to most. And apparently kids born in 2013 are as old as Bart. Doesn't make sense to me. They should be toddlers. How can they ride around on skateboards and have confusing encounters with girls? I don't know. I'm only in my early twenties myself, but this stuff already doesn't feel good. Everyone is old or dead. I'm still pretty young, and I am progressing in life, but it's all going so damned fast. Some of the people I went to school with have kids now. Life is so short!
@@TheBcoolGuy This is why I feel like we should enact mandatory conscription of every person 16-30
I wouldn't worry about that, many of the main voice actors are coming up for shuffling off. I don't think The Simpsons will still be making new eps involving Homer won't be a thing in 2040
bart born in 2006. oh no. this is not good. not good
why?
06/06/2006
Be afraid, be very afraid.
William So that's why he's portrayed as a devil :0
Because Determination Actually it is because Marge swallowed a single drop of alcohol while pregnant with him. Don't remember what episode, though
MattFreeze57 that's my sisters birthday ahah
These are the birth years of the characters (my opinion): Bart-1980, Lisa-1982, Maggie-1989, Homer and Marge-1956, Grampa-1907, Mona Simpson-1929, Patty and Selma-1951, Grandma Bouvier-1910, Clancy Bouvier-1920 and Mr. Burns-1886.
On Simpsons wiki Bart Is 1979, Lisa Is 1981 and Maggie 1988.
@@Wayne_Schlagel that makes perfect sense since the first episode aired on December 1989.
I read somewhere that Mr. Burns was born in 1881, not 1886
I think grandpa and Mona was born in the early 1920s
@@TheProfessor230 no he fought in ww1 as a todler
don't forget Homer missed the moon landing in 1969 when he was about 18
He was actually 13ish. He doesn't look that old.
There was also an episode with a flashback to Mona, Abe and Homer (as a toddler) at Woodstock '69. Also, that Mona was previously shown to have left Homer and Abe in 1967. Yeah, the Simpsons timeline is messed up.
Then how was he at Woodstock as a small boy?
I'm a little surprised that you didn't end up a little more focused on the fact homer has aged but not his kids! That's a fun part of all this to me. Perhaps something for (the future) ? Lovely as always!
He did
Homer aged but not his family because they are not real! It's all in his head.
@@mrpgr2321 but that is just a theory
Well, he did give the kids Anti-Aging Hormones
@13:00 :3c
We must remember that Marge has an interesting history with timelines. Don't let her squeamishness in That 90s Show fool you, this is someone who knows how to operate timelines. And what's more, the show has given us an interesting arc with Marge's relationship with timelines. She got her first taste of it with "Marge on the Lam" when Ruth Powers shows her how to retcon precious antique cans. She honed her skills when she joined the police force in "The Springfield Connection", passing the Timeline Exam with flying colors. And let's not forget how the later episode, "The Cartridge Family", ended. After Homer gives up his timeline for good, Marge finds it too irresistible to let go and secretly keeps it for herself. This is a character who is very familiar with timelines so the notion of Marge being too squeamish to have a fixed timeline is patently absurd.
Well played.
I don't get it.
Jackson DeStefano I can't breathe.
thinkingobserver In the second part of the Who Shot Mr. Burns Simpsons Mysteries episodes, TheRealJims says this monologue about guns instead of timelines. Then, in the Simpsons Mysteries episode about the drinking bird, he parodies that monologue by making it about drinking birds. I decided to do it for this episode with timelines.
Jackson DeStefano
The series has been Homer's coma dream since 1992. Everyone knows that.
Tenderfoot Prepper bs
@@lilylopnco : Its like the Catholics reply to anything that they cant explain in their own hodge podge religion, " the Lord works in mysterious ways!"
Well obviously
No that's too easy. More than that even the creators said that's not the case.
Well to be fair
Homer has ACTUALLY been in a coma
Oh my god, I love this channel. Thank you for doing this stuff dude. I cannot imagine the hours it must have taken.
Thanks! Thank goodness for The Simpsons Wiki and FX's Simpsons World! :D
(but it still took a depressingly long amount of time to compile all the data after watching/researching)
I'm sure even with those resources it was a major pain. But yeah man, I love your stuff. The animation, music, and analysis is all on point. Keep up the good work!
pieguyrulz!! i love your channel!! :P im subbed to both of you, keep up the good work guys
PIEGUYRULZ reporting your ass to cops
Oh man he got noticed by a senpai
The prom could just be 70s nostalgia themed, right?
That is a good explanation... It opens up a line of questioning whether all the high schoolers adopted 70s fashions for their prom outfits and treated it like almost a costume party dance. The sense that I get from the episodes is that there isn't a layer of irony to the theme and it's being played straight, but I think it would at least be arguable. There could be an element we weren't clued in on.
The vague '70s atmosphere in "Take My Life, Please" still makes it slightly messy, though. Ugh, that episode. At least that one isn't specifically given a year (despite the aesthetics/references) so that one could be arguable as well.
Hmmm. I was thinking that.
Probably the right explanation.
Okay guys, so the present day episodes all take place around the late 90s-to early 2000s, but when bender, fry, professor Farnsworth, and Lela travel back to stop bart from causing the apocalypse they accidentally cause the new technology we have now to be available about a decade or two earlier, this causes ellen to be president before trump instead of Obama accept when Obama is referenced, these episodes are in an alternate timeline homer created in that treehouse of horror episode where he travels back in time, Probably the timeline where willy gets killed accept for the episodes where willy and Obama are both referenced then that is a third timeline where there is also the mist that destroys people's skin and bart gets eaten by the dog, accept for all the episodes that bart, willy and Obama are all in which case it is in a separate timeline where the aliens take over the earth in the 30s because of of war of the worlds, accept for the episodes where, the aliens didn't take over the world in the 30s, obama is president, and and willy and bart are alive.
Wait what!?. I need to check my HIMYM lore.
Vinícius Contini I believe it was discussed in one of the Robin Sparklez episodes.
In ‘The Simpsons Arcade Game’, it explicitly says Homer’s age is 35 and that’s what I thought how old he was until Season 10’s “The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace” where Homer believes he’s wasted all 38 years of his life and Marge corrects him saying “You’re 39....”
This was reconfirmed the next season in “Kill the Alligator & Run” where he is 39 and fears he has three years to live.
These were both Shartzwelder episodes,so take from that what you will.
It's even more confusing if one lives in Britain, where' The Simpsons' is shown on 3 different channels and in no particular order... *Head Explodes*
Same in America. It comes on every fox network.
I can relate. I have nostalgia for Season 15 since that was the one I have experience with.
I watched it in 2015.
I think the real problem is that the show has just been running too long to make sense anymore
If they would have kept on moving, we could have seen The kids grow up.
It could have been very emotional, watching an episode from Season 1, to Season 20 were they would have gone from pre-school to university.
i kinda wish they would age the show 10 years into the future
Bart should be 40 by now
Can’t believe a cartoon character that’s been around for over 30 years was supossedly born before me.
@@SirDavid290 sitcom shows are only funny when the kids are young. That's why the simpsons has been on for so many years. if the kids grew up the show would lose its appeal. Same reason shows always have a baby season 5-6, to replace their growing children. Shows only last 10 yrs max with the kids growing.
You put in way too much effort in a video, you definitely need more exposure and subs
IKR
Poppa Chub: No Clickbait h
Maybe their school was just really into 70's theme stuff?
There are many problems with the post Golden Age Simpsons seasons (basically, the past 20 seasons). But for me, the biggest problem is retconning familiar characters like the Flanders, Lenny & Carl, Moe, the Van Houtens, etc. into the flashback episodes. On the one hand, it does give Springfield that real "small town" feel where everyone grew up together and never left town. On the other hand, it makes Springfield feel much smaller that it was portrayed during the "Golden Age" period. Instead of Homer and Marge growing up with different childhood friends who we don't see in modern Springfield because they grew apart over the years, we just see younger versions of the same familiar characters. It makes Springfield feel more narrow and confined than it used to feel during the Golden Age seasons.
The floating timeline is also suggested by a throw away line in the episode Beyond Blunderdome "but now in whatever year this is"
It would have been pretty fun to talk about the past within the "present", I mean, when did Homer jump the Springfield gorge? That is a very well known memory in the Simpson family. Even Lisas says once "We're tired of that memory" I would like a video talking about those things.
Rarity Sparkle The Present Timeline Video of Jims is kinda about that topic
So I'm guessing the whole "It's a cartoon show" thing is officially a running gag?
If the timeline continues to float for 5 more years homer will be born after the first episode takes place
In Angry Dad the movie, they flashback to 2002, when Bart first developed the tv series. I don't have any real concern for continuity in this show though, for instance in some flashback episodes Chief Wiggum is a child with Homer and in some, he's a teenager while Homer is a child. Also, they will retcon or not address events in certain episodes like "The Principal and the Pauper" and Fit Tony taking up the identity of Fat Tony without ever being referred to as Fit Tony again.
Its funny how despite the fact they got a lot of shit for ""The Principal and the Pauper" (even Matt Groening & Harry Shearer have publicly criticised the episode), they still go and do the same "jumping the shark" formula with Fat Tony and Snowball II. Heck, even during the Snowball II one they even referenced "The Principal and the Pauper" by having Lisa refer to Skinner as Principal Tamzariam.
I always that it would have been fun if they had kept Fit Tony, kinda like Barney's (almost) permanent transformation into a teetotaler
them not mentioning those things works in the lore though. the town decides to ignore the Skinner thing, for example.
I'm glad you're doing another Simpsons mystery, it's the reason I subscribed to your channel.
If they keep this whole "floating timeline" crap going, before I know it, I'll be older than Homer and Marge lol
Oh don't you worry, we'll all get old and die.
I've tried as hard as I could not to, didn't work
I was about Bart's age when I saw the first season of the Simpsons...I'm now several years older than Homer
I was born a couple of months before the show first aired, so at least I know the show and I will always be the same age. Hopefully it dies before me though lol
@@DavidGarcia-oi5nt you died???
i wish they would permanently age everything by 10 years in the future as its kinda boring just watching bart be 10 forever.
Homer still has that time travel toaster from the Treehouse of Horror episode and sometimes when he wants toast he forgets it's a time toaster. The various changes to the timeline he causes changes the timeline of the show, so for example, one time he accidentally caused the 80s to never happen. Considering how messed up the timelines he entered in during the short, this is more than acceptable for him to deal with. As long as they still have donuts.
Cheers for putting in this much effort. I'm not even a big fan of The Simpsons, but I'm loving how much depth you put into these. Also, I've been wanting to write a little series where they have a floating timeline, but didn't understand how I'd do it. Your videos are helping me out heaps, cheers dude! Please make more!
This is why I stop at season 11. When the 90s ended, the Simpsons ended for me
👏
futurama may or may not be a floating timeline from 3000 show's ending, but fry being frozen will have always happened in new years eve 1999
I think they aged in Benders Big Score. but don't quote me on that
Yeah, it's easier to play off in Futurama because most of the characters are adults and events are almost all in the distant future anyway. However, Cubert doesn't age and Fry and Leela sure don't *seem* like they're 40 by the end of the series.
I mean Futurama isn't that floaty is it? They always tell you which year it is. Actually if I recall correctly it went with the year the show was aired so the first season was year 3000 - 3001 and seasons 2 3002 and season 3 3003 then later when they got canceled and renewed later I remember them just skipping ahead to the actually year it was when the show was picked up again. If I recall correctly there was an episode called 3012 something being about the end of the world or something and it aired in 2012 when that was a thing.
yeah and in benders big score they are seen celebrating new years and it is mentioned that it's been some years sense the show started so some time must have passed
Jack Christmas
Cubert doesn't age because he's a clone.
The Simpsons been on so long that they have had 'flash forward' events in early seasons that would exist in the real past now.
Makes me wonder if Futurama was purposely formatted that way to avoid the timeline issues that would have already started cropping up, even in 1999 when Futurama released. Such a unique problem for a show to have created, born almost completely from the sheer length of the run.
Man, Jim's videos are so fun and entertaining to watch that I'm watching this 3 year old video I've already watched and I'm still fascinated by it
“That 90s Show” was the first time I really had my nose rubbed in the fact that times I lived through and remember well have become and will continue to become historical eras, no longer remotely current.
I've just excepted that the shows continuity has gone right out of the window.
accepted*
me too Matt
I can see smoke coming out of your ears trying to figure this out
One theory that makes the most sense to me is that The Simpsons timeline is seemingly consistent if we see the show as taken place in their own universe. Stuff that we specifically associate with the 70s , 80s , 90s and so on are stuff we see as nods rather than clues to the timeline. For example "That 90s Show" no longer confuses fans for having references that contradict that current year if we see that The Simpsons have a separate timeline and that the things that happened to us in a time era happened differently to The Simpsons. Please bare in mind that I'm more of a nostalgiac fan of the show and I stopped paying an interest to the newer episodes after a while. So if there's any inconsistencies people see in my comment I'd like to hear them and see if I can work around things that might put holes in my theory presented. Either way, good video.
Nice BoJack Horsemen reference! That show is amazing!
Ikr
In "Homer the Vigilante", Homer gives his age: "Well, Mr. Cat Burglar, you'd like to get in here, wouldn't you? There's just one little problem: 36 years ago, some lady gave birth to a mannamed Homer J. Simp -- ohmigod: underage kids drinking beer without apermit!"
the truth is that Barry Allan altered the timeline ..... again.
Keith Austin damn you Flash!
Oh No!
Love your videos mate-keep em coming!
You’re putting more effort into this than the writers do into new episodes
So true. Yesterday a producer said that there is no such thing as Simpsons cannon and that the show cannot be analyzed in that way as the events couldn't happen in real life. By that logic, star wars and marvel don't have cannon either. I don't watch the show anymore but it's a shame to see it become creatively bankrupt like this.
Maybe they're stuck in a time loop where all the flashback and flash forward scenes happened on a linear timeline, but they operate on a floating timeline where the the years and the times change, but their ages don't. It might be due to the fact that the Futurama crew crossed over with them and escaping Springfield caused a rip in the space time contiuum.
Slightly off topic but the sheer amount of top of the head knowledge about the Simpsons you have, I thought I was well versed in Simpsons lore, but some of your videos just blow my brain out of the water
He's the real Jims, man
Looking forward to the Present day Simpsons Timeline video, TheRealJims. Keep up the good work.
Well, in the episode 'Take my life, please' , Homer, when talking about his teenage years, refers to 'a simpler time when all we cared about was nuclear annihilation'. This fear was most significant around the time Ronald Reagan was president of the United States, (1981-'89). Furthermore, because of cooler relations between the USSR and the US during the 'Détente' of the 1970s, the flashback taking time that decade is doubtful. Based on this, the prom could well have happened in the '80s.
Americans were afraid of getting nuked from the 1950s until the fall of the Berlin Wall.
I keep hoping for a Treehouse Of Horror episode based on this. One segment where everybody ages to the real time ages they should be now. Another where all the still living Doctor Whos show up to investigate this anomaly, and all the characters of Springfield turn on them to keep this never changing timeline going, and in the end the Simpsons universe collapses in on itself
awesome video! just discovered this channel yesterday, now I'm subscribed
props for your time and effort you put into this and the rest of your videos.Just fame across this.Great job
Homer was at Woodstock as a kid
Lisa's First Word was made fully during the Season 7 era, just shelved until Season 9, so that's why it implies Lisa should be 10.
I really like the way you think and word things in your videos.
Edit: And the Animal Crossing music that came on while I was typing this totally helped. (I'm 90% sure it's AC?)
Thanks for this video!
Marge is also seen to be dating Lenny before she dates Artie Ziff in a flashback scene in a season 9 episode.
The prom being set into he 1970s really did impact my view of "that 90s show" because it was such a early established and emotional staple of the Simpsons. The fact that they play "why do birds suddenly appear" multiple times to indicate the love blossoming between Homer and Marge, essentially making it thier song, also creates such an association of their early love with it and the Era. That part of the simplsons story went very deep with refrences to the Era, then things got more subtle as they continued the floating timeliness until that 90s show just went hard into pop refrences again that contradicted the last establishment so long before. I think it also has to do with the viewership. The people who grew up with the Simpsons like myself were born in the late 80s/90s (just realizing that his first set birth year makes Bart almost a decade older than myself.) The 80s were something we experienced the echos of so when things started to slide from 70s to 80s in flashbacks it wasn't as obvious and noticeable. Once the stuff we associated as being in the same time Era that the early Simpsons took place and were so prevalent in our own childhoods simultaneously, it creates a weird disconnect. We were playing with skip-its or beanie babies as Bart was 10 years old and all of a sudden Marge and Homer are surrounded by these items well before Bart was even born. It just stands out to us more, so I think that coupled with the juxtaposed intensity that they went with in exploring the floating timeliness concept for that episode really hit a certain uncomfortable subconscious part of our brain telling us that things weren't right. Much more than they had. I also recognize there are a couple other established things in the past that fight the floating timeline and arnt easily remedied. This has to do with Homer's parents. Homer's mom was a flower power eco-fighter which sets up a lot of plot points with his relationship to her, his identity growing up and of course his relationship with his father. Great being still stuck in a 1950s mindset while his wife was reaching out fir liberation that ultimately made her flea her life, is a huge part of why he and Homer would up the way their are. Grandpa also was part of the Hellfish in WWII which is ALSO a huge part of his character and has been used to explore his relationships with other characters like Bart. WWII is a set event that limits the age of Grandpa. We can say a good deal of his stories are senile nonsense but we know for a fact her served I'm Europe in the Great War so that can't be ignored so easily. The Rugrats solve this in their reboot by having grandpa serve in Vietnam instead but even if that could so easily be done with Grandpa (it can't because the simpsons is goes more in depths with explaining the war and certain plot points so that whole characters and events would need to be changed to accommodate unless the Simpsons also hard rebooted), it would pose an issues as eventually Grandpa would be too young to serve in that war too. We could have him be a part of desert storm or other more recent wars but that would still cause for a lot of confusion with his character on how impacting the war and the surrounding culture was. I am not trying to downplay the more recent wars or denounce the impact on its soldiers but world wars were something very different from what we have experienced in our generation. They could kill off Grandpa to avoid the topic altogether but let's be honest that that won't happen and it still leaves a lot of other main characters like Mr. Burns who lived through that Era. I do actually love though that he is shown to be YOUNGER than Grandpa in those flashbacks, despite being portrayed as older than dirt. Mr. Burns CERTIANLY lives on a floating timeline.
I wrote the above when he mentioned the one thing breaking the floating timeline and was glad he brushed on some of my other points before the end. I honestly expect a Franklin Richard'sesque character to be altering reality to keep things somewhat the same that would have been introduced or altered at just the right time. Since they also seem to be altering time itself, that would be hard to pinpoint but fun to think about. I considered Magie but that would be too easy and still doesn't make sense in a lot of regards. Perhaps it's Flanders. Still not flawless, but he has a protective flare over the Simpsons and most of Springfield itself. He also has some obvious age shenanigans going on despite addmitting to be much older than he would seem. He also was shown to have gained his faith surviving near death experience he had for saving Homer. Perhaps this connection to God helps him keep things in control (something Flanders has been shown in need of psychologically) at the cost that he would be tormented by the same child who helped him find the ability to do this. It is unnatural so there would need to be an ultimate cost and would also explain why Homer is always the cause of Flanders' wives' deaths but never faces retribution that would send him away. It also explains why the two family's seem almost fated to interact so much from way back. It was that fated trampoline accident that set everything on course. Yeah..this is complete fan hypothesis, conspiracy waters with no real support at this point but it's still a fun explanation. Knowning the writing casts interests and flare for "borrowing" elements from nerdy media, I would not put it past them to go a similar direction to the Marvel explanation and have a character that is supposed to be a in show representation of themselves keeping the status quo without fully realizing their own purpose in a 4th wall break style.
Thanks for a amazing video. Love your stuff. This may have already been asked, or mentioned before, but I was wondering where you stand on the Simpsons shorts and if they fit into this timeline?
I always like the notion of the series existing over potentially infinite parallel universes. There are multiple timelines, one from each. Some episodes are from the same universe/timeline as others. Some are from nearby ones. And some are from drastically different ones. It would also go some way to explaining the ever-changing minor differences in the layout of the house. (a la "Parallels" from Star Trek TNG)
Theory that could work was that the Prom was just 70s themed, not that the prom had to actually take place in the 70s.
BlinksAwakening Then how you explain everyone dressing like it's the 70s before the prom?
If it was set in the 80s or 90s, why would these teenagers want a 70s themed prom? There is nothing for them to feel nostalgic about, at least in terms of romance.
Well, perhaps the prom originally _was_ is the 70s until the timeline floated so far forward it retroactively became 70s-themed (presumably there'd be a transitional period, pre-nostalgia, during which Springfield was simply behind the times, fashion-wise)
homer and marge's wedding seem to change everytime they flashback even where she wears two different dresses
I like your Simpsons videos! I don't watch the show much but this is some fascinating information.
I love these Simpsons vids man
An easy fix for the “it appears that Homer and Marge went to high school in the 70s” would be to say that the entire town of Springfield was *super* into the 70s at the time.
Just ask Disco Stu
What about Grandpa and Mr Burns? Sometimes Burns implies that he was born before the Great War or sometimes after and that he bought stock in 1929 (Smithers being born 25 years later so 1964). Same with Grandpa he goes from being born in "Nineteen tickety two"[sic] to being a little kid in the Great War (1914-8) to being a competitor in the Berlin Olympics [1936]. And he's been portrayed as a war hero, to being a deserter. And Burns goes from being a slacker to being an implied Nazi collaborator. You could argue that they are senile so they don't remember their past properly though dementia usually effects the short not long term memory first.
There's also Burns scaring children in a picture from the 1700s I believe? haha
For me, Grampa is 83, while Burns is 104.
And also let's remember that they met Santa Claus while fighting the Japanese.
Great video
You earned a sub
theory with the prom. you ever think the theme was 70s? A lot of proms have themes. When I was a senior in HS the theme was America (it was the June after 9/11). The first prom was in the 70s but each retelling 70s is the theme
I DONT UNDETSTAND MARGES HAIR. In some early flash backs her hair is blue and stood up like it is now but in one of them the one where her and homer have a first kiss, her hair is brown and down like normal hair. But in one of the high school flash backs her hair is blue and straight and then she says she wonders what happens if she wears it "up" like how it is now. But its alredy been up before in early flash backs from where she was as young as grade 1. Help and theories would be appreciated thank you lmao
And in one episode Homer is teaching a class and tells everyone that "Marge has been gray as a mule since she was 17" and uses blue hair dye. I don't think it's ever mentioned again in any other episodes, though.
Jeff Jacobson - Marge using blue dye has been mentioned at least twice in the show from what I can recall, and a few times in the comics as well.
Slushpuppy101 when she was a kid her hair was naturally brown she's been dying it since she was little. Her mother is probably put her hair in the beehive hairdo to match her and when she was teenager she decide to let it down but picked it up again when she married Homer. Most likely the reason for dying her hair is to be like her father who she initially idolize until finding out that he wasn't the pilot but a stewardess then continue that a habit.
@@Doctor_Odin No, in that one episode her hair was brown because she burned it with a straightening iron -- her natural color is blue and presumably after going grey she just dyed it back to her original color.
You should do a long version of the past that includes every character.
I know it would be hell to make but omg it would be epic
It's always interesting watching the older episodes where Skinner talks more often about the Vietnam War vs. new ones where he just mentions his military career.
I'm not even kidding when I say that my brain exploded here.
This was something I've long since given up on, but.... this was still so extremely interesting!!!!! Thank you for making this :D
There was one episode aired a few years ago where Bart goes back to the past, to when Homer and Marge were in high school, and accidentally changes some things. (Back to the Future, get it? HAHAHAHAHAHA MOVIE REFERENCES)
Might have been a Halloween episode. Would that ever count, though?
tree house of horrors are non canon
it was a tree of horror segment, at the end of which there were like 20 homers from all of earth history, not the clone homers from another treehouse segment from 10 years prior.
I remember that episode..
I was on a roadtrip to a family friend's house in basically the middle of nowhere. Where I watched it on a crappy 1980s TV that was about to die, with it connected to a HDMI antenna using a bunch of converters and the picture looked like something from a post apoc movie.
That was fun.
1:10 That's some nice glarin' Mr. B!
LOL
4:21 "A very unforgettable episode" oh I see what you did there.
In terms of time with cartoons, I always think that their timeline moves slower than ours, which is why Bart and Lisa can be 10 and 8 respectively for several "years," because what we're seeing moves slower than what we experience. It's like how time moves differently in fairyland (e.g. Narnia) where spending time there makes little to no time pass here. I suppose The Simpsons would be opposite. Your theory is much better researched than my blatherings of course hehe.
"How does the Simpsons timeline work?"
My wife's answer: "It doesn't; it's a cartoon!"
Best wife I ever married... 😎
How many wives have you married?
@@michelleresistance Only the best one! 😉
My thoughts exactly.
Great background music at the beginning
16:31 "a fun exercise to do" lmao nicely edited
Simple. The writers always act like they are writing season 1. The end.
I must ask,
What is the name of that music you use in your Intros??
7:34 from what i remember "Lisa's Sax" was produced in 1995, which makes way more sense
July 11 2020, 5 am. Lol quarantine has me watching these videos again. 🤣
I know it's a mess any way you look at it, but I think it's best to treat That 90s Show like a Halloween special outside the main continuity.
I know that dean sure was a monster.
There is a very good reason the timeline stops working correctly at a certain point.
And that point is January 24th, 1991.
In the episode "One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish", Homer eats the poisonous part of an ill prepared blow fish in a Japanese restaurant, he goes to the hospital and is told that if he did indeed ingest the poison he has 24 hours to live. The show goes on to show a lot of funny situations caused by this including Homer's bucket list which he follows pretty well.
During the night Homer goes downstairs and listens to a recording of Larry King reading the bible and in the morning Marge finds him in the chair believing that he is dead.....except surprise he is Alive!, (from Homer's perspective).
In fact I propose that Homer actually did succumb to the poison and that he died and the rest of the series after that has been his confused dream just before he expired.
So there you have it. Homer died in season 2, so the Simpson's timeline only had to make sense for 2 years, which it did.
After that it is just the dying hallucination of a man who has a crayon stuck in his brain.
BTW, the following episode, "The Way We Was", is just Homer reminiscing about his and Marge's early relationship.
So there!
I love your videos... Don't know if you have done this... But Id love to know how would you end the series? Would you make another movie?
Thanks!
Very interesting examination! The past returns as they say! Truly a wild and amazing journey! Amazing how those kids are still so young!
I just realized that grandpa fighting in WW2 would make him keep getting older and older since ww2 is a set date
I'm sorry, I wasn't listening, I was too busy listening to the Animal Crossing music.
I find it so weird how some things float but others don’t. Like Grandpa’s war service. That guy is definitely over a hundred by now
Dude That 90s Show is one of my fav episodes! That and The President Wore Pearls and Barthood.