'The Simpsons' under threat from cancellation

[Tornado]

Nobody wants to take a 45% pay cut, but the stars of the Simpsons get paid silly money - until this pay dispute, it was around $400,000 per actor per episode. They're very wealthy people now, and while a 45% pay cut is a lot, I'm sure it won't leave them destitute.

Not sure how this is relevant in the slightest.

[batson]

The Simpsons is my most beloved franchise of all time (if only due to the first 7 seasons of the show) so if the show is indeed coming to an end im going to feel... well... let me put it in a way that im sure everyone here will be able to relate to: im going to feel pretty much the way you would feel if Sega announced they would stop making Sonic games.

So yeah, not happy. The Simpsons coming to an end would feel like a really major part of the world i grew up in disapearing.

[Noir]

I've never found The Simpsons to be a particularly fantastic show in any way and in the approximately ten to twenty times I've ever actually watched it, they have all been because there was nothing more entertaining on TV at the time. So I really couldn't give less of a damn if there were to be no new episodes.

However I appreciate the show for its animation (at least, before the movie turned it to shit) and for lasting such a long time and would be somewhat sad to have such a pop culture icon die off.

[Ferno]

I happened to like the Simpsons Movie, for many reasons, and the animation was one of the main ones. I mean, yeah it wasn't Disney or (2D)Dreamworks (mainly sticking to western examples here,) but for what it was, I liked it.

wurld, y u never liek wut i leik?

[turbojet]

Imagine if the Boondocks went to Fox like it was supposed to. Jesus, the censors.

[SHAX Hedgefox]

I honestly could not care whether it dies or not. Hell, I'd prefer it if The Simpsons was cancelled. The new episodes are terrible, with stupid plots, terrible humour, and some episodes are basically the shows creators screaming "WE'RE STILL RELEVANT DAMNIT!", like the Twilight episode, or the Beverly Hills episode.

That said, it'd be nice if the series actually had a conclusion as opposed to just cutting off midway.

[Patticus]

Not sure how this is relevant in the slightest.

[Tornado]

I'm aware of this. Aquaslash was still correct, so I still don't see the relevance. They are the talent behind a show that probably makes Fox more money than any other single non-sports-related thing on the channel, and with each passing year the money they make increases because the syndication package and merchandising gets bigger; yet they make a fraction of what the people in those other shows make (because a million an episode for main cast members is much more typical for a "normal" sitcom of similar popularity).

And they should supposedly be okay with Fox basically demanding that they halve all of their salaries or the show gets cancelled? Fuck Fox.

[PaddyFancy]

I have little sympathy for Fox or anything Fox does because at the end its still part of the Murdoch Empire, and we all know what they get up to in the media.

[turbojet]

I know that you meant the Entertainment section, but I liked it because, in my mind,it read as "Fuck Fox News."

[Jacky]

Be sad to see it go, i've always been more of a casual fan of it, and i certainly enjoyed the movie as well.

guess everything truly comes to an end.

[Random Rhyme]

I mean I know that it had to end eventually but now it feels kind of unreal that it might end.

In a way I feel that if they end it based on this that a proper ending to the series would be less likely to happen since it wouldn't be sincere.

[DJ FLiGHTS]

Haven't watched their stuff in awhile. Wonder if they'll really let themselves die? I foresee one side's gotta buckle to keep this going.

[Solkia]

About fucking time.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Eh, it's been surpassed.

Groening's more successful with Futurama, the animated-family-comedy slot was taken by Family Guy after it was revealed McFarlane could at least pull off a pop-culture reference better than The Simpson's writers...

Y'know, watching any episode...it seems so dull. I can't remember the last time I had a genuinely laugh at it. I mean, Family Guy occasionally pulls out a joke that leaves me in stitches, and Futurama is still as awesome as when I last checked. It's a 90s relic, like Sony. It's just gotta go in the end...

[\gunther]

I'm going to be incredibly glum if The SImpsons ends. Not only due to it's place in American culture and the history of ANimation... but because I secretly always hoped to one day ramble to grandkids about how The Simpsons was actually good in my day. It just seems like a show that should always exist to me, for some reason, even though the quality has been less than stellar these past few years.

I'm going to be especially pissed if it gets canned for this reason.

[SchemingMinor]

The Simpsons have also been suspected to receive their own network channel due to News Corp. COO Chase Carey throwing the idea out during a conference meeting:

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2011/09/could-homer-simpson-get-his-own-channel.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+newsandbuzz+%28News+%26+Buzz%29

[\gunther]

The Simpsons have also been suspected to receive their own network channel due to News Corp. COO Chase Carey throwing the idea out during a conference meeting:

http://latimesblogs....ews+%26+Buzz%29

This proposal fills me with curiosity, excitement, and nausea.

Mostly nausea I think.

[Swiss]

Well, it's been stale for a long time now, so I'd actually be glad to see the milking stop.

But forgetting that, I'd have to watch the episode with Bryan Cranston in, if only to see if there are any Breaking Bad references.

[ChikaBoing]

the animated-family-comedy slot was taken by Family Guy after it was revealed McFarlane could at least pull off a pop-culture reference better than The Simpson's writers...

[Ferno]

http://www.avclub.com/articles/fox-executive-says-any-new-simpsons-season-would-l,62930/

Fox executive says any new Simpsons season would likely be its last

By Sean O'Neal October 6, 2011

Fulfilling a prophecy first spoken aloud by Troy McClure, a Fox executive has confirmed to The Wrap that The Simpsons is “no longer profitable for the network”—spelling out in those magic, long-ago-foretold words what this week’s tense salary negotiations have already suggested—and that any new season of the show after the current one would likely be its last. That’s a far more pessimistic outlook than Fox was initially pushing, and it comes on the back of what would seem to be the positive update that the show’s producers have now agreed to accept drastic pay cuts in order to continue. However, that same studio executive says now that even if the voiceover cast also accepts having its salaries cut nearly in half without any taste of syndication or merchandising profits to make up for it, their agreement will still only be for one more season, as that’s all that Fox is willing to make—especially given yesterday’s report that they’d reap a huge financial reward once they’re free to sell syndicated episodes to cable.

All of the actors have until noon tomorrow to decide, and if they decline, of course, the current 23rd season will be its last. So if The Wrap’s source is to be believed, the best-case scenario here is that 2012 will mark the beginning of the end for The Simpsons (just like the Mayans predicted!), and the show will fall just short of attaining a tidy, landmark, pleasing-to-OCD-types 25 seasons. But of course, this runs counter to Fox’s earlier avowal that they hoped to reach a deal that would allow the show “to go on entertaining audiences with original episodes for many years to come,” so we’re not really sure which statement to believe—the one that sounds like PR spin, or the one that sounds like a planted scare tactic. George Burns was right: Showbiz is a horrible bitch goddess.

Edited October 6, 2011 by Inferno

[#EndyGate]

At the very least they need to end it at 500

[Nepenthe]

I stopped watching the Simpsons before its apparent downturn and never really went back to it. It just wasn't a memorable part of my childhood and is barely a relevant part of my pop culture perspective because I don't watch a lot of primetime TV anyway. It won't be all that weird to me when it's been canned.

[JezMM]

24 isn't so bad a number to end on, at least it's even. But yes, if it must, end on 500.

I guess it was a day that was eventually going to come, just weird because you never imagined it would really. I don't mind if it ends, as long as it ends GOOD. If season 24 is the last, god help the writers who have to pen the final episode - knowing that it will be the final episode.

[AdventChild]

The Simpsons had been a very good part of my childhood and I think even the new ones are good and decent. It'll be sad to see these series to end. They could at least reach to the 500 episode mark, and maybe......at least make a MLPFiM parody/reference before kicking the bucket. Well, if the current cast isn't willing to go on, then the other option would be getting new VAs that sound very close to the originals, but of course, it'll be hard to find such a cast with VA-ing of that kind of caliber.

I do hope that there will be a chance of it continuing on longer, but it'll definitely be missed if it does end.