When did the Simpsons start to suck?

Personally I prefer seasons 3–13 and most episodes of 14 and a few of 15. Post-15 was crap. As soon as they brought in that freakin’ shadowing effect and started focusing more on current issues to try to be a combination of Family Guy and South Park it sucked. I’m not just saying that; I’ve seen plenty of 16–18 episodes and watched a few segments of Season 20 episodes and I was not laughing at all. It has a completely different feel and doesn’t feel like the Simpsons I’m used to anymore. It’s all Facebook and cell phones and iPods are other teen stuff. It seems too much like it’s trying to “reach out” to the kid population. It just needs to die already.

Die hard Simpsons fans will probably say seasons 4–6 are the best and everything else sucks, but I’m a tad more generous than that. Most will say 3–9 are the best, but compared to 16–21, 10–13 are excellent.

I have Seasons 1–11 on DVD. Seasons 1–2 are just a little too old for me and aren’t as funny.

This shows the “shadowing” effect, the new theme song, and mentions HDTV: http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/921/simpsonsez1.jpg Pretty much sums up everything I hate about the new episodes. :)

I lurve the Simpsons. I accept the change perhaps because I change as well. It grows with me and I am able to watch new episodes which I really enjoy. I think they should keep producing more seasons. Sorry to be the ‘outsider’ on the topic but that is just my opinion on the matter.

about the same time the Family guy got lazy…. so like 2 seasons ago..

Like 1999. Seasons 2 – 9 or so were brilliant. It’s just plain dumb now.

It’s all about 4–9. Though one of these [16, 17, 18] had a lot of funny jokes in the midst of bad storylines. Can’t remember which, because I haven’t bothered to watch the Simpsons in a few years now. It’s a ritual I miss deeply. And unfortunately, it seems that Futurama has begun to suck too, with the advent of the movies. ::sigh::

@DominicX I agree 10–13 are great compared to 16–20. It just keeps going more and more downhill. Not sure if I’d call myself a die hard fan but seasons 4 and 5 are probably the funniest seasons of any tv show ever IMO.

@hookecho

On TV.com, the highest rated seasons are 5 & 6, followed by 4, 7, 8, and 9, then 3. Which makes complete sense.

Worst, question, ever! KIDDING!

I was contemplating this before.

When the Simpsons first came out the show was cutting edge. Everyone was up in arms because of how Bart talked to his parents and the things he said. That kind of stuff wasn’t on TV. And the way they attacked taboo subjects because they were a cartoon wasn’t really done before either.

Now you have shows like the Family Guy where a dog dates and has sex with a person. That would never have seen the light of day with out shows like the Simpsons breaking ground. But, in the same step, those shows are making it difficult for the Simpsons to remain what it was and still compete with the same crowd.

And, quite honestly, after as many years as they have been on the air your going to have your good and bad seasons. There are shows that last 8 or 10 years that don’t in my mind pull out, total, as many good shows as the Simpsons have in any give 1 or 2.

But then, what would you expect me to say.

I find that many of the so-called “sucky” seasons are better on second or third viewings. I think the humor has grown more subtle. There aren’t so many tightly-packed, back-to-back jokes, but they’re still worth watching for the most part.

@Naked_Homer I know what you mean about it being controversial, I remember as a little kid some of my friends weren’t allowed to watch the simpsons. These days those first few seasons seem so tame.

@DominicX Sounds pretty accurate, the only thing that surprises me a little is season 3 being rated lower than 8&9.

@hookecho

Well, if I remember correctly. Personally, I would rate them thusly: 8, 7, 6, 5, 9, 4, 3, 10, 11, 12, 13, 2, 14, 15, 1. 16–21 don’t even qualify. :)

Just my personal opinion. I really quite love Season 8. The first Simpsons episode I ever saw was from Season 8.

@Naked_Homer

So you don’t think this (http://www.compsoc.com/~gav/krusty/herpes.wav) would’ve been on TV before The Simpsons? :)

@DominicX – what is that? I am surprised that it was yes. You have to admit it wasn’t mainstream or prominent.

@Naked_Homer

It’s from epsiode 91 in Season 5, ”$pringfield” when Krusty is at the Burns Casino doing stand-up. I always laugh when I hear it…lol

I like them every bit as much as I used to, I’m not obsessively anal retentive enough to sit there and rate the seasons best to worst (no offense @DominicX, I was typing that AS your answer popped up). There’s hit, there’s miss, some are more or less subtle than others, some are more or less rapid fire, and yes, you can’t be 100% cutting edge after 20 years. So far this season I’ve enjoyed both episodes, for my money it’s still ten million percent better than most of the other lazy reality show bullshit that stinks up the airwaves these days. No, it doesn’t push the envelope quite as far as South Park and Family Guy, but it never did. I personally think in ‘89 we had a FAR more repressed society. In case you don’t remember, the late 80s were in the middle of 12 years of Republican control, it was the height of the moral majority, 7–11’s pulled Playboy off its shelves, people boycotted Married…With Children because they made a joke about a dildo, and we were still nearly a decade away from the big lesbian kiss scene on Roseanne which resulted in Laura Dern being blacklisted for 5 years. For ‘89, the Simpsons was cutting edge, and as the times changed, the Simpsons kept up. But then you got South Park, then Family Guy both around a decade later, and they just took it to a whole new level. The Simpsons never tried a tit for tat, it just became more clever, more subtle. And the Simpsons has done EVERYTHING (even South Park realized that, remember the “Simpsons Did It” episode?) And once it had done everything, and it has exhausted the social commentary, it’s said everything it needs to say as well. What’s really left is utilizing the well known characters and taking full advantage the fact that this is a cartoon so there really are no rules about what can happen to the characters…there doesn’t have to be continuity and whatever happens this week doesn’t impact next week.

I’ll continue watching and just say that if you really think it sucks, why the hell are you still watching it?

@dalepetrie

I did that rating in 3 seconds…it’s a pretty good estimate, I think, though, for me. :)

And I stopped watching it after Season 15.

After you cleaned up and started AA.

@DominicX – I’d have a hard time disqualifying any season from my rankings of best to worst if I hadn’t seen them, maybe that’s just me. My point is, I’m just glad there’s a show to be seen every week still, new humor in the vein that I enjoy. Personally, let’s go with your assertion that season 8 is the best. OK, let’s go with that. You’ve had 12 years of watching that season, when it first aired and in reruns, it’s a classic. It’s really hard to watch a show for the first time and suddenly say, you know, that’s better than my favorite, or it fits just after 6 but just before 4, or whatever. Time gives you perspective, and time changes you as well. Where were you in your life when you first saw season 8 and where were you in your life when you first saw season 15 (which evidently made you give up on it). I just think some times people cut off their noses to spite their faces with things like this…they want it to tickle them in a way that it did at one time, and if it doesn’t give you exactly what you expect, you write it off and say it sucks, but then don’t even watch it to know if you’re missing anything. I personally thought last year’s episode where Homer threw a Mardi Gras party then lost the house was as good as many of the best episodes of the series.

@dalepetrie

Um…I’ve seen pretty much all of Seasons 16 and 17 and I’ve seen some season 18 episodes (and I didn’t give up on 15, I like 15, I gave up on post-15 episodes). I was not impressed. My brother and I used to watch it together on TV when the new ones came out. I didn’t like the vast majority of them, not nearly as much as older episodes and I explained why.

Believe me, I watched a few Season 20 episodes to give them a chance and I just don’t like them. I can’t help it; it’s just my opinion. Everyone has their own opinion.

The Simpson’s will never suck.

The Simpson’s has become a classic animated comedic show, in my eyes. I agree to a certain extent that these last season’s are lacking from what they used to be, but I’ll still watch the show from time to time, for old times sake. I grew up with the show, it was ever present in my childhood T.V-watching days. The dysfunctional, yellow skinned Simpson family has grown on me. Call me crazy but I have a soft spot for the show, unlike shows that came after, like Family Guy.
I do agree that The Simpsons does try a little too hard to mimic the zany antics that Family Guy has to offer. The producers should just realize that a good population of The Simpson viewers want the classic material used from the beginning seasons, the material that made everyone fall in love with the show to begin with!

They started to suck when someone came up with the brilliant idea of a talking dog who’s in love with his owners wife and a talking baby who hates his mom.. aaawwww. I love Family Guy!

I’m a little bit surprised at how easily people can discern the different seasons. Given an episode, even one I’ve seen twenty times, I could not tell you what season it was from.

2 or 3 seasons back , i enjoy them just not as much as the older ones .

A lot of people here like it, but I thought season 12 thru 14 sucked. Up to that point, I was recording every show, but had to stop because it was so bad. I thought it was funny that they put Comic Book Guy on the front of the Season 12 DVD, since it was the Worst Season Ever.
My favorite episode is Krusty Robs the QuickE-Mart. That is exactly my taste.

@drdoombot – You know I have been a fan since I watched the premier episode in my dorm room and I agree. I can give you general times but that’s it.

I am grateful that they changed which parent was going to be the pushy mature one. If you watch the first episode homer and marge are opposite characters of what they are now.

Classic lines from that episode:

Homer: We’re the worst family in the neighborhood.

Marge: Maybe we should move to a bigger community.

After tree house of horror 823472

@DominicX – Not trying to jump all over you, you are entitled to your opinion. I’m just confused, when you say something is so bad it doesn’t even get ranked, I think, OK, you’ve seen it, that’s your opinion, great. But then you say you stopped watching before those seasons aired and I think, OK, you’re judging something you haven’t seen. Then you say you HAVE seen them, I guess I’m at a loss, stopped watching to me means you stopped watching, which means you haven’t seen it. Whatever….my original comment about “if you think something sucks, why do you keep watching it” was directed more at the asker anyway, my comment to you specifically was that I meant no offense in talking about how anal retentive it was to sit and rank the seasons when as I was typing that you were doing just that. I agree with @drdoombot FWIW, I wouldn’t be able to tell you for the most part what season a show was from, basically at some point after parenthood became part of my life, I stopped watching every Sunday and just started seeing a lot of them in reruns. In the last couple years I’ve had a DVR and have been recording them and watching them on the day they air, but from my point of view, I really didn’t sit there and see every season in the order in which it aired for probably a good 5 year chunk of time between say seasons 14 and 19….now I see them on reruns, and I know they’re from the time period where people say they “suck”, and to me, I love it when I see a Simpsons I haven’t seen before, it’s like OH Goodie, I missed this one, and though I think they lack the edge we’re getting used to with Family Guy and South Park, I don’t really think they “suck”. And that’s MY opinion, doesn’t mean it’s any more valid than yours, just clarifying.

Does a question about when the Simpsons sucked have anything to do with Marge’s appearence in Playboy this week?

I think the Simpsons started sucking around season 18. Recently it has been slowly getting better in quality though.