The death of a character from The Simpsons raises questions about whether the time has come for the series – Glosa

It’s hard to imagine a more minor character than Larry Dalrymple. The balding man was a regular at the U Vočka bar, and when his death reveals to other people that he was a full-fledged human being with a rich inner world. This is how the initial situation of the last episode of the popular animated series The Simpsons sounds. However, such media as The Independent also report on this “death”, which only reflects the uproar surrounding it on social networks. Many of them suggest that this is another of the episodes that confirms that the series is mentally shifting and evolving. The 1990s are long gone, which would have treated such a topic with insight and black-humored cynicism. This piece rather skimps on humor and replaces it with existential contemplation. While the flow of time does not apply to serial characters, authors and creators cannot escape.

It’s just one of many shifts rock fans resent. It’s like it’s a special case of “serial cognitive dissonance” where the brain can’t absorb that although time seems to stand still in the series, the society it portrays is constantly evolving. The fact that the characters stopped smoking when the series was bought by Disney was ironically commented on by the creators themselves through the characters concerned. But there are many similar unobtrusive changes that go with time. Note, for example, that Barney has not been seen drinking alcohol in recent seasons, making his escapades seem more like an innate lack of intellect than current drunkenness.

But probably the most remarkable is the very premise of the series: Homer has only a high school education, but is able (albeit with difficulty) to earn enough money to have a house, a wife with three children in the household, and two cars. There is ample evidence circulating on social media that this is practically impossible in today’s United States. What follows are endless disputes about whether the standard of living has fallen so much during those thirty-five years, or whether it was an exaggeration already at the time of the premiere of the series.

Endless replay options

In short, the series has been on the air for too long. Of course, everyone has their own opinion on when the peak came, after which it all started to go downhill, but no one is having as much fun as they did ten, twenty or thirty years ago. Nevertheless, he still watches the new episodes, either out of habit or out of curiosity. Then there are situations that resemble a sophisticated joke that mathematicians play on less knowledgeable persons. They sit them in front of a sufficiently long decimal expansion of the number pi and then use a search engine to prove that it contains, for example, your date of birth or your phone number.

Does this mean that everything is part of some higher cosmic plan? No, due to the nature of pi, there really is anything in its infinite development. The same can be said for the many fascinating moments where The Simpsons seem to be predicting some absurd situation from the future. Donald Trump’s presidency is most often mentioned in this context. But as indicated by the musicians from the band Cypress Hill, who will actually play with the London Philharmonic, in their case it was more about inspiration, the realization of which was pushed by their fans. Where in Donald Trump’s head came the idea of ​​him as the president of the USA, only he knows, but he could easily have liked this vision presented in a seemingly insignificant animation.

These are just a few of the many thought-provoking thoughts that came from watching a series that originally had no ambitions other than to entertain. It’s hard to imagine what the world will be like after new parts are no longer created. But as the creators metaphorically warn through Larry, such a moment awaits everyone and everything.