¡Ay, caramba! The end of The Simpsons is nigh, Nancy Cartwright believes.
Cartwright, who voices Bart Simpson, gave her estimate on Michael Rosenbaum’s Inside of You podcast when Rosenbaum asked how long she thought the animated Fox hit would run.
“40 [seasons]” Cartwright said, before reiterating that was her opinion.
If she’s right, that means The Simpsons only has a few more years — the show is currently in its 37th season. But fans do know that they’ll see the Springfield gang at least that long: In April 2025, Fox ordered four more seasons of The Simpsons, renewing the show through Season 40, which would premiere in 2028.
But Cartwright did say she would “absolutely” go for as long as Fox and the producers of The Simpsons wanted to keep the show going, as long as all of her costars are still alive.
Earlier this year, The Simpsons showrunner Matt Selman said he doesn’t think the show will ever have a series finale that feels like a momentous ending.
“We did an episode about a year and a half ago that was like a parody of the series finale. We jammed every possible series finale concept into one show, so that was sort of my way of saying we’re never going to do a series finale,” he explained to TheWrap at the time. “We did a series finale in the middle of the show that made fun of all the ideas of wrapping everything up or ending.”
Selman added: “The show isn’t supposed to change. The characters reset every week. It’s like Groundhog Day, but they don’t know it — and they don’t die that much. If the show ever did end, there’s no finale, it would just be a regular episode that has the family in it. Probably a little Easter egg here and there, but no ‘I’m going to miss this place.’”
The Simpsons boss echoed those sentiments in a December 2024 interview with the New York Post, saying there will be no “sappy crappo series finale” for the show. “[The last episode will be] a parody of A Christmas Carol with [Mr. Burns] as Scrooge,” he quipped. “The laziest idea!”
The Simpsons, Season 38 Premiere, Sunday, September 27, 8/7c, Fox