Where Should I Stop Watching The Simpsons?

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You see, a while ago, there was this thread dedicated just to The Simpsons. By that time, I already some interest in watching the show, but I think reading all those memories and remarks from you guys was became one of the reasons that eventually truly made me want to experience it. So far, I have went through the first two seasons and halfway through the third, and I must say, it is being a very entertaining trip so far! But there's a problem...

 

As almost all of us can agree on, the first eight seasons are all must-see. We can also agree that the show began to decline and lost its quality. But the most divisive question is, where did the decline start, and where did the Golden Era end? I just hope that, with the poll and some civil discussion, we can reach a consensus... So, where should I stop watching The Simpsons?

[Pablo_Doom_Guy]

Mmmm after season 10 i would say , season 11 and 12 are meh , after that is a super mess for me =/ . It's a shame because they used to be a show i enjoyed to watch , now i only watch old espisodes . 

 

 

[Master O]

For those of us who don't know, what is the last episode of season 10?

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Just now, Master O said:

For those of us who don't know, what is the last episode of season 10?

Just googled it. Its 30 Minutes Over Tokyo.

[Linguica]

Season 8 for sure. It was the last season to have good show runners. Season 9 is when we got Armin Tanzarian, Manjula, and other assorted nonsense.

[diosoth]

Even the actors & most of the crew say it died with the Armin Tamzarian episode. Certainly the modern stuff is forgettable. Matt Groening floats by on ego, believing he's above all critique because the show is still on(his reaction over a MINOR bit of critique about Apu caused him to have an overreactionary meltdown), and Fox is too scared to cancel a long-running network franchise even if it's a pitiful shell of what it was, because of long-running name recognition. It would be like Mattel ending Barbie, even though barely anyone cares about that franchise anymore and it sort of struggles to make cash(Mattel is, in fact, teetering on bankruptcy), because it's a long-running brand that people recognize even if you know little about the franchise aside from the name.

[Murdoch]

3 - 8 are definitely the best seasons.

[Jello]

Yeah, season 8. There were some ok episodes in season 9, like The Cartridge Family, Das Bus, and Simpson Tide. But for the most part it was pretty much downhill after Season 8. And it could be strongly argued that seasons 1 and 2 are pretty lackluster as well. It wasn't until season 3 that the writing really started to improve and the characters became more developed. 

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12 hours ago, Jello said:

And it could be strongly argued that seasons 1 and 2 are pretty lackluster as well. It wasn't until season 3 that the writing really started to improve and the characters became more developed. 

I can kinda see that point being made for Season 1, but I have to respectfully disagree completely about Season 2. It was very consistent in quality and had many classic episodes.

[CyberDreams]

I personally love Season 1 and 2. For the longest time i only had Season 1 and 2 on DVD so i would watch them constantly, besides sporadic episodes on TV that is. Season 2 definitely has some great episodes so if for some reason you don't gel with Season 1, start there i guess.

 

For some reason my dad still watches The Simpsons as well. I guess he still loves it. I mean he's only been watching it since it started airing so i guess i can't blame him ;)

[Phobus]

To be honest, if I had all of The Simpsons available to me to watch right now, I'd probably not stop at any given point when told, as there's always another "actually pretty good" episode ahead. The reason and time to stop watching is when you've gotten bored of it. That won't be when somebody tells you it should be and you probably would only perceive the change in quality if you were binge watching it. It was really, really good from Season 2-8 though, IMO. If you had to see the best of it, you'd probably catch most of it there.

[Nekr0s1s]

i stopped watching after season 20, mostly because of the references to current social-political issues.

[Clippy]

7 hours ago, Nekr0s1s said:

i stopped watching after season 20, mostly because of the references to current social-political issues.

I didn't make it that far

 

Sad to hear the show got that way

[diosoth]

Matt Groening went the same direction as Trey Parker & Matt Stone did, pandering to the same crowd for attention- and one guess which side is praising South Park these days. Now there's another show that lasted far too long for its own good and left the creators with inflated egos that think they're above critique or disagreements. Seth MacFarlane(who can at least tell decent jokes when he's not forcing a message) at least wore his politics on his sleeve from day one, these others seemed to switch sides the second they got famous enough to claim that they were above all criticism just to they could shout baseless accusations at their critics instead of perhaps listening or GASP even agreeing with them.

 

Having a few million dollars in your bank account doesn't mean you're 100% right. Shame celebs can't understand that regardless of their politics(of which many don't even care about but flaunt for publicity, they'll switch sides for enough money)

 

(on that note I will say that while I like Family Guy, it's to a degree... the smaller jokes are often funny but the show has severely inconsistent writing, MacFarlane's own politics can get as extreme as the other side and as time went on it suffered the same as the other shows- too "popular" to cancel, the ideas were used up and it's struggling to stay around. "Fresh" isn't part of the equation anymore for those shows. It also relies far too much on pop culture references, often to stuff the audience has forgotten about. Though Seth may have had a falling out with Fox recently as Orville is hopping networks)

Edited February 25, 2020 by diosoth