The Disney-Fox merger brought the House of Mouse a lot of valuable new brands to add to their ever-growing collection, including X-Men, Fantastic Four, Avatar, Aliens and The Simpsons. Fox’s animated series is way past its heyday, of course, but it’s a cultural institution that Disney will likely be thinking of ways to mine for all it’s worth. And creator Matt Groening thinks that will involve a new film hitting theaters before very long.
While speaking about the show at Comic-Con this weekend, the inevitable question of whether a sequel to 2007’s The Simpsons Movie would ever happen came up and Groening suggested it’s a matter of when at this point rather than if. In classic Simpsons style, the producer zeroed in on the reason why it’s bound to happen: money.
“No doubt there will be another Simpsons movie one of these days. I think Disney wants something for its money.”
If Groening doesn’t sound particularly thrilled with the idea of another Simpsons movie, that’s because the last one – while very successful – was apparently hell to make. At the same panel, he explained that the 2007 film took a lot out of the production team as they had to produce it alongside the series itself.
“This is a true answer. The first Simpsons Movie almost killed us. We didn’t have a B-team waiting to do The Simpsons Movie, so the same people who wrote, animated, voiced and did the music for The Simpsons TV show also did the movie. That was in 2007. We’re almost recovered, almost.”
Speaking of the series, that shows no signs of stopping under Disney. Season 31 (!) starts airing this fall, with the annual Halloween special Treehouse of Horror – fortuitously, the 666th episode ever made – this year tackling a Stranger Things parody – complete with Lisa as Eleven.
Tell us, though, would you want to see a sequel to The Simpsons Movie? Have your say in the comments section down below.