Talk:The Simpsons

Deletion

This page is uncanonical and uninformative.--Fluffball Gato 04:29, March 17, 2010 (UTC)

Support

• Support - What I said was true. --Fluffball Gato 04:29, March 17, 2010 (UTC)
• Support - There isn't actually anything in-universe that specifically references The Simpsons, there are quotes which using out-of-universe knowledge we can deduce that they're referring to The Simpsons. The article might have a life as a real world article in which the in-universe reference can be noted, but as all the statements currently have 'source needed' tags I'm not sure of its validity. --Tangerineduel 10:53, March 18, 2010 (UTC)
• Support - As per above --Cally99117 15:28, June 14, 2010 (UTC)

Against

• Keep, as they say on Wikipedia. The Simpsons is actually important to Doctor Who in that it's the first time the show had been referenced on a major American network in prime time. That fact alone keeps it in, especially as we have a pic of the appearance. Also we do know the credits for the recent "Treehouse" episode do explicitly refer to the 2009 specials. So it's worth keeping around, for sure. But does it need to be repurposed into a real world article? Well, here I'm less sure. We have several articles, like Circle of Life, or The Lion Sleeps Tonight, where the reference to the title isn't explicit in the episode. Instead, we've used our common sense to tell us that this is in fact the subject being referenced. And I don't see how that does any harm. We don't need the words "The Simpsons" in Planet of the Ood to tell us that the "comedy Ood" is pulling a Homer Simpson. We don't need Silver Scream to use the words "Charlie Chaplin" to tell us that the Doctor is referring to Chaplin at a couple of points in the story. Physical descriptions, photographs, and aural cues — if they are specific enough — are enough to start an article on this wiki, I feel. Now, sure, we get into problems sometimes by believing a thing is a reference to X when maybe there's room for doubt. For instance, this article once referred to the Doctor's line in The End of Time, "Worst. Rescue. Ever.", as a reference to The Simpsons, and I think that's a bit too vague to state with authority. But I don't think there's a problem here with doing something like this:
  • Go ahead and repurpose the article as primarily a real world article. This subject is much more important to Doctor Who because of its parodic connection than anything else. Add it to Category:Television shows with Doctor Who connections and Category:Parodies and pastiches. We have missed several references to Doctor Who within The Simpsons, including one in the episode "Bart the Fink" that unambiguously refers to a "Doctor Who [episode watching] marathon", and another in "Springfield Up" in which Homer refers to a character voiced by Eric Idle as "Doctor Who". I don't personally think that all the references given at Wikipedia:Doctor Who parodies are entirely valid, but these two, when combined with the more famous Fourth Doctor appearances, are more than enough to confirm the fact that the television show, Doctor Who, exists within the Simpsons universe.
  • Flip the order of the information in the article. Pull the real world stuff to the top, and put the in-universe stuff at the bottom.
  • Relabel the section for the DWU stuff to Possible references in the DWU, or some such.
  • Make it clear in the DWU section that the DWU has never positively referred to The Simpsons by name.
  • Retain Category:Television series from the real world. As you know, I don't like having articles tagged in both RW and DUW categories, but this is, I think, a special case. I don't think you can justify how the Ood is a "comedy" Ood unless it is referencing the comedy television programme, The Simpsons. The Homerian "D'Oh!" is not funny in isolation from The Simpsons. Nor can you explain Bart's appearance in Party Animals or signature Bart phrases in Cuddlesome. Remember, Category:Television series from the real world is underneath Category:Cultural references from the real world, and these are definitely references. They don't "work" unless you know The Simpsons. CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 19:37, March 18, 2010 (UTC)

It's not quite in the same league as the other things in the Parodies and Pastiches category.

However I think it could have a small bit of info on the Doctor Who parodies or the Doctor Who pastiches pages linking to this page, just so it's acknowledged as something of a parody and when in the timeline of parodies the occurrences occur.

How significant is a reference in The Simpsons to Doctor Who? Can we positively prove it was the first on prime time US TV? (I'm just curious on this point)

Perhaps the Circle of Life article needs to be merged into The Lion King article as it's what the Doctor says it's from and The Lion Sleeps Tonight moved to 'Track number 90' (with a note in the article that it is 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight'. --Tangerineduel 12:39, March 21, 2010 (UTC)

It's not just one reference, but between 5 and 10 (depending on what you allow and what you don't). And the point is that within the world of The Simpsons, Doctor Who exists as a television show. The Simpson Family watch the show enough to occasionally hurl Doctor Who-related insults. It's also worth pointing out that the first, 1995 appearance occurred in an episode that aired the week of 23d November. That reveals a clear fan-awareness on the part of the production team, just as the recent "he will knock four times" credit does.

As for whether it can be definitively proved to be the first prime time ref, I can only tell you that it's the first listing at the chronologically-ordered Wikipedia:Doctor Who parodies that meets those criteria. That's thin, from a referencing standpoint, but then there's never been true academic research on the history of DW in America, as far as I know. Basic facts about DW in the US — like the number of PBS stations that carried it, the definitive date of first broadcast, and other really basic facts — have never been known with authority. Wikipedia:Doctor Who in America doesn't have any significant references before the 1996 movie, for instance. Realistically, therefore, there's little hope of actually providing a source for a much more detailed point like whether The Simpsons was the first DW ref in prime time. But what else could have possibly come before? The ST:TNG listing of DW actors names on a computer screen was way earlier, but it wasn't in prime time on a network. The 1992 SNL sketch was on a major network, but not in prime time. The best we can say, and likely the best we'll ever be able to say, is that it's the first ref in prime time on a major terrestrial network that has been uncovered by the editors of that wiki page since its creation in 2007. Still, I'd challenge anyone to disprove the assertion. Simply put, if there were an earlier reference, we'd know about it by now. All that said, I haven't actually changed the article to include the point.

What I have found are a number of articles that assert that the Fourth Doctor's appearance in The Simpsons attest to that incarnation's association with the programme. And that's perfectly true, of course. Nothing in the pre-2005 era was as iconic of DW as the Fourth Doctor himself. One could easily verify the statement: "The appearances of the Fourth Doctor in The Simpsons is often cited as proof that the Fourth Doctor, in the minds of many people, is the single most-identifiable aspect of Doctor Who." CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 05:41, March 22, 2010 (UTC)

Fourth Doctor or Tom Baker?

Is there really a case where the individual is actually supposed to be the Doctor? The Treehouse of Horror episode has Lucy Lawless and other actors including Tom Baker, who never aged apparently. The Mark Hamill episode was at a sci-fi convention and was more likely a fan. The Sideshow Bob episode has the "representatives of television" which means... something.
--Nyktimos 04:50, February 8, 2010 (UTC)

Longevity

When I encountered it, this article made a claim about The Simpsons having a chance to beat Doctor Who's record of 26 years of continuous broadcast. This is a spurious comparison, as DW's record is not for longest runnng scriped drama, but longest-running SF show. There are several shows in the UK which have records The Simpsons are never going to touch, like Corrie, and these are what should be the point of comparison with Simpsons. CzechOut ☎ | ✍ 04:52, March 17, 2010 (UTC)

The name of the show

Doing a search of the Discontinuity Guide for The Simpsons for references, The Tomorrow Windows came up. The show was named in the book and, fortunately for me, it was in the second chapter. --Nyktimos 05:07, March 24, 2010 (UTC)

As it is mentioned as an actual show should we re-work the page once more back to an in-universe page or leave it as it is at the moment? --Tangerineduel 11:58, March 24, 2010 (UTC)

The reference to "New New York" in "Holidays of Future Passed" is probably not a reference to Doctor Who, but to a different sci-fi show full of time travel that's set in a city called New New York, Futurama (also created by Groening and Cohen). The episode has multiple such references, ranging from Grandpa being frozen in a cryogenic facility that looks just like Fry's to a brief glimpse of "Codebreakers Chatroom" written in Alien Language 2 in the Ultranet. --70.36.140.126^{talk to me} 04:32, March 8, 2012 (UTC)

Franchise page

Just a thought, but rather than having an "in-universe" section on a real world article, would it not make sense to have an in-universe The Simpsonsarticle, and a separate The Simpsons (franchise) article for the real world information, as has been done for Star Trek and Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

Geek Mythology ☎ 17:05, April 11, 2013 (UTC)

Behind the scenes

Surely most of this information should be in a #Behind the scenes section? "Bart Simpson" is shown as a real person, so how is it related to the in-universe franchise? (also should Bart really be in a subcategory of fictional characters if he's practically never shown as a fictional character? Cookieboy 2005 ☎ 15:11, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

Althoigh I disagree with some things I said above, I think my general point still stands - surely this page should just be references to the show itself, and perhaps references to characters as fiction? The current format would be like if every appearance of Scott Tracy was covered on Thunderbirds. Cookieboy 2005 ☎ 23:57, 26 September 2024 (UTC)