Simpsons EP Calls Out Clickbait Over Fake Marge Death
If you saw headlines screaming "Marge Simpson is DEAD!" — congrats, you were officially clickbaited.
The Season 36 finale of The Simpsons, titled "Estranger Things", pulled one of its usual flash-forwards, this time dropping Marge in heaven — sitting next to Ringo Starr, naturally — watching Bart and Lisa make up. And while that might've triggered a temporary panic across the fandom, Marge is very much not dead. Unless you believe every version of the future The Simpsons has ever aired. (And if you do, good luck keeping track.)
Executive producer Matt Selman had to step in to shut the whole thing down.
"Obviously since The Simpsons' future episodes are all speculative fantasies, they're all different every time. Marge will probably never be dead ever again. The only place Marge is dead is in one future episode that aired six weeks ago."
So yeah — not canon, not permanent, not even new. But that didn't stop half the internet from reporting it like a full-blown series shakeup. Selman didn't mince words about the coverage either:
"Websites need traffic, and headlines equal traffic. And then you can explain that the headline was misleading at the very end of the article. Every single media outlet that ran this story knew that in no way was Marge dead. They all knew it, but they ran the headline anyway."
Which brings us to the real point: Marge isn't dead, but journalistic integrity might be.
For context, The Simpsons has killed off real characters before — Edna Krabappel, Bleeding Gums Murphy, and last season, Moe's regular barfly Larry — so fans were already primed to take any whiff of death seriously. But this one was never real. Just another hypothetical future in a show that's run on alternate timelines, Halloween specials, and complete disregard for continuity for nearly 800 episodes.
Speaking of numbers:
- Estranger Things was episode 790
- The Simpsons is renewed through Season 40
- That'll take it to 2029, with the clear goal of hitting 1,000 episodes
So no, Marge isn't going anywhere. Not until at least another 200 episodes of "speculative fantasies," time jumps, and Halloween gore have passed. And even then? Probably not.
If you want to find a real death, look for whatever shred of restraint is left in online entertainment reporting. Because Marge may be immortal, but common sense headlines? Those are long gone.