The Best Simpsons Predictions: From the Fox Sale to the Three-Eyed Fish

The Simpsons are back in the news once more, courtesy of Disney’s megapurchase of Fox. This is one of the most stunning acquisitions in history, yet Matt Groening and company somehow saw it coming almost twenty years before it happened, in a lost episode of the tenth season. With nearly three decades on the air, The Simpsons is no stranger to this kind of prediction, and today we are going to visit the most important ones.

… and Disney bought Fox. Stop the world, we want to get off. After a few adjustments (basically, confirming the spinoff of Fox Broadcasting and several stations) and a chilling $52.4 billion in stock, Disney has become the “Sheev Palpatine” of large-scale entertainment. Several site colleagues are still trying to determine the total number of franchises that will fall under Disney’s control, but the company itself was quick to highlight X-Men, Avatar, and The Simpsons. Fans are thrilled by the hypothesis of a mutant landing in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (Deadpool would demand more care with its R rating), James Cameron’s saga has four films on the way, and as for The Simpsons… well, let’s just say they knew everything from the beginning.

As a matter of fact, in the fifth episode of the tenth season, “When You Dish Upon a Star”, a two-second frame indicates “20th Century Fox: A Division of Walt Disney Co”. Rumors about a possible acquisition began gaining traction in November, but it is clear that some Hollywood minds never completely dismissed that possibility. Now, we can’t deny that The Simpsons has become very good at anticipating things.

Last May we mentioned ten inventions, and today we are going to review its general predictions that, after 29 years on the air, still scare us a little.

1. The Ebola Outbreak

The Ebola virus appeared on U.S. soil during the first days of September 2014, and the media covered its advance every minute. However, the episode “Lisa’s Sax” (S09E03) somehow anticipated the outbreak 17 years earlier when Marge shows Bart a little book called “Curious George and the Ebola Virus”. Most likely, very few Americans knew what Ebola was back then.

2. Tomacco

According to the story, Homer accidentally fertilized his tomato and tobacco fields in the episode “E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)” (S11E05), creating a fruit with a horrible taste and a very addictive quality. The idea of crossing tobacco and tomatoes goes back to 1959 with a publication in Scientific American, but it was in 2003 (four years after the episode aired) that a fan of the series named Rob Baur turned tomacco into a fact by combining a tomato plant with tobacco roots.

3. The God Particle

“The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace” is the second episode of the tenth season (S10E02), and it shows Homer as an inventor, trying to follow in the footsteps of Thomas Edison. At a specific moment, Homer works on a complex equation on a chalkboard. That equation is none other than the mass prediction for the Higgs boson, confirmed fourteen years later. Actually… the equations are three. Can you recognize the others?

4. The Three-Eyed Fish

One of the most emblematic and remembered moments of the entire series, “Two Cars in Every Garage and Three Eyes on Every Fish” (S02E04) presents the destruction of Monty Burns’s political career when Marge forces him to eat Blinky, the mutant three-eyed fish that grew up near the nuclear power plant. Everything seemed like fiction, until in 2011 they discovered a three-eyed fish in the waters of Embalse Lake (Córdoba, Argentina), near the nuclear power plant located there.

5. NSA Spying

This example does not belong to the regular series, but to the 2007 movie. The Simpson family is on the run from justice, and during a casual conversation on the train, Lisa suggests not talking so loudly (something Marge dismisses as paranoia), but the NSA is listening to everything they say. Curiously, it was that same year that the NSA’s PRISM program began its activities, and it was exposed six years later thanks to Edward Snowden’s leaks. There is also a reference to the NSA in another episode, “El Viaje Misterioso de Nuestro Jomer” (S08E09).

6. The FIFA Scandal and Germany’s Victory

The Simpsons have crossed paths with football on more than one occasion, and among the most recent we find “You Don’t Have to Live Like a Referee” (S25E16), which turns Homer into a referee for the World Cup in Brazil. Homer receives “offers” to fix the matches throughout the episode, but he maintains his integrity and lets Germany win the tournament. Indeed, it was the Germans who lifted the cup in Brazil (they thrashed the hosts and beat Argentina 1-0 in the final), and a year later the “FIFA scandal” exploded, revealing a network of fraud, money laundering, and bribes.

7. The Horrors of Auto-Correct

“Lisa on Ice” (S06E08) is a very special episode because it thoroughly explores the natural rivalry between Bart and Lisa, but it also presents us with a technological gem: the errors of auto-correct. Kearney tells Dolph to write a memo on his Apple Newton to beat up Martin, and the device’s terrible handwriting recognition turns “Beat Up Martin” into “Eat Up Martha”. 23 years later, things haven’t changed much.

8. FarmVille and Virtual Reality

“Bart Carny” (S09E12) takes us to the year 1998. Even though Marge can’t convince Bart and Lisa to clean the backyard, once the carnival arrives in Springfield, the little demon insists on trying the “Yard Work Simulator”, basically the same task, but transformed into a video game. This prediction has a bit of commercial virtual reality (the Rift was launched in March 2016), and a pinch of games like FarmVille (which debuted in 2009), and other more complex ones at the level of Stardew Valley or the Harvest Moon saga.

9. A Nobel Prize

Anticipating the results of the Nobel Prizes is much more complicated than it seems, but the episode “Elementary School Musical” (S22E01) did exactly that. In a bet on the Nobel Prize in Economics, Milhouse said the winner would be Bengt Holmstrom. With barely six years of difference, Milhouse’s choice turned out to be perfect, since Holmstrom received that recognition in real life.

10. Donald Trump’s Presidency

If the series has a “mother of all predictions”, it is this one: “Bart to the Future” (S11E17) explores a possible future for Bart in which he hasn’t been very successful with his life, while Lisa becomes President of the United States. Her government faces a deep budget crisis, caused by none other than the previous president… Donald Trump. The reference is short, but more than enough to cement the prediction. The controversial magnate reached the White House sixteen years later, and we can already see how it’s going for him.

Just ten entries, it is true, but The Simpsons’ predictions continue to grow with each new season. Any other that deserves to be mentioned? Feel free to share it via the comments. Personally, I think we will see Arnold Schwarzenegger’s prediction as President of the United States come true, something that also happened in Demolition Man. Technically, the law prevents him from running, but given the Terminator’s enormous popularity, anything can happen. Thanks for reading!