The endless debates about an apparent drop in quality on The Simpsons have left one aspect in the background: the animation itself. The technological jump of the past 34 years has been remarkable, and the show's creators have readily turned those advances into every episode. Even so, a fair number of fans now see the current animation as "stiff" or "robotic." Today we have a great chance to study the evolution of The Simpsons' animation and draw more direct comparisons between seasons.
Once Upon a Time in Springfield...
We recently revisited the origins of the famous lost pilot of The Simpsons, and one of the most interesting details is that its creators considered cancelling the series if the quality of the animation didn't improve. But public opinion seems to be heading in the opposite direction: today the characters' movement feels too robotic and artificial, while in the past the "rubber effect" (which showrunners hated) gave the show a certain organic and warm profile. One comment even suggests that early on The Simpsons "was not afraid of being a cartoon" and now "seeks to escape that" at all costs.
What can we do to resolve this conflict? The answer is to compare and study closely the evolution of The Simpsons' animation between 1987 and 2021. Technically, nothing stops us from embedding half a dozen videos in this article, but the folks at Insider shared an excellent mini documentary on YouTube that handles this comparison, including wonderful technical details and brief interviews with the show's masterminds.
The Evolution of The Simpsons Animation, from Start to Finish
Basically, it all started with hand-drawn sketches by Matt Groening, which he then sent to an animation team of three people. David Silverman was part of that team, and to animate a simple one-and-a-half-minute short, they needed between 60 and 80 hours of work per week. To save time, the animators used and abused tracing over Matt's drawings, which started a series of major changes in the character designs, to the point that they looked completely different from week to week.
For example, Matt Groening said that the famous "four fingers" were meant to simplify the drawing of the characters, and that reveals an essential fact: the apparent "simplicity" of The Simpsons characters is actually a facade. Their tolerance for errors is much lower, and something like a line that's too thick or a change in the size of the "spikes" on Bart's head can ruin the character between two frames.
Rules, Rules, Rules
The end result was a sort of "bible" with 500 pages explaining all the "allowed" and "forbidden" moves when animating each character, including the "8-point rule" for Lisa's hair. But the Insider video also reveals the reason behind the "anti-rubber" vision: the creators wanted to distance themselves from other animation styles, such as Disney and Warner. Movements had to be more restrained, with exaggerations focused on comedic and dramatic moments.
Despite all those rules, consistency slipped out the window more than once. A good example is the pupils: the characters should never look "cross-eyed," but in just a couple of seasons the size of the pupils grew. The creators say it wasn't intentional, although Silverman always wanted a "confused bird" expression for his characters.
The first digital experiments began in 1995 with the seventh season, where "Radioactive Man" (S07E02) stands out: all the color in that episode is digital. The big digital beta was Treehouse of Horror XIII (first episode of season 14), and a couple of episodes later the change became definitive. Errors could be corrected faster and at a much lower cost.
The HD Era of The Simpsons Animation
The pivotal moment for The Simpsons came with their 2007 movie. 2D and 3D at once, pure CinemaScope, a gigantic color palette and multiple light sources marked its development. Shadows in the series were used only at night or during more dramatic moments, but besides multiplying in the movie, they also helped improve the sense of depth. The movie was a box office hit, and the series absorbed everything it learned. Season 20 was the first in HD, moving from 4:3 to 16:9.
Obviously, that evolutionary leap created other problems, one of the most important being the impossibility of recycling material from previous episodes. A good example is the Simpsons' kitchen, and the papers stuck with magnets on the fridge. The SD version didn't demand many details, but in HD they had to redo almost everything. Springfield changed forever.
And that brings us to the much-debated animation. Are The Simpsons more robotic in HD? The answer is yes, and their own creators admit it. The show's new intro (specifically, Marge in the supermarket) has been used as a reference on multiple occasions.
At first, the stiffness was tied to a combination of lack of budget and learning. Today we can say the characters are a bit more fluid, but even at 34 years old, the show is a work in progress. The evolution of The Simpsons' animation must continue. Sometimes there are too many shadows, sometimes too much color, and it's likely that Homer and company will never escape the "natural stiffness" of HD. But one thing is certain: we will keep watching The Simpsons, one way or another.
