“The Simpsons” showrunner Matt Selman hit back at the “horrifying” suggestion that the popular show somehow predicted the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump.
After a shooter opened fire on the former president during his rally in Pennsylvania, injuring Trump and killing one of his supporters, a meme began surfacing on social media showing a false image of Trump from the cartoon lying in a casket, with the caption, “First time I’ve seen a ‘Simpsons’ prediction fail.”
Speaking to TMZ, Selman slammed the image in the strongest terms, making it clear the writers and show would never have an episode about assassinating the former president and that a cartoon Trump never appeared in a casket.
“Anyone who thinks ‘The Simpsons’ would include such horrifying content on a family TV show doesn’t really watch the show or have any understanding of ‘The Simpsons’ at all,” Selman told the outlet.
The Simpsons creator shuts down rumors that the Fox series ‘predicted’ the Donald Trump shooting https://t.co/nHPqmokEEG
— Daily Mail Celebrity (@DailyMailCeleb) July 17, 2024
He also told Reuters, “The image of Donald Trump in a coffin never appeared on The Simpsons. It is doctored.”
“Sadly it is all too easy to create fake Simpsons ‘predictions’ like these for the purpose of misleading people,” he added.
Next to some of the doctored images, social media users have noted their surprise and belief that the fake image was real, the Daily Mail noted.
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“The Simpsons got some explaining to do,” one person wrote.
Another person added, “Ain’t no f***ing way. The Simpsons predicted this too?”
While a third wrote, “Simpsons ain’t never miss.”
Internet users falsely believing the meme came from the cartoon most likely stems from the reputation “The Simpsons” have earned after it’s been able to seemingly predict the future more than once.
The show previously predicted the creation of technology similar to the Apple Vision Pro, FaceTime, the COVID pandemic, and more recently, the Titanic submersible implosion.
Entertainment Weekly recently did a piece titled, “20 Times ‘The Simpsons’ Predicted the Future” during the cartoon’s 35 seasons. The piece included what appeared in the cartoon episode and what ended up happening that same year or years later.
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