When Donald Trump announced his intention to run for US President in 2015, the billionaire shocked the world. But fans of The Simpsons had already seen it coming, as the iconic animated show predicted it 15 years earlier. It was one of a number of times the long-running series, recognised for its satirical depiction of US life and society, appeared to foresee future events.
Presidential Prediction
In the episode Bart to the Future, first aired in 2000, Bart is shown a vision of his future as a wannabe rock musician, while his bookworm sister Lisa is US President. She is heard talking to her staff about the "budget crunch" she inherited from former President Trump. In 2016, Trump stunned the world by winning the election. He did it again in 2024, and economic uncertainty has been a key feature of his second term.
Eerily, a 1994 episode includes a news clipping that reads "the US President was arrested." Trump was arrested in 2023, a year before he returned to the White House.
9/11 and Other Premonitions
In an episode from 1997 titled The City of New York vs Homer Simpson, a scene appears to allude to the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York City. In one frame, a brochure advertises transport around New York for just $9 a day. Behind the price stands the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, making it look like it reads 9/11, the date of the horror.
Other premonitions are said to include Covid, the January 6 Capitol riots, Richard Branson's flight to space, the Higgs boson particle being discovered, and even hip hop group Cypress Hill performing with the London Symphony Orchestra.
Writer and Producer Comments
Writer Al Jean said of the eerie coincidences: "If you write 700 episodes, and you don’t predict anything, then you’re pretty bad. If you throw enough darts, you’re going to get some bullseyes."
Producer Bill Oakley once said: "There are very few cases where The Simpsons predicted something. It's mainly just coincidence because the episodes are so old that history repeats itself."
Future Predictions
As Donald Trump's government released the first batch of its UFO files last week at the direction of the president, alien hunters were buzzing with excitement as to what they might contain. If one Simpsons episode is to prove to be a prediction of the future, we may see an ET encounter. In The Springfield Files, Homer believes he has found an alien after a night of boozing at Moe's Tavern. He isn't believed at first, but he and Bart finally capture the mystery figure on tape. Last year, comet 3i/Atlas sparked global fears of alien contact with humans.
Back in 1995, the information superhighway was quite a newfangled thing. The Simpsons' annual Halloween special warned of becoming too reliant on technology. In one segment, called Homer Cubed, the beloved beer-bellied dad stumbles into a three-dimensional cyberspace and is eventually sucked into a black hole and spat out into the real world, where he is mocked by passers-by.
In Homer the Heretic, which aired in 1992, Homer skips church due to the snow and Marge prays for him. But he instead invents his own religion tailored to his personal tastes, including holidays he invents to get out of work. While his family is at church the following week, Homer falls asleep on the couch while smoking a lit cigar, which sets the house on fire around him. At a time of extreme weather and warnings from scientists about global warming, this may one day be seen as a metaphor that we ignored the signs and got burned.
