Matt Groening Quotes

With 'Futurama,' I wanted to do unrequited love, and David Cohen agreed, and although our original plan was never to have Fry and Leela get together, we finally just said, 'You can only string the fans along so far.'

'The Simpsons' basically - and 'Futurama' - are really smart shows. They're kind of disguised as these goofy animated sitcoms, but the references within the shows, if you're paying attention, are pretty smart and pretty sophisticated.

Oh, loneliness and cheeseburgers are a dangerous mix.

This doesn't happen in America! Maybe Ohio, but not in America!
Homer Simpson

Basically, everything I try to do is to present an alternative to what somebody else is doing.

Your lyrics lack subtlety! You can't just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!

I'm normally not a praying man, but if you're up there, please save me, Superman.
Homer Simpson

Well, most grown-ups forget what it was like to be a kid. I vowed that I would never forget.

Living creatively is really important to maintain throughout your life. And living creatively doesn't mean only artistic creativity, although that's part of it. It means being yourself, not just complying with the wishes of other people.

A woman knows all about her children. She knows about dentist appointments, soccer games, romances, best friends, location of friend's houses, favorite foods, secret fears and hopes and dreams. A man is vaguely aware of some short people living in the house.

America's health care system is second only to Japan, Canada, Sweden, Great Britain, well ... all of Europe. But you can thank your lucky starts we don't live in Paraguay!

If at first you don't succeed - give it up. It isn't worth the pain.

The next time you are contemplating a decision in which you are debating whether or not to go for the gusto, ask yourself this important question: "How long am I going to be dead?" With that perspective, you can now make a free, fearless choice to do just about any goddamned sneaky thing your devious little mind can think up. Go ahead. Have your fun. You're welcome. Go on. See you in hell.

Love is a perky elf dancing a merry little jig and then suddenly he turns on you with a miniature machine gun.

I know all those words, but that sentence makes no sense to me.

The thing that makes me happiest about Simpsons Illustrated are all the drawings that we get from readers. I wish we could print them all. They're really imaginative. They show a lot of hard work.

'The Simpsons' obviously is a huge success, and Fox has nothing to do with its success, with its creative success, and as a result they don't really like the show. They don't like 'The Simpsons' at Fox.

I don't mind sharing the blame if she'll just admit she started it.

I had been drawing my weekly comic strip, 'Life in Hell,' for about five years when I got a call from Jim Brooks, who was developing 'The Tracey Ullman Show' for the brand-new Fox network. He wanted me to come in and pitch an idea for doing little cartoons on that show.

If I have one technology tip of the day, it's this: No matter how good the video on YouTube is, don't read the comments, just don't, because it will make you hate all humans.

I like the 'Simpsons' pinball machines. Those are pretty great.

A lot of our writers, like Conan O'Brien, moved on to other things

Of course I've gone mad with power! Have you ever tried going mad without power? It's boring and no one listens to you!
- Russ Cargill

To alcohol! The cause of ... and solution to ... all of life's problems

I judge my life by how miserable it used to be. If I could pay my rent, I was deliriously happy. Now I'm deliriously happy all the time.

I think 'Family Guy' and 'American Dad' have definitely staked out their own style and territory, and now the accusations are coming that 'The Simpsons' is taking jokes from 'Family Guy.' And I can tell you, that ain't the case.

I like all of the early relationship strips that were collected in 'Love Is Hell,' where I pretended to be an expert in relationships and did comics like 'The Nine Types of Boyfriends,' 'Sixteen Ways to End a Relationship,' 'Twenty-Four Things Not to Say in Bed,' and other arbitrarily numbered lists.

The really great thing about having two TV shows going on at the same time is that I can go to one and say that I have to go and visit the other, and then I can just go home, and they don't know.

You watched it! You can't unwatch it!

We've got a bunch of new writers now who tell me they grew up watching The Simpsons. It's bizarre, and they're writing some very funny stuff.

I always thought that television was the way to go in my goal to invade pop culture because it got to towns in which there were no bookstores. That's how I used to think of it: How do I reach kids who not only don't read but probably have no access to much in the way of books?

Oftentimes, what seems to be a street lunatic charging at me spouting gibberish turns out to be a devoted 'Simpsons' fan quoting their favorite line.

Part of the fun of being alive is knowing that you're annoying the hell out of someone else.

Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It's what separates us from the animals ... except the weasel.

Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come.

My father was a really sharp cartoonist and filmmaker. He used to tape-record the family surreptitiously, either while we were driving around or at dinner, and in 1963 he and I made up a story about a brother and a sister, Lisa and Matt, having an adventure out in the woods with animals.

I want it to go on, but I want us to go out on top.

The entire world of grown-ups is corrupt and stupid.

One year later, I got beat up at a Neil Diamond concert by a guy named Scrunchie!

I loved literary science fiction. In fact, as a kid, when I was reading science fiction, I thought 'I can't wait for the future when the special effects are good' to represent what was in these books by Arthur C. Clarke, Alfred Bester, Philip K. Dick, J.G. Ballard, Jack Vance.

I always say that 'Futurama' is real, and 'The Simpsons' is fiction.

We did 'The Simpsons Movie,' which took almost four years; it was the same people that do the TV show, and it just killed us. So that's why there hasn't been a second movie. But I imagine if the show ever does go off the air, they'll start doing movies.

Don't have a cow, man.

You should listen to your heart, and not the voices in your head.

Masturbation is nothing to be ashamed of. It's nothing to be particularly proud of, either.

Books are useless! I only ever read one book, To Kill A Mockingbird, and it gave me absolutely no insight on how to kill mockingbirds! - Homer Simpson

The writers led by Mike Scully are fantastic. And they're creating original stories that not only don't repeat what we've already done, they also don't repeat anything I've seen on television.

I was always frightened by taverns. They just seemed like very unpleasant places to go.

It's just hard not to listen to TV: it's spent so much more time raising us than parents have.

I think there is a certain charm to the hand drawn image that I like. My problem with CGI is that it's so rich in texture that my eyes actually get tired. Everything is in focus down to the littlest leaf.

Let's face it, all the good stuff happens after midnight.

You see, Marriage is like a Coffin, and each Kid is another Nail.

If something is too hard to do, then it's not worth doing. You just stick that guitar in the closet next to your shortwave radio, your karate outfit and your unicycle and we'll go inside and watch TV.

A lot of American shows don't last for as long as 12 episodes. They get cut after one. But certainly one of the great things about The Office in particular was that there was a beginning, a middle and an end.

I didn't lie, I was writing fiction with my mouth.
Homer Simpson

I grew up completely overwhelmed by TV, and part of the reason why I have gone into television is as a way to justify to myself all those wasted hours of watching TV as a kid. I can now look back and say, 'Oh, that was research.'

Me fail english? Thats unpossible.

Here's to alcohol: the cause of, and answer to, all of life's problems.

Buy Space Ghost cereal, but don't eat the prizes.

Sometimes people try to read into my strip and find out what my state of mind is. And I can say if I'm in a good mood, generally the comic strip starts out in a good mood, but the punchline is very negative and sour.

American culture has a lot of great moustaches in its history. Mark Twain had a great moustache, Charlie Chaplin, Ben Turpin ... but Zappa, he's got the best moustache in American history. Got the moustache, right, and he's got that little thing on his chin, I think it's called an imperial, that is, like, the coolest thing. That's like one of the great icons of the twentieth century.

But we all had an agreement to let each other get away with everything! That's Capitalism!

Never! Never, Marge. I can't live the button-down life like you. I want it all: the terrifying lows, the dizzying highs, the creamy middles. Sure, I might offend a few of the bluenoses with my cocky stride and musky odors -- oh, I'll never be the darling of the so-called 'City Fathers' who cluck their tongues, stroke their beards, and talk about "What's to be done with this Homer Simpson?

Stop thinking about fun and have it
Homer Simpson

Fans think they want to see more than the 10 to 20 seconds of Itchy and Scratchy that we put on the show, but my feeling is less is more. Once you've skinned and flayed a cat, ripped his head off, made him drink acid and tied his tongue to the moon, there really isn't that much to say.

The nice thing about 'Futurama' for me personally was that it was a way to honor some of the traditional ideas in literary science fiction, not so much movie or television science fiction - although we have that too, obviously. Our situation, a workplace comedy, led to all sorts of stuff.

Families are about love overcoming emotional torture.

I've been deadline-driven for my whole grown-up life, and that hasn't gone away. It is nice to be able to reflect about the big picture, about what kind of stories you want to tell, and how to take advantage of success.

The world ends when I die. And as far as I'm concerned, the rest of the universe might as well call it a day too.

I basically drew my own family. My father's name is Homer. My mother's name is Margaret. I have a sister Lisa and another sister Maggie, so I drew all of them. I was going to name the main character Matt, but I didn't think it would go over well in a pitch meeting, so I changed the name to Bart.

I would prefer to listen to a French classical composer like Olivier Messiaen than to the pop hits of the day.

You can't keep blaming yourself. Just blame yourself once, and move on.
Homer Simpson

It's a funny show. The characters are surprisingly likable, given how ugly they are. We've got this huge cast of characters that we can move around. And over the last few seasons, we've explored some of the secondary characters' personal lives a bit more.

I plead alignment to the flakes of the untitled snakes of a merry cow and to the republicrats for which they scam: one nacho, underpants with licorice and jugs of wine for owls.

Nihilism in American comedy came along way before 'The Simpsons.' There was a fairly nihilistic point of view to 'Saturday Night Live,' for instance, back in the beginning, and a lot of really dark comedy had a really anti-sentimental take on life.

[Ned Flanders]: Well looks like someone's having a pre-rapture party.
[Homer Simpson]: No, Flanders. Its a meeting of gay witches for abortion, you wouldn't be interested.

Everybody doesn't have to get every joke. People really appreciate not being condescended to.

I draw a weekly comic strip called Life in Hell, which is syndicated in about 250 newspapers. That's what I did before The Simpsons, and what I plan to do for the rest of my life.

When you're as important as I am, getting your feelings hurt by me is almost an honor.

You toyed with my heart, like it was a toy heart. (Lisa Simpson)

I promise I'll do anything for you, especialy if it's easy.
Homer Simpson

Humor does depend on surprise, and the things that people remember as the funniest things in the world, you look at later and you go, "What? What was that all about?"

Being a good embalmer is a thankless job.

I've loved science fiction ever since I was a little kid, mainly from looking at the covers of science-fiction magazines and books, and I've read quite extensively as an adult.

We have 'Doctor Who' references on 'Futurama,' but we have a lot of science fiction references that I don't get; but in the staff we have experts on 'Star Trek,' 'Star Wars,' 'Doctor Who' and 'Dungeons and Dragons.'

I'm a fan of animation and so, the more stuff that doesn't look like the other stuff that's out there, I'm in favor.

When will people learn? Democracy doesn't work!
(Homer Simpson)

On 'The Simpsons,' I will say that we definitely like to comment on what's going on in the world, and we try to be funny. If we can figure out a way of being funny about it, then we've gone part of the way of accomplishing our task.

Are we alone in an uncaring universe, or is God some kind of wiseguy?

Keep your expectations tiny you'll go through life not so whiney.

I went to Bali, and I was in a small village, and somebody who was with me showed a woman a little figurine of Bart and asked: 'Do you know who this is?' And she said: 'Mickey Mouse.'

You know, the courts may not be working any more, but as long as everyone is videotaping everyone else, justice will be done.

I like my beer cold, my TV loud, and my homosexuals flaming.

I don't have to be careful, I've got a gun.

I know for a fact, obviously, because my kids grew up watching the show, that there are some things they are introduced to from 'The Simpsons', and then later in life they see the thing we're parodying. My kids had not seen 'Casablanca,' and we'd done parodies of 'Casablanca.'

Since I was there in the very beginning, I know the history of the characters. So, I make comments about the tone and sometimes remind the writers that we've done that before.

What I've noticed in a lot of other cartoonists is a sullen resentfulness about their lack of attention and tiny checking accounts. I vowed back in the days when I had no money that I would not allow that kind of bitterness to overtake me ... Cartooning, in general, is a very solitary occupation, and it breeds all sorts of self-punishing thinking

You just have to keep in mind that the important relationship is the relationship with the audience. That's what I try to do. Everything else is secondary.

I have to say that The Simpsons comes from a huge number of great writers headed by Al Jean, the show-runner, and the work that they do is really fantastic. It's a blast just to sit around with them in the writers' room and listen to all the filthy jokes that will never get on the air.

Anxiety and hostility seem to be a great part of good and bad humor. Examining humor too closely does seem to destroy it.