History ComicBook / TheSimpsons

There have also been several [[SpinOff spin-offs]] such as ''ComicBook/BartSimpson'', ''ComicBook/TheSimpsonsTreehouseOfHorror'', and ''ComicBook/RadioactiveMan''.

** The first comic book involved Homer being on the receiving end of one of [[MiracleGroMonster Mr. Burns' experimental growth rays]]. He ended up rampaging through Springfield until a dose of an experimental formula returned him to normal. [[spoiler:The giant Homer ends up being brought back for the ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}'' crossover comic.]]

** The four-part "Futurama Simpsons Infinitely Secret Crossover Crisis" is a crossover with ''WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}}''. The final part [[SerialEscalation ups the ante]] by bringing in characters from ''every single fictional series'' ever written.
** The early days of the comics had ''When Bongos Collide,'' a three-issue storyline crossing over all three of the then-running Bongo titles: ''Itchy & Scratchy Comics'', ''Simpsons Comics'' and ''Bartman''. Interestingly enough, this storyline involved a plot device similar to the one in the Futurama/Simpsons crossover, with a device that brings fictional characters into the real world -- hence Itchy and Scratchy are running loose in Springfield, and Bartman teams up with Radioactive Man.
** Later on, a series of ''Bartman'' stories that saw him targeted by a villain called "the Canker" somehow tied into an earlier ''Simpsons Comics'' story about Ned Flanders being abducted and replaced by Kang and Kodos (who were teamed up with [[spoiler: Sideshow Bob]], who revealed that he was the man behind the Canker), aided by henchmen who showed up in a seemingly innocuous Rainier Wolfcastle[=/=][=McBain=] strip. The Bongo titles were actually surprisingly good at this sort of thing.

* LawyerFriendlyCameo: The final part of the "WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} Simpsons Infinitely Secret Crossover Crisis" features brief shadowed cameos from Franchise/{{Batman}}, Franchise/{{Superman}}, Franchise/WonderWoman, Franchise/SpiderMan, ComicBook/CaptainAmerica, ComicBook/{{Wolverine}}, and ComicBook/TheMightyThor. When [[LampshadeHanging Bart asks why]] they're all standing in the shadows, Spider-Man replies "Copyright protection!"

** The first comic book involved Homer being on the receiving end of one of [[MiracleGroMonster Mr. Burns' experimental growth rays]]. He ended up rampaging through Springfield until a dose of an experimental formula returned him to normal. [[spoiler:The giant Homer ends up being brought back for the ''{{WesternAnimation/Futurama}}'' crossover comic.]]

* BlackWidow: Agnes Skinner once had a dream of marrying and then immediately killing Stalin. A few panels after she reveals this, she notes that she has a gentleman caller coming round, and tells Skinner to get out of the house. As he leaves, we see who it is: [[spoiler: Fidel Castro.]]

* CompressedAdaptation: Invoked with Professor Frink's mononizer, a ray gun that compresses trilogies into a single feature by cutting subplots, exposition and {{foreshadowing}}. It works on books like ''{{Literature/Dune}}'' and movies like the ''Franchise/StarWars'' trilogy, although it causes most of the events to happen near-simultaneously such as Luke blowing up all of the Death Stars in the trilogy in the same scene.

* LawyerFriendlyCameo: The final part of the "WesternAnimation/{{Futurama}} Simpsons Infinitely Secret Crossover Crisis" features brief shadowed cameos from Franchise/{{Batman}}, Franchise/{{Superman}}, Franchise/WonderWoman, Franchise/SpiderMan, ComicBook/CaptainAmerica, ComicBook/{{Wolverine}} and ComicBook/TheMightyThor. When [[LampshadeHanging Bart asks why]] they're all standing in the shadows, Spider-Man replies "Copyright protection!"

** Most ''Treehouse of Horror'' stories are retold versions of horror movies, including ''Film/CatPeople'', ''Film/InvasionOfTheBodySnatchers'' and ''Film/TheExorcist''.

** "Murder He Wrote" from Treehouse of Horror #14, due to it being a parody of ''Manga/DeathNote''.

** ''Treehouse of Horror'', an annual series of Halloween comics inspired by the televised ''Simpsons'' episodes [[WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror of the same title]].

* AscendedMeme: "Boo-tleg," A story in ''Bart Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror #15'', features a bootleg Black Bart who had plans to sell shirts of himself at a flea market.
* AssholeVictim: Unpleasant and cruel people getting killed is a frequent occurrence in the Treehouse of Horror comics.
** Sideshow Blob's first victims include Dr. Nick, and the bullies, just after the latter had attacked Bart on Halloween Night.
** The Homer-plant eats Mr. Burns.

* BloodierAndGorier: The Treehouse of Horror issues are darker and more disturbing than the most recent episodes have been, even when they act as parodies of existing movies and film franchises.

** One Treehouse of Horror revolves around Burns using a cloning machine that creates perfect imperfect duplicates of whatever it's aimed at to create the perfect worker, by using it on Homer. It creates ComicBook/{{Superman}}.

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: The early issues of the comic were tonally much closer to WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror stories, such as with the first issue's storyline involving Homer growing to giant size. The majority of the stories soon became more akin to normal episodes of the show, albeit still a lot DenserAndWackier, and occasionally diving into kinds of stories that the show normally wouldn't cover.

* AGoodOldFashionedPaintWatching: A Treehouse of Horror segment has an Itchy and Scratchy cartoon that has them doing this, [[spoiler:due to the Pod People.]]
-->'''Itchy:''' The paint is drying.\\
'''Scratchy:''' ''({{beat}})'' Yes.\\
''[The End]''\\
'''Homer:''' ''(to Bart and Lisa)'' How can you two watch this show?

* HorrorHunger: ''Treehouse of Horror'' #17's story "Marge of the Dead" features Marge getting an organ transplant from a cadaver, with the transplant giving her an insatiable craving for human brains.

* NothingIsScarier: In ''Treehouse of Horror'' #17, the last story in the issue, "Harvest of Fear," utilizes this and GoryDiscretionShot by having the final page be drawn to look as though it was cut out. However, on the remaining sliver of page left, one can barely make out Bart [[spoiler: ''getting his face ripped off'']].

* OpeningShoutOut: A one-page comic in Treehouse of Horror 15, "Cloud 13," depicts the show's intro sequence as [[CerebusCallBack a recurring nightmare experienced by the whole family]].
-->'''Lisa:''' Doc, I keep having the same nightmare. Everyone in my family keeps trying to get to this couch...
-->'''Bart:''' And every night I'm punished. I wake up covered in chalk dust.
-->'''Homer:''' I'm being poisoned by a radioactive dowel, and then my son tries to behead me.

* ShmuckBait: "Harvest of Fear" in ''Treehouse of Horror'' #17 ends with Bart learning the author of the comic that's been driving him nuts removed the last page from every edition because he knew it'd drive kids crazy and lead them to him to find out what happened. [[spoiler: The author transforms into a monster and, as can just about be made out on the last page, he rips Bart apart.]]

* StylisticSuck: The "Boo-tleg" story from ''Treehouse of Horror'' #15 is about people dying from the poisonous bootleg candy Apu has stocked at the Kwik-E-Mart. To cover up the deaths and to avoid losing money Apu just has the dead individuals replaced with shoddily made bootleg clones.

There have also been several [[SpinOff spin-offs]] such as ''ComicBook/BartSimpson'', ''WesternAnimation/TreehouseOfHorror'', and ''ComicBook/RadioactiveMan''.

%%* CanonForeigner: Occasionally these show up.

* {{Bowdlerization}}: One issue doing Shakespeare parodies does ''Titus Andronicus''. It leaves out most of the ''really'' family unfriendly stuff. But since it's done in the form of an ''Itchy & Scratchy'', it still leaves the mutilation, murder, and people getting baked into pies.

** According to the comic "Zombie Moves," Music/MichaelJackson's dance moves in the "Thriller" video were inspired by Barney and Homer shambling to maintain their TotemPoleTrench as they played a zombie extra in a horror film he saw.

* BeenThereShapedHistory: Mister Burns' adopted father is responsible for the Hindenburg (he sold the makers discount hydrogen), the Titanic (he had the hull made out of tinfoil to save costs), communism, and the disappearance of Amelia Earhart (whose plane just happened to have a very large amount of incriminating tax receipts on-board).

* CanonForeigner: Occasionally these show up.

* CompressedAdaptation: Invoked with Professor Frink's mononizer, a ray gun that compresses trilogies into a single feature by cutting subplots, exposition and {{foreshadowing}}. It works on books like ''{{Literature/Dune}}'' and movies like the ''Franchise/StarWars'' trilogy.

* DarkerAndEdgier: The storyline of "They Fixed Homer's Brain" is far more serious and emotional than any other issue in the series.

** When Bart gets Principle Skinner deported to Canada with fraudulent paperwork, Skinner ends up having to escape forced labor in the Maple Syrup mines.

* BareYourMidriff: Most of Lisa's swimsuits are midriff-baring.

* SpeaksInShoutOuts: In one issue, Ned, lonely while Rod and Todd are at Bible camp, lavishes his parental attention on Lisa and Bart. They, and Marge, pick up his overuse of idiomatic proverbs, driving Homer nuts.

[[caption-width-right:250:[[ComicBook/FantasticFourNumberOne This looks familiar...]]]]

* EurekaMoment: After Bart and Milhouse are blackmailed by two plagiarists who stole their idea for a comic book idea which involves them drawing the issues for free and seek Lisa's help to get out of this, Bart picks up two "[[Magazine/{{MAD}} MOD]]" magazines with very similar covers and partially folds one cover against the other which gives him an idea. They send a copy of the new comic to a reporter with instructions to fold the cover a very specific way which launches an investigation that gets the plagiarists arrested. To show the reader how this happened, a page with the full cover is included with the book which if the reader folds the exact same way, shows a WantedPoster of one of the plagiarists.

* EurekaMoment: [[ItMakesSenseInContext After Lisa and Martin are appointed as substitute teachers due to Bart forging deportation documents that sent the school's teachers to different countries]], neither of them have success with their classes. After a visit to Clancy Wiggum about Ralph's literal inability to understand or even ''touch'' books, Lisa finds out that Ralph has a near-photographic memory of shows he watches on TV which he learned to do so he can imagine things in different colors and to make them melt. Lisa then wins over her class by recording herself give a lecture and playing it on a TV to the class, who remember everything easily and set grade records the following tests.

* FakedFoodContaminant: In one of the comics we learn that Bart regularly puts tentacles in his ice cream so that he doesn't have to pay for it.
* FakeOutOpening:

* MyGreatestFailure: A hobo claims he is the one responsible for [[DorkAge New Coke]], hence why he's now a hobo.

* CutawayGag: In "A Brand New Burns: Part Two", when Homer swears to [[ItMakesSenseInContext save Mr. Burns from his encapturement in a Mexican sweatshop]], Marge reminds him about the last time he rescued something. Cue flashback to him pulling a poor dolphin with a net around him out of the water at the beach. It's revealed that [[WhatAnIdiot he put him in a hot tub still flailing around desperately with a net around him]], insisting to Marge that if he cuts it, he'll escape.

* BalefulPolymorph: An alternate Bart who takes over his Springfield has turned his family into birds.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: The story "It's In the Cards" has Homer pull some CameraSpoofing so that he can skip work to attend a baseball game. Burns thinks the picture is frozen, and in his scramble to outrun Burns' Stormtrooper-esque maintenance crew to his station, Homer knocks the picture down from the camera, hitting a button which causes a power outage affecting the freezer at Springfield Elementary where the teachers' food is stored. The teachers all get sick and are replaced by substitutes while they recover, [[HalfwayPlotSwitch kicking off]] a RoleSwapPlot for Bart and Lisa (Bart's substitute likes him and trusts him with responsibilities while Lisa's dislikes her and treats her like a troublemaker) that ends badly for both of them. In a moment of DramaticIrony, Homer then scorns Marge's [[AnAesop aesop]] about how the important thing is that they should do their best despite the fact that, inevitably, "sometimes our actions have unforeseeable consequences."

* SwappedRoles: [[FoolishSiblingResponsibleSibling Bart and Lisa]] experience this when [[TheFoodPoisoningIncident the teachers get food poisoning]] and are replaced by substitutes. Bart's substitute [[MistakenForProfound reads profundity]] into all his improvised school assignments and favors him with a special project, while Lisa's is fascistic to the point of seeing her as a troublemaker for asking questions and wanting to learn, giving her Bart-typical punishments such as WritingLines. Oddly enough, they both manage to get their typical grades anyway: Bart fails the project assignment, not so much because all he has to show for his effort is a stick as because the teacher [[TakeThat assumes he's ripping off Marcel Duchamp]], while Lisa's teacher misinterprets her artwork in praise of multiculturalism as a satirical comment ''against'' multiculturalism and gives her an A, [[YourApprovalFillsMeWithShame which she takes about as happily as Bart takes the F]].

* UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: The story "It's In the Cards" has Homer pull some CameraSpoofing so that he can skip work to attend a baseball game. Burns thinks the picture is frozen, and in his scramble to outrun Burns' Stormtrooper-esque maintenance crew to his station, Homer knocks the picture down from the camera, hitting a button which causes a power outage affecting the freezer at Springfield Elementary where the teachers' food is stored. The teachers all get sick and are replaced by substitutes while they recover, [[HalfwayPlotSwitch kicking off]] a SwappedRoles plot for Bart and Lisa (Bart's substitute likes him and trusts him with responsibilities while Lisa's dislikes her and treats her like a troublemaker) that ends badly for both of them. In a moment of DramaticIrony, Homer then scorns Marge's [[AnAesop aesop]] about how the important thing is that they should do their best despite the fact that, inevitably, "sometimes our actions have unforeseeable consequences."

* TheLongList: Marge recounts every single job Homer's ever taken. [[NewJobAsThePlotDemands It takes several hours]].