Category:Season 20

The Simpsons twentieth season began airing on September 28, 2008. The season had officially been confirmed to air by the network in May, 2008. The show is now tied with Gunsmoke as the longest running American primetime television series.

Production on the season was delayed because of contract negotiations with the six main voice actors, but was resolved and the actors' salary was raised to $400,000 per episode. The delay in production has caused the planned 22 episodes to be shortened to 20. Voice actor Dan Castellaneta is to be credited as a consulting producer for the first time.

Episodes

1 - Sex, Pies and Idiot Scrapes - September 28 2008

2 - Lost Verizon - October 5 2008

3 - Double, Double, Boy in Trouble - October 19 2008

4 - Treehouse of Horror XIX - November 2 2008

5 - Dangerous Curves - November 9 2008

Known titles

• KABF20 - "Mypods and Broomsticks"
• LABF01 - "Take My Life, Please"
• LABF08 - "Father Knows Worst"
• LABF09 - "Four Great Women and a Manicure"
• LABF10 - "Waverly Hills 9021-D'oh"
• LABF11 - "In the Name of the Grandfather"
• LABF12 - "Coming to Homerica"
• LABF13 - "Lisa the Drama Queen"
• LABF14 - "The Good, the Sad and the Drugly"

Known writers

• Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, writers of the film Superbad will write an episode. The duo asked the producers of The Simpsons if they could write an episode. They were invited to the writers room where they pitched several episode ideas. One was accepted, and they wrote an outline with the help of some feedback from the regular writers.The table read took place in August 2008, and production on the episode began soon after that.

Known plots and guest stars

• A December 2008 episode will feature Mr. Burns winning a basketball team in a poker game. The episode will also feature a decline in Springfield's bee population, and the founding of a new habitat, which is later destroyed by Burns Mark Cuban, Jeff Bezos and Marv Albert
• "Four Great Women & A Manicure" will be a trilogy episode. Maggie Simpson will enter preschool, but is put down for being creative. She later goes on trial in a parody of the novel version of The Fountainhead. It will also "reimagine the worlds of Macbeth, Citizen Kane, and Queen Elizabeth I, with Springfield residents in key roles." Jodie Foster will guest star as an adult speaking Maggie Simpson and it will air in early 2009.
• "The Good, the Sad and the Drugly" will feature a charitable girl who Bart falls in love with, prompting Bart to behave in order to date her. However, she discovers his true personality, causing him to end up reverting back to his old ways. Anne Hathaway voices the charitable girl.
• The episode written by Rogen and Goldberg sees Comic Book Guy create a superhero called Everyman, which is adapted into a film starring Homer. Rogen plays his personal trainer. Homer gets into great shape but the film is cancelled, and his life falls apart. The episode is to air in 2009.
• One episode will be a Prison Break parody.
• Homer and Grampa go to Ireland to buy a pub, only to discover that pubs are no longer popular there. Kenneth Branagh guest stars as a pub owner.
• Moe falls in love with a woman over the Internet. When he meets her in person, she turns out to be three feet tall. He remains in love with her, but worries about what his friends will think.
• In a March 2009 episode, Homer tries to kill some rats in his kitchen. They make him a meal which turns out to be less than spectacular, so he continues to try to kill them.It has elements of Ratatouille.
• Al Jean: "[Homer] leaves Maggie on the doorstep of a convent where they take her and then it turns into a Da Vinci Code satire where they have some use for Maggie at this convent that may involve world peace and they’re trying to get Maggie back. It has National Treasure elements in it and there’s this really cool complicated story line."
• The Simpsons' house is foreclosed but purchased by Ned Flanders who then rents the home to the Simpsons.
• Ellen Page guest stars in an episode as a character named Alaska Nebraska.
• Kelsey Grammer will return as Sideshow Bob.
• Bart befriends a Muslim boy, but Homer suspects the boy's parents of terrorist activities.
• Merl Reagle and Shohreh Aghdashloo will guest star in yet to be named episodes.
• One episode will be shown only after the watershed (9 p.m.) in the United Kingdom.