Unproduced episodes

These are Unproduced episodes of The Simpsons where full scripts were written but the episode was never produced. This page refers only to full scripts, and not subplots or jokes that were dropped from episodes. Mike Reiss claims only a small number of scripts haven't been produced because they are difficult to work on and thus are rarely completely thrown away.

All of these episodes are either mentioned by Mike Reiss in the "Stark Raving Dad" commentary or Bill Oakley in the "Ask Bill & Josh" question session they did at NoHomers.net in 2005.

Finished scripts

"The Prince episode"

"The Prince Episode" (unofficial title) was started a year after "Stark Raving Dad" aired. The writers decided to make a sequel where Leon Kompowsky returns and thinks he is the musician Prince. It was slated to air during the fifth season. According to Mike Reiss, it was written by some freelance writers and polished by Conan O'Brien, however, Bill Oakley says it was written by Conan O'Brien.

In the episode, Prince gets everyone in the town to "loosen up, become more flamboyent, everyone becomes more sexually open, they're dressing in paisley."

The script was sent to Prince and he sent back a page of notes about what he was wearing in various scenes. The notes didn't correspond to the writers script. As it turned out, Prince was talking about a completely different script. According to Reiss it was sent to him by someone, Oakley says a friend of Prince's wrote it and in an interview Matt Groening said Prince's chauffeur wrote it. Prince absolutely hated the writer's script and demanded the other one be made, but the writers didn't like it.

The episode eventually fell through.

"Thirtysimpsons"

"Thirtysimpsons" was made for Season 3 and was a cross-over episode about the TV series Thirtysomething. Homer meets a group of Yuppies and hangs out with them. It was written by David Stern but "never seemed to work" and wasn't in the "style of the show" and wasn't produced.

A Military School episode

A script written in the first few years of the show sees Bart sent to a military school. The script never worked and was thrown out. In Season 8, a similar episode called "The Secret War of Lisa Simpson" was made.

Pitched ideas

• For the seventh season: "Greg Daniels pitched an episode about racism in Springfield. It never got past the planning stages because the topic was just too incendiary to be dealt with effectively."
• For season eight: "A hilarious and fully worked out story by George Meyer. I can't reveal the subject matter here but we never went forward with it because of 1) legal ramifications and 2) the fact that at least a couple of people on the staff/cast would've felt personally attacked by the episode and we just didn't want to deal with the fallout."
• Oakley and Weinstein had an idea for an episode about Lisa "discovering the joys of campy things", to be entitled "Lisa and Camp". It was never produced and eventually became "Homer's Phobia".
• In February 2012, Oakley tweeted what he felt we the ten best episodes pitched but never produced:

1. "Prince Comes to Springfield" by Conan O'Brien (above)
2. "Lisa the Scientopteran" by George Meyer (above)
3. [Homer's $1000 Suit] - index card left on bulletin board by Sam Simon
4. "Homer vs. Dr. Hibbert on the Issue of Race" by Greg Daniels (above)
5. [Amusement Park] by Matt Groening
6. "thirtysimpsons" by David M. Stern (above)
7. "Homer the Narcoleptic" by David X. Cohen
8. "Bart Gets 144 Jeeps" by Bill Oakley & Josh Weinstein (Inspired by this urban legend.)
9. [Homer Privately Tells Bart He Loves Him Best] by Ken Keeler
10. "Homer's Sexual Fantasy" by Dan Greaney

• In February 2017, Weinsten tweeted a photo of a wall of unused ideas for episodes circa 1996:

1. [Bart the Locksmith]
2. [Marge the Cartoonist]
3. [Wacky Races]
4. [The Naked & The Ned]
5. [Moe Gets Caller ID]
6. [State Fair]
7. [Homer Finds Marge's Old Love Letters]
8. [Burns & Smithers Love Triangle]
9. [New Speed Limit]
10. [Science Class Robot Battle]
11. [Fried Cake]
12. [Springfield Donates White House Christmas Tree]