“The Simpsons” have continued their streak of being our pop culture Nostradamus.
Fox’s long-running animated series — actually the longest running in history — has an episode from 1993 which appears to foreshadow 2020 with the pandemic and “murder hornets.”
Titled “Marge in Chains” the season 4 episode features a sick Asian worker sneezing on a shipment of juicers that many of the residents of Springfield wish to purchase, which kicks off an “Osaka Flu” outbreak.
As people panic they knock over a truck they think has the cure, but instead demolish a crate marked “Killer Bees” which then swarm.
Earlier this week, scientists said they had spotted Asian giant hornets — also known as murder hornets — in Washington state, and it’s still unknown how they got there. The world’s largest hornet can kill a human just by stinging a few times.
One of the episode’s writers, Bill Oakley, initially told The Hollywood Reporter back in March that he didn’t like the Internet pointing to the episode as a predictor of the pandemic saying, “I don’t like it being used for nefarious purposes.”
“The idea that anyone misappropriates it to make coronavirus seem like an Asian plot is terrible,” Oakley said. “In terms of trying to place blame on Asia — I think that is gross.”
But on Wednesday he conceded the similarities tweeting “ok fine i guess we did” in response to another Twitter user saying the show predicted 2020.
It’s far from the first time “The Simpsons” has been our Magic 8 ball.
CNN
