Citing a production on the first film that was apparently a four-year logistical nightmare, Matt Groening made it clear at a recent UCLA panel discussion that no second Simpsons Movie was in the cards. The feature film version of the long-running Fox series made over half-a-billion dollars worldwide in 2007, and was generally well-liked even by those who abandoned the series long ago. Despite its success, apparently you couldn’t pay Groening and company to go through that process again.
“It took us four years [to make] and it killed us. It stole animators from the show.”
I have to assume producer David Silverman was being tongue-in-cheek when he said, “maybe in another 10, 15 years,” but I can’t say without having been there. Perhaps we can look forward to a 40-year anniversary film or something.
I’d suspect the more likely option is that when Fox finally decides to halt the show, they’ll write in a plan for a movie to punctuate the series.
More from the panel can be found at THR.