http://chud.com/nextraimages/simpsons_movie.jpgThe Simpsons has been so awful for the last few years that people have been calling the latest barely mediocre episodes a return to greatness. Could it be that there’s a method to this unfunny madness? Could it be that all the jokes have been saved for the big screen movie, to be called SimpsonsThe Simpsons Movie? Judging by the trailer, which seems to be ripping off The Family Guy, a show buily on ripping off The Simpsons, no.

That’s right, there’s a trailer. Honestly, this is sort of shocking to me. There are some projects that stay as vaporfilm which make me feel comforted – I always know that these movies will never exist but will generate baseless rumors for me to occasionally riff on when the real news gets slow. But here’s the teaser, which ran before this weekend’s Ice Age, and was presumably seen by every human being who still wees in diapers, judging by the box office take.

Click here to see the trailer on trust ol’ youtube. You know what’s interesting to me, as someone who started with The Simpsons way back when? If this movie had been made in the first few years of the show, the only character in the preview would have been Bart. He was THE Simpson character. But now it’s all about Homer. Not since Trapper John left M*A*S*H has a long running show evolved so thoroughly.

Says Variety: "We’ve taken script security to the point of lunacy, though it helped that we wrote it in Aramaic," quipped Mike Scully, who wrote the script with creator Matt Groening, Brooks and series veterans Al Jean, Ian Maxtone-Graham, George Meyer, David Mirkin, Mike Reiss, Matt Selman, John Swartzwelder and Jon Vitti.

David Silverman, the "Simpsons" supervising animation director who co-helmed 2001’s Monsters, Inc., is set as director.

Interestingly, the article indicates they have just begun storyboarding for the film, which the teaser claims will have a July 07 release. That’s a damn fast turnaround for an animated film.