Harry Shearer’s place in The Simpsons cast will be hard for the show to replace – he is the voice of more than 20 of Springfield’s finest characters

I don’t want to be that guy who says something negative about The Simpsons. Because as we all know, The Simpsons is one of those lovely certainties in life that counter-balances all the horrible ones such as death, taxes, the fact that somebody you love will inevitably get cancer one day, or the looming prospect of a third series of Broadchurch that is even more disappointing than the second.



But still, today’s news that voice-actor Harry Shearer will be leaving the show after 26 years at least calls for a moratorium as to whether we should still be putting so much of our faith in humanity’s future on The Simpsons.



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Over the past decade it has gone from worry to suspicion to reportage to evidence-based-panic to the acceptance of cold, hard, reality that The Simpsons is past its best. Even its anointed successor, Family Guy, has gone off the boil during the years we’ve been worrying about The Simpsons. Its longevity has become something of an endurance test for a very long time now.



Facebook Twitter Pinterest The Simpsons and Family Guy. Together at last … Photograph: Fox

Still, it’s difficult not to suspect that Shearer’s departure is something approaching apocalypse. Sure, it’s not on the surface as much of a catastrophe as losing Dan Castellaneta (voice of Homer) or Julie Kavner (Marge), Nancy Cartwright (Bart) or Yeardley Smith (Lisa). But much of The Simpsons’ brilliance is down to the extent to which they managed to build such a rich world, with so many fully-fleshed (for drawings) secondary characters. In 2013, we lost Marcia Wallace, the voice of downtrodden-but-not-out schoolteacher Edna Krabappel, and a generation mourned. Say what you like about death, but of all the many terrible things about it, it’s rarely a political move. Shearer’s departure raises different questions of its own over what life is like at The Simpsons HQ. Which are of course questions for another day when we’re already dealing with collective panic over the future of Ned Flanders.



Edna Krabappel, voiced by the late Marcia Wallace. Photograph: Fox

Today’s news of Coronation Street’s plans on how they’re going to write out Deirdre Barlow, following the untimely death of actress Anne Kirkbride, is proof enough that there are some characters so beloved that recasting them is never going to be an option.



What this means is that we’re potentially waving goodbye to (in no particular order) Mr Burns, Ned Flanders, Kent Brockman, Dr Julius Hibbert, Scratchy, Lenny, Reverend Lovejoy, Otto, Kang the Extratrerrestrial, Dr Marvin Monroe, Dewey Largo, Police Officer Eddie, Radioactive Man, Principal Skinner, Waylon Smithers, Judge Roy Snyder, occasional-Maggie Simpson, Jebediah Springfield, Rainer Wolfcastle, Lion Tamer Ernst, Birchibald T Barlow, Jasper Beardly, State Controller Atkins, Student Benjamin, Marty from KBBL Radio, unspecified Happy Little Elf, Herman Mermann, Sanjay Nashaspeemepetlion, Elderly Barber, Reporter Dave Shutton and Dr J. Loren Pryor…

Burns and Smithers, both played by Harry Shearer. Photograph: Fox

I’m not saying we would dreadfully miss all of these characters. I’m just saying that it’s a lot for Kelsey Grammar to have to take on all by himself.

The elephant in the room is that the received wisdom about animation is that these shows can last for ever because drawings don’t age. And yes, Mickey Mouse has been voiced by several different people. And yes, the successful transition of most of the voice cast of Radio 4’s brilliant Dead Ringers to ITV’s surprisingly adept Newzoids tells its own story about how a successful impersonation of Nicola Sturgeon can survive all weathers, and it doesn’t matter if you know who’s doing it or not. (Incidental pop fact: the UK’s leading female voice impressionist Debra Stevenson is also a Corrie alum, having portrayed late-blooming incestuous cougar Frankie Baldwin).

So yes, recastings like these probably can work. But even the kindest of hearts would never try to suggest that Kermit has been the same since the passing of Jim Henson. But we’re not talking about Frankie Baldwin here. We’re not even talking about Nicola Sturgeon. We’re not even talking about Kermit the Frog. We’re talking about The Simpsons. The bloody Simpsons. And when we’re talking about things that are this important, you just cannot do that.

Can you? I have no desire to live in a post-Simpsons world. But sometimes, some things you love just need putting out of their misery.