The first Simpsons’ stores in the world are set to open in March in Beijing and Shanghai, according to Chinese media.
The lovable, dysfunctional, yellow-coloured family has been delighting and scandalising fans for the last 26 years, but why has Fox decided to choose China to launch its flagship store? Particularly considering the on-off relationship China has had with the Simpsons.
‘What happened to you China, you used to be cool?’
The Simpsons was first screened by some Chinese broadcasters in the early 2000s, but then in 2006 China banned cartoons.
Along with Mickey Mouse it was dropped from peak-time TV, reportedly in an attempt to protect local animators and amid fears about the effect of foreign culture on Chinese children.
However, some commentators suspected that the ban was an attempt to keep the Simpsons off screens given its coverage of controversial topics and its mockery of anything and everything – China included.
The most controversial episode, as far as China is concerned, is one in season 16, where the Simpsons fly to China to help a relative adopt a baby.
This involves the family passing through Tiananmen Square, where they see signs saying: “On this site, in 1989, nothing happened”, and later encounter a tank – both references to the 1989 Tiananmen massacre.
Homer also makes fun of Mao Zedong’s embalmed body, which he likens to “a little angel who killed 50 million people”, and poses as a Buddha to enter an orphanage.
China’s authorities were also unlikely to be amused at the show’s portrayal of Tibet Town, an area in Chinatown surrounded by barbed wire, or the fact that Lisa Simpson is also known as a supporter of the Free Tibet movement.
‘Wow, the fortune cookies here really are more accurate’
Homer Simpson utters those lines in the Goo Goo Gai Pan episode, first aired in the US in 2005. Within a decade, in 2014, the Simpsons were officially back in China, released for streaming on Chinese web portal Sohu after a deal with Fox.