What Critics Really Said When ‘The Simpsons’ First Aired

Fox’s The Simpsons has been on the air for so long, Bart would be around 50 if he were actually aging, and Homer would be well into retirement age! After getting its start as animated shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show, The Simpsons made the leap to standalone show on December 17, 1989, with the Christmas special “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire,”

So, how did TV critics at the time feel about moving into a surreal suburban town called Springfield? Was The Simpsons roasting on a critical fire… or did critics think this was the kind of show that might go the distance? (Surely they couldn’t have thought that distance would be 36 years and counting.) Here’s what contemporaneous reviews tell us…