I’m about to pose a question I never thought I would say and I hate myself for even thinking it: Is it time for The Simpsons to finally be over?

… There, I said it, and I’m not proud. 

When I was a kid I was all about The Simpsons. I collected anything and everything to do with Bart Simpson. I was already forced to be made fun of for my name and related to the boy with both my age and names (the J. in his name is also Joseph). During the ‘90s however, The Simpsons was at the top of the charts and its writers were top-notch. Where else has a series of shorts from a sketch show been made into a regular half-hour sitcom that has lasted 29 seasons with 632 episodes and counting?

With longevity comes loss of flavor though. Sure every year we await the “Treehouse of Horror” episode, the show’s longstanding Halloween tradition, but over the last five years the series has begun to do more episodes using the same alternate universe story style or flash-forwards into the family’s future, something that used to consistently change. Not to mention that, due to this ever-expanding series using characters that have always been the same age, the past is no longer cannon. Every five or six years we see a new history of Bart and Lisa’s births and Homer and Marge’s early years dating, while leaving behind major history only to be mentioned when stories are lacking (e.g., Homer’s activist mother, Apu and Manjula’s octuplets, Marge’s multiple careers as a painter which are always represented as her first or second time, and the VanHouten’s non-upstanding marriage).

The problem with this broken history is that so many important events have occurred in the show’s history that have since been forgotten, replaced with Game of Thrones adaptations. Abe Simpson fought in WWII with Mr. Burns, yet in order to keep ages consistent this is hardly mentioned anymore. What about the baby Selma adopted in 2005? Or Ned Flanders’ love life after both of his wives, Maude and later Edna Krabappel, passed away? And let’s not forget about the fact that Seymour Skinner is living his life like Don Draper, everybody knows it and still says nothing.

The very fact that all of these plotlines have been used and discarded over time without acknowledging them later in life makes one consider whether this series can withstand living in a era of serial programming. Sure it lives on Sunday nights alongside Family Guy and Bob’s Burgers, but both series follow the understanding that if a major event happens it is either later discussed or influences events, or specific events occur to cancel said story out (e.g., Stewie’s time travel paradoxes or Stan Smith’s life-altering gun safety story on American Dad that caused him to think the same at the end as he did in the beginning).

Given its longevity at season 29, there is no doubt that Fox will continue renewing The Simpsons for more seasons based on its success alongside Bob’s Burgers and Family Guy, but I truly question this decision without reconsidering stories and use of specific characters. With the multiple reboots of popular ‘90s series, perhaps the same should be done here, reintroducing the Simpsons we had 20 years ago, back when Santa’s Little Helper got a credit card, during Lisa’s early years as a vegetarian, and when Kang and Kodos weren’t terribly cheap gimmicks throughout the series just to fill space.

I realize this is my own personal opinion, and I am still a fan of the series, though I know some people who are even bigger fans of this current run. I must ask however: how long is too long for a show like this to run?