Did The Simpsons Really Kill Off [Spoiler] In Season 37 Premiere? Plus, The Iconic Easter Egg You Didn't See

The Simpsons recently blew up the internet with its 36th season finale flash-forward, which led many (too many!) people to mistakenly believe that the Fox comedy had killed off beloved matriarch Marge Simpson. Following Sunday's Season 37 premiere, another longtime Springfield resident's fate is now in question, albeit one whose name you might not even know.

Thanks to some vintage pulls from Marge's high school wardrobe, Lisa becomes a style icon at Springfield Elementary, gaining her admission to the school's exclusive fashion club. Lisa is surprised to discover that the club is located in what used to be the music room, prompting fellow student Deavin to tell her, "We took it over when Mr. Largo died." When Lisa asks for clarification, Deavin adds, "Or he has jury duty. It was something dumb."

Could it just be a throwaway line? Of course. But in the off chance that Lisa's beloved band director really has met his untimely demise, TVLine checked in with The Simpsons co-executive producers Cesar Mazariegos and Jessica Conrad, the latter of whom wrote Sunday's premiere. When asked if Mr. Largo is actually dead, the duo replied in unison with an emphatic "no."

When Conrad wrote the line about Mr. Largo's "death" into Sunday's episode, she wasn't worried about riling up any fans. In fact, "for something like this, I would welcome the riling up if you actually believe that would kill him off off-camera," she says with a laugh.

Adds Mazariegos, "When we killed off Larry the Barfly last year, that was a big discussion. 'How do we do it? Should it be that guy, or should it be trucker hat guy?' Anything that's that big, where there's a whole episode about it, we for sure think about it. But we usually don't want to get rid of our characters. And it's such a cartoony world. We know even if Moleman is in a car that explodes, it doesn't mean he's dead forever."

Read on for more of TVLine's Q&A with Conrad and Mazariegos about the Season 37 premiere, including which classic Simpsons Easter egg was tragically left on the cutting room floor:

TVLINE | I loved the Dawson's Creek parody in this episode. I take it you were a big fan?
CONRAD | Oh yeah, I was.
MAZARIEGOS | And she's a big Clincher — I mean Reacher — fan.
CONRAD | Yes, I am a big fan of that as well. All of that Reacher stuff was written out of love. I actually hadn't seen it when we first had the idea and started writing it, but then my boyfriend and I blew through every episode. It's the best.

TVLINE | Have you wanted to spoof it for a while but just hadn't found the right opportunity?
CONRAD | It actually came about organically. I had the idea for Lisa finding and wearing Marge's old clothes, and then Dawson's Creek just worked as a way to get into that part of the story, explaining how that era of clothing is cool again. In the COVID lockdown era, a lot of people watched shows together with their family, so that felt like something fun for them to bond over.

TVLINE | Those were some carefully curated outfits. Did you have a hand in what Lisa ended up wearing?
CONRAD | Oh, definitely. After having our initial kickoff meetings with the director, we started getting design mockups, so we'd send them inspiration. We went online and looked up old Delia's catalogues and screenshots from Dawson's Creek. It was a fun process.

TVLINE | We're used to seeing these characters in the same clothes every week, so I feel like it's a big deal anytime they get a new outfit.
CONRAD | Yes, and that was a fun joke to play with. All of a sudden she's changing clothes every day, but we're ignoring the fact that this has never been an issue before. And we also kind of hit that with Sherri and Terri; both of them are dressed exactly the same, but only one of them is cool enough to be in fashion club.

TVLINE | It reminded me of the episode where Lisa started dressing "cool" to impress her new friends.
CONRAD | We actually almost had that in there. I forget why we took it out, but we did almost have a little wink to that. She was going to be wearing that outfit in the montage.

TVLINE | The Simpsons is hitting 800 episodes this season. Does the show have anything special planned for that big milestone?
MAZARIEGOS | It will be two separate episodes that will air on the same night. We're currently figuring out out our big couch gag for it. It's an episode that deals with Marge's relationship with Santa's Little Helper; we even look back at the first episode when they got the dog. The way we address [the milestone] is by addressing it in the couch gag.