The Simpsons has featured countless celebrity guest stars over the years, but one of the best was horror master Stephen King's season 12 cameo. Over the course of its more than three decades on the air, The Simpsons has seen its fortunes swap when it comes to attracting big-name Simpsons guest stars. In the beginning, The Simpsons would have to reach out to potential guests, and wouldn't always get a yes in return. After the show became a pop culture phenomenon though, suddenly Simpsons producers were fielding more requests to appear than they necessarily had space for each season.
Considering how many A-list pop culture icons that The Simpsons has had on, it's no wonder that King, the most popular horror writer in history, eventually stopped by for a cameo. It seems like the exact type of thing he'd love to do in his downtime from hammering out his latest novel, and The Simpsons clearly has a lot of reverence for King, having referenced his work (or adaptations of it) on more than one occasion.
Sure enough, King did eventually show up in Springfield, if only for a brief interlude. Thankfully, both he and The Simpsons writers were able to make his appearance highly memorable and hilarious for King's constant readers to witness. King may be known for causing terror, but he can also incite a good laugh when called upon to do so.
That Time Stephen King Made A Cameo On The Simpsons
In The Simpsons season 12 episode "Insane Clown Poppy," the titular family headed to a book convention in Springfield, and one of the guests was Stephen King. King was there to sign books and meet fans, but when Marge approached him to ask what his next horror story would be, the author surprised her by saying he that he was taking a break from the genre. Instead, King revealed that he was working on a biography of Benjamin Franklin, although things took a dark turn when King remarked how Franklin would use electricity to torture small animals and mountain men after discovering it, and finished by saying that the key Franklin famously tied to a kite opens the gates of Hell.
As King's description of his Franklin book continued, his voice became more threatening, and black storm clouds suddenly appeared overhead. Amusingly, Marge didn't seem at all surprised by this, asking King to contact her when he gets back to horror, and in the best touch, King actually made a small note to do so. The Simpsons' Stephen King cameo expertly plays off the common misconception that King must be just as sinister a man in real life as his books are scary, when according to most, that couldn't be further from the truth. Interestingly, while certainly most famous for his horror work, King has written several great non-horror tales, including Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, The Body (adapted as Stand by Me), and The Green Mile.