There were a lot of great bits that happened during the Simpsons/Futurama crossover this past Sunday, and the creative team waited until almost the very end to drop one of the wackiest reveals in the show’s history: the one-eyed aliens Kang and Kodos are actually a lesbian couple with the last name of Johnson. That’s a far more unpredictable character outcome than their big death episode to kick this season off, and executive producer Al Jean actually confirmed it as a reality, in as much as anything that happens in The Simpsons’ universe can be considered reality.
Here’s how the unceremonious admission happened: Futurama’s Emperor Lrrr and his wife get into a small tiff, and when Lrrr invites the female member of Kang and Kodos to go and comfort her, they both heed his request. It was a great little moment, but one that didn’t seem likely to get explained in full at a later date. Luckily, Al Jean shared the grand explanation behind the scene with EW, and you can read it below.
We’ve implied androgyny, we’ve implied that one might be a woman—we never said that both were, but why not? Who knows? We thought it was a great ending to get the Futurama aliens, and then we thought it was a good excuse to bring in Kang and Kodos. People are asking: is this episode canon? And I go, ‘What really happened – did Homer really fall off a cliff all those times and live?’ But that being said: Yeah, sure, they’re Kang and Kodos Johnson. They’re a gay female couple in their species. They seemed to be married.”
Which one of them got on their knee-tentacle though? The term “lesbian couple” is probably a different thing entirely when its two female members of a different alien species being together, but it’s still a nice piece of character biography. Who cares if they both have deeper voices than I ever will?
This isn’t the first time that Kang and Kodos have been a part of something lackadaisically progressive, either. Back in “Treehouse of Horror VII,” Kang was voted for President after being unabashedly honest about voting for third party candidates. Check it out in the clip below.
While we probably won’t be able to go too deeply into the personal lives of Kang and Kodos in the future, Jean also reveals that the alien lovers – it’s gonna take some getting used to that – will indeed be the focus of a future episode. January will see The Simpsons heading to Kang and Kodos’ home planet. I can’t wait!
