Although the quality of the show is not the same as it used to be, the early seasons are among the best that had aired on the TV across all genres, needless to say animation. It also sit comfortably in the center of the all the American made animations, when it comes to the spirit and direction of the show. Animation in my view can be roughly put into two categories, one is associated with Japanese animation, the other is associated with American animation. The difference is obvious on the surface such as style of drawing, but a more subtle yet more important difference is the theme. The Japanese animation tend to be fantasy based and try its best to distant itself from reality, this phenomena rooted in otaku culture, which means the viewers are sick and tired of reality to some degree and just want watch something that is not here not now. While the American animation basically is no different from any real world TV series in themes and story telling, but because the drawing dose not amount to the real thing, this bring a great advantage. Namely a more loosely and more ambiguously defined world can be used to justify much more ridiculousness and randomness in the plot, and because the viewer don't usually associated a poorly drew face to a real person, this can be used to justified the character's more complex behavior and a more flexible personality. This makes the American animation perfectly suitable for portraying society in a certain way, or be critical of something in the pop culture. And basically this is what American animation does, it is used as a self-reflection tool or a way of express certain thoughts on society or life by the writers. Generally I think animation does a better job than the real world TV shows with few exceptions such as "black mirror".
Simpsons is among the best in this regard and is very moderate in the theme of the story. Some shows tend to reflect on personal growth and development, such as "Bojack horseman", some show would discuss personal philosophy on a more grand scale, such as "rick and morty". Other shows offers critical view of society such as "South park". Simpsons simply does all at the same time, it's critical to society today but not as sharp as "South park", it has a underlining tone of "no matter what we do the society won't change much", so in its story telling it just paint the whole picture without providing the cause nor the solution, in "South park" the cause part is at least provided. On the side of personal philosophy, the starting point of discussion in Simpsons is the relationship between individual and the group whether it's family or the whole society, discussion that focus on personal development is also presented but overall it's not a major topic. Shows like "Bojack horseman" or "rick and morty" emphasize more on the topic of a abstract person in a abstract environment, the relationship between self and others are somewhat secondary.
In other words you can basically start with Simpsons and apply minor change to it and you can get most of the American show with few exception such as "Adventure time" which is a fantasy. In no way I'm saying that all the shows are originate from Simpsons, it just happens that Simpsons just sit in the middle of basically everything, and has this "All in one" characteristic. You could say it does everything well but is not the best in any given area, to some extend it's true, but bear in mind that none of the creators has this idea of "do all the things at the same time" when they start the show, to end up with Simpson, it took true genius, but when you see all the writers that had been working on the show, especially the early season, it won't be a surprise.
Simpsons is among the best in this regard and is very moderate in the theme of the story. Some shows tend to reflect on personal growth and development, such as "Bojack horseman", some show would discuss personal philosophy on a more grand scale, such as "rick and morty". Other shows offers critical view of society such as "South park". Simpsons simply does all at the same time, it's critical to society today but not as sharp as "South park", it has a underlining tone of "no matter what we do the society won't change much", so in its story telling it just paint the whole picture without providing the cause nor the solution, in "South park" the cause part is at least provided. On the side of personal philosophy, the starting point of discussion in Simpsons is the relationship between individual and the group whether it's family or the whole society, discussion that focus on personal development is also presented but overall it's not a major topic. Shows like "Bojack horseman" or "rick and morty" emphasize more on the topic of a abstract person in a abstract environment, the relationship between self and others are somewhat secondary.
In other words you can basically start with Simpsons and apply minor change to it and you can get most of the American show with few exception such as "Adventure time" which is a fantasy. In no way I'm saying that all the shows are originate from Simpsons, it just happens that Simpsons just sit in the middle of basically everything, and has this "All in one" characteristic. You could say it does everything well but is not the best in any given area, to some extend it's true, but bear in mind that none of the creators has this idea of "do all the things at the same time" when they start the show, to end up with Simpson, it took true genius, but when you see all the writers that had been working on the show, especially the early season, it won't be a surprise.