Is Dan Harmon Creating Fox’s Next Homer Simpson?

No pressure here, Dan Harmon — Fox is saying your new animated show Krapopolis is poised to create the fourth head on its animated Mount Rushmore, alongside Homer Simpson, Bob Belcher and Peter Griffin. Fox is so jazzed that it has greenlit three full seasons before a single episode has aired. The news must be a nice break for Harmon from answering questions about Justin Roiland’s ongoing legal problems. 

What is Krapopolis? Imagine a Family Guy or Simpsons that takes place in a mythical suburb of Ancient Greece, with family members including human beings, gods and monsters. “It’s set in a time in folklore when the city is as new as the idea of doing business on the internet in the 1990s. It’s just sort of like a thing that might be here today or tomorrow,” Harmon told TV Insider. “So it’s kind of impossible to be so bad at it that you don’t deserve the job; it’s just a bunch of upstarts and startups.”

Could Krapopolis share a universe with the reality-hopping Rick and Morty? “I’m always having this discussion with the writers,” Harmon teased. “This universe shares a history with ours, correct?”

That’s the good news. The bad news? Because 2023 network television is on the cutting edge of 2021 digital technology, Fox is launching an NFT component to the show, just like the gods did in Ancient Greece. When the show hits during football season, its not-yet fans can hit the Krapopolis NFT store to buy digital stuff and access exclusive content.  

It’s this element of the show that’s setting off my alarm bells. Despite the fact that the NFT market has crashed, the Krapopolis Marketplace (minting is LIVE!) allows you to reach into your cryptowallet and buy a Krap Chicken, some kind of virtual token that allows you to “vote on show elements, watch exclusive behind-the-scenes content, join art contests and attend unique IRL experiences with the cast and crew.” You also get a daily KRAPEGG that you can redeem for merch (which we assume is digital, not something you can actually wear or hold in your hand). 

Yikes. Last we checked, Mount Rushmore comedy isn’t created by crypto bros voting on show gags. It’s not hard to imagine Fox programming executives getting all hot and bothered at a pitch that included the words “blockchain,” “digital goods” and “leaderboards,” even if they had no idea what they really meant. Here’s hoping that the show’s digital component doesn’t drag Harmon’s new show down into a pile of Krap.