'Simpsons' Fans Discover Show Predicted Richard Branson's Space Flight Years Ago

Fans of The Simpsons have once again hailed the cartoon for predicting the future—with a 2014 episode that showed Richard Branson in space.

Matt Groening's animated sitcom has a track record for seemingly foretelling world events such as the Donald Trump presidency, which was mentioned by Lisa Simpson back in 2000.

Now the writers have been proved right once more. The 15th episode of the 25th season, "The War of Art," shows the billionaire Branson reclining in zero gravity, admiring a painting on the wall of his spacecraft.

The scene looks eerily similar to photos from the 70-year-old's inaugural flight to the edge of space, on July 11.

The prophetical Simpsons scene first aired on March 23, 2014 in the U.S. This week Twitter user Aditya Kondawar shared side-by-side images of the real Branson and his animated character. "How can The Simpsons show predict every Damn thing?" he asked.

Another Twitter user, Michael, replied: "In the 15th century, we relied on Nostradamus for his prophecies. In the 21st century we call on the Simpsons!"

Aman Sagar tweeted: "That's insane, there must be some logical explanation to this."

Aniket Rao joked: "Matt Groening is a time traveller."

Abi was more interested in using the cartoon to plan for the future, posting: "The point is what else it has predicted so that we can get better prepared for the future."

Clenjus D'souza shared his own theory on Twitter: "Maybe their writers are psychics."

Zach Layton offered a more plausible—if less fun—explanation, writing: "A simple google search on [Virgin Galactic] history shows this. The Simpson's episode aired 3/23/2014 (IMDB). VG was starting to run test flights in 2014. So assumed press in 2013 at the time was all over this and that's where they got inspiration for the episode."

Other scenes from The Simpsons back catalog that have since come true include a depiction of the Shard skyscraper in London more than a decade before it was built and a news item about a financial crisis in Greece years before it happened. There have been a few hoaxes too, however, including a false claim that the show predicted a coronavirus pandemic.

In real life, Branson experienced zero gravity during his short trip—the first fully crewed space flight for VSS Unity, Virgin Galactic's space plane.

Following the successful touchdown, the billionaire raved about the experience, tweeting: "I have dreamt about this moment since I was a child, but going to space was more magical than I ever imagined."

Virgin Galactic, which he founded in 2004, aims to be able to transport tourists into space next year, with tickets expected to cost around $250,000 each.