James R | On 25, Jul 2014

If you were planning to go outside this summer bad news: FFX just came up with 552 reasons not to.

If you like yellow people eating their shorts and drinking Duff, say hello to your new favourite TV channel: SimpsonsWorld.com. The service, which launches in August, will offer every single episode of The Simpsons available to stream on-demand.

The site is not currently available to UK users but it’s an ambitious demonstration of just how important a single popular TV show can be to a channel’s success. Netflix had Breaking Bad to boost membership numbers, while the majority of complaints surrounding BBC Three’s switch to online-only were to do with the possible loss of Family Guy. Yahoo!, meanwhile, is banking on a resurrection of Community to establish its own VOD service. And it’s no coincidence that Amazon’s rebrand from LOVEFiLM Instant to Prime Instant Video was accompanied by the reveal of a third season of BBC’s Ripper Street.

FX, though, has gone straight for the big one for its new comedy channel, FXX: The Simpsons. All of it. All The Simpsons. All the time.

The cost for the exclusive cable and VOD rights? A staggering $750 million.

But FX will be hoping its gamble works, attracting paid viewers who, in return, will get instant and on-demand access to the whole shebang, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week – not just on a computer but through apps for the iPhone, iPad, Android devices and computer consoles.

To start off, though, the channel will show an epic, round-the-clock marathon of all 552 episodes from the show’s 25 seasons – plus 2007’s The Simpson’s Movie – starting on 21st August and ending nine days later on 1st September. In October, the VOD service will launch proper.

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