Maggie Simpson

Margaret "Maggie" Simpson is the youngest of the family, and is a baby. She first appeared in the Tracey Ullman short "Good Night" and was quite prominent during the Ullman days, often being featured alongside Bart and Lisa. Maggie has since become the least seen of the five main Simpsons.

Biography
Like average babies, Maggie is impressionable and easily influenced by what she sees around her. She once hit her father on the head with a mallet, shot a suction dart at his picture and brandished a pencil in imitation of Itchy and Scratchy. Despite her age, Maggie is a formidable marksman and she shot the fingers off of a group of mobsters in rapid succession with a rifle. She was behind the attempted murder of Mr. Burns and she fought Gerald during the St. Patrick day riot, her representing Ireland and Gerald Northern Ireland.

Maggie is often seen falling over, and is a common sighting.

She is keenly aware of her surroundings, and can usually be seen imitating the flow of action around her. Like Bart, Lisa and Homer, she is not fond of spending time with her aunts Patty and Selma. It is also known that she dislikes Gerald, the one eyebrowed baby very much.

Maggie says her first word in the episode "Lisa's First Word", when Homer reminisces about raising Bart and Lisa. She says "Dada", something neither Bart or Lisa would call him when they were babies.

Future
In the future, Maggie went on holidays to Alaska, which was warmer because of global warming. Maggie is seen as a punk teenager. It is said that she has a beautiful singing voice (though ironically is never heard talking) and likes to play around a lot with her friends and family. It is revealed that she has a daughter named Maggie Jr with Gerald, who looks exactly the same as Maggie.

Creation
Matt Groening first conceived the Simpson family in the lobby of James L. Brooks' office. He had been called in to pitch a series of animated shorts, and had intended to present his Life in Hell series. When he realized that animating Life in Hell would require him to rescind publication rights for his life's work, Groening decided to go in another direction. He hurriedly sketched out his version of a dysfunctional family, and named the characters after various members of his own family. Maggie was named after Matt Groening's younger sister Margaret "Maggie" Groening. She often sucked on a pacifier and wore a sleep suit, two traits Groening used for Maggie. Maggie then made her debut with the rest of the Simpsons clan on 19 April, 1987 in the Tracey Ullman short "Good Night". Groening thought that it would be funny to have a baby character that did not talk and never grew up, but assigned any emotions that the scene required. Her comedic hallmarks include her tendency to stumble and land on her face while attempting to walk (though this has been downplayed in later seasons), and a penchant for sucking on her pacifier, the sound of which has become the equivalent of her catchphrase and was originally created by Groening during the Tracey Ullman period, and by Nancy Cartwright during the regular series.

During the show's opening credits, Maggie is run through a supermarket checkout scanner, which reads that she is worth $847.63 (a reference to the monthly cost of infant-rearing in 1989). In "The Simpsons 138th Episode Spectacular," the scanner instead reads "NRA4EVER," a reference to the running joke that the show's creators are right-wing radicals.

Voice
With few exceptions, Maggie never speaks but is very participatory in the events around her, emoting with subtle gestures and facial expressions. Maggie has spoken in "Good Night", the first short to air, after the family falls asleep. On this occasion, Liz Georges provided the voice of Maggie.

Maggie's first word spoken in the normal continuity of the series occurred in "Lisa's First Word", when she was voiced by Elizabeth Taylor. Elizabeth Taylor's performance as Maggie was named the 13th greatest guest spot in the history of the show by IGN. James Earl Jones, who voiced Maggie in Treehouse of Horror V was in seventh place. She would later have brief dialogue in Treehouse of Horror IX, voiced by Harry Shearer, who used his Kang voice. In earlier episodes, Yeardley Smith did many of Maggie's squeaks and occasional speaking parts, although in later seasons her parts were done by Nancy Cartwright. Although she has spoken many times, she has only had two canonical speeches that were real within the series. Her first canon speech was in Lisa's First Word, and this word was "daddy" (as both Bart and Lisa grew up calling Homer his given name), however only the viewers and not the family heard her say this (At least until the Father's day Clip show). Her second speech was in Coming to Homerica. This time the family did hear her speak.

According to The Simpsons Movie, the first word the family heard Maggie say was "sequel?", in the ending sequence (unless one counts the Father's Day clip show as being canon).

Maggie also said some thing in Four Great Women and a Manicure when on she is in the court.

Heroism
Maggie has saved people's lives on a few occasions. Maggie saved Bart and Lisa from Groundskeeper Willie inTreehouse of Horror VI and she saves Homer from being killed by mobsters by shooting them down in Poppa's Got a Brand New Badge. Maggie has even saved her arch-enemy, Gerald from floating into space in a Simpson comic story called Bringing Down Baby. Maggie saved Homer a second time on The Simpsons Movie from Russ Cargill by smashing him in the head with a boulder. Homer also said "What a great little accident you turned out to be", which was referring to the fact that she was conceived at a time that none of her parents intended to, she also saved him from drowning.