Grandpa Simpson Walking In and Out — Grandpa Simpson tipping his hat as he enters a room with Bart at a lectern

Grandpa Simpson Walking In and Out

2010reaction GIFclassic

Published November 13, 2026

Grandpa Simpson Walking In and Out is a reaction GIF taken from the November 1996 Simpsons episode 'Bart After Dark,' in which Abraham Simpson enters a burlesque house, spots his grandson Bart working the door and immediately turns around to leave. Online editors began swapping characters into the loop around 2010, and by October 2020 a two-panel still version had its own template post on r/MemeTemplatesOfficial for jokes about quietly backing out of awkward situations.

simpsons reaction memes gif memes two panel memes dismissal memes

Overview

Two formats share the name. The animated version keeps Abraham's original uninterrupted motion: he opens the door, hangs his hat on the rack, sees something he dislikes, grabs the hat back and walks out in one fluid loop2. Editors often swap Abraham for another character, like a Minecraft Creeper3 or Twilight Sparkle4, so the joke becomes whoever is 'noping out' of the new scene.

A two-panel still image macro pairs the frame of Abraham entering with the frame of him leaving, usually captioned with a scenario reveal placed between the panels7. Captions put a group chat, a dating profile or a new workplace between the two halves. Humor rests on Abraham's smooth 180, which reads as the gentlest possible rejection: no reaction shot, no complaint, just a quiet exit.

Origin & Background

Platform
The Simpsons (source) / Something Awful (earliest meme use)
Date
2010

The source scene aired on November 24, 1996, during 'Bart After Dark,' the fifth episode of The Simpsons' eighth season. Bart gets sentenced to work as a doorman at the burlesque house the Maison Derriere after smashing a gargoyle, and Abraham 'Grampa' Simpson wanders in looking for the kind of show an elderly man might enjoy. In a single looping motion that the scene later made famous, he opens the door, hangs his hat, catches sight of Bart and reverses the whole sequence5.

The earliest documented reuse of the frames as a meme was posted to Something Awful on February 19, 2010, when user Andrew 'Garbage Day' Miller edited Bart out and replaced him with a frog saying 'get out' inside a thread called 'Frog Blog'1. The original clip itself was uploaded to YouTube on July 29, 2012, where it is still the canonical source for later GIF edits2.

How It Spread

After the YouTube rip went live in mid-2012, character-swap GIFs started appearing across image-sharing sites. An Imgur user posted an edit on August 21, 2012, replacing Bart with a Minecraft Creeper, which collected over 14,600 views3. On May 28, 2013, a Derpibooru upload substituted him for Twilight Sparkle and drew 334 upvotes among My Little Pony fans4.

Later mutations in Grandpa Simpson Walking In and Out leaned on YouTube itself. On February 26, 2018, channel '20fadhil: Revolution' uploaded a ten-hour loop of the scene that passed nearly 5,000 views in under three years6. Still-image two-panel variants arrived shortly after: Imgflip user theexplodedninja posted an early two-panel edit in December 2019 that reached roughly 4,400 views7, and on October 10, 2020, Redditor Jordz0_0 shared a cleaned-up template to r/MemeTemplatesOfficial that topped 160 upvotes in about two months8.

Timeline

1996-11-24

'Bart After Dark' airs on Fox, introducing the uninterrupted enter-and-exit motion that later becomes the meme.

2010-02-19

Something Awful user Andrew 'Garbage Day' Miller posts a frog edit of the scene in a thread titled 'Frog Blog,' the earliest known meme use.

2012-07-29

The original clip is uploaded to YouTube, giving GIF editors a clean source.

2012-08-21

An Imgur user swaps Bart for a Minecraft Creeper in an edit that later clears 14,600 views.

2013-05-28

A Derpibooru artist replaces Bart with Twilight Sparkle; the post hits 334 upvotes.

2018-02-26

YouTuber 20fadhil: Revolution uploads a ten-hour loop of the scene.

2019-12

Imgflip user theexplodedninja posts an early two-panel still version of Grandpa Simpson Walking In and Out.

2020-10-10

Redditor Jordz0_0 shares a clean two-panel template on r/MemeTemplatesOfficial.

How to Use This Meme

Grab the GIF or either of the two frames, label the 'entering' moment with yourself or your group, and label what Abraham sees with whatever scenario you want to reject. The quieter the caption, the better the joke.

Frequently Asked Questions