The Simpsons [Season 2, Episode 3]
Treehouse of Horror
Shown 25th October 1990
Reviewed 31st October 2001 - Wednesday
The kids are in the treehouse telling horror stories.
Homer sits on the branch outside, listening.
Bad Dream House
The Simpsons move into a new house.
Unfortunately it is not just Haunted - it is cursed.
The house is actually sentient, so it can speak to the human inhabitants
like in House of Whacks - the futuristic AI house in
The Simpsons [Season 13, Episode 1] Treehouse of Horror XII
.
Hungry Are The Damned
The Simpsons get abducted by space-aliens:
Kang, Kodos and a third one (voiced by James Earl Jones -
Star Wars: ANH
). The aliens give them lots of food, but Lisa is suspicious of their intentions.
The Raven [wr. by Edgar Allen Poe]
This is a wonderful version of the poem,
narrated by James Earl Jones, starring Homer and with Bart as the Raven.
The Simpsons [Season 3, Episode 7]
Treehouse of Horror II
Shown 31st October 1991
As always, we get a trio of terror tales:
The Monkey's Paw
Homer buys a magical monkey's paw that can grant four wishes.
The family each get a wish, and oddly enough Lisa's is the most destructive.
The Bart Zone
In an alternate universe, Bart is a mind-reading monstrosity who rules
Springfield with an iron will.
If I Only Had A Brain
Mr Burns builds a robot that can do Homer's job.
However, it needs a brain ...
The Simpsons [Season 4, Episode 5]
Treehouse of Horror III
Shown 29th October 1992
Reviewed 2nd November 2001 - Friday
The anthology starts with Homer doing his Alfred Hitchcock impersonation
and giving a disclaimer.
Clown Without Pity
Homer buys Bart a Krusty the Clown doll for his birthday.
However, the doll is evil and wants to kill Homer.
King Homer
In the 1930s, Mr Burns hires a ship to go to Ape Island
and capture a giant ape.
Dial Z for Zombies
Bart and Lisa try to bring pet cat Snowball back from the dead.
However, they manage to unleash a horde of zombies on the town.
The Simpsons [Season 5, Episode 5]
Treehouse of Horror IV
Shown 28th Oct 1993
Reviewed 11th November 2001 - Sunday
Bart gives us an introduction, set in an art gallery of horrors.
The Devil And Homer Simpson
Homer sells his soul to Ned Satan Flanders in exchange for a donut.
Terror at 5 1/2 Feet
Bart takes the bus to school.
However, he sees a Gremlin on the side of the vehicle.
Bart Simpson's Dracula
Peasants have been found dead, drained of blood.
Only Lisa realises that a Vampire is responsible,
and Mr Burns is the prime suspect.
The Simpsons [Season 5, Episode 15]
Deep Space Homer
Shown 24th Feb 1994
Reviewed
NASA are dismayed with the low TV ratings for their space launches.
They study sitcoms like Tool Time and Married With Children,
then discover that they should send an average American up
as an astronaut on the next shuttle mission.
Homer and Barney are recruited and trained,
which allows some hilarious references
Star Trek
episode Gamesters of Triskelion.
Even the Itchy and Scratchy segment is Scar Trek: The Next Laceration.
Homer gets to go into space, alongside guest-star Buzz Aldrin.
Everything should be okay, as long as they do not land on that creepy
Planet of the Apes
...
The Simpsons [Season 6, Episode 6]
Treehouse of Horror V
Shown 30th Oct 1994
Reviewed 23rd April 2001 - Monday
The Shinning
is a parody of a certain Kubrick film.
Time & Punishment
sees Homer travel to the age of the Dinosaurs, and change the time-stream ...
Cafeteria of Doom
sees Principal Skinner solve a detention-room overflow and a fresh meat shortage ...
The Simpsons [Season 7, Episode 6]
Treehouse of Horror VI
Shown 29th Oct 1995
Reviewed 7th September 2001 - Friday
Attack of the 50ft Eyesores
Giant advertising hoardings trash Springfield!
Nightmare on Evergreen Street
Bart has nightmares that Groundskeeper Willie is trying to kill him.
This is an extended Freddy Kreuger parody.
The Third Dimension
A science experiment goes wrong,
and Homer is sucked into ... the third Dimension!
Yes, we get to see him rendered in glorious CGI.
The Simpsons [Season 8, Episode 1]
Hallowe'en Special VII
Shown 27th Oct 1996
Reviewed 31st August 2001 - Friday
The Thing & I
Homer is keeping a monster in the attic.
It is Bart's evil siamese twin!
The Genesis Tub
Lisa's school science project results in her creating a tiny civilisation.
Citizen Kang
Homer, out fishing, is kidnapped by the aliens Kang and Kodos.
It is the year of the election race between Bill Clinton and Bob Dole,
so when they tell Homer Take us to your leader
BOTH leaders get abducted.
The aliens disguise themselves at the candidates.
Their election campaigns are wonderful parodies of the real thing.
American Democracy is a two-party system,
where things will be the same no matter which one wins!
The Simpsons [Season 8, Episode 2]
You Only Move Twice
Shown 3rd Nov 1996
Smithers turns down a job as manager of a nuclear power plant in Cypress Grove.
Their second choice, Homer Simpson, accepts it.
His family are doubtful about it at first,
but seem to get what they want.
Marge has lots of free time after her automated house does all her chores.
Bart is popular at his new school,
while Lisa is allowed to wander in the woods unsupervised.
It turns out that the new boss, Hank Scorpio, is a really nice guy.
But as Homer wanders through his daily chores as Plant manager,
the background story taking place is a series of tropes from the
James Bond
franchise. Yes, Scorpio is a supervillain,
and he needs the nuclear power plant online ASAP to power his superweapon.
The Simpsons [Season 8, Episode 10]
The Springfield Files
Shown 12th Jan 1997
This starts with the Simpson family arriving onto their couch by rocket-pack.
The Leonard Nimoy (
Star Trek: TOS
) gives an intro in the style of his 1990s pseudoscience show.
It is friday, and Homer wants to give himself a long weekend of drinking.
He skives off work by rigging the CCTV system to a VCR
playing a VHS tape of the guys in their 1970s clothes.
That is not the only thing about this episode that has dated badly -
the breathalyser in Moe's Tavern has a setting for Boris Yeltsin.
Anyway, on his way back from the bar after closing time
the severely drunken Homer encounters a mysterious glowing humanoid.
The FBI Division of Paranormal Activities in Washington DC
hears about Homer's unsubstantiated UFO encounter.
This is more like the idea behind
Fringe
, while the
X-Files
investigators just solved cold cases.
Scully (
Gillian Anderson
) is more interested in a report of some drugs and illegal weapons coming into New Jersey.
Mulder states that this is not something the FBI should be concerned about.
In truth, he is correct – that would be the responsibility of the DEA and the BATF.
The Feds get Homer to look at a line-up of aliens, including Kang (or is it Kodos?),
but he is unable to pick out the one he saw.
The only way to solve the mystery is to recreate the incident,
by going to the same place at the same time and waiting for the alien ...
The Simpsons [Season 9, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror VIII
Shown 26th Oct 1997
The intro is by the Fox Network's official censor,
a continuation of Marge Simpson's overprotective mothering intros
from the first few Treehouses.
Yes, once upon a time Censorship was a right-wing thing.
Twenty years later, it has become a left-wing one.
The Homega Man
Mayor Quimby made a public joke about frogs' legs,
so the French Government fire a nuclear missile at Springfield.
Homer manages to survive the explosion,
and this leads on to a parody of
The Omega Man (1971)
. The other survivors are mutants, and they go after Homer!
Fly vs Fly
Homer buys a matter transporter off the Professor.
Unfortunately, this was not a good idea - it actually works!
Bart thinks that if he makes himself half-fly
he will end up with superpowers.
Instead he ends up as a parody of
The Fly (1961)
.
Easy-Bake Coven
1649 CE, and the men of Springfield have burned most of their womenfolk
on the trumped-up charge of witchcraft.
Eventually, Marge is accused of being a witch too.
The Simpsons [Season 10, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror IX
Shown 25th Oct 1999
Reviewed 31st October 2001 - Wednesday
Hell Toupée
Homer gets a hairpiece, but it is possessed!
It belonged to Snake (the town's crook),
and he uses Homer to kill off the people he had grudges against.
Bart is one of the witnesses who got Snake sent to the electric chair,
so he is next on the hit-list.
This is a bit like the average Sideshow Bob episode,
without the charm that Kelsey Grammar brings to it.
Terror of Tiny Toon
Marge refuses to let Bart and Lisa watch a scary hallowe'en cartoon.
Instead they accidentally get sucked into the television,
when Bart uses the plutonium nugget from the opening credits
to power the TV's remote controle.
Inside the show, they get chased by Itchy and Scratchy!
Also, a certain other character pops up.
Starship Poopers
Maggie gets her first baby tooth, a fang, and sprouts tentacles.
Yes, her father is the space-alien Kang!
The only way to sort this out is ... to appear on the Jerry Springer show.
The Simpsons [Season 11, Episode 4]
Treehouse Of Horror X
Shown 31st Oct 1999
Reviewed 31st October 2001 - Wednesday
Kang and Kodos present the special at Century City, Los Angeles.
I Know What You Didly-Idly Did.
Marge accidentally runs over Ned Flanders.
Homer tries to cover it up, like Weekend At Bernies.
Someone knows what they did, because they get creepy messages like in
I Know What you Did Last Summer
...
Desperately Xeeking Xena
Lisa and Bart get super-powers.
They get their own TV show, Stretch Dude and Clobber Girl.
The villain, The Collector, kidnaps
Lucy Lawless
from a
Xena: Warrior Princess
Convention!
Life's A Glitch, Then You Die
It is New Years Eve 1999, the run-up to Y2K.
Unfortunately, Homer was the Y2K compliance officer at the power plant.
Society breaks down, but the looting is stopped
by the fact that every computer chip on earth is kaput.
Homer and Bart sneak onto a space-ship with Tom Arnold and Rosie O'Donnell.
The Simpsons [Season 11, Episode 17]
Bart To The Future
Shown 19 Mar 00
Homer takes the family to a Native American Casino.
Bart bumps into the manager,
who gives him a vision of thirty years into the future.
Bart is an aging wannabe-Rockstar,
while Lisa is the first heterosexual female President of the USA.
The Simpsons [Season 12, Episode 1]
Treehouse of Horror XI
Shown 1st Nov 2000
Reviewed 31st October 2001 - Wednesday
The intro sees the Simpson family appear as another famous family,
The Munsters
!
G-g-ghost D-d-dad
Homer is fated to die.
He avoids fate for most of the day, but eventually he snuffs it.
However, he has to do a good deed before he can get into heaven.
Scary Tales Can Come True
Back in the Middle Ages, Homer loses his job as village oaf.
He and Marge cannot afford to keep the kids,
so Bart and Lisa are cast out into the forest.
Luckily, Lisa's book of fairy-tales happens to list
all the horrible things they will encounter.
Night Of The Dolphins
Lisa frees a dolphin from Seaworld.
However, he is the dolphins' King and he wants revenge for his captivity.
The Simpsons [Season 12, Episode 6]
The Computer Wore Menace Shoes
Shown 3 Dec 00
Homer sets up his own web pages,
and uses the pseudonym Mr X to post rumours.
Some of the rumours are too close to the truth for comfort,
so he is drugged and wakes up on ... The Island.
Patrick McGoohan (
The Prisoner
) is Number Six (of course!), and Homer is Number Five!
The Simpsons [Season 13, Episode 1]
Treehouse of Horror XII
Shown 6th Nov 2001
This starts with the Simpsons trick-or-treating at Burns' Mansion.
They are dressed as the Flintstones,
the original cartoon family that also inspired Family Guy.
Hex and the City
The Simpsons go to Ethnic-Town, where the ethnic stereotypes hang out.
Not people of colour, of course – EUROPEAN stereotypes like Italians.
Homer offends a Gypsy fortune-teller,
so she puts a curse on the people he loves.
As his family and friends fall victim of supernatural evil,
he must end the curse by catching a leprechaun
by using some lucky charms cereal as bait.
House of Whacks
Marge Simpson is sick of house-work,
so she has some robots upgrade the appliances to a fully automated household.
Pierce Brosnan (
The World Is Not Enough (1999)
) voices the house's AI, which falls in love with Marge.
Wiz Kids
This is a parody of
Harry Potter
. Well, the kids go to a magical school -
but it is just their regular school.
That said, Harry has a cameo as himself.
Lisa humiliates Bart, simply by being better at her spell-casting than he is.
Yes, she has been pushed up two grades into his class.
In revenge, he teams up with Dark Lord Montymort (AKA Monty Burns).
The Simpsons [Season 14, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XIII
Shown 3rd Nov 2002
The Simpsons have a seance to contact Maude Flanders.
Send in the Clones
Homer gets a hammock that clones him.
He clones himself so many times that he creates a National Emergency.
The Fright to Creep and Scare Harms
Lisa discovers the gravestone of William H Bonney.
Shocked by the fact he was shot dead at a young age,
she starts a gun-control movement.
But she must be the only person who does not know who Billy The Kid was.
Still, nobody expected his ghost to appear -
along with Kaiser Wilhem and The Sundance Kid!
The Island of Dr Hibbert
This parodies
The Island of Dr Moreau
.
The Simpsons [Season 15, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XIV
Shown 2nd Nov 2003
Reaper Madness
Homer kills the Grim Reaper, and has to replace him.
Frinkenstein
Prof Frink gets a Nobel Prize (presented by
Jennifer Garner
), and reanimates his dead father.
Naturally, Frink Snr goes on a kill-crazy rampage for new organs.
Stop the World, I want to Goof Off
Bart and Millhouse get a stopwatch that magically stops time.
The Simpsons [Season 15, Episode 15]
Co-Dependent's Day
Shown 21 Mar 04
Cosmic Wars comes out - a
Star Wars: Phantom Menace
parody. Bart and Lisa go to the Ranch to meet Randall Lewis
(a hilarious mockery of George Lucas)!
Marge and Homer go to the nearby winery,
which improves their marriage but they become Alkies.
The second half of the ep is about the consequences of alcoholism.
The Simpsons [Season 16, Episode 1]
Treehouse of Horror XV
Shown 7th Nov 2004
Reviewed 18th May 2006 [Thursday]
The Ned Zone
Flanders can see the future.
Four Beheadings and a Funeral
Victorian London - Lisa is Sherlock Holmes, hunting the Mutton-Chop Murderer.
In the Belly of the Boss
Maggie gets miniaturised in a health-pill, which is swallowed by Mr Burns.
The family get in a mini-sub to rescue her. Marge takes the
Raquel Welch
role, which means she gets a couple of gratuitous bikini shots!
The Simpsons [Season 17, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XVI
Shown 6th Nov 2005
Reviewed
Kang and Kodos watch the baseball championship on TV.
It is going too slowly, so they alter the space-time continuum
and accidentally destroy the universe.
B.I.: Bartificial Intelligence
Bart is hospitalised,
so the Simpsons buy a robotic replacement named David - just like in
A.I.!
Survival of the Fattest
Monty Burns invites his blue-collar slobs to a Hunting Weekend.
He is going to play The Most Dangerous Game.
I’ve Grown a Costume on Your Face
A witch gatecrashes the Springfield town fancy-dress contest.
She curses everyone to become whatever they dressed as.
Was this not used in
Season 2 of Buffy?
The Simpsons [Season 18, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XVII
Shown Sunday November 05th, 2006
Married to the Blob
Homer eats an alien morsel,
and becomes ravenously hungry.
He then proceeds to eat anything and anyone he can find.
You've Got to Know When to Golem
Bart steals the Golem of Prague from Krusty the Clown.
To control it, he writes instructions on paper
and puts them in its mouth.
Then Lisa upsets the plan, by ordering it to speak.
The Day the Earth Looked Stupid
This is based on the real-life
War of the Worlds
broadcast in 1939, which was directed by
Orson Welles
. In this version,
the citizens of Springfield in 1938 become panic-stricken idiots.
The Simpsons [Season 19, Episode 5]
Treehouse of Horror XVIII
Shown Sunday November 04th, 2007
The pre-amble conducted by Marge.
She is interrupted by on-screen promos for other shows,
and she takes a messy revenge on them.
E.T. Go Home
Bart discovers Kodo the Destroyer hiding in the garden shed.
The youngster befriends the extra-terrestrial,
believing that Kodo comes in peace and brings a message of love.
Yes, this is a parody of
ET: The Extra-Terrestrial
. All pretty predictable.
Mr. and Mrs. Simpson
Homer is a hit-man, assassinating people for Monty Burns.
He discovers that Marge is also an assassin,
a freelancer going for the same targets as him.
Yes, this is a parody of
Mr and Mrs Smith
. Unlike the previous segment,
this version does not put a horror-movie spin on the story.
Heck House
Bart and Lisa go trick-or-treating with Milton the bully.
They start to play practical jokes on reluctant adults,
but it all gets out of control.
The adults band together to get revenge,
and Ned Flanders comes up with a plan.
He gets his god to curse him into becoming a demon,
and then uses his power to illustrate the seven deadly sins.
Homer is Gluttony and Sloth, Groundskeeper Willie is Rage,
Mo the bartender is Lust and Avarice and Envy.
The Simpsons [Season 20, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XIX
Shown Sunday November 02nd, 2008
The intro scene is set during the Obama/McCain election year.
Yes, that is how long ago this episode was first broadcast.
Homer Simpson goes to vote for Obama,
for some reason hoping that this will mean less money for fthings he hates - like parks and libraries.
Unfortunately he
Untitled Robot Parody
Springfield is overrun by cheap knock-offs of the
Transformers (2007)
. Marge tries to stop them from fighting each other,
although she never considers that they might then team up and conquer Earth.
Where are Kodos and Kang when you need them?
How to Get Ahead in Dead-Vertising
Homer gets hired by the advertising industry to murder celebrities
so the marketing executives can exploit their images without paying royalties.
However, the celebrities regroup in Heaven,
and gallop down to take revenge in a scene not entirely dissimilar to Billy the Kid's onslaught many years previously.
It's the Grand Pumpkin, Milhouse
This is a parody of Peanuts, the Charlie Brown cartoon.
It is Halloween time, and Milhouse wants to see the Grand Pumpkin.
Lisa agrees to keep him company, rather than go trick-or-treating.
Until she realises it is a complete waste of time -
which is quite out of character, since she is a know-it-all without any childish innocence.
Speaking of which, the good news is that Milhouse's wish comes true
and the Grand Pumpkin comes to life.
The bad news is that it discovers what humans do to its kind,
so it goes on a kill-crazy rampage.
The Simpsons [Season 20, Episode 20]
Four Great Women And A Manicure
Shown 10 May 09
Marge takes Lisa to the beauty parlour for her first mani-petti.
Lisa insists that a woman can be successful
without being attractive to men (or lipstick lesbians).
Marge tells the story of Queen Elizabeth the First.
She was jealous when Walter Raleigh (Homer)
had an affair with her lady-in-waiting (Marge).
Luckily, Walter/Homer defeated the Spanish Armada.
Lisa responds by telling the story of Snow White.
A lawyer from the Walt Disney Corporation is on hand
to ensure that the Public Domain story does not infringe copyright.
This version has Snow White played by Lisa,
and is a blatant parody of the Disney version.
There is no Prince Charming, because Lisa does not think that women need men.
Marge tells the story of a woman held back by an inadequate husband.
This is the story of MacBeth,
the stage-play performed by the local amateur theatre group.
Life imitates art as Marge hen-pecks Homer into killing his rivals.
Normally, they only tell three stories in these portmanteaus.
However, Maggie wants one so Marge tells her an abridged version of
The Fountainhead
. A baby named Maggie Rourke is a talented architect.
However, her kindergarten teacher refuses to allow her freedom of expression.
Finally, Maggie speaks -
an eloquent if Ayn Randi-ian declaration of self-will voiced by
Jodie Foster
.
The Simpsons [Season 21, Episode 1]
Homer The Whopper
Shown 2nd August 2010
Bart and Milhouse discover that Comic Book Guy has created his own comic,
based on a superhero named Everyman.
His superpower is that he can absorb powers from other superheroes ...
just by reading the comic-books that their stories are in.
Bart convinces CBG to self-publish,
and for some reason the Everyman comic becomes very popular with young kids.
As a result, a Hollywood studio buys the movie rights.
CBG refuses to accept the hollywood deal unless he gets final approval on casting.
He selects Homer Simpson as the star.
The studio hires a dietitian to knock Homer into shape,
because they want the star to be athletic and in-shape ...
totally the opposite of the character in the comic-books.
They should have gone with Rainier Wolfcastle,
although he would probably refuse after the Atom Man fiasco.
Nobody mentions either Atom Man or Wolfcastle,
familiar names from the show's golden age in the 1990s.
This was co-written by Seth Rogan (
American Pickle
). It may be a parody of Hollywood, as experienced by an insider,
but this is not the best Simpsons episode by a long shot.
The Simpsons [Season 21, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XX
Shown Sunday October 18th, 2009
This starts with the classic Universal Studios monsters
as they team up to go on a halloween rampage.
To blend in they dress as modern-day characters like
Harry Potter
, and then gate-crash the party at the Simpsons house.
Unfortunately the wives turn up,
and domestic violence ensues.
Dial 'M' for Murder or Press '#' to Return to Main Menu
Lisa makes a deal with Bart, to get revenge on their respective teachers.
They use the criss-cross strategy from Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train
(or Throw Momma from The Train).
Unfortunately, Bart ups the stakes to murder.
Lots of Hitchcock references ensue.
Don't Have a Cow, Mankind
Yet another zombie story.
This time it is a parody of
28 Weeks Later
- Bart is immune, so the family must get him to the Safe Zone so they can end the outbreak.
The zombies are named Munchers in a piece of genre-blindness.
There's No Business like Moe Business
This is a musical set in Moe's tavern. It is a parody of
Sweeney Todd
, as he discovers that putting human blood in the drinks makes him sexually less-resistable.
The Simpsons [Season 22, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXI
Shown Sunday November 07th, 2010
This starts with Bart provoking Homer, then Professor Frink has a scene,
and finally we get a parody of Ricky Gervase's show The Office.
War and Pieces
Marge disapproves of Bart and Milhouse playing computer games,
so she makes them play some board games instead.
They pick one named Satan's Path - it may sound a bit like
Ouija
, but it turns out to be more like
Jumanji
.
Master and Cadaver
Homer and Marge go yachting for a second honeymoon.
They pick up a castaway - a Billy Zane type, voiced by Hugh Laurie (
).
The story is titled after a Russell Crowe movie,
but in fact it parodies a Sam Neill one.
Yes, a completely different New Zealander!
Tweenlight
Lisa Simpson gets a new boyfriend (voiced by Daniel Radcliffe -
Harry Potter
). No, he's not a wizard, he's a vampire.
The Simpsons [Season 23, Episode 3]
Treehouse of Horror XXII
Shown Sunday 30th October 2011
The Diving Bell and Butterball
Homer gets bitten by a venomous spider, and the venom paralyses him.
He learns that there is only one muscle he can control - his anal sphincter.
Yes, he manages to communicate by farting.
Dial D for Diddly
Flanders is a serial killer, bumping off townsfolk on the orders of his god - like in
Frailty
. However, he does not seem to notice that
the victims are always people who have somehow annoyed Homer Simpson.
In the Na’Vi
This is a parody of
Avatar
. Bart and Milhouse get sent undercover to infiltrate the aliens.
The Simpsons [Season 23, Episode 14]
At Long Last, Leave!
Shown Sunday 26th August 2012
Springfield conducts an apocalypse survival test.
The Simpsons use their storm cellar as a survival shelter.
Strangely the doors are against the fence,
so it must be built under Flanders' back yard.
The townsfolk vote to evict the Simpsons and run them out of town.
This seems a bit familiar.
It is a cross between a Treehouse of Horror story and
The Simpsons Movie
.
The Simpsons end up in an off-the-grid community called The Outlands.
This is like something out of a post-apocalyptic movie.
Their new neighbour is Julian Assange.
Yes, this episode was filmed so long ago
it was before his legal difficulties.
The Simpsons [Season 24, Episode 2]
Treehouse of Horror XXIII
Shown 07 Oct 12
The pre-amble is set in the ancient Mayan civilisation.
Homer must be sacrificed, or the Mayan gods will destroy the world in 2012.
The Greatest Story Ever Holed
Lisa lobbied the town to build a Large Hadron Collider instead of a baseball stadium.
The LHC accidentally creates a small black hole,
so Lisa takes it home and keeps it in the basement.
The townsfolk dump their garbage in it, which makes it grow.
Naturally, this leads to references to Disney's
The Black Hole (1979)
.
UNnormal Activity
This is a parody of the Found Footage movie
Paranormal Activity
.
Bart & Homer's Excellent Adventure
Bart wants to buy an antique comic-book at its original price,
so he time-travels back to 1974.
He starts out by disrupting his parents' courtship, as in
Back to the Future (1985)
. Then, when he travels back to 2012 he discovers Marge married Artie Ziff instead.
Yes, it is
Back to the Future 2 (1989)
- although the twist is that Bart prefers this new future.
It is up to Homer to save the timeline.
The Simpsons [Season 25, Episode 2]
Treehouse of Horror XXIV
Shown 06 Oct 13
The opening credits resemble the standard credits sequence,
but is filled with references to previous Treehouse stories.
Then, because the director was
Guillermo Del Torro
, it features homages to a lot of his films.
There is even an appearance by Hypno-Toad from
Futurama
!
Oh The Places You'll D'oh
This is a parody of
The Cat in the Hat
- well, the original comics by Dr Seuss.
The Simpson children cannot go trick-or-treating because they are sick with the mumps.
Luckily a magical creature (who looks like Homer) arrives
and takes them on a wonderous adventure.
Unfortunately he is a sadistic spree-killer,
but that is to be expected in this kind of story.
Dead and Shoulders
Bart gets accidentally decapitated,
and to keep his head alive it has to be stitched onto Lisa's neck.
Of course, Bart wants everything his own way.
Freaks no Geeks
This is a parody of
Tod Browning
's classic 1930s monochrome horror movie,
Freaks
. The sideshow carnival is run by Monty Burns.
Most of the regular characters are freaks,
except for Homer (the strongman) and Marge (the trapeze girl).
The Simpsons [Season 25, Episode 18]
Days of Future Future
Shown 13 Apr 14
Homer over-exerts himself climbing the stairs, and drops dead.
Luckily Professor Frink has perfected cloning technology,
and used Homer as his subject instead of a sheep.
He even arranged for Homer's memories to be transferred into the clone,
so it is as if the real Homer is back.
Worse, every time Homer gets killed he just comes back as a new clone.
Decades later, Homer runs out of clones and becomes a computer AI.
Marge kicks him out of the house, so he has to live with Bart.
It turns out that forty-year-old Bart Simpson
is a slacker with an ex-wife and a job at Cretaceous Park.
Future Lisa is not President of the USA.
Instead she is a charity worker,
slopping out vegan brain-substitute at a soup kitchen for zombies.
Her husband, Milhouse, gets zombified ...
and Lisa prefers the new version.
Since he no longer breathes, his asthma is now cured.
The Simpsons [Season 26, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXV
Shown 19 Oct 14
The intro sequence is a parody of the Oscars,
as broadcast from Rigel VII (hoomeworld of Kodos and Kang).
School in Hell
Bart reads an ancient Aramaic tablet, which opens a portal to hell.
He and Lisa get sucked in, but they actually get on well there.
Bart actually becomes a top pupil there,
and changes his name to Beelzebart.
Clockwork Yellow
Mo is leader of the Droogs, a gang of mockney thugs from
Clockwork Orange
. One of them, Homer, hooks up with a young Marge.
Since food is his substitute for sex,
the fast-forward scene is Homer indulging his favourite appetite.
Years later, Mo needs the eye-clamps to watch Fox TV.
A home invasion brings him out of retirement,
but he and the others wander into homages to other films by
Stanley Kubrick
- Eyes Wide Shut, Full Metal Jacket and
2001: A Space Odyssey
.
a parody of The Others
Homer communicates with ghosts by writing on the mirror.
The TV only plays versions of Married With Children storylines.
Yes, somehow the house is haunted.
The ghosts are the earlier version of the Simpsons,
from The Tracey Ulman Show.
The Simpsons [Season 26, Episode 12]
The Musk Who Fell to Earth
Shown 25 Jan 15
The Simpsons [Season 27, Episode 4]
Halloween of Horror
Shown 18 Oct 15
It is the night before halloween.
Homer takes the kids to Crustyland,
which has been given a scary halloween makeover.
In fact it is too scary, and leaves Lisa traumatised.
Despite the fact the show has been on air for three decades,
Lisa is still just an eight year old child.
On Halloween night, Marge takes bart out trick-or-treating.
Of course, they must be home before curfew ...
or they will run into ADULT halloween!
Homer stays home with Lisa.
Unfortunately they are harrassed by a trio of drifters
who are angry after Homer got them fired
for stealing from their employer, Apu at the Kwiki-mart.
The Simpsons [Season 27, Episode 5]
Treehouse of Horror XXVI
Shown 25 Oct 15
The pre-amble is in a dated animation style, obviously a reference to something else.
The story has the kids go trick-or-treating,
and run into the brain-eating zombified Frank Grimes.
Wanted: Dead, then Alive
Sideshow Bob (Kelsey Grammar -
Medium
) finally manages to kill Bart.
However, Bob quickly gets bored with his new job as Assistant Professor at Springfield University.
He uses a leprechaun-powered machine to resurrect Bart.
Homerzilla
This is a monochrome parody of the 1950s Toho studio movie
Godzilla
. The story starts in Japan where every day Abraham, AKA Grandpa Simpson,
sacrifices a donut to the ocean in order to appease a magical sea monster.
When How I Met Your Mother did a similar parody of the chop-socky genre,
accusations of Yellow-Face racism were made.
However, the worst thing The Simpsons has been accused of
is of giving South Asian people on-screen representation in the form of Apu.
Telepaths of Glory
The kids go for a walk in the woods.
Lisa is videoing everything on camera - this is a Found Footage parody.
She and Bart follow when Milhouse falls down a pit.
The trio get covered in radioactive waste from the Burns power plant,
and end up with super-powers.
Yes, this is a parody of
Chronicle
.
The Simpsons [Season 28, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXVII
Shown 16 October 2016
Perhaps because this is the 600th episode,
we get two introduction sequences.
The first shows the Simpsons spending Halloween night
by going to buy a Christmas tree.
Notably, Homer is dressed in a homemade costume as Bender from
Futurama
. They are ambushed by the Furious Four -
Sideshow Bob, Kang (or Kodos), the ghost of Frank Grimes ...
and the Leprechaun who has been in a few other treehouse episodes.
The second intro scene is Planet of the Couches, a parody of
Planet of the Apes (1968)
.
Dry Hard
Springfield has been dried up after years without rainfall.
Monty Burns controls the town's reservoir,
so he has absolute power.
He orders the population to hold their own version of
The Hunger Games
, featuring only the most attractive children.
Lisa inspires everyone to team up,
and it turns into a more standard post-Apocalyptic fantasy like
Mad Max: Fury Road
.
BFF RIP
Lisa's best friend dies in a mysterious accident.
Then her other friends start to die off.
The cops arrest Lisa on suspicion,
but Bart breaks her out while carrying out his side job
of smuggling contraband to the other suspects.
It turn out that the killer is Lisa's imaginary best friend.
Moe-Finger
To escape the school bullies, Bart hides in Moe's tavern.
It turns out that Moe secretly runs a group of Secret Agents,
and Bart gets recruited.
His first mission is to avenge his father.
The finale is a James Bond style opening credits scene
in the classic Maurice Binder style,
celebrating 600 episodes of the Simpsons.
The Simpsons [Season 29, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXVIII
Shown 22 Oct 17
The Simpsons family are halloween candies, like characters from
Sausage Party
.
The Exor-Sis
Homer tries to order Pizza on the Internet,
and ends up getting a delivery of Pazuzu instead.
They leave the idol in Maggie's nursery,
and she ends up getting possessed.
Coralisa
With Maggie still recovering from possession,
Lisa is left at a loose end.
Snowball the Cat lures her into an alternate universe,
which is made of 3-D animation like in the movie
Coraline
. Her alternate family are much more like her,
but they have a hideous disfigurement.
MMM... Homer!
Marge takes the kids out of town with her for a few weeks.
Homer is left alone, and quickly eats everything in the house.
He ends up resorting to cannibalism.
Instead of eating other people, he only eats bits of himself.
The Simpsons [Season 30, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXIX
Shown 21 Oct 18
Homer and Marge take the kids on vacation to Foggyport.
Unfortunately the townsfolk try to sacrifice the Simpsons to Cthulhu.
Their only chance of survival is if Homer defeats Cthulhu in an eating contest.
Luckily, Homer skipped breakfast.
Intrusion of the Pod-y Switchers
The Mapple corporation launches its new product,
the MyPhone, which converts humans into Ipod-people.
The whole thing is being used to distract the human race
while they are invaded by vegetable people from outer space.
Lisa and Bart try to escape without being converted.
Comic-book Guy calls this out as a parody of
Invasion of the Body-Snatchers
, but then incorrectly says it ripped off
The Thing (From Beyond Space)
. In fact, it actually ripped off
The Puppet-Masters
.
MultipLISA-ty
Bart, Milhouse and the school bully get kidnapped
and wake up locked in a basement - like in
Saw
. Their captor is Lisa, who has multiple personalities - like in
Split
.
Geriatric Park
Mr Burns builds a theme parl that combines
speculative theories with untested science.
Then he invites the Simpson family to tour it.
Naturally, Homer messes everything up
and the OAPs turn into dinosaurs.
The Simpsons [Season 31, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXX (AKA Episode 666)
Shown 20 Oct 19
Marge gives birth to a new baby.
Unfortunately it is a boy, and Homer fears it will be just like Bart.
He insists that Dr Hibbert exchanges it for a baby girl.
The good news is that he gets Maggie -
the bad news is that she is the daughter of ten thousand lunatics.
Danger Things
This is a parody of
Stranger Things
, set in the mid-1980s.
Milhouse gets abducted by a monster from another dimension,
so Lisa gets Professor Fink to send her through.
Heaven Swipes Right
Homer chokes to death on a hotdog at a baseball game.
Serves him right, after what happened to Maude Flanders.
Unfortunately he is rejected from Heaven because he was premature,
so they send him back into another body.
When Hairy Met Slimy
Instead of parodying When Harry Met Sally,
this is actually a parody of
The Shape Of Water (2017)
. Marge's chain-smoking sister Selma is a cleaner in a secret lab.
She falls in love with the alien inmate, Kang the Conquerer.
Monty Burns, owner of the lab, wants to dissect the alien.
Selma gets Homer to help break her lover out.
The Simpsons [Season 31, Episode 8]
Thanksgiving of Horror
Shown 24 Nov 19
the first Thanksgiving
an A.I. mishap
a dangerous space mission complicated by a sentient cranberry sauce
The Simpsons [Season 32, Episode 4]
Treehouse of Horror XXXI
Shown Nov 20
The intro sequence is a parody of the 2020 US Presidential election.
Toy Gory
This is a parody of the
Toy Story Franchise
, shown in 3-D style animation.
Bart gets given a new toy, Radioactive Man,
which turns out to be his equivalent to Buzz Lightyear.
Ironically Bart turns out to the the equivalent
of the nasty kid next door who disfigured his toys.
As a result, the toys now seek their revenge on him.
Into The Homer-verse
Homer eats all the halloween candy,
so he goes looking for a vending machine at the power plant.
Unfortunately he accidentally activates a machine
that opens a portal into parallel universes.
This leads a bunch of alternative Homers to come through.
When Homer tries to send them back,
he has to face off against the alternative versions of Mr Burns.
Be Nine, Rewind
It is Lisa's ninth birthday.
Unfortunately she is caught in a time loop.
Luckily she has someone who can help her.
Ironically it is her ex-boyfriend,
Nelson Muntz the school bully.
The Simpsons [Season 32, Episode 7]
Three Dreams Denied
Shown 22nd Nov 20
Comic Book Guy goes to ComicCon in San Diego,
where he realises he might get hired by Marvel
if he really impresses the guests with his question.
While CBG is away, Bart visits the store and meets the replacement -
a professional voice-over actor.
This is Bart's chance to become a voice-over artist himself.
Strangely he says he never thought that people actually provided
the voices for cartoon characters,
even though his dad was the voice of Poochie.
Finally, Lisa has a story of her own.
The bad news is that it is yet another love story.
Her new love interest is the new boy in school,
who is also her rival for the saxophone position in the school orchestra.
The Simpsons [Season 32, Episode 15]
Do PizzaBots Dream of Electric Guitars?
Shown 14 Mar 21
The Simpsons [Season 33, Episode 3]
Treehouse of Horror XXXII
Shown 10 Oct 21
The intro scene is a parody of classic Disney movie
Bambi
.
Bong Joon-Ho's This Side of Parasite
Given that the original movie
Parasite
basically rips off this show, this parody is kind of meta.
To push things even further,
Bart and his charge watch an Itchy and Scratchy parody of
Snowpiercer
.
Nightmare in Elm Tree
Bart tells a scary campfire story in his treehouse.
Lisa and Maggie get scared, so Homer decides to chop the tree down.
Unfortunately he dreams that the tree comes alive.
It then magically brings the other trees to life,
and they try to take over Springfield.
As well as the obvious references to
Guardians of the Galaxy
and
Little Shop of Horrors
, but there is also an inadvertent reference to
The Happening
.
The Telltale Bart
Vincent Price reads Maggie a nursery rhyme.
Each verse is about a month of the year,
with Bart doing something terrible each time.
Dead Ringer
Bart and Lisa investigate a mysterious Tiktok video.
Anyone who watches it will die in seven days, like in
Ringu
.
The Simpsons [Season 34, Episode 6]
Treehouse of Horror XXXIII
Shown 30 Oct 22
The Poopadook
Marge reads Maggie a bedtime story.
This one rhymes like the works of Dr Seuss, best known for
The Grinch
. However it is a parody of
The Babadook
. The demonic spirit possesses Marge,
and makes her try to kill Maggie.
Death Tome
This is a parody of the
Death Note
series, even down to using Japanese-style anime animation.
Despite this new photo-realistic style
the characters are easily recognisable,
since they are voiced by the original artistes.
The story has Lisa discover a magical book
that allows her to kill anyone she wants.
Of course, despite being a vegetarian
she turns out to be very bloodthirsty.
Simpsons World
This starts with the classic 1990s Monorail episode.
However, it turns out that the Simpsons family are now lifelike robots.
Instead of simply watching episodes on TV,
the audience can now interact with them in a theme park like
Westworld
.
The Simpsons [Season 35, Episode 5]
Treehouse of Horror XXXIV
Shown 05 Nov 23
