Ahh, the sweet cleansing feeling of numbers. Zombie Simpsons scored the lowest season premier in its history last night, inflicting itself upon a mere 8.21 million people. The Cleveland Show, premiering directly afterwards, increased the ratings by more than a million people (to 9.42). (Family Guy itself checked in at 10.17 million.) There are at least a million Americans out there who’ve become so turned off by Zombie Simpsons that they didn’t even watch it while waiting for the latest from Seth MacFarlane. Excellent.
For historical comparison sake, here are the last five season premiers of Zombie Simpsons:
Season 16 (Treehouse of Horror XV) – 7 Nov 04 – 11.2 Million Viewers
Season 17 (The Bonfire of the Manatees) – 11 Sep 05 – 9.6 Million Viewers
Season 18 (The Mook, the Chef, the Wife, and Her Homer) – 10 Sep 06 – 11.5 Million Viewers
Season 19 (He Loves to Fly and He D’Ohs) – 23 Sep 09 – 9.43 Million Viewers
Season 20 (Sex, Pies and Idiot Scrapes) – 28 Sep 09 – 9.43 Million Viewers
It’s not the world’s most consistent downward trend, but it’s definitely moving in the right direction. Plus, Zombie Simpsons tends to start relatively strong in the fall and then peter out after New Year’s. (I like to think that its crappiness wears the audience down.) For example, last year the eight episodes broadcast before New Year’s averaged 8.66 million viewers; the twelve broadcast after New Year’s averaged only 6.17 million viewers. So a start of only 8.21 is encouraging, to say the least.
Of course, this is all pointless. The first time ratings are all but meaningless and we all know where the real money is made. But it is fun and I do like to see Zombie Simpsons humiliated.
As always, all numbers from the indispensable TV by the Numbers.
Dead Homer Society 
6 responses to “Zombie Simpsons Rocked by Family Guy Spinoff”
“Season 16 (Treehouse of Horror XV) – 7 Nov 04 – 11.2 Million Viewers
Season 17 (The Bonfire of the Manatees) – 11 Sep 05 – 9.6 Million Viewers
Season 18 (The Mook, the Chef, the Wife, and Her Homer) – 10 Sep 06 – 11.5 Million Viewers
Season 19 (He Loves to Fly and He D’Ohs) – 23 Sep 09 – 9.43 Million Viewers
Season 20 (Sex, Pies and Idiot Scrapes) – 28 Sep 09 – 9.43 Million Viewers”
Jesus Christ, what happened to episode titles like “Bart Gets an F,” “Lisa’s Pony” or “Homer at the Bat”?? Looking at those laboured, unfunny episode titles makes me wonder: do you think the writers come up with the stories first and then the titles, or do they came up with convoluted titles and then the shitty “plots” to match them??
They’re all puns now, whereas in the before time only a few of them were puns. Take a look at Season 19:
He Loves to Fly and He D’ohs
The Homer of Seville
Midnight Towboy
I Don’t Wanna Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Treehouse of Horror XVIII
Little Orphan Millie
Husbands and Knives
Funeral for a Fiend
Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind
E. Pluribus Wiggum
That ’90s Show
Love, Springfieldian Style
The Debarted
Dial ‘N’ for Nerder
Smoke on the Daughter
Papa Don’t Leech
Apocalypse Cow
Any Given Sundance
Mona Leaves-a
All About Lisa
With the exception of ToH (duh) every single one of those is a pun on an existing phrase or title. By way of example, here is Season 5:
Homer’s Barbershop Quartet
Cape Feare
Homer Goes to College
Rosebud
Treehouse of Horror IV
Marge on the Lam
Bart’s Inner Child
Boy-Scoutz ‘N the Hood
The Last Temptation of Homer
$pringfield (Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Legalized Gambling)
Homer the Vigilante
Bart Gets Famous
Homer and Apu
Lisa vs. Malibu Stacy
Deep Space Homer
Homer Loves Flanders
Bart Gets an Elephant
Burns’ Heir
Sweet Seymour Skinner’s Baadasssss Song
The Boy Who Knew Too Much
Lady Bouvier’s Lover
Secrets of a Successful Marriage
That’s 22 titles of which, depending on how you count, about six or seven are puns or a reworking of a famous title. The difference is pretty stark. Zombie Simpsons is basically paint by number, they already have a basic outline and each week they fill the necessary parts. “Cute Title” is just one more item on the checklist.
“Apocalypse Cow”… *shudders*
The day the show died for me was when I saw ‘Bart the Mother’, I never imagined the show could get worse. I was wrong, that cow episode was the biggest load of balls that I’ve seen in the show’s history, and there’s been plenty of shit piles this decade, as we all know. If anyone here hasn’t seen that episode, let me suggest that you cook up some grilled cow shit instead, it’s better for you.
I’ve seen about five minutes of it, something about Bart marrying a hillbilly girl to save a cow. I hadn’t been drinking but I’m pretty sure I blacked out anyway.
If I’m right, it wasn’t until season 10 that the show deigned to have an episode title with the word “d’oh” in it. Since then, most seasons have had at least one episode title following suit, and man, as lazy puns go, don’t they look lame:
Season 10: D’oh-in’ in the Wind
Season 11: Days of Wine and D’oh’ses
Season 14: C. E. D’oh
Season 17: We’re on the Road to D’ohwere
Season 18: G.I. D’oh
Season 19: He Loves to Fly and He D’ohs
Season 20: Waverly Hills 9-0-2-1-D’oh
Season 21: The Greatest Story Ever D’ohed
If these trends continue, we can assume that future episodes will have shitty titles like “Tae Kwan D’oh,” “D’oh, D’oh, D’oh Your Boat,” “D’oh Me The Money,” “Let My People D’oh,” “D’ohn’t Go There,” “There’s No Business Like D’oh Business,” etc. I better stop in case Al Jean comes across these and he starts actually using them.
They probably start with the title now and work their episode plot around that. Maybe they could re-introduce the karate instructor back into the show for the Tae Kwan D’oh and the Sea Captain for the second? Shouldn’t laugh, it’ll probably happen, as you say.