Image grabbed from here.

“Oh . . . a little sterile, no real insight.  What do you think Miss Hoover?” – Principal Skinner
“Enh.” – Miss Hoover

IGN really phoned it in this week.  There are six paragraphs in their review of that reprehensibly dull Halloween episode.  There’s an opening full of generic praise, there’s a closing full of generic praise.  The four middle paragraphs are dedicated, in order, to simply retelling the story of each of the four segments from the episode, including that tepid little opening.  In addition to that, each contains the full title of the segment and two quotes from that segment.  It’s like paint by number except that it’s writing. 

As always, I’ve edited out the synergy. 

October 18, 2009 – The Simpsons‘ Zombie Simpsons’ "Treehouse of Horror XX" was a fine addition to a gross subtraction from the series’ Halloween specials. And for the first time in ten years, we got an episode that actually aired before Halloween, though it still sucked. That’s got to count for something. Though recent Recent specials have had their share of been nothing but clunker segments, and "XX" had three strong stories that were equal parts funny and dark lived up to that dismal track record.

The opening sequence was a lot of fun good way to make sure there were four commercial breaks, as horror classics Dracula, Mummy, Wolfman and Frankenstein’s monster safely roamed meandered the streets of Springfield on Halloween. Running into the school bullies, the four were mocked for their out-of-date attire, for some reason: "Turner Classic Movies called, they want their costumes back." After changing into the likes of Iron Man and SpongeBob, the four crashed the Simpson’s Halloween party, for some other reason. When their wives showed up to end their fun, Homer insulted them and was soon torn to bits. With his severed head floating in the punch bowl and his X-ed out eyes forming the "XX" of the episode’s title, the fun drudgery was ready to begin.

The first official segment had one of my favorite titles of the "Treehouse" series so far: "Dial ‘M’ For Murder or Press ‘#’ to Return to the Main Menu." This was a heavily stylized plodding and twist filled segment, shown in black and white, as it was parodying referencing a multitude of Alfred Hitchcock films. After Miss Hoover sent Lisa to detention, Bart hatched a plan to have Lisa "prank" Mrs. Krabappel while he pranked Hoover, therefore eliminating each other as suspects. Lisa did the old "ding-dong ditch" and Bart, of course, murdered Miss Hoover, cuz, you know. It was a simple misunderstanding. To Bart, "Ding-dong ditch" means "you kill her then throw that ding-dong into a ditch." The Hitchcock references throughout the segment were fun to spot impossible to miss because they were crammed in with no regard to whether or not any of them were funny, clever or insightful, though I’m sure I didn’t catch them all.

The second segment, titled "Don’t Have a Cow, Mankind," was a great zombie apocalypse parody run through with a new Krusty Burger turning all who eat it into what the show called "Munchers." The sandwich was called Burger Squared, and as Krusty laboriously explained, they "start with grade-A beef, feed that to other cows, then kill them and serve the unholy results on a seven-grain bun." This was another fun and funny painfully long and obvious segment which referenced films like 28 Days Later and I Am Legend. It was your basic zombie gore fest, with lots of biting and bloodshed and little to no humor. It was great time consuming to see Apu kicking some ass: "As a vegetarian, I did not consume any tainted burgers. As a convenience store owner, I am armed to the teeth." Bart being hailed as the chosen one because of his immunity was an interesting twist a pointless contrivance, but it that didn’t really take the story anywhere except for an ending that fell sort of completely flat.

The Sweeney Todd referencing closing segment, "There’s No Business Like Moe’s Business" was a real treat the worst of a bad lot. Instead of simply parodying the musical, which would’ve made at least some sense, they put on an actual excruciatingly boring musical parody. The whole thing was presented on stage with some cuts to the audience now and again, because otherwise it wouldn’t have filled up the allotted screen time. (Had to include Kang and Kodos somewhere!) The songs were some of the best utterly hapless and about what we’ve come to expect from the series in recent memory. They not only moved dragged the “story” along, but they were hilarious time wasting, too. Moe singing about his perverse taste of romance had me floored remembering when he wasn’t an overly sensitive comedy black hole: "I can only make love in the back of a hearse/And I gotta be dressed as a Civil War nurse…. But you could do worse." And Homer’s song-and-dance interpretation of Moe’s fake letter was hysterically random and without merit. Moe said it was going to get "gayer," but I wasn’t expecting that.  [Ed. Note: I can’t help the preceding sentence, I don’t even know what it’s supposed to mean.] The segment ended with characters from the previous parts of the episode coming together and singing us out. It was hard not to enjoy, because it meant it was over.

Being the first "Treehouse of Horror" to air since The Simpsons Zombie Simpsons switched to their HD format, the visuals throughout the episode were fantastic run of the mill and full of background bits and details we might not have gotten had to pretend to care about a year or two ago. With the animation being fresh even more overly elaborate, the writing has stepped up as well continued to suck and we were treated to a 20th Anniversary installment that is worthy to stand beside some of their Halloween classics reminds you that not all anniversaries are happy occasions.