“Vital organs they are what we’re dressed in/
the family dog is eying Bart’s intestine/
Happy Halloween!” – Simpson Family & Groundskeeper Willie

In our continuing mission to bring you only the finest in low class, low brow, and low tech internet Simpsons commentary we’re bringing back our “Crazy Noises” series and applying it to Season 21.  Because doing a podcast smacks of effort we’re still using this “chatroom” thing that all the middle schoolers and undercover cops seem to think is so cool.  This text has been edited for clarity and spelling (especially on “Halloween”).

What a complete waste of a Halloween episode.  We weren’t really expecting anything different, but in a format where, as Dave points out below, you can essentially do whatever you want it’s pretty remarkable that they had to resort to chase scenes and a poorly produced fake musical to fill the time.

Charlie Sweatpants: So, first things first, did anyone skip this piece of shit?

Dave: Nope, I endured it.

Mad Jon: No, sadly I watched it.

Charlie Sweatpants: Okay, then this’ll be like group therapy.

Dave: Isn’t that what this is always like?

Mad Jon: Shall we start at the beginning?

Charlie Sweatpants: “Show me where Zombie Simpsons put the firecracker?”

Mad Jon: I have always hated the four act Zombie, and this is just more proof

Charlie Sweatpants: That opening sequence did seem to drag, though I’m not sure if that’s because it sucks or because it was actually long.

Mad Jon: The first part was as meaningless and stupid as anything Fox has had the gall to air to date

Dave: I don’t know that the quarter-act did much, other than set the stage for disappointment

Mad Jon: And sell more commercials

Dave: Marge’s warnings, Homer lighting himself on fire – both are infinitely more effective

Mad Jon: But didn’t you see homer had x’s on his eyes and that led into the Simpsons XX Halloween special?

After he died?

Charlie Sweatpants: Oh, I got it.

Mad Jon: When the Monster wives came to admonish their husbands?

Charlie Sweatpants: I just checked, the opening for this one, that monster party, was substantially longer than the intros in the old seasons.

Like, twice as long.

Mad Jon: I would have bet a lot of money on that

Dave: Same

Charlie Sweatpants: So it wasn’t just you imagination, it was long AND crappy.

While were on the topic of ways this episode frittered time away to fill its contractually obligated broadcast slot, I thought it was particularly lazy that they had two chase scenes.

Dave: I didn’t even notice.

Mad Jon: Hmm, funny enough I don’t remember either.

Oh wait, there was one in the Hitchcock act wasn’t there

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah, Lisa chases Bart through all the Hitchcock scenes and then they flee the zombies with Apu in the second segment.

Dave: All three segments were lazy. Referencing something isn’t enough to make a joke

Mad Jon: Oh yea.

Charlie Sweatpants: It’s those kinds of barren joke & satire free zones that always make me cringe.

Dave: Well that’s exactly the thing.

I don’t understand how you take a concept like “Treehouse of Horror,” which is an excuse to flex your creativity and do things the show wouldn’t normally do, and fail miserably.

Charlie Sweatpants: Failing miserably is what they do. They’re professionals.

Mad Jon: Well at least (and I am being VERY lenient) the first two actual acts were the classic horror parody we’ve all come to expect.

Charlie Sweatpants: Oh the musical ditchpig that was the third act was far and away worst.

Mad Jon: Oh sure

Dave: Agreed.

Don’t even get me started on “Al ’20 More Years’ Jean”

I wanted to throw something at my TV

Mad Jon: I did. Well I was in a hotel so it wasn’t my tv, but you know.

Charlie Sweatpants: I’ve seen Sweeny Todd, I know the plot, and it wasn’t until I was looking at stuff on-line that I understood that’s what they were trying, emphasis on trying, to parody.

Mad Jon: Really though? I have seen Sweeny Todd too, but that wasn’t even close.

Charlie Sweatpants: Also, I’m not sure it’s really the best move to cut to a bored audience from time to time.

Bit on the nose, if you know what I mean.

Dave: I thought that was cute.

Maybe the only time I laughed, even if it wasn’t intended for me to laugh

Mad Jon: Cute like a puppy or cute like a one legged puppy that wants to be a quarterback when he grows up?

Charlie Sweatpants: At what?

Dave: The bored audience that exactly reflected my sentiment

Charlie Sweatpants: Oh, the bored audience. Sorry, I’ve been drinking.

Yeah.

Dave: Quarterback puppy.

Mad Jon: Fair enough. Can’t blame a man for dreaming

Or a puppy.

Charlie Sweatpants: Actually, I did kinda chuckle at that line about people eating the body and blood of their savior.

I honestly think that was it for the whole half hour though.

Mad Jon: That’s because they accidentally triggered your hatred for religion. G

Dave: I’ll just beat a dead horse here – if it’s not funny, why bother?

Mad Jon: g?

Charlie Sweatpants: G.

Dave: That sums up this episode.

Mad Jon: <– also has been drinking.

Charlie Sweatpants: You’ve got it there Dave, but they bother because they’re being paid to.

Dave: Thank god for dwindling viewership.

Charlie Sweatpants: Oh yeah.

Mad Jon: I am starting to come to the conclusion that DJ 3000 was hired to write the episodes a few seasons after “Bart gets an elephant” and someone forgot to turn it off.

Charlie Sweatpants: Tee hee.

Mad Jon: Nobody noticed because everyone was busy auditioning people for whatever reality show for which FOX is currently to blame.

Charlie Sweatpants: They did rip off a joke from Wayne’s World 2, that’s something a computer might do.

Mad Jon: Seriously though, there aren’t enough horror movies to parody that you have to halfass your way through an act on the loosest basis that it is coping off of Sweeny Todd when it most certainly is just stealing the idea of feeding people to people?

I know the writers blew their wad early when they did a whole regular episode parody of SAW, but there has to be hundreds of other movies to poke at, there is like 10 new horror movies a year!

Charlie Sweatpants: Be fair, something must rise to a certain cultural height, nay . . . a peak, before Zombie Simpsons will use it for a big chunk of the episode.

You know, like Josh Groban.

Dave: Ugh.

You just had to bring him up again.

Charlie Sweatpants: Who, I might add, did a “celebrity” endorsement at the first commercial break.

It trigged a flash back to that awful episode from last season and I needed to bring it up. This is a therapy session, isn’t it?

Mad Jon: Really? I thought I was paying more attention to commercials than the episode, and I still missed that one.

Well, you are in a safe place, so let it out Charlie

Dave: It is. Go on.

Mad Jon: I still haven’t figured out what Emily Blunt does for a living.

Charlie Sweatpants: Well, there really isn’t much more to it. I mean, the N Sync episode was almost nine years ago and if that’s not jumping on a flash in the pan pop culture phenomenon then I don’t know what is.

Mad Jon: Good point, can you see Bart wearing ‘hammer pants’ in season one or two? No. He waited until 11.

Charlie Sweatpants: IMDB says she’s been in a bunch of stuff I’ve either never heard of or never seen. (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1289434/)

Mad Jon: Well IMDB can have her.

And that stupid fucking fantasy land in which she lives.

Dave: Burn, Emily Blunt.

Charlie Sweatpants: Hammer pants is a good reference, but even that only took up like ten seconds as opposed to Groban’s 22 minute commercial for tween girl iTunes downloads.

Mad Jon: I know it brother. I know it.

Charlie Sweatpants: Anyway . . .

Is there anything else here that needs mentioning?

Mad Jon: Does vomit count as mentioning?

Charlie Sweatpants: Yes?

Mad Jon: Cause if not, I got nothing.

Dave: You vomited?

Mad Jon: No, but I had to suppress a dry heave at the twin thoughts of this episode and the Emily Blunt one from last season.

Dave: Channel that towards something productive.

An effigy, perhaps.

Mad Jon: I will, but I was thinking more like a 6-pack

They could all be effigies I guess.

Dave: That’ll do nicely.

Nothing to add. It was boring and unfunny. The apple has fallen far from the TOH tree.

Charlie Sweatpants: I’ve got one more thing. At the end, when the cast of the faux-musical comes on they sing a two line ditty (to the main theme), which goes, and I quote, “We hope you enjoyed this year’s Halloween show, Treehouse of Horror number XX.”

Mad Jon: I am going to need closure on that anecdote Charlie.

Charlie Sweatpants: I would like to compare this to TOH V which ended with the fog that turns people inside out and an over the credits musical number that has more humor in it that this entire episode.

Mad Jon: Classic, classic.

Dave: Actually you raise a good point.

The show hasn’t done solid songs or musical numbers in ages.

Mad Jon: Just crappy ones for sure.

Charlie Sweatpants: That was my first thought as soon as I saw them come out. I was like, “oh they’re going to sing over the credits” and then there was that.

Mad Jon: “that” was pretty bad

Charlie Sweatpants: Yeah.

I just thought it nicely illustrated how far things have fallen. It used to be they had so much stuff they needed to sing an entire musical number over the credits. Now? They pen two lines to the tune of the theme song, commemorating their greatness, and then fade to black.

Mad Jon: Maybe they just couldn’t wait to go back to their mansions and eat their lobsters.

Dave: That’s entirely likely.

So, are we all feeling a bit better after venting?

Charlie Sweatpants: I guess.

I did watch TOH II today. That made me feel better.

Mad Jon: Good call, maybe I will follow suit.

Dave: I’m planning a TOH marathon

Probably beer-fueled

Probably awesome

Mad Jon: Is there any other way?

Charlie Sweatpants: Indeed.

Okay, any final thoughts, slanders or remonstrances?

Mad Jon: Nope, I wouldn’t recommend this episode except for a form of execution.

Dave: Fuck you, TOH XX.

Mad Jon: Damn, wish I’d thought of that.