You're just getting in touch with your roots. Remember in the 90s when H. W. Bush criticized the Simpsons for being relentlessly cynical and suggested the Waltons as an alternative? Man, this show has come a far piece.
I felt the title felt refreshingly negative for your channel. But then I remembered that you can be that way - there are the alligator rants, after all.
The main issue with Tree House of Horrors is that they are now such direct parodies that there is no room for subversion. The old Tree House of Horrors did parody right-you did not have to know the source material to enjoy it.
They also tended to be parodies of Twilight Zone episodes (30 minute episodes that condense well... and were often based on short stories), classic horror/sci-fi films, or specific tropes. In recent years they've changed it to just general parodies of recent films. That makes it feel more like a second-rate Mad parody.
While I'm not a fan of "Untitled Robot Parody", it is the most recent Simpson episode with a funny line that stuck with me. Homer: Hmm. Is there something different about the kitchen? Toaster transforms into the word "No" Homer: Well, the toaster's never lied to me before.
That and "Look, you have made the nacho machine cry!" are the jokes I remember from time to time. Trans-Clown-O-Morphs was a much better homage to Transformers.
Honestly, the Homer eating himself segment is so visceral to me, it’s one of my favorites because it creeps me the hell out. I know it’s bad writing but good god is it disturbing
@@youdbettertube yeah, it's too creepy though. The old episodes, such as the TOH segment where Homer picked at his donut head, were just better and they came with funnier jokes, such as with Homer and his donut head, Chief Wiigum's outside saying "don't worry boys, he's gotta come out sometime"
You know what would have worked for the Stranger Things parody? The Simpsons debut _in_ the 80s. They should have harkened the style of the episode back to the first series. The same character models, backgrounds, etc. It would have added a nice dimension and possibly more fodder for parody. Especially as a real 80s show lampooning one *trying* to be 80's.
To be fair to Wiz Kids, luckily stumbling into the solution is something Harry was known to do in the early books. I saw the Enchanted Shin as an amusing enough heightened parody of that trope.
Yeah the movies went on and painted a much different picture of what Harry was like in that regard, he was not as competent and well in control of the scenario and had more dumb luck on his side than anything. That cannot be said about Harry in the early films.
I didn't know that Wiz kids was made before the first Harry Potter movie and I watched the episode pretty recently and wondered why it was so off. Now I know lol.
Good point, actually. I still enjoy the segment, regardless. Honestly, I think distancing itself from being a straight parody helps it in the long run.
@@imperfectly_megan Came out just before the first movie, but the first four books had already been published; so the writers had quite a bit to go on if they quickly read the books before writing.
Correction: The part in Homerzilla "making fun of Godzilla 2000", wasn't making fun of Godzilla 2000, it was poking fun at Godzilla 1998, the American remake that's often panned for barely being a Godzilla movie. Godzilla 2000 was the first in the Millennium era made by Toho, the original Japanese creators/owners of Godzilla. Also I love the Gamera cameo in that segment.
@@georgeschweikert8768 Highly doubt it since Matt Groening is a big fan of the original Japanese films, don't see why he would make fun of them. The reboot being titled, "Zilla" also gives it away since Toho bought the rights to that version, renamed it Zilla and killed it off in Final Wars.
I love Four Beheadings and a Funeral if for no other reason than the last line delivery. “Daddy I had the craziest dream” “Ralphie, you’re stiiiiiill in it” Always get a laugh out of me
I will be honest, while Simon Stoolowitz is easily an S tier scene and character, the rest of the segment was nowhere near as good. Yet again, it could be just because Simon Stoolowitz is probably the best Treehouse of Horror character (and overall Simpsons character to).
Halloween Segments always had one that wasnt as good as the others but it was usually not by much. As time went on however it became harder to say which segment was worse in a halloween special since they lost a lot of scariness and a lot of interest.
I hated when they dropped the horror aspect of you know, The Treehouse of *Horror* , and just started using them as an excuse to parody whatever was popular at the time.
I suppose even the fifth (I think) treehouse of horror had nightmare cafeteria, which was still classic simpsons level good and led into the memorable credits sequence afterward, but is still competing against The Shinning and Time and Punishment, which might be two of the best treehouse of horror segments. In my opinion, at least.
It feels like they didn't read the books either, or they just thought there was nothing good/well known enough to parody. It's an awful segment, number one contender for me.
I honestly enjoyed the Harry Potter segment. It wasn’t as heavily parodied in media at that point in time so I think it was more novel the year it came out. Thanks to that segment, I now say “ohhh my enchanted shin” every time I whack it on the coffee table
The enchanted shin is a funny Deus ex Machina. I also like Krusty's terrible "Wailing Wall" pun for some reason. The best segment in that ToH is still House of Whacks, though.
It’s fitting that Telepaths of Glory has a compelling first half and a boring second half, because Chronicle has a really solid first two acts and then completely falls apart in the final act when it tries to do the whole OTT superhero battle in a city and makes the stakes way too big. I blame Max Landis.
@@yannickgrignon2473 I wouldn’t quite go that far; Dane Dehaan almost saves the first two thirds for me. Unfortunately once they have him kill Michael B. Jordan’s character the film takes a nosedive. It goes from “How would kids handle having these superpowers in a somewhat more grounded setting with no supervillain?” To “Fuck it, let’s make Dane Dehaan the villain and have a big battle in a city like every other superhero film.” The found footage gimmick also wears very thin by the end.
ALSO, DON'T KILL OFF MICHAEL B. JORDAN! I know killing off Michael B. Jordan worked out in The Wire, Fruitville Station, Black Panther...wait a minute.
@@GeriatricFan1963 They also didn't explore more of the alien artifact they found in exchange for the final fight. The film was great up until that point
My biggest problem with most modern Treehouse of Horror segments is that they’ll parody anything without even considering if the thing they’re doing a parody of is even remotely related to Halloween. Even the least interesting classic Treehouse segments were always on theme, but Avatar, Transformers, and Mr. and Mrs. Smith (among others) aren’t exactly movies I would associate with Halloween.
They even parodied James Bond. It was during that segment I asked out loud, “What does James Bond have to do with Halloween?” As much as I like the movies up to and including The Spy Who Loved Me, it just got very out of place for what was supposed to be a Halloween special.
Yeah, that’s my biggest problem too. And as demonstrated by the Transformers segment as a big example, some segments it seems like the writers don’t fully grasp the appeal of the source material.
@@kanna-san.Many Simpsons jokes (or even Family Guy jokes for that matter) feel smug and mean-spirited when the writers aren’t fans of the thing they are parodying or really understand them.
“Trees are not scary” is something the writers should’ve learned from The Happening. Edit: This whole video I was going “wait which one was that” at the titles, and then after seeing the screenshots I was like “oh yeah I remember that one”, since I binged them all last year. This was a nice reminder that these segments existed without me having to actually watch them all again.
the spider verse parody should've been about each tree house of horror takes place in an alternate universe, like the actual cannon simpsons traveling the universe, its universe just happens to be a tree house of horror.
See, I would have swapped out 10 or 9 with that parody because it’s so freaking by-the-numbers that it’s boring. At least with the parody of Parasite you can mine a lot of content from its terribleness and make RU-vid videos, blog posts, and clickbait articles all based around dissecting all the many things wrong with it. But when somethings so bland and inoffensive that you have nothing really to say about it, than all you are doing during rewatch is wonder how it could have better if it had taken another direction. And to be honest, The Golem segment was always one of my favorites because, much like the Krusty and Rabbi Kristoffsky episodes, it always felt so authentically Jewish that even a guy raised in a secular household could relate to it. I didn’t think the Golem was too mopey, all he did since waking back up was kill and do a bunch of empty childish pranks, I would’ve gotten philosophical and dour too after doing a lot of that.
I really enjoy Wizz Kids, but something interesting is that I never knew it actually predated the first movie, so as a kid I was always confused as to how their Harry Potter parody barely resembled the films I'd seen.
Before I knew the parody predated the films, I was under the assumption that they couldn’t go too close to the actual thing for legal reasons so they just kept it very off brand.
You know how you can automatically tell that the Harry Potter episode is a parody of the book and not the film? No movie uniforms. Because as fans of the books should know, there are no red and yellow ties or Gryffindor symbols on their robes. They are solid black (or here, solid red). They wear hats too although even the books seemed to forget this after a while.
The first film had the students wearing hats (the Gryffindors threw them up in the air when they won the House Cup), but the hats disappeared in the second film and weren’t used again.
I agree with the top spot. I also think it might be a good idea to include the season/year of release when you show the episode's title just for more information for the viewer
Trees can be scary, the Wizard of oz had a very creepy forest, but it doesn't work well when they are being more active. They work best as an addition not the main attraction
Typical modern Simpsons Halloween joke: Step 1: Character gets killed or fatally injured. Step 2: Said character or another character says something mundane about it. Step 3: Writers hope someone in the world thinks it's funny.
Agree about Homerzilla, way too confused about what it’s trying to be. On a fanboy level, my biggest gripe with that segment is that they didn’t do the most obvious thing ever and have Homerzilla battle King Homer. Would it be blatant, nonsensical fanservice? Yes. But the show has been on 30+ years and the least they can do is pander to my nostalgia
Boy, would that have been such an amazing coincidence if the writers did that because I’m pretty sure Kong: Skull Island was just announced at San Diego Comic Con that same year, and people were already speculating a new Godzilla vs. Kong film in the newly christened MonsterVerse. It would have been perfect.
I remember I liked the circus freak segment back in the day. Kang and Kodos has a great cameo in that one. It felt natural instead of them being awkwardly thrown in somewhere for the sake of it.
That one actually made me laugh, but at the dumbest joke. "You're fine unless Rabbit Ears hears and tells Big Mouth." (Rabbit Ears tells Big Mouth) Big Mouth: "WHAAAAAAT?"
I really enjoy “Master and Cadaver,” I will admit that part of my fondness is because I’m a sucker for nautical tales, so any creepy stories on the high seas automatically have my interest. On top of that, I think the story does a good job showing why Homer and Marge are suspicious while also showing the guy’s overall innocence. It sets a mood and right now is the closest thing we get to a Ghost Ship story on the show. I guess the “Mutiny on the Bounty” sketch does this a little, but this segment is better at covering the overall vibe once Homer and Marge step onto that other ship. I think it all being in Maggie’s imagination is a bit of a fake-out, but it is fun to consider why Maggie’s imagination would go so dark. I don’t like the Clockwork Orange stuff though, especially since they do a longer parody of it only a season or so later.
Geriatric Park? Oh, you have got to be kidding sir. First you think of an idea that has already been done. Then you give it a title that nobody could possibly like. Didn't you think this through...it was on the bestseller list for eighteen months! Every magazine cover had... one of the most popular movies of all time, sir! What were you thinking? I mean, thank you, come again.
Geriatric Park was already a Naked Gun joke too. Not that the show needs to do anything original, but seeing a giant old dude crush somebody with his walker was funnier to me than elderly dinosaurs.
As a huge fan of Transformers, I can say it felt really lame. Just about anything good that was done better elsewhere, like with bit with the sex toy robot was done better on Robot Chicken. Plus, the bit where the robots don't know why they're fighting seems pretty dumb since that's something that's always been a big thing. Both sides have major ideological differences with the Decepticons wanting to conquer and expand while Autobots want peaceful coexistence with resources also being a major part of their conflict. This is something that has been around since day 1 with the franchise. Still, I prefer this over the crappy bit from another episode the Simpsons did with "Transclownomorphs". As for Diving Bell and the Butterball, I found the Spider-Man part made it worse. It had pretty much no build up and felt tacked on because the episode ran short. Not to mention that the jab at Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark felt more like it was at the expense of the various members of the production that got seriously injured rather than at the show itself. If I'm in the mood for something taking a shot at Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, I'll stick to South Park's version.
Its gonna feel even more lame in hindsight when Transformers One comes out, as it’s literally about the origins of the rivalry between Optimus Prime and Megatron, and delve into their personalities that make non-fans can really feel for them.
I would love a critical analysis of the non-Halloween anthology episodes. For a few years there, they did at least one every season, but I don't think they've done one in at least a decade at this point. Some of them were really good, and I got the feeling the writers were finding it harder and harder to stretch stories out to a full 22 minutes, so they leaned into anthologies to give themselves a break. Then... they stopped.
The top pick always makes me smile but for a silly reason. In the Star Trek episode "The Menagerie" Captain Pike is paralysed and can only communicate by beeping. Everyone acts as though he cannot ask for anything. Yet this Simpsons segment shows how, relatively, easy it would be.
To me, it's more like they're spoofing the recent popular movie everyone is talking about. I'm expecting next year's Treehouse of Horror to do an "Everything Everywhere All At Once" parody.
@@michaelstrong5383 it would be good if that was a feature length episode like Not IT but instead of involving the Simpsons it would be good if it starred Apu or Ned Flanders
Homer eating himself messed with my brain. It was the only time I considered turning the show off. I’ve seen every episode, but that’s the only one I will never watch again.
For me, the poodle is a reference to a book series starting with the first book, 100% wolf. The main character is a werewolf who on his first turn, wasn’t a wolf but a poodle. Not sure though, it’s a niche book
@@michaelbarker6732 I was saying for myself I see the Milhouse Werewolf poodle as a reference to a book series called 100% Wolf. But because the series is Australian and I don't personally know anyone else who has read them, it was a bit niche.
@@tf9241 its not impossible but i think it might be more likely that a poodle is just a really unthreatening dog so both the simpsons and 100% wolf maybe made the same joke
@@michaelbarker6732 but you might be right. Just don’t hear much of the werewolf being a weredog instead. Only examples I can think of is 100% Wolf and my babysitters a vampire
I actually really enjoy Wiz Kids. As a kid I hated it because I was a big Harry Potter fan but I sort of appreciate that this like is more a vague genre parody and shows an alternate reality version of Springfield. In fact the only joke I don’t really like is the one with Harry Potter lol. It also is a good episode for Bart character writing wise he’s got some good lines in there
The Simpson's writers pretty much ran out of halloween-horror material after the first decade. They then basically turned "Treehouse of Horror" into just movie parodies.
Believe it or not, Master and Cadaver will always be one of the most prominent Simpsons episodes in my mind. It was one of, if not the first episodes that I ever saw. It was a heavily edited video on RU-vid around 2012ish, with distorted, sped up audio making everybody sound like one of the Chipmunks. I'm pretty sure the beginning was cut off as well. I still remember a line "my employer tried to inject it with poison" or something like that. Also, the radio nipple binoculars joke. It really stuck with me, and I clicked on the next video, which was the Fruit-Batman episode. I found it hilarious, and went down the rabbit hole. I have been a fan ever since, despite nobody else in my family liking it. :)
My least favourite is the cannibalism one, but I understand it's pretty personal. There's just something so horrific and nauseating about it conceptually that I can't stand it. It's not the fun or interesting kind of disturbing and there are no jokes good enough to make it worth withstanding, it's just really gross and I kind of want to throw up just thinking about it.
@@Delightfully_Bitchy This feels weird to say, but not that cannibalism one. That one I'm actually fine with. It's a more recent one where Homer ends up accidentally eating his finger or something then finds it so tasty he keeps eating other body parts until eventually he's just a head.
Another awesome list! I would love to see a list ranking some of the intros to THoH episodes. I feel like they get overlooked a lot but there are so many iconic ones!
#20 unlocked the memory of 'Immigration of the Body Snatchers' from the 'Bart Simpson's Treehouse of Horror: Heebie-Jeebie Hullabaloo' comic I had as a kid...
You should do a Simpsons Mysteries about Maggie Simpson and her potential for evil. The show has often hinted how smart she is, even at just one year old. Or how Halloween specials will portray her as straight up evil sometimes. It would make for a good Halloween special on top of this treehouse of horror vid
You know, I'm surprised Wiz Kids made it so high up. Maybe it's nostalgia talking from my own harry potter phase. But it felt like a decently creative kids magic segment. I think it coming out before the movies actually strengthened it too. I mean look at how many movie parodies made it on this list because they couldn't make them funny enough, at least it didn't just start quoting Philosopher's Stone at us. Instead we get "let's turn Springfield elementary into hogwarts and see what we can come up with." Though yeah enchanted shin is pretty dumb.
The Jurassic Park parody just felt like a massive disappointment. Even the title itself feels like a dated joke since it was even used in one of the Naked Guns sequels. Honestly the Billy and the cloneosaurus joke was a better parody of JP than the segment they did.
As someone who didn't even like the actual Parasite movie, watching an incredibly shallow "parody" (if you can even call it that) of it that just ends in a random massacre was not thrilling at all. Not even for the novelty of seeing the Simpsons in the setting of a film I liked, since I didnt even like it to begin with. Not to mention the obvious question: Why did they even do a parody of Parasite? it's the same thing I asked myself during the Kingsman and Hunger Games parodies. None of those movies are scary. Not even a little bit. So why even do a parody of them for a HALLOWEEN episode? Just to be topical, that's why. They should have, if at all, reserved them for just regular anthology episodes. I mean, they probably just added the bloody killings in them to justify it being in a halloween episode. However, when they did the "Bartman Begins" segment in "Revenge Is a Dish Best Served Three Times", they also added a lot of unnecessary blood and murder in that, so it's not even a good excuse to begin with. The "Geriatric Park" segment should have been higher, honestly. I wanted a Jurassic Park parody for years, and when we finally get it, it's just that? Thinking about it, it's kinda like a poorly done version of "Dial Z for Zombies", in terms of basic layout and structure. Imagine if that episode spent more than half of its run time just doing setup before we get any zombie action, and then have it wrap up with like 2 minutes left. If they promise us dinosaur carnage, they should have actual dinosaur carnage for the majority of it. Such a disappointment of a good setup. Oh, and not to forget, Naked Gun did the "Geriatric Park"-joke first. And better. "Freaks no Geeks" should not have been on the list, in my opinion. I think it's quite an underrated segment that does a good job capturing the old timey style of the time period and has so many fun designs for the different freaks. The callback to the previous segment with Bart still stuck to Selmas body was honestly really clever. The whole thing kinda reminds me of "The Island of Dr. Hibbert", where it's largely a style over substance kinda segment. That one has a more rushed and disappointing ending though, where Homer just randomly gives up and willingly becomes an animal. Here, the ending is at least inspired by the actual ending from "Freaks" and even though the How I met your mother gag is kinda dated, it does actually get a laugh out of me.
This kinda proves how great the TOHs generally are. Many of these are alright at least and Wiz Kids and Golem certainly don't belong on this list at all.
Commenting as I'm watching so you may address this later, but spot on commentary for 4 beheadings. I was initially upset by the pick for the list, my nostalgia greatly influencing my mood. But your comment on it being more of an anthology feel was so on the nose that it made me agree fully with your criticisms. Love the videos. Love hearing other people talk about something that means so much to me. Thank you!
The Mario Batali one is my most hated treehouse of horror segment. It was also my most hated celebrity appearance in the show for a long time until the musk who fell to earth happened.
I remember watching all the treehouse of horror episodes last year, and when I watched the "In the Na'vi" segment, I hot up from my seat and turned it off because I was really grossed out by the alien stuff. Worst segment imo
Honestly the Mr & Mrs Smith Parody and the Parasite one killed me not only because they’re not really Halloween appropriate but because they actually could have worked if they were premises for regular full length Simpson episodes
When I was in Junior High, I found Master and Cadaver to be an incredibly memorable segment, purely due to the fact that I thought Marge looked unusually hot in that bikini. So take that for what it's worth, I suppose
Gonna have to disagree on Master & Cadaver, which is the only one on the list I loved. It's one of the few and rare "post golden era" Halloween skits that are genuinely horrifying and suspenseful. The actual dread that Marge and Homer have over killing and innocent man is heart rending. Also, I love the fake out ending with Maggie, because it perfectly captures how twisted the fantasies and play pretend of children can be. As a kid, I had similar dark play time make believe and even darker dreams.
I started a new tradition: every October I watch a Treehouse Of Horror everyday. I won't lie some of the new ones are still pretty good. Treehouse Of Horror 25 is actually really good, I recommend it all the segments are solid.
The Harry Potter one should not have been on there, or at least not that high. Also, where is that terrible Mr and Ms Smith parody that has nothing to do with Halloween?
I remember liking the Untitled Robot Parody as a kid, but then you could put anything Transformers-related on for me as a kid, and I'd probably enjoy it. Looking back, I really can't argue with any of your points. Matter of fact, to my recollection, all of the Transformer references are pretty shallow. Like, "oh, these everyday machines turn into robots and fight each other." "Oh, this one is a red and blue truck." "Oh, these two have goofy names."
So as a Jewish person I really want to defend the Golem segment as something that doesn't deserves to be on this list but at the end of the day it comes down to me feeling like it's just a middling segment that actually does a good job at inserting the Golem mythology whole-cloth into the context of Springfield while not scrubbing it of any of it's Jewish text which I just find it neat.
I think "not working with Hallowe'en" is the problem Jims has- take out the part where Bart kills the bullies and Skinner and this could just be a normal episode outright.
As an avid Transformers fan, I found that episode painfully, exhaustingly poor. It not only used hackneyed jokes, it did them badly, and strung them together into an utterly incoherent plot.
I always loved Wiz Kids, but you have brought me over to your way of thinking momentarily. It is definitely not a good parody of Harry Potter at all, but i still think it stands on its own as a pretty decent treehouse segment just because of the jokes and the novelty of it. One thing though, is that the part where Smithers eats Mr Burns is so hilarious to me that might just cloud my judgement.
Remember when The Simpsons episodes used to have titles like "Lisa's Pony", because it's about Lisa getting a pony? I feel like some of these Treehouse of Horror segments try to hard to be relevant to the narrative and be a parody of another title at the same time.
