The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror Episode 3

The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror Episode 3 

Aired: October 29th, 1992
Season 4: Episode 5
Written by: Atrocious Al Jean and Morbid Mike Reiss, Warped Wally Wolodarsky and Johnny Katastrophe Kogen, Scarifying Sam Simon and Vicious Jack Vitti



Welcome to the third Treehouse of Horror "Review". Let me start by saying this is one of my favorite Treehouse of Horror Episodes as the overall writing is arguably the best it has ever been for the Simpsons and this came out at the peak of their popularity.

The opening has Homer being revealed with his outline similar to Alfred Hitchcock even going as far as echoing the iconic phrase "Good Evening". From there Homer warns and mocks the audience about the episode being too scary and that everyone is too chicken to turn off the screen. With the screen "turned off" Marge scolds Homer for mocking the audience. Next comes the Treehouse staple of panning through the cemetery with mock tombstones and finally finishing with the coach gag showing the Simpsons as skeletons.

The episode centers around a Halloween party with a bunch of kids are over for a Halloween party and Marge starts telling a story of a witch that dies while passing out her "body" parts, which Homer consumes. The rest of the episode/segments are set up as scary stories told from Lisa, Grandpa and Bart. There are plenty of horror references since all the kids are dressed up but specifically Bart is dressed as Alex from Clock work orange.

Segment 1 - Clown without Pity 

This first story as told by Lisa starts at Bart's birthday with Homer forgetting a gift, so he runs out to the local House of Evil and purchases a Krusty doll. The back and forth between Homer and the shop keeper is really funny. Bart is thrilled with the new toy but Grandpa warns that the doll is evil, Marge says that he has been saying the same thing about all the gifts. Homer discovers the doll is evil and is attempting to kill him, although most of the family does not believe it. Finally Marge calls the company who made the doll and they end a tech out who tells them that someone must have set the doll to evil, so he switches him to good and all is well. There are plenty of funny parts in this episode but I love the scene where homer is being attacked and he screams out "Marge, Marge the doll is trying to kill me and the toaster's been laughing at me".

Here is the list of the references I noticed while watching this segment.
- Child's Play and "Living Doll" from the Twilight Zone: The premise of the segment and the actions of the Krusty doll in general are pulled directly from these two sources.

- Cape Fear: When Krusty attached himself to the undercarriage of the car with a belt like Max Cady

- Town without Pity (Song) - The title of this segment is a parody of this.

Segment 2 - King Homer 

Next up is Grandpa's story which is a "retelling" of King Kong, Simpsons style. The entire episode is a retelling of King Kong. Not much to say, if you have ever seen the original King Kong then you know what to expect it is funny and my favorite line has to be when Burns asks Smithers what he thinks about Marge joining the crew, Smither's responds with " I think women and sea men don't mix" Burns responds with "we know what you think". A solid segment that helps introduce younger people to the story of King Kong, at least it did for me.

Here are the references I noticed in the segment.
- King Kong: The entire episode is based on the King Kong film.

- The chief of the Island shouts "Mosi Tatupu", which is actually the name of an NFL running back

Segment 3 - Dial "Z" for Zombies 

The final story is told by Bart after Ned walks in and scares everyone dressed as an elaborate and gory Zombie. The story revolves around Bart needing to do a book report so he stumbles across a book the Occult section of the library which has spells to reanimate the dead. In an attempt to reanimate Lisa's cat Snowball 1 the kids go to the Pet Cemetery, but things goes wrong when Bart's spell wakes up all the zombies. In a desperate attempt to reverse things the Simpsons go back to the library and find a book that sends all the zombies back. I love this segment and it is arguably the first true "scary" episode with monster/zombies. There are plenty of funny lines but my favorite is tied between when the kids tell Homer they did something bad and he asks if they wrecked the car or raised the dead, they respond with raised the dead and he once again asks if the car is okay. Then when Homer shoots the zombie Ned Flanders without knowing he was a zombie.

Here are the references I noticed in the segment.
- Dial "M" for Murder: The title of this segment is a play on this title.
- Return of the Living Dead: The zombies keep repeating brains similar to the zombies in this film.

- Michael Jackson Thriller Album: While raising the dead Bart has this album on his head.

- Pet Cemetery: The pet cemetery is arguably inspired by the books/films.

Closing: There is no traditional closing that ties back to the Halloween party, which is odd since the other episodes always did that. Either way this is a great episode and one I would suggest people start with as a means to being introduced to the Treehouse of Horror Episodes. Good Night Everyone.