Overview
Giant monsters created by political rage threaten to tear the town apart; a Victorian Mr. Burns is jump-scared on Thanksgiving by the ghosts of his abused workers; Homer bonds with a pair of extra-terrestrial jeans.
Our Take
Ah yes, the yearly tradition of FOX premiering the most popular of Halloween specials after Halloween is here in the form of Treehouse of Horror. This year we have three shorts written by Rob LaZebnik, Dan Vebber & Matt Selman with a knock-out stellar opening intro from Jorge R. Gutierrez that should be in the Hall-of-Fame of one of the better looking opening intros ever done by an independent animator.
Between all three shorts, I think the most Halloween-worthy were “The Fall of the House of Monty” and “Denim” whilst “The Information Rage” was probably the show’s producers putting in a quick note about how divisive the current American conversations really are, we used to have a show that did more of this biting satire on a regular basis with a bit more of a heavy-handed approach, but that show was bought by Disney and eventually succumbed to the inflated Tableau demands of social media analytics that were largely co-opted by international bot farms…it was called The Simpsons. Fans of Godzilla will enjoy the Kaiju battles, however, Kaiju battles have been done by a number of animated series that have done it better and, quite frankly, the show should have let their writer-cousins in Futurama have a crack at that one because this one wasn’t all that choreographed all that well and as mentioned the writers have long packed in sharper pencils the likes of which John Swartzwelder enjoyed to truly go deep on the commentary that the bit was attempting to go in on.
“The Fall of the House of Monty” felt the MOST classic horror movie-style. With a sepia-tone aesthetic set in a Victorian-era setting with the scariest character that The Simpsons has in its arsenal. I LOVED the biting commentary on corn syrup, especially just before the election as farming is a hot topic that isn’t talked about enough in the mainstream media and the producers did a great job in incorporating zombies but the Thanksgiving dinner feast was a bit muddled in it’s execution. On one hand, the producers are talking about the perils of corn syrup in every food item imaginable but showcase Moe, possibly the most “don’t give a shit” of all of the cast as trying to eat a bunch of peas before he dies. For my money I thought Lisa would’ve been the most apropo to go in that direction, not Moe “No Funerals” Szyslak. Still though, fun sketch.
Last, but certainly not least, the Stoopid Buddy Stoodios-co-produced “Denim”. Inspired by the terrible comic book franchise Venom that just had a third iteration cross over $300 million at the time of this writing, “Denim” is a fantastic co-production that I don’t think gets done correctly without the guys who brought us decades of Robot Chicken episodes. The premise was fantastic, the dialogue was the funniest of the three bits this evening, and Homer’s methods of wooing Marge was hysterical.
Overall, a solid year of Treehouse with “Denim” showcasing the most old-school adventure-seeking type of bits that The Simpsons has historically been known for. Long gone are days when The Simpsons could be seen as a source for unbiased, unfettered, true satire which is what made older Treehouses so special but the show still gets some good licks in and I guess that’s all we can ask for at this juncture.