Sunday, October 30, 2011

T.V. REVIEW: Simpsons Treehouse of Horror XXII

Hurray! The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror XXII is actually airing before Halloween this year! So I thought I should review it since I haven't blogged about anything Halloween-related yet this year (sorry about that!).

In the opening sequence, Marge is a Switch Witch. After the kids eat some of their candy, she takes the rest and replaces it with toothbrushes, dental floss and mouthwash. Then Homer is supposed to drop it off at Candy for Troops, but instead he drives to Candy Eating Peak to gorge himself and falls down a canyon, getting stuck under a rock in a funny spoof of 127 Hours.

This Treehouse of Horror episode was a bit of a disappointment compared to some of my favourites (read a list of my Top 10 Treehouse of Horror Segments here), or even last year's episode (read my review here), but that is probably because I haven't seen any of the movies/T.V. shows  which are spoofed. Here are the segments:

The Diving Bell and the Butterball

In this parody of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Homer is paralyzed by a spider bite and learns to communicate through farting.

This segment is mostly fart jokes, so I didn't find it very funny. Also, not only have I not seen The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, I have no idea what it's about and have never heard of it until now. At least with the others, I have an idea of what they're about. But there are still a few laughs at the end when another spider bites Homer and he becomes a Spiderman who shoots webs from his ass when he farts.

Dial "D" for Diddly

Ned Flanders begins murdering "evil" people when he believes God is telling him to in this parody of Dexter.

As I've already said, I've never seen Dexter - I know I should probably watch it, I'm sure I'll get to it eventually - but despite this, I still found this segment to be the funniest of the episode. I especially enjoyed the scene where Ned kills Patty and Selma. He puts a sign on the side of the road that says "Free Cigarettes" and then shoves a boulder on top of their car a la Wile E. Coyote.

In the Na'vi

In the future, Bart and Milhouse are sent to another planet to harvest Hilarium for Krusty the Clown, in a spoof of Avatar.

I found this to be the least funny segment of the episode. Unlike the others, this one just has Avatar-related jokes. I enjoyed seeing what Bart and Milhouse would look like if they were part of Kang and Kodos' race of aliens, but that was the only fun part of this segment.

Overall, I felt pretty "meh" about this year's episode. But it's worth watching for Dial "D" for Diddly and the opening.

Rating: 3/5

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Your review was much more kind than this one:

http://filmverse.wordpress.com/2011/10/30/worst-treehouse-of-horror-episode-ever/

Melissa Helwig said...

Haha, I wouldn't call it the worst Treehouse of Horror episode ever. I think Dial "D" For Diddly redeemed it a bit, but they other two segments were pretty bad.

Fear Street said...

I missed this one and I was really disappointed, but now I don't feel so bad about it. Dial "D" For Diddly sounds great, though.