Difference between revisions of "Treehouse of Horror V"

Latest revision as of 11:22, April 14, 2024

This THOH is considered non-canon and the events featured do not relate to the series and therefore may not have actually happened/existed. The reason behind this decision is: The episode is part of the Treehouse of Horror series. If you dispute this, please bring it up on the episode's talk page.

"For the next half-hour, we will control what you see and hear. You are about to experience the terror and foul horror of... The Simpsons Halloween Special."

―Bart

"Treehouse of Horror V"

Episode Information Episode number: 109 Season number: S6 E6 Production code: 2F03 Original airdate: October 30, 1994 Couch gag: Each member of the family enters with disfigured bodies. Guest star(s): James Earl Jones as Alternate universe Maggie Showrunner: David Mirkin Written by: Greg Daniels Dan McGrath David S. Cohen Bob Kushell Directed by: Jim Reardon DVD features

"Treehouse of Horror V" is the sixth episode of season 6 of The Simpsons and the one-hundred and ninth episode overall. It is also the fifth installment in the Treehouse of Horror series and consists of three parts. It originally aired on October 30, 1994. The episode was written by Greg Daniels, Dan McGrath, David S. Cohen and Bob Kushell and directed by Jim Reardon. It guest stars James Earl Jones as alternate universe Maggie.

Synopsis[edit]

"In the fifth annual Halloween special, the Simpsons become the caretakers of a hotel owned by Mr. Burns, Homer accidentally creates a time-traveling toaster, and the teachers at Springfield Elementary School start slaughtering children to eat them."

Plot[edit]

Opening sequence[edit]

Marge gives a warning about the episode and says that they're not allowed to air it. Instead, they air a clip from the movie 200 Miles to Oregon. The clip is cut off by Bart's voice who starts to give an ominous message. Homer cuts in and ruins the mood. Bart then introduces The Simpsons Halloween Special. The camera pans through the Springfield Cemetery, showing Moe getting hanged, Patty and Selma being burned as witches, and several adults having their heads cut off by Bart.

The Shinning[edit]

On Tuesday, the Simpson family drives to a hotel owned by Mr. Burns to become the caretakers of it. Marge asks Homer if he remembered to lock the front door, so they drive back to do that. On Wednesday, they almost make it again, but then have to drive back to lock the back door. On Thursday, Lisa points out that they left Grampa at the gas station, but they carry on regardless. They finally arrive and Mr. Burns shows them around the hotel. At the hedge maze, Bart cuts through it with a chainsaw, angering Groundskeeper Willie. When Bart reads Willie's mind, Willie tells Bart that he has "the shinning", which he can use to contact Willie if Homer goes crazy.

Back at the hotel, Mr. Burns gets Smithers to cut the cable and take all the beer from the lodge. Homer acts calmly about this at first, but then quickly begins to go crazy. He goes to the bar and speaks to Moe, who's a ghost. He tells Homer that he has to kill his family to get a beer from him. Homer snaps and writes "no beer and no TV make Homer go crazy" over the walls before he tries to goad Marge into hitting him with a baseball bat. Homer scares himself when he looks in a mirror and falls down the stairs, knocking himself out. Marge then locks him in the pantry and she and the kids carry on as normal. Moe and his group of ghouls drag Homer out and tell him to kill his family.

After axing down two wrong doors, Homer finally finds his family and chases them around the hotel. Marge tries to contact Chief Wiggum for help over the radio, but he assumes that it's over when Marge ends the transmission with "over". Bart then decides to contact Willie for help using his "shinning". When Willie gets the call, he runs to help, dropping his portable television in the snow outside. As he gets inside, Homer axes him in the back, killing Willie. The family then escape out of the hotel and into the snow. Lisa grabs the portable television that Willie dropped and shows it to Homer, getting him to stop his murderous rampage. The family all gathers around Homer to watch the television until they freeze. When the Tony Awards come on the television, the family is horrified that they can't change the channel because they are frozen.

Time and Punishment[edit]

At breakfast, Homer manages to get his hand stuck in the toaster. After finally getting it free, he gets it stuck once more. After freeing it the second time, Homer tries to repair the toaster, rather than buy a new one. When he takes it for a test toast, it takes him back in time to the age of the dinosaurs. Homer remembers advice that his father gave him, not to step on anything. Homer kills a bug and then goes back to the future to find that it's different. Ned Flanders rules the world and brings in the Simpsons for "re-Neducation" when Homer insults Flanders. They're taken to the Re-Neducation Center where they go through various brainwashing procedures. When Homer finds that they're going to have a lobotomy, he runs back to the house and uses the toaster again.

This time, Homer accidentally sits on a fish. When he gets back to the future, he finds that the rest of the family are giant. The next time he goes back in time, he sneezes, causing the deaths of every living creature. When he returns to the present time, he finds that the family are rich, have a nice house, and Patty and Selma are dead. However, when he finds that donuts don't exist in this world, he goes back in time once again. As he does, it starts to rain donuts outside. The next time he goes to the present, he finds Willie, who starts to tell Homer how he can get back to his own world. Maggie then axes Willie in the back, killing him, and says that it is a disturbing universe. The next time Homer goes to the past, he started to destroy everything, causing the universe to keep changing when he returns. Eventually, Homer finds that the family is mostly normal, except they have very long tongues. Homer decides that it's close enough and just eats his food.

Nightmare Cafeteria[edit]

At Springfield Elementary School, the class is playing around. Bart then decides that the class should all turns their desks backwards as a prank. However, only Bart does this, causing him to get detention. Since the detention room is full, Bart is sent to the cafeteria instead. When Jimbo trips up Lunchlady Doris and a pot of sauce, he gets covered in it. Principal Skinner tastes Jimbo and finds him delicious, so he sends Jimbo to help Lunchlady Doris in the kitchen. Jimbo is then cooked and turned into burgers, which the staff find delicious. The next day, Üter cuts in line to get more food. He is then sent to detention and also turned into food, which is served the next day. Lisa finds it weird that kids are disappearing and then food named after them is being served. She and Bart go to Marge and ask for help. However, Marge refuses to help, saying that they are old enough to fight their own battles.

Soon, only a handful of students are left and are merged into one class. Bart, Lisa, and Milhouse decide to escape the classroom, but are then chased by the school's staff. As Willie tries to rescue them, he is axed in the back by Skinner, killing him. The kids end up in the blender room where Milhouse falls in. as Bart and Lisa talk about how something will save them, they also fall into the blender.

Closing sequence[edit]

Bart screams and wakes up to find out it was all a dream. Marge reassures him that there's nothing to worry about except the mysterious fog that turns people inside out. The fog then seeps in through the window and does just that. The family and Willie all begin to do a musical number (to the tune of "One" from A Chorus Line) about being turned inside out. At the end, Santa's Little Helper drags Bart offstage by his intestines.

Production[edit]

Showrunner David Mirkin calls the episode the "most intense, disturbing Halloween show" that The Simpsons has done. The black and white live action footage for 200 Miles to Oregon was inserted as there was concern from the network executives that the show would be too much to air and they wanted to censor it. Mirkin is heavily against censorship so he added the gag in as a response.^[1]

The tombstone that says "Amusing Tombstones" on was added in because the writers had gotten tired of coming up with actual humorous tombstone messages.^[2]

Matt Groening originally pitched that the way Homer traveled in time was by jamming his hand in the toaster. However, the other producers rejected the idea as it was "too ridiculous". Groening was also confused by Homer saying that he was the "first non-Brazilian person to travel backwards through time" as he didn't understand it.^[3] The original line was "first non-fictional person".^[2]

When the Simpson house rapidly changes, one of the original designs was a house made entirely out of squirrels. Background designer Lance Wilder actually drew the house. However, it got cut. Due to the art taking him a day and a half to draw, he started to use it as a Christmas card design.^[4]

An earlier draft of the script had Homer finding out that he had another son called Roy one of the realities.^[5] This idea was later used for "The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show" instead, where Roy was a lodger instead of another son.^[2] This idea came around because someone outside of the show had suggested they add in a new character to the family.^[3]

A cut scene from the "Nightmare Cafeteria" segment had Sherri and Terri being cooked and eaten as "Terriaki steak with Sherri sauce". The scene where Bart and Lisa go to Marge was to originally have Homer in as well. Homer told the kids about writing a book of recipes on cooking Milhouse.^[2]

The inside out scene was inspired by an episode of Lights Out called "The Dark", where gas seeped into homes and turned people inside out. This scared David Mirkin as a child so he wrote it into the episode. The dance number was then written in to end the show on a lighter note.^[1]

• 

  Production art of the "squirrel house"

• 

  Finished version of the "squirrel house"

Reception[edit]

In 2003, Entertainment Weekly named "Treehouse of Horror V" the ninth best episode of the show.^[6] In 2010, IGN called the episode the best episode of season 6 and called it "funniest Treehouse of Horror to date".^[7] In 2019, Screen Rant ranked the episode 4th in their best episodes of every season listing and says that many fans "considered the very best Halloween episode".^[8] Also in 2019, Time ranked the episode 3rd in a ranking by Simpsons experts.^[9]

Composer Alf Clausen was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series in the 47th Primetime Emmy Awards for "Treehouse of Horror II". However, it lost to "Daggers" from seaQuest DSV.^[10]

As of September 2022, the episode has a 9.2 rating on IMDb.^[11]

Gallery[edit]

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  Poster for "Time and Punishment"

References[edit]

Wikisimpsons has a collection of images related to "Treehouse of Horror V".