Simpsons Did It!: “Treehouse Of Horror XXII”

In terms of meta humor, this Halloween episode opens with Marge sending Homer to donate all the kids’ Halloween candy to the soldiers overseas for some reason, but instead he drives out to the desert, falls into a ravine, and gets his arm trapped under a rock like in 127 Hours. Homer calls 911 for help, and the dispatcher is voiced by Aron Ralston, AKA the guy who really lived the 127 Hours story.

Also, Jackie Mason has, like, one line as Rabbi Krustofski.

But this is the annual Halloween anthology, so let’s see what happens:

Homer gets bitten by a black widow and can’t move or speak after that, but he learns to communicate through farting.  That’s a bit foul.  Later he’s bitten by a radioactive spider and gains some spider-powers but still can’t move or speak.

Part two has Ned Flanders as Dexter because God is telling him to kill people.  Only it isn’t God.  Homer rigged Flanders’ Bible and was sending his neighbor off to kill all of Homer’s enemies.  Ned figured it out, realized he was going to Hell, and attacked Homer, but Homer suggested there was no God, or else Homer couldn’t burn the Bible.  Only then God shows up and strangles Homer to death.  Marge asks if God can bring Homer back, but God says the boss won’t let Him.  Who’s the boss?  Not Tony Danza.  The devil.  God gets him coffee.  Can it get any worse for Ned?  Yes.  His dead wife Maude is sleeping with the devil.

And then there’s an Avatar parody where Bart infiltrates Kang and Kodos’ world to get some rare element that, after a large scale war between humans and the aliens of that world, we learn the aliens would have just given if they’d been asked politely.

But there was this:

So, that’s that.  And no, Grampa, I don’t know when the Black Swan was supposed to come in.