Simpsons Did It!: “Treehouse Of Horror XXXIV”

Hey, it’s the annual Halloween episode!

I never really know what to say about these.

Well, the episode opens with the Springfield Museum closing its doors in order to convert the artwork into NFTs.  Hey, there’s a timely reference!  Not!  Anyway, Homer and Bart sneak in to convert the Simpsons’ own cheap artwork into more valuable NFTs, and Bart opts to do put himself into the machine to scan his own butt.  But this is a cartoon, so the machine really converts stuff to digital and Bart is put online…where he becomes very valuable, giving Homer mixed signals.  Marge is less happy about it, but three shadowy figures who know about NFTs step in!  It’s Kylie Jenner (playing herself), Rob Gronkowski, and Jimmy Fallon (not played by themselves).  They know how to put Marge online with a key to get Bart out.  But since Marge is the second live human NFT, she is worth far less and isn’t even on the same level as Bart.  But she learns she can increase her values by killing other NFTs (yes, they are alive in there) because people who trade those things like edgy stuff.  That includes Marge’s murder of Milhouse and Ralph Wiggum when Kirk and the Chief toss their boys inside the machine to make money and the two become painfully merged.  That gets Marge to the top level, but Bart likes it up there.  Plus, Mr. Burns offered Homer a lot of money.  Will he sell Bart before Marge can get him out?

Well, no.  He’ll sell himself as an NFT so he can finally ride the wave of something just as Marge gets Bart out.  And Homer’s time in there doesn’t last long as the bubble bursts.

D’oh!

That’s one.  Next is a change to a classic episode when Kelsey Grammer’s Sideshow Bob realizes Bart only asked him to sing the entire HMS Pinafore as a distraction, so he butchers Bart instead in front of a terrified Lisa.  As an adult, Lisa is a top criminologist when Officer Nelson comes to her for help solving a murder.  A whole lot, actually.  Someone killed Rod Flanders with a note to Lisa written in Rod’s intestines and another in blood saying he’s the first.  But then other people in Springfield, like Martin, one of Cletus’s kids, and Sheri (but not Teri).  They can’t all be the first.  Or they can because they were all the oldest child, including Sheri.  Will Sideshow Bob, in jail for life, provide any help?  Eh, maybe.  But then Nelson dies and it looks like Lisa did it.  Mostly because she did.  It was all an elaborate plan to get Lisa into Bob’s cell because she was a split personality or something.  Plus, Maggie is a prison guard, and she helps.

That was an elaborate plan just to murder Sideshow Bob.

Oh, and in the final story, Smithers catches Homer eating donuts in unauthorized spots in the Nuclear Plant, but when he lets one roll through the corridors, he eats it anyway, causing his DNA to mutate.  The next day, whenever Homer burps, the gas turns other people into Homers.  It starts with Flanders, and it goes from there, infecting everyone in town including Santa’s Little Helper, Kang, and Kodos.  They all have Homer’s face, his voice, and his preferences.  Bart, Lisa, and Maggie are all immune, so Professor Frink in his radiation suit asks them to find Homer so they can reverse everything.  This actually is harder than it seems because Moe’s is crowded full of New Homers (Moe is also still himself and he’s loving all this business), but they do find Homer.  Too bad Homer isn’t interested in fixing anything.  He likes it like this.  Even showing him a Homerized Marge doesn’t fix things, and soon, well, everyone on Earth is a Homer.

Hey, who needs expertise?

I never know what to say about these things.  I blame Jimmy.