Treehouse of Horror episode: 3
Year: 1992
Season: 4
Segment: 3 of 3
Segment title: “Dial Z for Zombies”
Writer(s): Al Jean & Mike Reiss, Jay Kogen & Wallace Wolodarsky, Sam Simon, Jon Vitti
Characters:
Main: Bart, Lisa, Homer, Marge, Maggie
Supporting: Flanders, Skinner, Martin Prince, Dolph, Jimbo, Curny, Krusty, Sideshow Mel, Willy, Barney
Homage to? Night/Return of the Living Dead and every zombie movie or TV series you've ever watched
Basic premise: When Bart and Lisa try to resurrect their beloved cat, the spell goes a little wrong and suddenly Springfield is overrun with zombies.
Best quotes:
Book (on Bart opening it, phantom faces leering out of its pages): “Evil! Evil! Bad! Beware!”
Bart (slamming book closed): “Cool!”
Book (faces from within): “Ow! Ouch! Ow!”
Bart (reading): “Let’s see, what we got?
How to get your skeletons their whitest, selling your soul in a buyer’s market…”
Lisa; “Bart! You cast the wrong spell! Zombies!”
Bart: “Please, Lisa: they prefer to be called the living impaired!”
Willy (patting down a grave): “There! Pretty as a picture.” (Zombies emerge from the grave) “Aaah! Zombies!” (Zombies shuffle off, Willy pats down grave again) “There! Pretty as a picture!”
Lisa and Bart: “Dad! Dad! We did something really bad!”
Homer: “Did you wreck the car?”
Lisa and Bart: “No.”
Homer: “Did you raise the dead?”
Lisa and Bart: “Yes.”
Homer: “But the car’s okay?”
Lis and Bart: “Yes.”
Homer: “All right then.”
Skinner: “Martin Prince to my office. And bring that big, juicy chess club brain of yours along with you!”
Homer: “Spare my family! Take me! Take me!”
(Zombies gather around, walk off annoyed at there being no brain to consume).
Flanders: “Hey Simpson! I’m feeling a mite peckish. Mind if I nibble on your ear?”
Homer shoots him with a shotgun.
Bart: “Dad! You killed the zombie Flanders!”
Homer: “He was a zombie?”
Homer (shooting): “Take that, Washington! Eat lead, Einstein! Show’s over, Shakespeare!”
Zombie, getting back into grave: “Excuse me,
I’m John Smith.”
Other zombie: “John Smith, 1882?”
Zombie: “My mistake.”
Type of ending: Ironic
Synopsis: Trying to do a book report for school (his first attempt,
Baby’s First Book, being deemed not to have fulfilled the brief by his teacher) Bart comes across an occult section in the library, where he finds a book of spells. Arriving home, he finds Lisa pining for the loss of their pet cat, Snowball, and looks in the book for a spell to bring her back to life. They go to the graveyard, but the spell instead raises all the dead. Springfield is now in the midst of a zombie attack. Clever touch there when Bart is raising the dead, he has a copy of Michael Jackson’s
Thriller on his head. Also clever when Homer points a shotgun at the screen and yells “To the book depository!” I mean, it’s not Texas, but the meaning is pretty clear. Anyway eventually Bart reverses the spell and the zombies go back to their graves. Clever commentary at the end, when, as they all sit watching TV, Marge says “I’m sure glad we didn't all turn into mindless zombies!” and Bart says “Shh! TV!” Homer then remarks “Man fall down. Funny.” And they all grunt.
Rating: A
Score
Story: 8
Laughs: 7
Originality: 3
Ending: 5
Longevity: 2
Total: 25