Not every parody on The Simpsons is well-informed.
- There's something resembling an anime parody in the Season 12 episode "HOMR". While at an animation convention, Bart and Lisa watch a Japanese cartoon (which Bart refers to as "Japanimation", a term which hasn't seen much use since The '80s) in which a robot-wolf-like creature captures a female warrior who turns into a prawn and destroys the robo-wolf, who then turns into a pair of wind-up shoes and walks away. So the point Al Jean (the episode writer) is making is "Ha-ha-ha, anime is weird" (which Bart and Lisa lampshade). Oddly, it seems more like a parody of American science fantasy cartoons from the '80s (He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (1983), Thundarr the Barbarian etc.) than actual anime. Same thing with the "Battling Seizure Robots" parody from Season 10's "Thirty Minutes Over Tokyo" (though that's more of a reference to that infamous Pokémon episode "Electric Soldier Porygon", which was banned after viewers suffered seizures).
- Of course, there is a homage counterbalance — one of the couch gags is Japan-themed
and adds Ultraman (complete with his famous attacks) and Jun the Swan among other things. - As the title implies, Season 23's "The D'oh-cial Network" is established as a parody of The Social Network. The similarities, however, are more or less restricted to: Lisa starting a Facebook Expy networking site, use of Radiohead's "Creep" (which was present in the trailer, not the actual film), and a cameo by Armie Hammer. It seems like the writers watched the trailer for The Social Network before penning this one.
- The parody of The O.C. in "Milhouse of Sand and Fog", which does get the title, theme song and general age ("young") of the characters right, but only featured a couple generic lines of dialogue followed by a montage to the main theme, with some guys (one of whom is dressed in a Snoopy suit for some reason) walking cheerfully down the street, visiting an amusement park and withdrawing some money from an ATM while being held at gunpoint by the guy in the Snoopy suit. What any of this has to do with the series is a mystery.
- In a sort of crossover with Robot Chickennote , the Couch Gag for "The Cad and The Hat" uses a rather out of place parody of the California Raisins singing about how bad they are to the tune of the Marvin Gaye hit turned jingle, "Heard it Through the Grapevine".
- One episode has a Precious parody that consists solely of jokes about how fat the lead actress is. This may be somewhat explained, seeing that the movie's subject matter is very family-unfriendly.
- A parody of Tintin in "Husbands and Knives" references the moon rocket from "Explorers to the Moon", the isle of "The Black Island", Captain Haddock, Thompson, Thomson, Snowy and Tintin's Belgian nationality. Apart from the general tone and style, the series isn't satirized at all.
- The Rin Tin Tin parody in "Old Yeller Belly" is equally shallow. All we see is Rin Tin Tin biting Adolf Hitler in the ass. The Rin Tin Tin movies were popular during the 1920s and early 1930s before Hitler took power.
- One episode featured an Itchy and Scratchy episode that parodied House. During the brief short, the writers demonstrate knowledge of the following things about House: it's a show about a doctor, and the theme song is "Teardrop" (the latter being demonstrated by having the opening chords play constantly throughout the short). The most significant notes about House, his Deadpan Snarker Doctor Jerk nature, ends up completely absent.
- The 2010 Treehouse of Horror episode features a parody of Twilight. Twilight being probably one of the most widely-parodied subjects of the era, it's rather conspicuous when the only Twilight elements are the fact that it features a Romantic Vampire Boy who looks like Edward Cullen, a few scenes that seem to have been taken from the first film's trailer, and a gag about Milhouse being a were-poodle—all of which happen very early in the episode. The most infamous element of the franchise—that Twilight vampires sparkle in sunlight—isn't acknowledged at all, nor are any of the other memes about Twilight (creepy relationship dynamics, oddly-sanitized takes on vampire lore, Bella's lack of personality) that made it such a punching bag back in the early '10s. Tellingly, at one point in the episode, Dracula shows up: in most other parodies of the era, this would mark some kind of comparison between classical vampires and Twilight-style ones, possibly resulting in a fight between Dracula and not-Edward. Instead, the differences are never acknowledged; in fact, Dracula is Edward's dad, and there's no sign of animosity between them. Basically, for this one, they hadn't even seen other parodies of Twilight.
- The parody of Dinosaurs in the episode "Black Widower" accuses the show of plagiarizing The Simpsons and singles out the character of Robbie in particular as being a copy of Bart. The parody only vaguely resembles the real show, because Dinosaurs and The Simpsons have very little in common besides being broad satires of Sitcom tropes, and Robbie and Bart are absolutely nothing alike other than being the older brothers in their respective A Boy, a Girl, and a Baby Family, and if anything, Robbie is more similar to Lisa, being the resident Soapbox Sadie and Voice of Reason. They also (unsuprisingly) draw comparisons between Maggie and Baby Sinclair, but other than being the babies in their respective families, the two have nothing in common, with Maggie being a more or less normal infant, while Baby is fully capable of speech and is a Spoiled Brat who delights in screwing around with his father (making him more like Bart than anything).
- Another Treehouse of Horror has a parody of Dexter. All it takes from said series is a song similar to its theme tune and that it's about a guy who doubles as a killer.
- As with many Harry Potter parodies, the one on "Treehouse of Horror XII", "Wiz Kids", seems to know little about the series except that it involves a Wizarding School; aside from that, they got the villain's name ("Voldemort" → "Montymort") and the fact that he has a pet snake. Interestingly, later "normal" episodes have a Book Series Within A Show that parodies it a bit better, with their own versions of Dumbledore and Snape. (And yes, the latter kills the former.). However, Harry Potter creator J. K. Rowling enjoyed the "Wiz Kids" segment, agreeing to appear as herself in "The Regina Monologues".
- Their "Bartman Begins" parody does try to just spoof Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins. Instead they present a general recapitulation of the character type, promiscuously drawing from various Batman media. The campy villains and bizarre decision to set the story in 1933 are strange enough, but the most egregious is making Ba(r)tman a Sociopathic Hero. He avenges his parents' murders by killing all criminals, even nonviolent ones - and, in some cases, people who simply look like criminals! He shoves them into exposed electrical wiring purely out of spite, and they die instantly. Granted, Batman did kill criminals early on in the comics, but that aspect was phased out. Ironically it ends up working better as an unintentional parody of Frank Miller's Batman in the infamous "All Star Batman and Robin" comic.
- Another episode had a parody of Fibber McGee and Molly consisting only of puns and jokes about alcoholism, none of which were featured in the actual show.
- The Treehouse of Horror segment "I Know What You Diddily-Iddily-Did" is supposed to be a parody of I Know What You Did Last Summer. In fact, the first treatment was written by Donick Cary right after seeing the movie, but he left the show to work in an ultimately abandoned Austin Powers cartoon series. The remaining writers changed his choices for the fisherman (Abe to Flanders) and final showdown location (an abandoned roller disco to... well, the middle of nowhere), and the final act to reveal that Flanders survived because he is a werewolf and isn't actually mad with them. The similarities are thus reduced to the title, the Simpsons running over Flanders and thinking they have killed him, and Flanders coming back to stalk them in a fisherman's coat and leave "I know what you did" notes on their property - but it is never explained why he even does the last two.
- Efcot Center in "Special Edna" is a very shallow knock on Epcot. Aside from the fact that Epcot is PART of Walt Disney World (the episode treats “Disney World” as an alternate name for Magic Kingdom), almost all the rides parodied in the episode are actually from the Tomorrowland sections of Magic Kingdom and Disneyland, and the episode generally treats Efcot’s aesthetic as a gigantic version of the Carousel of Progress, which is also from Magic Kingdom.
- "Round Springfield" has a brief joke involving Mufasa showing up in the clouds and saying, "You must avenge my death Kimba-I mean Simba.". Not only is the notion that The Lion King is a carbon copy of Kimba the White Lion a grossly embellished one, but Mufasa never told Simba to "avenge his death" but rather that Simba needed to return and take back his place in the "circle of life".
