Line #46 Recap/TheSimpsonsS9E4TreehouseOfHorrorVIII


1	'''Original air date:''' 10/26/1997
2
3	'''Production code:''' 5F02
4
5	The annual ThreeShorts HalloweenEpisode starts with Fox Censor, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin the FOX network censor,]] editing this year's Halloween special to a TV-G rating (removing all the [[Series/{{Friends}} NBC-style]] [[Series/{{Seinfeld}} sexual]] [[Series/SaturdayNightLive innuendo]] and [[Series/WalkerTexasRanger CBS-style action violence]]), but the TV rating bug fights back by stabbing Censor until it reaches TV-666. Afterwards, the Simpson family enters the living room where they get executed on the couch.
6
7	!!The HΩmega Man
8	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/the_hmega_man.jpg]]
9	A parody of ''Film/TheOmegaMan'' (aka the second film adaptation of ''Literature/IAmLegend''). France threatens to destroy Springfield in response to a racist "frog legs" joke Mayor Quimby made, and Marge convinces Homer to look into getting a proper bomb shelter just in case (the shelter they already have is just a cardboard box Homer taped an umbrella to). As it turns out, while he's inside one to examine it, the French see their threat through with a NeutronBomb, and he emerges to discover he's apparently the last man in Springfield.
10
11	He indulges in all the town's leftover pleasures (such as watching a Creator/DavidSpade[=/=]Creator/ChrisFarley [[Film/TommyBoy movie]] in an abandoned theater, sitting in his boss's office [DeletedScene only], and dancing naked in church) until a mob of Springfieldians mutated by the bomb (including Moe, Dr. Hibbert, Principal Skinner, Chief Wiggum, Sideshow Mel and Mr. Burns) plot to kill him to get rid of the mistakes of the past for a better future. A car chase through town ensues, and Homer winds up back at his own house to discover his family alive and well -- the house's multiple coats of lead paint created "the perfect bomb shelter." The mutants are touched by the reunion and Marge suggests the two groups can be friends -- but it's a ruse to ensure the mutants' guards are down, as she and the kids promptly kill the mutants with shotguns. "Now ''that's'' the Marge I married!", exclaims the impressed Homer and the family decides to steal some Ferraris.
12
13	!!Fly vs. Fly
14	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fly_vs_fly.jpg]]
15	A parody of both [[Film/TheFly1958 the 1958]] and [[Film/TheFly1986 1986]] versions of ''The Fly''. The Simpson family attends Professor Frink's garage sale and Homer winds up buying a matter transporter. He promptly puts its two pods to good (to him, anyway) use and forbids Bart from trying it out for himself. In the middle of the night Bart tries to send Snowball II through it; instead both it and Santa's Little Helper go through at once. When Bart sees the result -- two hybrids, one combining dog and cat front ends and one combining dog and cat rears ("Ewwww, you can be Lisa's!") he's intrigued by what would happen if he and an ordinary housefly buzzing past went through together...
16
17	Expecting to come out as "Superfly", Bart is disappointed to find that he and the fly's heads have been proportionally swapped. Still the undaunted [=BartFly=] heads out to cause mischief while grotesque [=FlyBart=] is reluctantly accepted by the other Simpsons, who believe he's the "real" Bart. When [=BartFly=] realizes that [=FlyBart=]'s usurped his place in the household, he reveals himself to Lisa and she agrees to help him reverse the process. [=FlyBart=] attacks them both, but upon putting [=BartFly=] in its mouth Lisa knocks it into the transporter and both boy and fly are restored to normal. Homer, seeing what the transporter has wrought, grabs an ax and vows to do what he "should have done a long time ago" -- and chases Bart around the house for playing with the machine.
18
19	!!Easy-Bake Coven
20	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/easy_bake_coven.jpg]]
21	A parody of ''Theatre/TheCrucible''. In 17th-century Springfield, the townsfolk busy themselves by finding and killing witches. When Marge is accused of witchcraft, she pleads innocent, so it's decided to toss her off of a cliff to reveal the truth -- if she's innocent, she'll fall to an "honorable Christian death", if she's guilty, she'll be able to magically escape. As it turns out, she ''is'' a WickedWitch, and flies off on her broomstick to her family and the townsfolk's horror. At their mountain hideaway, Marge reunites with her sisters/fellow witches Patty and Selma, and soon, thanks to eavesdropping on the Flanders, they head out to find some delicious kids to eat.
22
23	The Flanderses find themselves a target of the witches' intent, but before the threesome can haul off Rod and Todd, Ned and Maude offer them ''gingerbread'' kids instead. The witches find the cookies sufficiently tasty and spare the children of the town... wishing they hadn't already filled up on kids at their previous stops. According to Captain [=McAllister=], placating witches with treats was the origin of trick-or-treating, and the following year kids all over town happily go door-to-door for goodies. Homer, on the other hand, decides to egg a house -- which Lisa points out is his own. So he accuses ''her'' of being a witch and a mob promptly runs her out of town.
24
25	!!This episode contains examples of:
26	* AbusiveParents: This applies to Homer perfectly in both the closing scenes of "Fly vs. Fly" and "Easy-Bake Coven". In the former he tries to kill Bart with an axe, caring more about the 35¢ transporter than his own son, and in the latter he accuses Lisa of being a witch and sends a whole mob to chase after her simply because [[DisproportionateRetribution she points out that he is egging]] ''[[DisproportionateRetribution their own house]]''.
27	* AccidentalMisnaming: When Marge tells her sisters about being exposed as a witch, one of them comments that this means [[Series/{{Bewitched}} she finally left "Durwood"]], and Marge corrects them about Homer's name. But, as expected, they don't care.
28	* ActuallyAGoodIdea: The Witch Sisters comment that Maude's idea of them eating their children is a great idea that they shouldn't pass up on.
29	-->'''Witch!Patty:''' Geez. We were just gonna swipe their shoes.\
30	'''Witch!Selma:''' But a good idea is a good idea.
31	* AdaptationDistillation: "Fly vs. Fly" combines elements of both film adaptations of the original short story. As in 1958, Bart and the insect (as well as Snowball II and Santa's Little Helper) have body parts proportionally swapped, [=BartFly=] turns the famous "Help me!" denouement in a spider's web into a prank upon the arachnid, and Homer seems about to destroy the machine at the end -- but instead intends to use his fire axe on Bart. From the 1986 film comes the MysteriousMist / OminousFog that accompanies the use of the teleporter (which also physically resembles the design of that version more than the old-time phone booths of '58) and Bart theorizing that going through the pods with a fly would merge them into one creature, albeit in a much more positive manner than what happened to poor Seth Brundle. [=FlyBart=] ambushing [=BartFly=] and Lisa is a variation on the climax of that film, in which the grotesquely mutated Brundle, having kidnapped his lover, ambushed her ex from above when he came to rescue her. The hybrids of the pets might have been inspired by a notorious deleted reel from the '86 film involving a baboon-cat hybrid creature and its gruesome demise, which was cut after the first test screening for being so upsetting that the audience couldn't care about the protagonist after that.
32	* AlbinosAreFreaks: In "The Homega Man", Homer mistakes real-life albino musicians the Winter Brothers for flesh-eating mutants and runs them over.
33	-->'''Homer:''' Die, you chalk-faced goons!
34	* AndTheRest: When Homer believes he's the last man alive, he bemoans losing his family, saying "Little Bart... little Lisa... little Marge... And all the rest!" Tellingly, this not only includes Maggie, but also the pets ''and the TV''.
35	* AndThisIsFor: Marge turns Lou and Eddie into a fairy princess and a snowman respectively for pushing her off a cliff.
36	* AngryFistShake: In "Fly vs. Fly", [=BartFly=] tricks a spider into thinking that he's caught in its web. When he's about to be eaten, he slaps the arachnid and flies away. The spider watches him in anger, shaking four legs in synchronized movement, probably swearing revenge.
37	* ApocalypseAnarchy: Homer really enjoys being the last man alive. He goes dancing to the church, completely naked.
38	* ApocalypseHow: Type 0 in "The Homega Man". The nuclear warhead [[SlapOnTheWristNuke destroys only Springfield]].
39	* ArbitrarySkepticism: Kodos and Kang are nearly hit by the nuclear missile. They report back on seeing a cylindrical type object nearly hitting them (a UFO, in other words.) Their control team mock them, saying, "''Sure'' Kang. I'm writing it all down."
40	* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: When revealed to be a witch in "Easy-Bake Coven", Marge smugly declares she withered the village's livestock, soured their sheeps' milk, and made their shirts itchy.
41	* ArtisticLicenseNuclearPhysics: While the neutron bomb France sent at Springfield did nothing more than strip the residents down to skeletons or turn them into mutants, an actual neutron bomb would have turned Springfield into a crater and its explosion would leave behind nuclear fallout and fires.
42	* AssholeVictim: One of the suspected witches burned in "Easy-Bake Coven" is Agnes Skinner. Lampshaded when Skinner cheerfully bids her goodbye after she declares she'll see him in Hell.
43	* BaitAndSwitch:
44	** At the end of "Fly vs. Fly", after Bart and the fly are turned back to normal via the transporter, Homer decides to pick up a fire axe and does "something [he] should have done a long time ago"...
45	-->'''Homer:''' (looks Bart dead in the eye) '''''I'll teach you to mess with my machine!'''''
46	-->(cue the segment ending with Homer chasing Bart with the fire axe back and forth across the living room)
47	** In "Easy Bake Coven" it seems like the Flanders saved the town from the witches by unwittingly starting "Trick or Treat". Marge then later notes it was only a shame they got full on so many kids ''before'' they went to the Flanders' house.
48	* BittersweetEnding: The first segment has Springfield still ravaged from the nuclear bomb and many of it's civilians (mutated or not) dead. But the Simpsons are still together as a family and head out to steal some Ferraris.
49	* BlatantLies:
50	** After accidentally punching Lisa in the face through the teleporter, Homer claims Marge did it.
51	** "Fly vs. Fly" ends with Homer promising to not hurt Bart... while chasing him with a fire axe.
52	* BodyHorror:
53	** The effects of Bart crossing into the matter transporter with the fly's head on his body.
54	** The mutants in "The Homega Man" appear to be rotting. Wiggum at one point says that it "really brings a tear to your eyesocket" just before his eyeball falls out.
55	* BurnTheWitch: What accused witches are sentenced to in old Springfield until they are deemed fit to return to society again.
56	* CheeseEatingSurrenderMonkeys: Subverted when Mayor Quimby insults the French and they declare war on Springfield, and destroy it with a Neutron Bomb. Along with everything else.
57	-->'''Quimby''': ''seconds before the bomb hits'' I bet I'll get blamed for this
58	* CouchGag: The Simpsons sit on the couch and are restrained with metal shackles, and metal caps come down and electrocute the family.
59	* CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot: Lisa reveals their house had so many layers of lead paint it made "the perfect bomb shelter," meaning Homer didn't need to shop for a bomb shelter at all.
60	* CounterProductiveWarning: Here, Marge and her sisters are depicted as witches, and the Flanders are worried about their kids as they mention how witches take children away to eat them. The Bouvier witches were watching from their magic cauldron, and mention they were just going to swipe their shoes, but prefer to go with the children-eating idea.
61	* DeathByIrony: During the pre-title sequence, the Fox Censor touts the then-new TV rating system, rating the show TV-G, only to get stabbed to death by the rating box. For each stab, the rating box increases to TV-PG, then to TV-14, then TV-MA, TV-21, and finally, TV-666.
62	* DeliberateValuesDissonance: PlayedForLaughs in "Easy Bake Coven", with the 17th-century Spring-Fieldians engaging in anti-Witchcraft hysteria, Maude fearing that witches make people do wanton carnal acts, and Ned telling her not to fear death because at 35, they have already passed their life expectancy. Marge and her sisters also think nothing of terrifying the townsfolk and eating children once she's revealed as a witch.
63	* DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment: "And it wasn't long before this yearly custom became an annual tradition."
64	* DidntThinkThisThrough: It's clear in "Easy-Bake Coven" that Wiggum and the other law enforcement officers had no plan for one of the women accused of witchcraft actually having magical powers. Wiggum tells Marge that if she actually is a witch, she should report back to him to be tortured and killed, not considering that Marge could easily fly away.
65	* DirtyCoward: When Homer accidentally punches Lisa in the face through the transporter in "Fly vs. Fly", he immediately blames Marge for it.
66	* DisproportionateRetribution:
67	** Homer tries to kill Bart with a fire axe simply because he used the matter transporter.
68	** At the end of "Easy-Bake Coven", when Lisa points out Homer is egging ''their'' house (prompting the crowd behind him to mock him), Homer sics the crowd on Lisa by calling her a witch.
69	** Mayor Quimby makes fun of the French, so France launches a neutron bomb to kill him and everyone else in Springfield.
70	* DontTouchItYouIdiot: In "Fly vs Fly", Homer warns Bart not to play with the matter transporter -- which Bart then does anyway. Though to be fair to Bart, Homer wasn't exactly being careful with it himself; he manages to accidentally injure Lisa via the telepods ''while explaining to Bart what could go wrong''. ("Ow! Someone punched me in the face!" "It was your mother!")
71	* DramaticThunder: The final stretch of "Fly vs Fly" takes place while it's raining outside, and there's some of this just before [=BartFly=] manages to reveal himself to Lisa. (Later, when [=FlyBart=] is pursuing her, Marge shrugs off the action with "They're like this every rainy day.")
72	* DroolHello: Done by [=FlyBart=] in "Fly vs Fly" when it's about to attack Lisa.
73	* EatsBabies: Zigzagged in "Easy-Bake Coven". Played straight when, after eavesdropping on Maude Flanders fears about what witches do, Marge, Patty and Selma decide that eating kids sounds like a great way to get back at the villagers. Subverted when, upon reaching the Flanders' house, the witches are quite happy to accept a bribe of candy, cakes and other treats instead of eating Rod and Todd. Then double-subverted when, after finishing collecting their bribes from the Wiggums, Marge complains that she wishes they hadn't filled up on children before snagging all these goodies, belching before leading her sisters off into the sky.
74	* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: While Marge is an unapologetic WickedWitch in "Easy-Bake Coven," she still loved her family, wasn't entirely happy about having to leave them, and takes clear offense at how her sisters badmouth Homer.
75	* FailedASpotCheck: After leaving the fallout shelter, Homer doesn't notice that Herman has been reduced to a lifeless skeleton.
76	* FantasticRacism: Marge would rather gun down the mutated survivors than coexist with them.
77	* ForcedTransformation: As part of her revenge, Witch!Marge turns Wiggum into a giant gopher, Eddie into a snowman and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking Lou into a fairy princess]].
78	* FrenchJerk: France launches a neutron bomb on Springfield all because they didn't like a joke that the mayor issued at their expense.
79	* GarageSale: Homer buys a matter transporter from Professor Frink, which leads to Bart reenacting ''The Fly''.
80	* GenreBlindness: Bart clearly never watched either version of ''The Fly''. When he manages to catch the insect, he envisions the teleporter will fuse them together into some kind of superhero, and even says "I'd be stupid ''not'' to do this!"
81	* GoshDangItToHeck: The FOX censor, [[CensorshipBureau appropriately enough]], utters these each time he is stabbed.
82	* HalfHumanHybrid:
83	** In the second story Bart uses the Transporter to merge with a Fly.
84	** In the third story which takes place during the witch trials. Marge is revealed to be a witch. Which makes Bart, Lisa & Maggie half witches.
85	* HaHaHaNo: The Fox Censor's reaction to one of the lines in the script he is editing in the intro.
86	* HalfwayPlotSwitch: The opening stretch of "Easy-Bake Coven" is a spoof of ''The Crucible'', but once Marge is revealed to be an actual witch, the parody is by necessity dropped.
87	* AHeadAtEachEnd: When Bart puts Snowball II and Santa's Little Helper through the teleporter, they come out as two different pets; the first with both heads ("Twice the pet and none of the mess!") and [[InvertedTrope the second with both butts]] ("Eww! You can be Lisa's.").
88	* HeelFaceDoorSlam: Just when the mutated denizens of Springfield decide they don't need to eliminate the "mistakes of the past" after all and can live just fine with norms, Marge and the kids pull out their shotguns and blast them.
89	* HollywoodHistory: The Witches of Salem were hanged or pressed with rocks, not burned as is popularly believed.
90	* HolyBurnsEvil: Subverted when Marge and her sisters show up at the Flanders home and Ned brandishes a cross to ward them off, but one sister says "Oh, please!" and shoves him aside. Not quite a CrossMeltingAura because the item doesn't get destroyed. It just plain doesn't work.
91	* HybridizationPlot: When Bart finds out that the teleportation machine is capable of creating multiple hybrids between two different creatures, he tries to become a human/fly hybrid under the belief that it would turn him into a superhero. It doesn't work - he comes out as a normal-sized fly with his head on it, whilst the fly comes out as Bart's body with a fly head on.
92	* HypocriticalHumor: When instructing the family not to touch his transporter, Homer calls it a "highly 'sophistimamacated' doohickey" and then proceeds to accidentally punch Lisa in the face due to knocking his hand through the transporter to the toilet. Furthermore, he was using the transporter to ''use the bathroom from downstairs.''
93	* IdiotBall: Marge in "Fly vs Fly" by not getting up to stop Homer from killing Bart (she's just annoyed with Homer's behavior); and Homer in "Easy-Bake Coven" for egging his own house.
94	* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: The Fox Censor dies this way during the pre-title sequence, stabbed to death by a sword by the rating box.
95	* InsaneTrollLogic: It wouldn’t be a story about 17th Century witch trials without this.
96	-->'''Krabappel:''' Then how come your sheets are much whiter than mine?
97	* IronicDeath: Herman ended up perishing from a nuclear war even though his job was to help prepare other people for it -- and he died standing no more than a few feet from a bomb shelter.
98	* {{Irony}}: As it happens, Homer didn't need to buy a fallout shelter in "The Homega Man"; the house has enough layers of lead paint to protect them.
99	* InsistentTerminology: In "The Homega Man", the mutated Moe tells Homer that they prefer being called "freaks" or "monsters" rather than "mutants".
100	* ItCanThink: Flyhead-Bart shows a disturbing degree of intelligence - eavesdropping on Fly-Bart and Lisa's conversation, before attempting to ''murder them both'' to prevent them using the teleporter.
101	* KarmaHoudini: In "Easy-Bake Coven," Marge cast all sorts of curses on the village, sparked a massive witch hunt that got many innocent (if unpleasant) women killed, then proceeded to eat several children with her sisters before moving onto candy. At no point do any of them answer for their crimes.
102	* LaboriousLaziness: In "Fly vs. Fly", Homer takes the effort to move one of the matter transporters around the house and the other end to certain rooms so he can do simple tasks like opening the fridge and using the bathroom without having to actually be there.
103	* LaserGuidedKarma: In "Easy Bake Coven", Marge is pushed off a cliff as a test if she is a witch (with the obvious outcome that she will die either way). Only she turns out to be an actual witch, to which everyone is shocked and openly never suspected (they just wanted a witch trial that day). She terrorises them as payback, unleashing nasty transformation curses on Wiggum and the other officials in particular.
104	* MeaningfulName: The FOX Network censor is named Fox Censor.
105	* MundaneUtility: Homer uses the teleporter, which could be used to travel infinite distances, to do such things as bypass the stairs in his house and grab a beer (or cat ear medicine at one point -- accidentally) from the fridge without getting up from the couch.
106	* MysteriousMist: Turns up several times with the transporter's usage in "Fly vs. Fly" in a spoof of the 1986 film. After Bart goes through, Marge even asks "What's with all this mist?" as she and the others enter the kitchen. Though when Homer demonstrates it as an easy way to bypass the stairs in his house, some of the smoke is actually the result of the seat of his pants being ablaze.
107	* NeverMyFault: Quimby bitterly notes that he'll probably get the blame for France firing a neutron bomb at Springfield; while the bomb is very much DisproportionateRetribution, it was Quimby's culturally insensitive joke and refusal to apologize that provoked it.
108	* NewEnglandPuritan: "Easy-Bake Coven" is a parody of ''The Crucible'' and its portrayal of witch hunt in the name of God. It's set in 17th-century New-England-like Springfield. Edna Krabappel is a fallen woman and wears a scarlet A on her chest as a reference to ''The Scarlet Letter''. 75 women have been processed and burned at the stake as witches. Marge pleads everyone to come to their senses and says that this witch hunt is turning into a circus. Naturally, she's accused of witchcraft. It turns out she really is a Wicked Witch, and flies off on her broomstick to her family's and the townsfolk's horror.
109	* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Maude talking to her husband about how witches steal and eat children in "Easy-Bake Coven" gives Marge and her sisters the idea to do just that, as originally they were just going to [[PokeThePoodle steal peoples' shoes]].
110	* NiceJobFixingItVillain: [=FlyBart=] trying to eat [=BartFly=] just makes it easier for Lisa to knock both of them through the teleporter, reversing the merger.
111	* NinjaProp: The TV rating stabbing the FOX censor.
112	* NoodleIncident:
113	** What exactly was the "frog's legs" joke Mayor Quimby made that pissed off the French enough to make them nuke Springfield? We don't know, but Kent Brockman thought it was hilarious.
114	** Similarly, what did the hippo on the news do that was so heroic that it became an official police deputy? And why is Homer so bitter about that particular story?
115	* NotMeThisTime: In "Easy-Bake Coven", Marge the witch insists that Lenny's turnip crop was destroyed by gophers and she had nothing to do with it, after having boasted about the things that she did do. Subverted, as when they claim they burned all the gophers, she turns Chief Wiggum into one, implying the gophers were her doing.
116	* NumberOfTheBeast: During the pre-title sequence, each time the Fox Censor gets stabbed by the rating box, the rating increases, and when he finally dies, it reaches 666. Afterwards, the EpisodeTitleCard is shown ''[[CouldntFindAPen with his blood]]''. The last two ratings (TV-21 and TV-666) aren't real, of course. The ''actual'' rating for this episode was TV-PG.
117	* OffingTheOffspring: Homer tries to get his kids killed twice, both times coming out as DisproportionateRetribution. He first tries to kill Bart with a fire axe in "Fly vs. Fly" for using his transporter, and then in "Easy-Bake Coven" he accuses Lisa of being a witch, sending an angry mob after her, simply because she pointed out that he was throwing eggs at his own house (which caused other villagers to laugh at his idiocy).
118	* OhCrap: The mutants' faces look positively ''scared'', right before Marge and the kids shoot them.
119	* PartingWordsRegret: After moaning that ComicBook/{{Aquaman}} can't marry a woman without gills, Comic Book Guy looks up to see the nuclear missile about to hit ''him''.
120	-->'''Comic Book Guy:''' ''(sighs)'' I wasted my life.
121	* ThePowerOfLove: The sight of Homer reuniting with and hugging his family is enough to make the freaks drop their murderous vendetta against him and propose building a utopian society for both them and norms. Then while their guard is down, Marge and the kids whip out some shotguns and blow them away.
122	* PresentDayPast: "Easy Bake Coven", as is typical of ''Simpsons'' anthology episodes set in the past. Lou is still Wiggum's deputy despite being black, and there is no reference to slavery nor a counterpart of the slave Tituba, who had a prominent role in ''The Crucible'' and the historical Salem witch trials. And the next year the townsfolk celebrate Halloween just like in the modern day, with Homer dressing up as [[Series/IDreamOfJeannie Jeannie]].
123	* ShoutOut:
124	** Comic Book Guy is reading (and complaining about) an ComicBook/{{Aquaman}} comic just before the missile hits.
125	** Homer watches a Creator/ChrisFarley[=/=]Creator/DavidSpade movie at the theater, most likely ''Film/TommyBoy'', as Homer gleefully says "Oh, Spade... why did you put ''Farley'' in charge of the bees?".
126	** [=WitchSelma=] refers to [=WitchMarge=]'s husband as "Durwood" ''a la'' ''Series/{{Bewitched}}'''s Endora referring to Darrin by that name (among others).
127	** [=WitchMarge=] and her witch sisters click their back heels on the brooms to make them fly a la [[WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes Witch Hazel]].
128	** Wearing a black hood and with paling skin, Mutant Burns says to Homer [[Film/ReturnOfTheJedi "And now, you must die."]]
129	** In "Easy-Bake Coven", Mrs. Krabapple is wearing a [[Literature/TheScarletLetter Scarlet A on her chest]].
130	** Mike Scully's scary nickname in the end credits is [[Series/TheXFiles Mike "Agent" Scully]].
131	** The title of "Fly vs. Fly" is a parody of Magazine/{{MAD}} Magazine's "Spy vs. Spy", written in the ''Spy'' logo font.
132	** In Bart's fantasy of becoming a super-creature by merging with the fly, there's a double shout-out: "[[ComicBook/{{Superman}} Look! Up in the sky! It's]] Film/{{Superfly}}!"
133	** Homer dresses as Jeannie from ''Series/IDreamOfJeannie'' in "Easy Bake Coven".
134	** Witch!Selma comments that the brew needs more [[{{Theatre/Macbeth}} eye of newt]] while her sister complains that she always says that.
135	* SweetTooth:
136	** Unsurprisingly, [=FlyBart=] loves maple syrup and eats sugar straight from the sack while the family watches TV... while Homer tries to sneak some for himself!
137	** The Flanders convince the Witches to not eat children by giving them gingerbread men. The Wiggums later give them caramel apples and caramel cod.
138	* TakeThat: In "The Homega Man", the "Withstandinator" bomb shelter includes a [[ComicStrip/TheFarSide Gary Larson calendar]]. Homer flips through each page, saying "I don't get it." Since this is ''Homer'' not getting it though, this could be a downplayed example.
139	* TalkingTheMonsterToDeath: Subverted in "The Homega Man". Marge gives a heartwarming speech to a mutated mob that calms them down long enough for Marge and kids to get into position and blast them away with shotguns.
140	* TemptingFate: Lisa tells [=BartFly=] that "that hideous freak doesn't scare me". Seconds later, [=FlyBart=] reveals himself on the ceiling, causing Lisa to scream in fright.
141	* ThisIsGonnaSuck: When France launches a nuke at Springfield, the camera follows the path of the bomb... directly into Comic Book Guy's stomach. After walking down the street complaining about a comic book, he looks toward the missile and simply says "Oh, I've wasted my life." Mayor Quimby gets his own: "I bet I'll get blamed for this."
142	* ThreeShorts: As per usual.
143	* TookALevelInJerkass: Homer does this twice in two segments by trying to kill Bart in "Fly vs. Fly" and telling everyone his own daughter Lisa's a witch in "Easy Bake Coven".
144	* TrialByOrdeal: Used to determine whether or not Marge is a witch in "Easy-Bake Coven".
145	-->'''Wiggum:''' OK, here's how the process works. You sit on the broom and we shove you off the cliff.\
146	'''Marge:''' What?!\
147	'''Wiggum:''' Well, hear me out; if you're innocent, you will fall to an honorable Christian death. If you are, however, the bride of Satan, you will surely fly your broom to safety. At that point you will report back here for torture and beheading.
148	* TheUnfavourite: Lisa in "Easy-Bake Coven"; Homer even goes so far as to [[OffingTheOffspring send an angry mob after her by accusing her of witchcraft]] just because [[DisproportionateRetribution she pointed out that he was egging their own house, causing the other villagers to laugh at him]].
149	* UnusuallyUninterestingSight: In "Fly vs. Fly", Marge says "He may be a horrible freak, but he's still my son. I'm sure we'll grow to accept him in time." As the next scene shows, it only took an hour for them to accept [=FlyBart=].
150	* VinylShatters: Exaggerated in "Fly vs. Fly" when [=FlyBart=] breaks the ''record player'' while chasing [=BartFly=] out of the house.
151	* WallCrawl: [=FlyBart=] can do this and uses it to get the drop on Bart and Lisa from above at one point.
152	* TheWeirdSisters: In "Easy-Bake Coven", Marge and her two elder twin sisters Patty and Selma are witches who intend to eat the children of the Springfieldians.
153	* WholePlotReference: "Fly vs Fly" is one to ''Film/TheFly1958'' and [[Film/TheFly1986 its 1986 counterpart]]. When Bart steps into the teleporter with the fly, he's going for the latter but gets the former.
154	* WitchHunt: "Easy-Bake Coven" is a parody of one, and naturally the paranoia and petty abuse of witch trials is upped to eleven due to it being 17th century [[WorldOfJerkass Springfield]], with Marge tried as one simply because they didn't have anyone to put on trial that day, and an expected MortonsFork test where she will die either way. The big twist on the genre is that Marge turns out to be a ''real'' witch and starts a revenge rampage on the town with her sisters.
155	* WitchWithACapitalB: Bart's pretty excited upon finding out his mother was a witch.
156	-->'''Bart''': Well I'll be a son of a witch!
157	* WickedWitch: Marge, Patty, and Selma in "Easy-Bake Coven".
158	* WouldHurtAChild: In the second and third shorts; Homer attempts to kill Bart for messing with his transporter in "Fly vs. Fly", and then sends an angry mob after Lisa by accusing her of witchcraft to cover up for his own stupidity in "Easy-Bake Coven".
159	* WrongGenreSavvy: Bart trying to fuse with a fly, thinking that it will give him superpowers. Instead, they ended up swapping heads.
160	* YourMom: Yeardley Smith's (voice of Lisa) name in the end credits, which in Halloween specials are usually [[CreditsGag gag names]].

Context Recap / TheSimpsonsS9E4TreehouseOfHorrorVIII