Regardless of Marge’s ominous warning, The Simpsons’ first “Treehouse of Horror” episode wasn’t actually all that scary or graphic. But it surely did trick quite a lot of children into having fun with the work of literary grasp Edgar Allan Poe.
Because the years progressed, the annual Halloween episodes did change into extra violent. Just some years later, “Treehouse of Horror V” discovered Groundskeeper Willie taking an axe to the backbone not as soon as, not twice, however thrice.
In 1997, the eighth “Treehouse of Horror” episode turned the primary to be broadcast within the age of the TV rankings system, which was launched in January of that 12 months. So The Simpsons opted to parody this improvement by starting the present with a go to from the great previous “Fox Censor,” whose job is to guard us “from actuality.” However after reducing the episode’s crack-pipe references, and informing audiences of the brand new parental steering coverage, the censor was swiftly murdered by a sword-wielding “TV-G” score field, which climbed its method as much as “TV-666” with every successive stab.
Even whereas dying, the censor refused to say something extra profane than “Jiminy Christmas.” His blood then dripped down the entrance of his desk, forming the phrases of the episode’s title.
It’s a reasonably grisly scene for The Simpsons, or any present, to be trustworthy. Maybe not surprisingly, the actual life Fox censors had some notes.
Throughout the episode’s DVD commentary, Simpsons creator Matt Groening admitted that the phase “really frightened me.” Then showrunner Mike Scully famous that there was a little bit of a “battle” to get the censors to approve the scene — not as a result of a censor was being killed, however because of the method by which they had been killed. The censors “thought it was a bit of bloody, or violent,” Scully recalled. “There was quite a lot of discuss in regards to the measurement of the sword. I feel there (had been) quite a lot of arguments about if it was a small knife. What’s funnier (versus) what’s extra horrifying. And (additionally) in regards to the sounds and the quantity of blood.”
Director Mark Kirkland defined that the writers’ first alternative of weapon was a lot smaller. “I bear in mind, initially, it was a dagger. However the censors did protest that it was too ugly.” So he was instructed to “make it a sword as an alternative of a dagger. They mentioned a ‘broadsword’ can be acceptable.”
Yeah, apparently brutal murders are positive for primetime tv so long as the weapon is way bigger than a knife. As for the bloody photographs and the unnerving sound results, it positive looks like the Simpsons creatives gained that struggle, as a result of the scene is definitely brutal.
It simply may be probably the most disturbing scene within the present’s historical past, not together with the time Elon Musk got here to city.
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