Terror virtuosos Alfred Hitchcock, Edgar Allan Poe and Stephen King all get their turn in frame in this near-three minute symphony of horror pastiche put together by Mexican dark fantasy lord Guillermo del Toro in celebration of The Simpsons’ 24th annual Halloween special, Treehouse of Horror.
The visionary Pacific Rim filmmaker, a longtime Simpsons fan who approached the task by mixing “the movies I have done” with “the creatures and monsters of film, which have influenced me enormously”, was initially asked to put together a standard length couch gag but asked instead to “do a really long riff on the title sequence, rather than just a couch gag.”
We’re glad he did. The end result is worthy of repeat viewings and pretty much reference porn for horror fans with Carl accidentally decapitating Lenny while entering Blade Runner mode, Maggie driving the car from The Car, and Mr Burns eating Smithers as the terrifying Pale Man from Del Toro’s own Pan’s Labyrinth.
Be right back, just gonna watch this 20 more times or so.
