It’s amazing that after 25 years of couch gags, The Simpsons have yet to run out of hilariously adorable and creative steam. But somehow Matt Groening and co. manage to do it year after year, and 2014’s is no different — thanks to a heck of a lot of holiday business and the ubiquitous and seemingly obligatory (at least these days) reference to the 2013 Disney film, Frozen.
The clip, which will be featured before this year’s holiday episode, “I Won’t Be Home For Christmas,” (airing Sunday, December 7th on Fox) features a veritable smorgasbord of holiday happenings — from present-making to candy cane smoking, and even a sleigh race from hell, because Mr. Burns, obviously — before the whole gang transforms into the Frozen characters. Santa’s Little Helper becomes Kristoff (Bart)’s best buddy Sven, Lisa takes on the queen of ice and ire, Elsa, while Marge becomes the happily ever after-restoring sister like a regular ol’ Princess Anna. Maggie, is an adorable stand-in for Grand Pabbie, but is nothing compared to Homer — the most Olaf Olaf to ever Olaf in the history of Olafs (save the original Olaf).
We’ve got one fairly substantial question for this clip, though: where’s Snowball VII?
The synopsis for the episode proves it won’t be all happy-happy good times, though: “After Moe convinces Homer to stay out drinking on Christmas Eve, Marge tells Homer not to come home. This leads to Homer’s sad trek through lonely Springfield, where he learns that the only place where one should truly get drunk on Christmas is home.”
What’s your favorite holiday-themed couch gag the series has ever done? Leave ’em in the comments.
I kind of like that, in the pan over the assorted Springfieldians, God was bringing Satan a gift instead of angrily shaking His fist at him. It was a rather nice touch I thought. That and the ghost of Krusty’s father being with him for the holidays was also rather sweet.
The ghost of Joan Rivers appears in the Chinese Restaurant. A bitter-sweet cameo.