That new episode of The Simpsons was great. ✨

The show ending on "Santeria" and Lisa screaming "nooo!" was something I almost fought, because my son loves Sublime. But I cleared it with him, and he gave me the go-ahead.

The original last shot started on the refugees, then pulled back to show the town. It was over spooky music. We realized we needed some sort of narration to wrap things up, so reversed the shot. Amazing what you can think of last minute to fix your egregious screw-ups.

I BELIEVE (but don’t know for sure) that this is the first time in the show’s history that “Yoinked!” has ever been uttered. Because, you see, Homer is not doing the yoinking, but is instead the one to whom the yoinking is being done. (Any super fans know if this is true?)

I don’t know how Jess feels, but I’m on Homer’s side on this one. Give me TV crap every time. (“Forged in Fire” fans, let me hear you.)

“Mozart in the Jungle” was originally “Peaky Blinders.” The staff felt that Peaky was too good a show to seem like torture. I argued that “Peaky Blinders” was a funnier-sounding name, which is OBJECTIVELY TRUE. I now reluctantly admit, to the entire world, that everyone else was right.

Has Trump announced his pick for Burnmaster General yet?

This is the original “final” animation for the attic. We realized VERY late that the wood didn’t match the rest of the concrete, Brutalist house. Fortunately, super-producer Richard Chung spared my life when I told him we’d need to ($$$$$$$$$) redo it.

In the future, TV critic is a hereditary position. Alan Sepinwall’s bloodline will never perish.

Third episode is (obviously) “Fahrenheit 451.” It took a long time of many brains thinking to come up with the right twist. In the end, it was (I have no idea, any writer know?) who cracked it. Definitely not me!

“T-shirts worn as real shirts” was a problem. If this is Chalmers’ fear, then no one can be wearing a shirt without a collar in the entire segment. Which meant many, many redesigns. It was either that or come up with a new joke, which was obviously out of the question (?).

At one point, I’m pretty sure the “Chalmers meets Robot Chalmers” scene was 57 pages long. I’m still angry we had to make cuts.

“Frinkcorporated” is a subtle pun on “Incorporated.” Ten points if you caught this, pals!

...So, it seemed natural that Mr. Bradbury would envision a future where this trend had only continued. Anyway, that’s why the insanely high pants. It’s WORLD BUILDING.

I love the small tweaks to “current” fashion in science fiction movies. Like in “Aliens,” all the execs wear normal business suits, but the collars are turned up for some reason. In the actual 50’s, men wore their pants high...

Middle segment is based on “Marionettes, Inc.”. Written by Ray in 1949, it envisions a future where super-advanced robots are only distinguishable from humans if you put your ear to their chest and listen for the sound of ticking gears.

This is Pamela Hayden’s last performance as Milhouse. So happy for her for walking out on top, Barry Sanders-style, but dammit we will miss her. She’s the best. No one could turn a tackle-for-loss into a 35-yard gain like Pamela.

First segment is based on “The Screaming Woman.” It began as a 1948 radio play (yawn), then it was a short story (yuck!), and now it has reached the highest literary form (cartoon).

For this 1950’s-set segment, Jess had the idea to ask our amazing composer Kara Talve to give us a “Andy Griffith Show”-type whistling theme that could turn creepy later. That was a cool idea. I just wish we had more room for it. Jess needs to learn to write fewer good jokes.

BRIAN/ [TO SELF] Don’t, dont, don’t ask him to do Gollum. Be a professional for once in your stupid, inept life. ANDY SERKIS/ Did you say something? BRIAN/ Sounding great, sir!

BRIAN/ That was great, Mr. Serkis. BRIAN/ Wonderful choice, Mr. Serkis. Brave and insightful...

This line was cut, after the Ringmaster asks the Illustrated Man to turn over his freak badge and tattoo gun: RINGMASTER/ Blubbo the Eternal Baby will conduct your exit interview. Here are some of the notes I gave my hero Andy Serkis to help him find his characters:...

We gave the design team multiple notes on exactly how ripped Pint-Sized Hercules’ tiny little abs should be. Worth every penny.

Yes, Brain-Zo the Human Measuring Tape’s enormous cranium gives him superhuman intelligence. But he wants to be remembered for the tattoos along his body that allow him to pretty accurately measure distances up to five feet, eleven inches.

Advanced writing tip: when your showrunner says “I want to do a show based on [insert idea here],” immediately volunteer to work on it. Showrunners almost always green light ideas they thought of themselves. Not many know this!

All of it infuriatingly creative and lovely and perfect. But then some members of our staff recounted stories of meeting him. And it turns out he was a generous, warm person. Obviously, nobody’s perfect.

Matt Selman had the idea to do an episode based on the stories of Ray Bradbury. Jess and I read a bunch to find the ones we wanted to adapt. Which is possible because Ray Bradbury wrote A LOT.

And the end result was better than any of us thought possible. Amazing, beautiful work. When I learned she was doing one of my episodes for the upcoming season, my reaction was: “Jackpot!”

The episode was directed by Debbie Mahan. Really hard show to pull off — tons of new designs (not being able to use the normal designs for characters and locations is a lot of extra work for the animators), and entirely different animation looks for each segment.

No exaggeration, Jessica Conrad wrote one of the best drafts I’ve ever read in my 20-something years on the show. A peak inside the rewrite room: BRIAN/ Let’s see if we can beat this joke. [WRITERS PITCH FOR 20 MINUTES] BRIAN/ I guess what we already had is good.

I haven’t live-tweeted (or whatever you call it here, let me know, I’m old and new to this!) since I left Twitter years ago. This is a few notes on “Simpsons Wicked This Way Comes,” written by Jessica Conrad, directed by Debbie Mahan, with the whole thing being run by Matt Selman.

Day one here! I’m going to do a quick-and-dirty live tweet of tonight’s episode of “Simpsons Wicked This Way Comes,” because it’s VERY GOOD. West Coast airing only. Enjoy, my zero followers!