The ratings are in! An impressive total of 12.48 million viewers tuned in last night to watch the nineteenth Simpsons Halloween Special. That’s great news, which shows there’s still a large audience out there who’ll sit down and sample new episodes of The Simpsons.
Treehouse of Horror episodes always tend to be high rating, and this year’s was clearly no exception — More people watched this episode than ANY Season 19 and 17 episode. THOHXIX scored viewers higher than any episode since Season 18’s ‘The Wife Aquatic’ in January 2007 (13.9 million). To find the next highest ratings after that we had to go to Season 16’s ‘Homer & Ned’s Hail Mary Pass’ in 2005, which had 23.1 million viewers. But before that it was Season 15’s ‘I, D’oh-bot’ (16.3 million), and that season’s very own Treehouse ep (16.2 million). Season 14’s Treehouse Of Horror XIII had 16.7 million.
To summarise, Treehouse Of Horror XIX is the third highest rating THOH episode we have on record and the most watched THOH in 5 years. It it the most watched episode since January 07 and the third highest rating of any episode in four years.
The show also trounced Family Guy (9.97 million), the recently cancelled King Of The Hill (8.60 million), and American Dad (7.20 million) for the night. FOX was fourth placed overall and first placed among adults 18 – 49. The Simpsons and King Of The Hill were third in the 8:00 timeslot behind Sunday Night Football and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Huzzah for the Grand Pumpkin! really good ratings, shows there’s life in the show yet, and to top it off it was genuinely a really good episode.
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:37 pm
Wow! Great ratings and the episode was really good too
Not the best threehouse I’ve ever seen but still a great one! 
“It’s the Grand pumpkin, Milhouse” was my favourite of the storys. 8/10
November 3rd, 2008 at 6:29 pm
Wow. Awesome ratings for a great episode. Definately not among the best THOH, but it was still a really good one.
And WOW at King of the Hill’s ratings.
Perhaps FOX are now reconsidering their decision to renew American Dad. 
Wishful thinking, I know lol. 
November 3rd, 2008 at 11:20 pm
Congrats to The Simpsons! It was a good Treehouse of Horror, cannot top the one with the time traveling toaster. Obviously it’s partially due to the football, but I’m hoping for some increased interest in the Simpsons this season.
November 4th, 2008 at 12:32 am
All the celebrity blogs linking to this post below have misquoted my post as the highest ratings in the last 5 years. Highest rating TREEHOUSE OF HORROR episode in 5 years
November 4th, 2008 at 1:20 am
!@#$%^ whoa, nice work Simpsons. I am happy! thought grand pumpkin was pretty good but the other 2 sucked.
November 4th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
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November 4th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
Yea, that’s all I can say! (I’m speechless – and can’t be bothered to think what to write)
November 4th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Homer voting was real funny and the grand pumpkin. TOH is always good. GREAT.
November 5th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Yea. Whoa, what a lot of trackbacks!
November 9th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
I just watched this episode now (on Sky1). It just seemed too short and I’d say Untitled Robot Parody was the worst.
March 27th, 2009 at 12:43 am
One of the best Treehouse of Horror Episodes. My most favorite parts is the transmorfers part. Keep going Matt Groening!
May 6th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Impressive ratings but it was a bit boring when it got to the segment It’s the grand pumpkin milhouse but the rest of it was totally awesome and very amusing.