Anthology episodes

Over the long run of the Simpsons there have been many episodes which feature 3 mini-stories that are held togeather by a backbone story plot. The reason for 3 mini-stories is due to the commercial break structure of the show.

Halloween Specials

The Halloween episodes are the most well known but there have been many others. After season five the backbone story was removed from the halloween episodes but the 3 mini-stories still remained.

Non-Traditional episodes

Several episodes do not fall into the normal pattern of 3 mini-stories.

Vignettes

In 22 Short Films About Springfield Bart and Milhouse wonder about the various stories that happen around Springfield. The episode inspired Simpsons creator Matt Groening to come up with a concept of a possible spin-off series called Tales from Springfield, about the recurring characters of Springfield.

In Springfield Up flash backs of several charactors are used featuring them at different points of their lives.

Over-lapping POV

Uses a story telling techneque which has been used by several shows including Malcolm in the Middle and Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles. In this format the same story line is told from several differnt prespectives.

In Trilogy of Error the same story is told from Homer's POV then Lisa's, then finally Bart's.

The Seemingly Never-Ending Story is another POV story, with several different threads telling the same story over and over again from different prespectives.