Thoughts on [3ACV17] Pharaoh to remember

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Post your reviews and thoughts on it here once it actually aired    For people who havent seen it that evening: You'll be SPOILED in this thread, so leave if you dont like that.

Please keep it chit chat free.

[#1 :]

I'm excited for another new episode!  I'm gonna vid cap tonight's episode, and encode an SVCD.  I'm tired of trying to download episodes and I hate video tape.  (Fast forwarding for 10 minutes isn't my idea of a good time)  With a 1.4 Gig Athlon, encoding doesn't take long at all   

For a preview:

TV Guide:

"A planet with an ancient-Egyptian influence makes slave labor of Leela, Fry and Bender, who turns on his pals when he gains some power."

Yahoo:

"A Pharaoh to Remember"
Pharoah Hamenthotep enslaves the crew and forces them to assist in constructing a pyramid.

For a post view:

Mixed on this episode.  Some funny jokes, but not funny enough.  I don't like it when Bender gets so out of control mean that if everyone died he wouldn't care.  I like Bender more when he's stealing stuff, breaking things, etc.  When he was yelling at everyone at the funeral it got old real fast. 

We get the point, Bender is a jerk - you don't have to make an entire episode based around that fact.  Just use is as part of the humor, not as part of the plot.

That said - I still enjoyed the episode.  I enjoy every episode.  Even a bad episode of Futurama is 100 times better than a good episode of, say, every other show on earth.

[#2 :]

At least in this episode Zoidberg was able to sing more than three secs after Hermes, this is actually heaven!
Also some good Fry and Bender stuff (lives large and kicks butt), and a again talking Scruffy as well as the still slave-like working Australian and especially Benders "Walk like an egyptian"-moves made this episode fun!

[#3 :]

I liked it.  Not the best I've seen, but very enjoyable! Zoidbergs singing was indeed a 'wonderful' experience, and I hope we'll witness even more of his vocal magnificence in the upcoming season 4 episodes! 

Also: Rock on, Eddie Rosas!
(A few of you alien language fetishists may get that after a while  )

[#4 :]

Initial response:

I don't think I've ever wanted to beat Bender with a baseball bat as much as I did tonight.  Definitely a lower-half episode for me.  I enjoyed the first five minutes, until Bender went out trying to be remembered, and I did appreciate seeing the Australian guy again.  Man, that guy has no luck at all.

C-

[#5 :]

I didn't like the first act but act 2 and 3 were pretty funny. B-

[#6 :]

Well, I waited until after it was done airing, so here goes:

I liked it overall, but gave it a 3/5 on the rating thingamajig to the right. The scenery and animation was lush, but the story was a bit lacking. There are Bender-centric episodes where he can be quite good, but others like "I Second That Emotion" are kind of lame. Unfortunately, this one came out more like ISTE. Leela looked pretty good in the slave outfit, so that got an extra star.   
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"It's a stone cold shame."

[#7 :]

First section was funny at the funeral, the rest wasn't.  Bender being a jerk is funny, but it was taken to the extreme.  My least favorite episode this season.  I'm thinking a D; below average episode (like most Benderiffic episodes, in my opinion).

I would like to see more of Fry; we haven't seen a Fry episode since Roswell, and Fry has more interesting/funny plots than Bender normally has.

[#8 :]

Damn, I am in the minority...I thought this episode was fucking hysterical. I missed half of the jokes, because I was so busy laughing at the other half.

"Don't Be A Slave To Credit", haha.

Also the Professor catching the funeral bouquet was one of the funniest things ever. It slowed down in the end, but who cares. This was a stand-out episode.

[#9 :]

I really enjoyed this one.  Bender being a total asshole is just really enjoyable to me.  It's kind of a way to vent through him if you are feeling angry.  I hated Bender too, but that's what I really love about his character.  He can be taken to a point beyond "loving to hate him" and honestly hating him, and I think that's really cool, because it's something that isn't done on many other TV shows.  It's hard to explain, but I love the fact that he had no respect for human life in this episode.  On top of that, I thought it was really funny.  Overall, I'd give it an A-

I agree with the sentiment that we need more Fry-centric episodes this season.

[#10 :]

 

Originally posted by FishyJoe:
Also the Professor catching the funeral bouquet was one of the funniest things ever.

Forgot about that part.  That made me laugh.  But really now, about a quarter of the way through, about once they became slaves, I just wanted to beat Bender with an aluminum baseball bat.

[#11 :]

   

Originally posted by McGrady:
I would like to see more of Fry; we haven't seen a Fry episode since Roswell, and Fry has more interesting/funny plots than Bender normally has.

Ah, here's something I can agree with. The lack of Fry this season has been terrible. He had what, like three lines last week? And he didn't do much in this episode either. He had a fairly decent role in Love & Rocket, but he was in his "must try to impress Leela" romantic mode rather than his typical hilarious goof-off mode. In Roswell That Ends well he was awesome, we need more stuff like that.

P.S. Yeah, I'll also agree that Bender was an asshole, and not in a charming, likeable way like he was in Cyberhouse Rules. But still, I thought he was funny.

[#12 :]

The Bender funeral scene was excellent but it ran out of jokes after the crew got enslaved. The plot was way too obvious, this was just Fear of a Bot Planet with better CGI.

[#13 :]

Is it me or is Bender losing his edge? He's gone from patronizing a suicide booth to freaking out because he's not on the news. He's still utterly immoral... just oddly insecure, which is odd. Aside from that, this was quite a good episode (although I agree, some more Fry would be nice).

[#14 :]

I liked this one better than "Fear of a Bot Planet", don't get me wrong, that's a classic episode, but I think I liked the Eygptian element better.

[#15 :]

Good Episode (worth reviewing a couple of million times!!!)

Did I miss something, or didn't Ancient Egypt have a 1:1 Slave to Whip policy?  Damn bloated bureaucracy!!!   Some Locusts whould have been nice!

[#16 :]

Pretty good, first act was very funny.

[#17 :]

I thought it was an average episode.  It was pretty funny when the Osirians said that they learned space travel from the ancient Egyptians.

[#18 :]

I betcha that becomes a subtle hint of something important to come...

[#19 :]

While not as bad as some other Benderiffic eps (Bendless Love, Bendin' in the Wind, Raging Bender, etc), this was not an upper-echelon episode

[#20 :]

What is with people? This was the best episode in a long time. No relationships, no intense character revelations, just pure planet visiting, Bender yelling fun! A++~! I was very hyper before the Star Wars Episode 2 trailer so this was a great episode to vent some of that hyperness.

[#21 :]

I liked it.  It gets my seal of approval, whatever that's worth.

[#22 :]

Well, this episode certainly wasn't the greatest. It relied more on slapstick humor. I'm more into Fry then I will be to Bender. It seems any ep with Bender as the star isn't all that great, with the exception of the Honking.

[#23 :]

I liked it, but I don't like it when Bender's the star. He's just not really 3-dimensional enough. You can only have him be a jackass for so long, it's predictable.

[#24 :]

Tha episode was ok but not fantastic. I liked the jokes. 3/5

[#25 :]

Meh. Best gag was Benders' POV of the ship leaving the Egyptian planet, showing the Bender Pharoah statue from foot to head.
Surly Bender does not a gag make. It takes witty writing to pull that off. This ep didn't have much of that.

[#26 :]

hahahahahahahaha, pretty funny stuff. Kinda hard to see by the naked eye, but slowly, you can see that this slave driver's wearing a shirt, "What would Pharaoh Do?"

[#27 :]

 

Originally posted by Sarge:
Meh. Best gag was Benders' POV of the ship leaving the Egyptian planet, showing the Bender Pharoah statue from foot to head.
Surly Bender does not a gag make. It takes witty writing to pull that off. This ep didn't have much of that.

What was that from?  I know I've seen that sort of thing before.

[#28 :]

Meh! So what if it was similar plot wise... it still had very funny moments 

*The bit where Zoidberg Sings Oh! Danny boy...*
*Bender licks butt.. lol*
*the bit where they made fun of elton john and threw him in with the Pharaoh*
*Leela getting wiped on the ass alot..  *

[#29 :]

Pretty poor episode ...  the only good points were Zoidberg's "Danny Boy" (without the Bender response) and the irony of Bender crying about being lost to obscurity weeks after the show has been cancelled and syndication looking doubtful.

(And yes, it's been cancelled....   I don't care if there are a few episodes kicking around to play next "season", if production is over, it's cancelled)

[#30 :]

So it looks like I am also part of the minority here in that I really liked this episode. So the plot was really wasn't anything to shake a stick at but this episode had alot of other things going for it. Very fast moving with plenty of jokes thrown in. I must be missing something here because I never really got the sense that this whole episode was about proving what a jerk Bender is.

I don't mind an episode that has a weaker plot or a more loosely tied togehter plot. An occasional episode that is fun to watch that doesn't have very much significance in the Futurama universe is OK. I thought Where the Buggalo Roam had more character development oppurtunities but was not as fun to watch as A Pharoh to Remember.

I liked the funeral scene and everybodies eulogy to Bender and his increasing disatisfaction as it went on. Amy's was the best! Louder and with more feeling! Zoidberg's song and getting smacked up side the head by a martini glass was great also. As was Farnsworth catching the bouqet - I guess we know who's funeral we'll be attending next.

The stuff on the Egypt planet was great also. The concession stands as a false pretense for recruiting slaves was funny I thought as was Bender's work ethic in building the Pharoh's tomb was great. I laughed when the slave driver couldn't keep up. I thought it would have been great to hear Steve Martin's King Tut playing when Bender was announced as the new Pharoh and he came out walking like an Egyptian.
Fry's list of what is wrong with being a slave was very cool and I liked how it was sprinkled throughout the episode and not all in one big chunk.

And the coup' de grace of the whole episode - Leela dressed as a slave! The icing on the cake? Seeing her get whipped.  I'm terrible I know.
RM

[#31 :]

I found the episode less than stellar too. All the pre-slave stuff was good...

[#32 :]

 

Originally posted by Bendo:
So it looks like I am also part of the minority here in that I really liked this episode.

Sigh...you know it's bad when even the people here who work on the show hate it. I don't know what the deal is. I watched it again, just to make sure I wasn't high or something when I watched it and enjoyed it so much the first time, and what can I say? I still laughed. All of the jokes were still funny. Maybe we are just freaks.

[#33 :]

FishyJoe - were not freaks - were ahead of our time.   

One other thing that I didn't see until I saw this a second time was the statue of Bender had one foot over the previous Pharoh's (can't remember how to spell his name) tomb as if he is about to crush it. I thought that was funny as well - but what do I know? I'm a freak! 
Remember Me! Remember Me! Remember Me!
RM

[#34 :]

This episode was OK, but it reused a ton of old ideas- Bender ruling a planet, a giant version of Bender that shoots out fire...The best part was when the Professor caught the bouquet. "Looks like we'll attend your funeral next!" Maybe a GENEROUS C.

[#35 :]

Well, you if guys are being freaks than I wanna be one too!

[#36 :]

Oh yeah, and the sight gag of Bender's graffiti when demolished looked like a giant ass!!!

[#37 :]

I think Bender's funnier when he's sad.

[#38 :]

Benders Dying Wish...If Only Virtual...
 

[#39 :]

I did'nt like this episode, Bender is just to evil.