General Futurama Discussion - A New Thread

[Reply #280 on:]

Sneak peek two and three!

[Reply #281 on:]

What a strange episode idea. "They should be ducks"

[Reply #282 on:]

Click here to make on-topic (or off-topic if you feel like it) nominations for the 2023 PEELies. Nominations will be open until early October.

If you're enjoying the new Futurama review threads, there are PEELies specifically relating to those!

[Reply #283 on:]

Apparently someone has already done the work (though some more need to be added, I think).

Yeah, it's missing a lot of deliveries due to lack of information. For instance, in "The Problem with Popplers", the crew is just on their way back from "the planet of the moochers". We have no idea if they made a delivery there. Then there's "The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz" where hauling a tanker is considered a mission when transporting something from one place to another is the definition of a delivery.

The Planet Express crew has been on many missions throughout the series despite primarily being a delivery company. I believe Planet Express is less about funding the professor's research and is more of a cover for the professor to have a crew of expendables to act as errand boys. "Time Keeps on Slippin'" had the crew harvest highly volatile chronitons. In "Proposition Infinity" the professor had the entire crew help harvest a storm so he could win a contest. Then there's plenty of occasions when the Planet Express ship is used as a battleship or a research vessel. I doubt the series will ever expand upon it because Futurama has lost its depth over the years. If we count missions as deliveries then that would really bump up the numbers.

[Reply #284 on:]

I believe Planet Express is less about funding the professor's research and is more of a cover for the professor to have a crew of expendables to act as errand boys.

Oh yeah, I think it must be acknowledged that Planet Express being a delivery company is essentially a contrivance that gives us the (excellent) punchline in the pilot, where Fry travels a thousand years in the future and successfully escapes being career-chipped as a delivery boy only to become…a delivery boy.

“A bunch of misfits work for an intergalactic delivery company” is a great premise for a sci-fi/workplace comedy, sure, but it’s ultimately more an after-thought in the grand scheme of the series than anything else. In most episodes the deliveries are just a plot device to get us to some fun new planet and/or introduce us to some fun new aspect of the future.

All of which is to say it doesn’t especially bother me when numerous episodes go by with nary a delivery in sight. I don’t dislike the delivery stuff, but I rarely notice or miss it when it’s gone.

[Reply #285 on:]

Nearly every single episode shows the Planet Express ship and Planet Express headquarters (technically all episodes have the ship if we count the intro). Usually I think that counts enough as being a work comedy. I wonder how often the crew is at Planet Express off-the-clock.

I want to make a point about how Planet Express is really more of a research facility and the crew is there to allow for big experiments, but I'm not sure what point I want to make about it. Is Planet Express a criminal enterprise? A little bit given how they moved Zuban cigars and firearms.

Planet Express is pretty damn important on Earth. How often have they been called upon to do something for the government? I'd like to imagine the entire Planet Express crew is important to the well-being of the universe almost as much as Fry is.

[Reply #286 on:]

Apparently someone has already done the work (though some more need to be added, I think).

Yeah, it's missing a lot of deliveries due to lack of information. For instance, in "The Problem with Popplers", the crew is just on their way back from "the planet of the moochers". We have no idea if they made a delivery there. Then there's "The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz" where hauling a tanker is considered a mission when transporting something from one place to another is the definition of a delivery.

The Planet Express crew has been on many missions throughout the series despite primarily being a delivery company. I believe Planet Express is less about funding the professor's research and is more of a cover for the professor to have a crew of expendables to act as errand boys.

There are entries with 'unknown' in that list, I suspect the real reason others aren't there is because people haven't been bothered to add them yet.

I don't think there's much space between 'fund research' and 'act as errand boys'; either way, from that point of view, they're there to further the Professor's interstests in whatever scrap he gets himself in. Which is fine, it's (proven to be) productive ground for new stories.

I believe Planet Express is less about funding the professor's research and is more of a cover for the professor to have a crew of expendables to act as errand boys.

In most episodes the deliveries are just a plot device to get us to some fun new planet and/or introduce us to some fun new aspect of the future.

This gets to the heart of why that plot device is so good, in my mind. The grounded-in-a-realistic-workplace-environment thing is important, but the specific workplace of intergalactic delivery is useful for just that: get us to some fun new planet. There's a Gene Roddenberry quote, probably apocryphal, where he says they won't run out of stories for Star Trek because there are a lot of planets out there. In that sense, the delivery-company premise gives Futurama exactly the same foundation as Star Trek (another oft-cancelled, oft-renewed show): a group people with a job that takes them to new planets every week, more or less.

I want to make a point about how Planet Express is really more of a research facility and the crew is there to allow for big experiments, but I'm not sure what point I want to make about it.

That's basically it, though, isn't it? An excuse to give a somewhat mad, somewhat amoral professor enough resources to do grandiose things. So, from a storytelling point of view, the characters bounce off all the interesting new planets they visit, as well as the interesting new devices the professor invents.

[Reply #287 on:]

I mentioned it on another thread, but does anyone else find it weird that season 8 basically hasn't attempted to do the classic Futurama gut-punch montage over a needle-drop ending even once? It's something I consider a staple of the show. I can't see "All the Way Down" being one of these, either.

I'm specifically talking about the endings of "Leela's Homeworld", "Jurassic Bark", "Lethal Inspection", "Cold Warriors" and "Game of Tones". "Time Keeps On Slippin'" is like a prototype to this ending, too, so I guess you can lump it in with them.

[Reply #288 on:]

I took the liberty of updating the episode review threads overview.  I added a few older ones, but let me know if I missed any.  Frankly shocked there is not a more substantial one for "The Problem with Popplers".

[Reply #289 on:]

Maybe PEEL doesn't really have a problem with Popplers, since very few of them are registering right now?

[Reply #290 on:]

I mentioned it on another thread, but does anyone else find it weird that season 8 basically hasn't attempted to do the classic Futurama gut-punch montage over a needle-drop ending even once? It's something I consider a staple of the show. I can't see "All the Way Down" being one of these, either.

I'm specifically talking about the endings of "Leela's Homeworld", "Jurassic Bark", "Lethal Inspection", "Cold Warriors" and "Game of Tones". "Time Keeps On Slippin'" is like a prototype to this ending, too, so I guess you can lump it in with them.

Honestly, I feel that is because they didn´t trust emotional punch of any of those episodes.

[Reply #291 on:]

I took the liberty of updating the episode review threads overview.  I added a few older ones, but let me know if I missed any.  Frankly shocked there is not a more substantial one for "The Problem with Popplers".

Fry and the Slurm Factory
The Honking
Fear of a Bot Planet
My Three Suns
A Clone of My Own
Where the Buggalo Roam

I'm surprised I couldn't find one for Into the Wilds Green Yonder.

[Reply #292 on:]

Here it is! (I had a vague memory of posting in the ITWGY review thread around the time the DVD came out, so I dug through my own post history to find it. That was a…harrowing experience, to say the least. Do not recommend. ) I believe this thread began as a place to aggregate professional reviews of the movie prior to its release, but then it ultimately became the PEEL review thread as well.

[Reply #293 on:]

Ah, I knew it! So it's just "Xmas Story" and "The Lesser of Two Evils" unaccounted for. I'm sure there's a real thread for "The Problem with Popplers" as well.

It could be false memories, who knows.

[Reply #294 on:]

I mentioned it on another thread, but does anyone else find it weird that season 8 basically hasn't attempted to do the classic Futurama gut-punch montage over a needle-drop ending even once? It's something I consider a staple of the show. I can't see "All the Way Down" being one of these, either.

I'm specifically talking about the endings of "Leela's Homeworld", "Jurassic Bark", "Lethal Inspection", "Cold Warriors" and "Game of Tones". "Time Keeps On Slippin'" is like a prototype to this ending, too, so I guess you can lump it in with them.

Honestly, I feel that is because they didn´t trust emotional punch of any of those episodes.

Well yeah but I'm pretty sure these episodes tend to be start at the end and write backwards situations. I'm not saying it's weird that there's no emotional ending tacked onto "How the West Was 1010001". I'm saying it's weird that they didn't decide to put an episode into production that features an emotional ending sequence. They're the ones who chose to make the ten episodes that they did. They could just have easily have settled on ten completely different episodes (with the slight exception of "The Impossible Stream" being vaguely tied to "Meanwhile" and "Children of a Lesser Bog" being time-stamped to 2023).

[Reply #295 on:]

I think "All the Way Down" was going for that basic vibe, albeit not in montage form. To be honest, I've had my fill of montages—comedic, dramatic, and everything else in between—after the CC run relied on them so heavily, so I'm fine not having them in the Hulu episodes. For what it's worth, I thought the musical cue at the end of the season finale was great, and in combination with the semi-glitchy slo-mo animation made for a pretty emotionally affecting moment.

[Reply #296 on:]

I'm with you. It started to feel like a bit of a cheap ploy by the end of the CC run so I'm happy for them to find other ways to illicit emotion. I don't think they really managed it in season 8, though. Hopefully they will in season 9.

[Reply #297 on:]

I took the liberty of updating the episode review threads overview.  I added a few older ones, but let me know if I missed any. 

Thoughts on SABF16 - Simpsorama

[Reply #298 on:]

^And, on a similar note: Thoughts on NP903 - Radiorama.

[Reply #299 on:]

Extremely random albeit slightly related question;

I was thinking:

So the last episode had its musical outro bleed right the way through (almost) the end of the credits. This is not only something that I saw the Simpsons do a lot back in the day (i.e. when I used to watch it) but in general is personally one of my favourite tropes in all TV.

But, if I remember correctly, they have very rarely (if in fact ever?) did that with Futurama. So, yeah, can someone help me; is this last episode really the only time they've now bled music through the credits?

[Reply #300 on:]

Doesn't "The Luck of the Fryrish" do it?

I also suspect "Leela's Homeworld". Anything that ends with a montage would make sense.

[Reply #301 on:]

I like when TV shows expose me to obscure music I would never had otherwise come across. The latest one Satellite-Tea is a banger and a real hidden gem. It only had 200 views on youtube apparently before the episode aired, great find.

[Reply #302 on:]

Extremely random albeit slightly related question;

I was thinking:

So the last episode had its musical outro bleed right the way through (almost) the end of the credits. This is not only something that I saw the Simpsons do a lot back in the day (i.e. when I used to watch it) but in general is personally one of my favourite tropes in all TV.

But, if I remember correctly, they have very rarely (if in fact ever?) did that with Futurama. So, yeah, can someone help me; is this last episode really the only time they've now bled music through the credits?

The only example that comes readily to mind—and it may not be quite what you're talking about, since it's briefly interrupted by Fry and Leela's closing exchange—is Bender singing through the end credits of "The Series Has Landed." And of course there are a handful of episodes that have a different song play over the end credits (like "We'll Meet Again" in "A Big Piece of Garbage" or the Beastie Boys stuff in "Hell is Other Robots"...maybe this was especially prevalent in season one?), but it's not a song that begins in the closing scene and carries through. To UrL's point, most/all of the Big Emotional Episodes have a song playing through the cut-to-black, but then the usual end credits theme starts up.

[Reply #303 on:]

Doesn't "The Luck of the Fryrish" do it?

I also suspect "Leela's Homeworld". Anything that ends with a montage would make sense.

"Jurassic Bark" as well, I think.

[Reply #304 on:]

I think you've got it Gorky; thanks everyone who replied though. I forgot all about those Season 1 outros; silly though that I still remember that Mars University had a different intro and the DVD commentary suggested that they were going to experiment a lot more with alternate intros but it all just got abandoned very quickly; maybe it was just something about Season 1?

As for the other episodes, like Jurassic Bark and especially Luck if the Fryrish (imo) I always felt that the music should have bled through the credits, but Gorky's right, they cut off so the usual credits can play.

But yeah, I'll also second Extrablood; Futurama writers have obscenely good taste in obscure music!

[Reply #305 on:]

Kinda. According to David X. Cohen, they often just typed a phrase relevant to the episode into iTunes and went with whatever song popped up.

[Reply #306 on:]

Ha! Never knew that - but hey, what works, works!

[Reply #307 on:]

Uh, this will be the last announcement regarding PEELies 2023 nominations: get them made. The nomination threads will be closing very soon. Within the next day or so.

Nominations for the on-topic awards have always been sparser than the off-topic ones, but you can help to tip the scales and make what's probably the last hurrah for PEEL burn a little bit brighter as it burns out.

Please, if you've enjoyed PEEL this year, or for the last ten or twenty years, then nominate so that we've got some good poll options. The alternative is that I make things up to fill the poll slots at random, and nobody wants six poll options for "Best Review Thread" that are the six worst episodes of all time. Do they?

[Reply #308 on:]

Hey, Svip, I'm not sure that you linked to the review thread for "Bender's Game." One of the last posts in the thread you linked to is a post by Tedward saying that the actual review thread is this one:

Bender's Game reviews (Spoilers ahoy!)

[Reply #309 on:]

I just had a thought.

"Parasites Regained" leaves Nibbler with the worm parasites in his system. In theory, they should be making him (even) more hyper-intelligent, not to mention muscular and generally more physically capable.

What if "Cuteness Overlord" picks up on this and Nibbler becomes a villain, enslaving the universe with his newly gained strength and intelligence?

[Reply #310 on:]

I just had a thought.

"Parasites Regained" leaves Nibbler with the worm parasites in his system. In theory, they should be making him (even) more hyper-intelligent, not to mention muscular and generally more physically capable.

What if "Cuteness Overlord" picks up on this and Nibbler becomes a villain, enslaving the universe with his newly gained strength and intelligence?

Maybe he becomes/makes himself ruler of the Nibblonian council?

[Reply #311 on:]

I just had a thought.

"Parasites Regained" leaves Nibbler with the worm parasites in his system. In theory, they should be making him (even) more hyper-intelligent, not to mention muscular and generally more physically capable.

What if "Cuteness Overlord" picks up on this and Nibbler becomes a villain, enslaving the universe with his newly gained strength and intelligence?

Good call but I don't know if they really want to inject so much continuity now...

[Reply #312 on:]

I think my favourite episodes of Futurama are the ones where the plots could have been ripped right out of a pulp science fiction story, but the Futurama writing crew have put a comedic spin on them. Rosewell That Endswell, Amazon Women in the Mood and Godfellas are all good examples of that. When I think of the episodes that I thought were particularly weak this season-- the Impossible Stream, Children of a Lesser Bog, and Rage Against the Vaccine-- they don't really do that. What I'm saying here is the weakest episodes of the CC run and the Hulu run have been these episodes that are just a mish mash of random plot elements or commentaries on current events that don't really use the setting of the show to its fullest, and I feel like the writers do better when they focus on more on actual sci-fi elements. I think an episode where a giant corporation on the moon expands to encompass the entire universe says a lot more a lot better, than an episode where they are literally just narrating the Covid-9 pandemic and they solve it with voodoo.

[Reply #313 on:]

I think my favourite episodes of Futurama are the ones where the plots could have been ripped right out of a pulp science fiction story, but the Futurama writing crew have put a comedic spin on them. Rosewell That Endswell, Amazon Women in the Mood and Godfellas are all good examples of that. When I think of the episodes that I thought were particularly weak this season-- the Impossible Stream, Children of a Lesser Bog, and Rage Against the Vaccine-- they don't really do that. What I'm saying here is the weakest episodes of the CC run and the Hulu run have been these episodes that are just a mish mash of random plot elements or commentaries on current events that don't really use the setting of the show to its fullest, and I feel like the writers do better when they focus on more on actual sci-fi elements. I think an episode where a giant corporation on the moon expands to encompass the entire universe says a lot more a lot better, than an episode where they are literally just narrating the Covid-9 pandemic and they solve it with voodoo.

Attack of the Clothes sounds like it might be one of those.

[Reply #314 on:]

I think that the topical stuff is just something they seem to feel the need to get out of their systems when they return from being off the air for a while and, thankfully, I get the impression they've done that. None of the season 9 episode titles strike me as particularly topical (beyond Squid Game arguably being a flavour of the month show -- but I think the premise is what they're interested in there rather than keeping up with what's popular).

[Reply #315 on:]

Title Quids Game, if I'm getting it right, has something to do with money, not with the show.

[Reply #316 on:]

Claudia Catz did say that the topical stuff will be continued next year. They do refuse to parody sci-fi in favor of topical themes purposely. A big mistake IMO.

[Reply #317 on:]

Title Quids Game, if I'm getting it right, has something to do with money, not with the show.

Squid Game has classism and the failures of capitalism as major themes in the story, so it could be both, although those don't seem like the kind of topics a show like Futurama could cover.

Might just be punning the name of a popular show. "Game of Tones" had literally nothing to do with "Game of Thrones", for instance.

[Reply #318 on:]

Possibly, but the idea of Mom holding a deadly contest that the characters have to compete in seems too obvious and good to turn down. It's certainly a lot more appealing that what I assume will be "Planet Express becomes a coffee business".

[Reply #319 on:]

I just had a thought.

"Parasites Regained" leaves Nibbler with the worm parasites in his system. In theory, they should be making him (even) more hyper-intelligent, not to mention muscular and generally more physically capable.

What if "Cuteness Overlord" picks up on this and Nibbler becomes a villain, enslaving the universe with his newly gained strength and intelligence?

Alternative: Cuteness Overlord is rogue nibbleonian who will be defeated by Leela in "Otherwise", suggesting there will be three-part of episodes (one of them being anthology).

Possibly, but the idea of Mom holding a deadly contest that the characters have to compete in seems too obvious and good to turn down. It's certainly a lot more appealing that what I assume will be "Planet Express becomes a coffee business".

Execution is everything. Might be a major gagfest.