Rank order the anthology episodes

[on:]

From best to worst:

1 - Reincarnation - Cool animation concepts and some good philosophical questions
2 - Anthology Of Interest #1 - For the Leela murdering section
3 - Anthology Of Interest #2 - The wizard of Oz section was cool, the video game section was alright
4 - Naturama - Nowhere near as bad as people make out. Kind of entertaining and an interesting change
5 - Saturday Morning Fun Pit - Really liked the scooby doo section, but not so much the others
6 - The Prince And The Product - A bit silly and pointless, but also funny in places and just a bit of fun really. Wind up section my preference of the 3
7 - The Futurama Holiday Spectacular - Still the worst ever episode of the whole series IMO

[Reply #1 on:]

1. Anthology of Interest II
Three fantastic segments, funny, interesting, brilliant

2. Reincarnation
Wonderful animation, great thematic links between segments, a great unused series finale (even though Overclockwise gets all the credit)

3. Anthology of Interest I
One of the first episodes of Futurama to really take things to the next level in a way that continued through seasons 3 and 4. Fun, interesting, original, funny.

4. Saturday Morning Fun Pit
I'll never understand why people hate this episode. I guess it's entirely because of Purpleberry Pond. The Scooby Doo segment is great fun. The GI Zapp one is some of the funniest stuff Futurama has ever done.

5. Naturama
A weird episode and largely feels pointless, but it's also one of the season 7 highlights in that it's actually a competent episode.

6. The Prince and the Product
A baffling mess.

7. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular
Solid contender for worst episode of the entire series.

[Reply #2 on:]

1. Reincarnation
This is not only the best anthology episode, but one of the top five things to happen in the post-Fox era of the show. Visually appealing, conceptually interesting, and funny as hell.

2. Anthology of Interest I
I recently rewatched this one, and while I don't love it—the first and third segments are pretty weak, in my opinion—that second segment is one of my all-time favorite things the show's ever done. (I also find myself saying "I need a big cereal" with greater frequency than you'd think, so parts of this episode are just firmly embedded in my brain/personality, I guess.)

3. Anthology of Interest II
Also recently rewatched this episode, and while it's really just OK, I do think each segment has an interesting idea behind it—the execution's just a bit lacking. Good gags throughout, though, so I can't really complain.

4. The Prince and the Product
I'm not proud of it, but this one made me laugh quite heartily, which is more than can be said for pretty much everything else on this list from here on out.

5. Naturama
Much like TPatP, this one has a truly baffling premise that does not align remotely with what Futurama is usually about. But it's an amusing enough send-up of nature documentaries, and the individual segments are decent, so I can't complain too much.

6. Saturday Morning Fun Pit
The only thing that sticks with me about this episode is the Nixon stuff, and that's not enough to make it worthwhile.

7. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular
This one is offensively bad, I think. Also, why make a non-canon holiday episode when there have already been plenty of canon holiday episodes? Most of these anthology episodes are needless, but this one is particularly so.

[Reply #3 on:]

Top tier; Reincarnation.
Not quite top tier. Just good; AOI and AOI 2.
Mid tier; Naturama
Garbage tier; SMFP, TPATP, TFHS

[Reply #4 on:]

Good:
1. Anthology of Interest I
2. Anthology of Interest II
3. Reincarnation
Not as good but at least one segment's-worth of enjoyability:
4. Saturday Morning Fun Pit
5. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular
Meh:
6. Naturama
Also meh but with an unrelated plot between the anthology segments:
7. The Prince and the Product

[Reply #5 on:]

Top tier; Reincarnation.
Not quite top tier. Just good; AOI and AOI 2.
Mid tier; Naturama
Garbage tier; SMFP, TPATP, TFHS

I basically agree with this, with the exception of TPATP, which I'd put at mid-tier

[Reply #6 on:]

I wrote a reply to this thread this morning and accidentally hit back instead of post.  Time to re-type everything!

1) Reincarnation
By far the best anthology, and it's not even close. It's hilarious, creative, a wonderful love-letter to the various animation styles and it retains the spirit of Futurama. It's not only one of the best episodes of the CC era, but one of the best episodes, period.
2) Anthology of Interest I
All three segments are great, but Leela's murderous rampage is my favourite. It feels like a coherent episode despite there being no central theme connecting them. Perhaps because they all end with major characters dying/the universe being destroyed.
3) Anthology of Interest II
A big step down. Each segment is decent but none of them stand out. One of the weakest Fox-era episodes
4) Naturama
Kind of charming, but the premise wears thin kind of quickly. Frankly, I might have loved it if they picked just one story and stuck it in a different anthology episode. Not too bad overall, at least. It gets more hate than it deserves.
5) The Prince and the Product
A bafflingly stupid concept. It's surprisingly okay as far as the jokes go, and I appreciate what they tried to accomplish with the "main" story stitching it together, but the entire thing was just a poorly-executed mess.
6) The Futurama Holiday Spectacular
An unfunny trainwreck. Some parts of the Robanukah segment are passable but everything else is terrible. The songs suck. The overall theme is dumb. It's just a bad episode with very little worthwhile content.
7) Saturday Morning Fun Pit
The magnum opus of bad episodes. The scenes with Nixon were okay, but the bulk of episode failed to deliver anything substantial. The parodies weren't creative and it was clearly just an excuse to dress the Futurama characters up in silly costumes, and they didn't retain any of their Futurama personalities in the process.

[Reply #7 on:]

Some parts of the Robanukah segment are passable

Oh yeah, that's the only redeeming part of the episode. "I don't wrestle dry, Bender—I went to Vassar" is an indisputably great line.

[Reply #8 on:]

Bringing this over from the Futurama news thread, where quite a lot of good posts regarding the anthology episodes had been made recently:

I feel like the Futurama universe is strange and creative enough to not need wacko spin-off anthologies.

I suppose that the biggest reasons to want to have anthologies, or at least the kinds that Futurama has given us, are 1) the opportunity for non-canon stories, although it should be noted that there's no reason an anthology episode from its conception automatically has to be non-canon (or that a non-anthology episode does have to be canon, for that matter), and 2) the opportunity for new art design (much more so in the post-Fox anthologies).

And yeah, regarding the first point it does surprise me that for a show with a premise that has a literal universe of possibilities, they were already going for some non-canon short stories as early as season two, even though they obviously were not already running out of other ideas...but then again, thinking just of the AoI episodes in relation to the rest of the original run, it was kind of neat to have a show where all kinds of wild things happen and you occasionally can see some even wilder non-canonical things too.

This is a really subtle thing, but I think the framing device of the What-If Machine helps make the AoI episodes more palatable right from the start, because it provides an in-show justification for the non-canon segments that follow; we're told we're seeing simulations based on answers to the characters' what-if questions about themselves or their world. Compare that to "Saturday Morning Fun Pit," where okay, we're about to watch cartoons along with Nixon...but then why are our Planet Express characters in these cartoons? Or in "Naturama," okay, we're watching a nature documentary about Earth...but then why do the animals resemble our characters? And "The Futurama Holiday Spectacular" barely even bothers explaining itself at all. There's a greater expectation placed on the audience to just go with it, which probably doesn't do those episodes any favors. "Reincarnation" would also seem to have the same "just go with it" attitude of its CC-era anthology ilk, but I think the God Entity's introduction does give an acceptable explanation for what follows that's more in line with the AoI episodes; we're seeing what it might be like if Futurama's universe was [reborn] a certain way. I'm not at all saying that episode's success hinges simply on its having that cold open (I doubt it would it have felt like something was off if it wasn't there), but I do think it helps a tiny bit.

As for the second point, there are of course plenty of chances for creative art design in all the strange worlds and characters that could be encountered even in a regular episode. But, if the idea is that anthologies are needed in order to get a bunch of fun episode-specific redesigns on the main characters, I submit that "The Farnsworth Parabox" proved such a thing is also quite possible in a regular episode.

I really wish they'd stop bothering with these anthology episodes. I guess the actual Futurama staff must be the ones who like them

I remember them mentioning on the CC-era episode commentaries that these anthologies take quite a lot of hard work for the directors and animators due to all of the redesigns needed (as well as for the writers due to having to fit multiple stories in so short a runtime)...so yes, they must consider the finished product to be worth the extra effort.

[Reply #9 on:]

"Reincarnation" would also seem to have the same "just go with it" attitude of its CC-era anthology ilk, but I think the God Entity's introduction does give an acceptable explanation for what follows that's more in line with the AoI episodes; we're seeing what it might be like if Futurama's universe was [reborn] a certain way. I'm not at all saying that episode's success hinges simply on its having that cold open (I doubt it would it have felt like something was off if it wasn't there), but I do think it helps a tiny bit.

You’re kind of implying as much already, but I think the other thing that makes “Reincarnation” go down easier is its placement in the series’ run. It was produced as the final episode of season six, presumably before the crew knew definitively that they’d be picked up for season seven, and there’s something sort of poignant about ending on a note not of finality but of possibility: the show and characters as we know them may be kaput, but they can persist (and exist) in other forms.

This is not to oversell the philosophical nature of the episode, but “Reincarnation” is all-around smarter and thematically meatier than any of the other anthology episodes—in addition to being hands-down the funniest. Now that I think of it, I would have been more satisfied with “Reincarnation” as a series finale (for the CC run, at least) than “Meanwhile,” but I acknowledge that’s likely an unpopular opinion.

[Reply #10 on:]

Bringing this over from the Futurama news thread, where quite a lot of good posts regarding the anthology episodes had been made recently:
And yeah, regarding the first point it does surprise me that for a show with a premise that has a literal universe of possibilities, they were already going for some non-canon short stories as early as season two, even though they obviously were not already running out of other ideas...but then again, thinking just of the AoI episodes in relation to the rest of the original run, it was kind of neat to have a show where all kinds of wild things happen and you occasionally can see some even wilder non-canonical things too.

I suspect it was a very conscious decision to experiment with giving the show its own "Treehouse of Horror" that they could return to as an annual event of sorts. It's easy to forget just how much of an event the annual Simpsons Halloween special used to be when the show was still a cultural magnum opus. It's still one of the only episodes average people pay any attention to whatsoever each year. Amazing, the most recent one was a legitimately good episode too -- one of the first in nearly a decade. Given that the first one was called "Anthology of Interest I", they clearly always intended to make more of them. I'm guessing the original plan was always for it to be an annual thing, but for whatever reason, they didn't feel like making a third one when season 4 rolled around -- perhaps because of conversations like what you just said.
It's something I'd love to know, though. If anyone ever gets to ask David X. Cohen or Matt Groening a question, can this be your second one please (after "Is 'Carolyn Premish' a pseudonym and, if so, for whom?").

This is a really subtle thing, but I think the framing device of the What-If Machine helps make the AoI episodes more palatable right from the start, because it provides an in-show justification for the non-canon segments that follow; we're told we're seeing simulations based on answers to the characters' what-if questions about themselves or their world.

You're absolutely correct but I also really don't think we can overstate how important it is that those wraparound sequences are fantastic. The very concept of a What If Machine is a great, sci-fi idea that could probably sustain a real, canon plot on its own if they ever wanted to try to do so. They have the hilarious concept of the finglonger. Then on top of that, the dialogue is zippy and really funny stuff. Almost every line is hilarious and lands. The same isn't true of any of the wraparounds we've had since.

"Reincarnation" would also seem to have the same "just go with it" attitude of its CC-era anthology ilk, but I think the God Entity's introduction does give an acceptable explanation for what follows that's more in line with the AoI episodes; we're seeing what it might be like if Futurama's universe was [reborn] a certain way.

It definitely helps, but also the drastically different visuals do a lot of the lifting here, too. It's immediately apparent that you're not watching normal Futurama when they're in black and white, Fleischer-style animation. I honestly wonder if "Saturday Morning Fut Pit" might have benefitted from not opening on Richard Nixon watching cartoons and just went straight into "Bendy Boo" (though, obviously, we need it to set up the hilarious third segment).

As for the second point, there are of course plenty of chances for creative art design in all the strange worlds and characters that could be encountered even in a regular episode. But, if the idea is that anthologies are needed in order to get a bunch of fun episode-specific redesigns on the main characters, I submit that "The Farnsworth Parabox" proved such a thing is also quite possible in a regular episode.

I think it comes down to what the intent is. "Reincarnation" could have easily been a canon plot where some sci-fi shenanigans alter the very fabric of space and time to turn it into multiple different animation styles. However, in doing so, you're left with a very different plot and it wouldn't be about the animation styles in the same way. They'd be set-dressing and an opportunity for some of the jokes. The way "Reincarnation" handles it, the animation styles are really the primary focus of the episode. And it's one of the biggest reasons "The Prince and the Product" failed: because the segments are so barely about the toys that the characters actually are. Hell, the one that reimagines them as cars immediately runs out of car stuff to do and inexplicably becomes a parody of The Ring, a 20-year-old horror movie. Hell, even "Naturama" specifically told stories related to the animals in question. It found a way to make being a salmon relevant to Fry and Leela's love story, for instance. "Prince and the Product" on the other hand, would just have had the characters be salmon and then have them go shopping at a supermarket and have the story be about a new giant supermarket that's taking business away from small independent stores... but they're all salmon.

[Reply #11 on:]

This is not to oversell the philosophical nature of the episode, but “Reincarnation” is all-around smarter and thematically meatier than any of the other anthology episodes—in addition to being hands-down the funniest. Now that I think of it, I would have been more satisfied with “Reincarnation” as a series finale (for the CC run, at least) than “Meanwhile,” but I acknowledge that’s likely an unpopular opinion.

If it had one final tag of the God Entity saying something about finality (or lack thereof) after the anime segment, then I'd probably agree with you. I love the concept, but the thought of the series ending forever (for 10 years) on an anime shot of characters flying into the sky doesn't really do it for me.

[Reply #12 on:]

You’re kind of implying as much already, but I think the other thing that makes “Reincarnation” go down easier is its placement in the series’ run. It was produced as the final episode of season six, presumably before the crew knew definitively that they’d be picked up for season seven, and there’s something sort of poignant about ending on a note not of finality but of possibility: the show and characters as we know them may be kaput, but they can persist (and exist) in other forms.

Yes, the thought that the opening's "nothing really dies" line was very likely intended to be referring to Futurama itself would have given the episode a further bittersweet touch had the show indeed not been renewed again. And speaking of which:

This is not to oversell the philosophical nature of the episode, but “Reincarnation” is all-around smarter and thematically meatier than any of the other anthology episodes—in addition to being hands-down the funniest. Now that I think of it, I would have been more satisfied with “Reincarnation” as a series finale (for the CC run, at least) than “Meanwhile,” but I acknowledge that’s likely an unpopular opinion.

If it had one final tag of the God Entity saying something about finality (or lack thereof) after the anime segment, then I'd probably agree with you. I love the concept, but the thought of the series ending forever (for 10 years) on an anime shot of characters flying into the sky doesn't really do it for me.

Yeah, having the "next week at the same time" bit truly be the series' final note would have been quite the letdown, even after such a high that the segment provided.

However, I remember that on the commentary, DXC said that the anime segment was moved to be the third one after its positive convention reception but the video game segment was originally going to be the last one instead, that he liked the idea that the show would thus end with having something potentially profound to say about the pursuit of science, and that instead of "Level Complete" it would've originally said "Series Complete" (and I think there was also the observation that having the series end with the video game segment would've coincidentally provided a nice bookend because the first shot of the pilot was also of a video game). While I think that would have been a preferable arrangement if "Reincarnation" was indeed the series finale, that too probably would have felt oddly lacking in closure somehow, beyond just being poignant.

As it is, though, I'm very happy with the segments of "Reincarnation" being ordered as they are.

[Reply #13 on:]

You're right! I completely forgot about the order switch. That would have worked beautifully for me for the reasons you give.

I kind of wish they'd retained the order for that episode, honestly. The video game one feels like a nice ending and it could still have said "season complete" or something to that effect.