Review: "Put Your Head On My Shoulders" (Season 2, Episode 7)

"Love is in the air, everywhere you look around..." - John Paul Young.

Airdate: February 13th, 2000

Synopsis: Amy goes and buys a new car, having passed her university classes. (Yes, Amy still goes to school. Remember that?) While taking Fry out for a spin on Mars, the car runs out of gas. Waiting for a tow truck, the two become enamored with each other. Shortly after they arrive back at Earth, however, Fry begins to feel smothered by Amy. Good timing, though, since just as he's about to break up with her, an accident puts his head on her shoulder. Literally.

Meanwhile, Bender decides to pull a Jerkass Homer, and start his own business. This time, he scams people out of money in a matchmaking scheme.

Review (SPOILERS): Ah, Valentine's Day. The day of love, loss, regrets, yadda yadda yadda. If my updates to this blog were any slower, the timing would be appropriate for this episode!

Instead, this is the blog's... sort-of Christmas Special. So... Merry Christmas, I guess?

It's been well documented that the large amount of Shippers in the Futurama fandom "ship" Fry and Leela. Agree with it or not, it's pretty much the dominant pairing. I don't consider myself a militant shipper of any kinds, though - I mentioned this in a preview post for the Gravity Falls episode "Northwest Mansion Mystery", but as long as the ship is "launched" and developed well, I don't really care.

Thus, we get a quick look at Fry/Amy... Ary? Phamy? Amillip? Frong? Ah, let's just call it Framy for now.

At first glance, it seems like a simple enough relationship. The two are fun loving, quirky, all that jazz. So, why didn't it take off? Simple - you need conflict to sustain a story arc. And with Framy, the relationship itself didn't seem like it could lend itself to long-term conflict. It might have, but there wasn't a lot there.

Instead, we get a bit of short-term conflict involving how quickly Fry and Amy got into the relationship. In fact, the episode is more of a look at how Fry, for all his quirks, really isn't mature enough for a relationship. As soon as his relationship with Amy begins getting more serious, he feels like his freedom is being threatened. Fry's more callous and selfish behavior in this episode doesn't feel too out of place as much as it does a closer analysis of how immature he can be.

If anything, this episode serves more as a development of the "Freela" relationship, with Leela acting more like Fry's confidante than before. That, and she seemed to "rescue" Fry from Amy's date with the banker by luring him into a very technical conversation about banking regulations. That's definitely a sign of friendship there, and while the romantic angle is still very ambiguous, it is a step in the right direction.

Bender's scheme, as mentioned above, did remind me of the Mike Scully era of The Simpsons, where Homer would seem to get jobs on a weekly basis, acting obnoxious all the way. Granted, the results are funnier here than they are there. Far funnier. Not only is it in character for Bender to become a scammer, but his attempts to do so en masse are treated like it should - as cheesy and low-grade as humanly possible. That, and he got his karmic retribution.

In fact, I could argue that he did try and hook everybody up with sleaze-balls just to get everybody else together. The story did bring this theory up, and although both Leela and Bender rejected it in favor of the idea that Bender just wanted to con everybody out of money, this theory still might be plausible. A little bit.

Honestly, I thought the B-plot was funnier than the A-plot, mainly because of the quirky twists and turns within the former.

Overall, while not the best episode of Futurama, nor the most memorable, it's still a good valentines day episode.

Tidbits:

• This episode brings back Zapp Brannigan, as egocentric and pathetic as ever. The man who once tried to be a great lover is reduced to using a questionable dating service. Ironically, given his sexism from earlier episodes, he winds up dating a cross-dresser. Methinks that Bender wanted to do this just to mess with Zapp's mind.
• A rather quirky gag involves Bender's posterior requiring a bumper. However, Bender rejects the replacement, and has it removed, under threat of explosive backfire. The writers could've made a callback or two mid-episode, but I think leaving it to the very end made it funnier in this case.
• This episode marks the second appearance of Elzar's Restaurant, the first being "Hell Is Other Robots". I forgot to bring this up in my "Robots" review, but much as I'm confused at how a bunch of delivery workers can afford to eat there, Bender's use of this restaurant there and here does make a bit of sense, given his apparent fanboyism of Elzar.
• Thanks for reminding me that Al Gore could've been President of the United States. I like Gore, but let's just say insomnia cases would've dropped like a stone had he been elected. (Nice going, Florida and Tennessee.)

Favorite Scene: Gotta be the scene at Malfunctioning Eddie's Car Emporium - his first appearance on the show. Nice parody of the American car industry with the... Thundercougarfalconbird.

Least Favorite Scene: Again, not a scene, but Zoidberg's behaviour in this episode seemed to toe the line of likability.

Memorable Quote: Fry's chocolate metaphor. "Would chocolate let me finish?"

Score: 7.5. Not being the most memorable of episodes caused the relatively low score.