Review: "When Aliens Attack!" (Season 1, Episode 12)

Airdate: November 7th, 1999.

Synopsis: May, 1999. A transmitter controller for WNYW-TV, the FOX affiliate in New York City, orders a pizza and beer. He invites the pizza delivery boy, one Phillip J. Fry, to watch the season finale of Single Female Lawyer, a show that revolves around lawyer Jenny McNeil and her various sexual exploits. While yawning, Fry spills his beverage on the control panel, knocking the station and the program off the air. FOX has to replace it with "eight animated programs in a row".

A thousand years later, the signal arrives at the planet Omnicron Persei 8, home of the Omnicronians. Their king and queen, Lrrr and Ndnd, vow revenge on Earth.

Cut to Earth. One Phillip J Fry is dragged from the TV out for a Labor Day trip to the beach. Hilarity ensues... until a UFO shoots lasers at the beach. Lrrr declares that McNeil must be surrendered immediately. President McNeil retaliates by going to war against the mothership, with 25-Star General Zapp Brannigan at the helm. Doesn't work. Fry realizes what the Omnicronians are talking about, and that he must whip up a script for a show he didn't really watch.

Review: On June 23rd, 1998, Time Magazine released an issue that had three greyed-out faces of feminism - suffragette Susan B Anthony, writer Betty Friedan, and activist Gloria Steinem. Right next to them, sat the non-greyed-out face of Ally McBeal, the main character of Ally McBeal. Time Magazine posed the question... Is Feminism Dead?

To accomplish this review, I decided that it would be best to watch the pilot of Ally McBeal. It was... alright, I guess. The main character was a tad bit irritating, though, which you don't really want in a dramedy - it's acceptable in shows like Red Dwarf, where the main character can be irritating for laughs, or Breaking Bad, where you focus on a fall from grace. Not in McBeal.

This episode, from what I could tell, does a damn good mockery of Ally McBeal - it mocks the reason why shows like McBeal are loved. People like comfort food comedy. Sure, you could have shows like Red Dwarf, where characters are fleshed out with vast brilliance. You could just as easily, however, have a show like The Cleveland Show, where shows are unchallenging to the intellect of people, and thus, are bland comfort food TV.

Review: "A Flight to Remember" (Season 1, Episode 10)

OK, who didn't say "what could possibly go wrong" when they first watched this episode?

Airdate: September 26th, 1999

Synopsis: It seems like Fry, Leela, and Bender have quickly had enough of the Planet Express missions- they only reconsider their resignations upon learning that the crew is going on the maiden voyage of the space cruise ship, Titanic. (This is gonna be a successful trip!) To try and ward off the advances of the ship's captain, Zapp Brannigan, Leela declares her engagement to Fry. At the same time, Amy declares Fry her boyfriend to impress her parents. Bender doesn't even get involved in that brewing love triangle- he's out to rob, and runs into (and falls head over heels over) the Countess de la Roca.

Meanwhile, Zapp decides to deviate from the ship's course- instead flying through a comet field and near a "blackish, hole-ish thing". Three guesses and no prizes for guessing what happens.

Review (SPOILERS): I wasn't old enough to know the true impact of Titanic-mania in the late 90s. Believe me, if it was anything like Avatar-mania in 2010, it probably got all the awards the year after it was released, and is now seen as just an excuse to show tons and tons of special effects through a very standard "romance" plot set during a disaster...

I think. I dunno- I never really watched the movie. (Well, there goes whatever little credibility I had.)

What this episode does do, for those that never watched Titanic, is launch the romantic subplots that would dominate the show over the next few seasons.

Review: "The Series Has Landed" (Season 1, Episode 2)

Thankfully, there's no dancing to the Vengaboys.

Airdate: April 4th, 1999.

Synopsis: Fry, Leela, and Bender are introduced to the inner workings of Planet Express. After previewing a commercial that will air during the Super Bowl ("Not on the same channel, of course"), they meet the rest of the crew- John Zoidberg, the quirky doctor; Hermes Conrad, the straight-laced bureaucrat; and Amy Wong, the slightly flighty intern.

With Leela chosen as the captain of the ship, the new crew are given their first job- deliver a package to the Moon. While Fry is initially excited to go to the moon, he realizes that the place has become a cheap-o tourist trap akin to Disney Land... and they can't even do that right. Aggravated, he drags Leela out into the "real" moon... and his antics almost kill them, forcing them to work for a "moon farmer" to get some oxygen.

Review: As mentioned in my "Space Pilot 3000" review, Futurama's view of the future is very dystopian. However, it goes about this in a unique way. Unlike Blade Runner, which did a straight-up dystopia, Futurama did so via pretty much taking our society, adding a few spaceships and aliens, and poof! Dystopia. It's done in such a subtle manner that the average viewer probably won't notice.