Review: "The Day The Earth Stood Stupid" (Season 3, Episode 7)

Thank you, Dewey Decimal System. You destroyed the universe.

"Brain! Brain make people dumb!" "No, Leela. Brain make people smart." - Leela and Fry. No, I did not mix up that order.

Airdate: February 18th, 2001.

Written By: Jeff Westbrook and David X. Cohen

Plot: Leela is disenchanted at how stupid Nibbler appears, not doing anything but cause trouble at a pet competition. However, when brains attack the Earth, Leela catches Nibbler as he boards a mini space shuttle, back to his home planet of Eternium. There, the Nibblonians introduce themselves as an intellectual (if cute) species determined to tackle the Brainspawn. The Brainspawn feed off of the Delta Brainwave, making everybody in their path stupid, and leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. The one person that can save them? Fry, who happens to lack a Delta Brainwave.

Review:

Season 3 is, again, often cited as the season which started Futurama's rise from merely being a great show to being a sublime show. If "Parasites Lost" launched the central romantic relationship in the franchise, and "Luck of the Fryrish" give emotional levity to it's central plot, than "The Day The Earth Stood Stupid" stands out as one of the most inventive science fiction elements in the history of the show - all while being drop. Dead. Funny.

Review: "Bendless Love" (Season 3, Episode 6)

"Oh.... my love... my darling..."

"Ten times normal wage? I'll give those jerks what for!" - Bender, crossing the picket line... before taking the job. Ah, Bender - walks the walk, doesn't talk the talk.

Airdate: February 11th, 2001

Written By: Eric Horsted

Plot: The Planet Express Ship crashes on takeoff. Leela's crash report deduces that the L-Unit was bent. That, plus several other "bent" objects leads suspicion to fall on Bender - which is confirmed by a videotape showing him "sleep-bending". Fired because of his addiction, Bender winds up taking a job bending at a company facing a strike. There, he meets Flexo - his yin body double - and Angleyne, a voluptuous Fembot who Bender takes a shine to, and who might be reciprocating his feelings. Thing is.... Angleyne and Flexo are caught out at dinner together. Bender, therefore, decides to impersonate Flexo, believing that she's truly in love with the bearded bot.

Review:

Bender is well known to the casual viewer (and pretty much everybody else) for his flamboyant lifestyle. He's an egoist, a thief, and a drunkard. It makes perfect sense for him to pick up women on a daily basis - which was seen in "Hell is Other Robots" as the act of rebellion against his religion. Here, though, Bender gets a taste of genuine love - or at least a crush. It's a cute little episode, albeit not close to the show's best.

Review: "The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz" (Season 3, Episode 5)

Airdate: March 4th, 2001

Plot: Leela, opposed to the path the Planet Express Ship has to take while towing an oil tanker (by a penguin preserve on Pluto), resigns her command to protest with environmentalists - led by Free Waterfall Sr. Y'know, the guy who's son got eaten by Lrrr. Bender is appointed Captain, much to Fry's displeasure. The two fight, and Bender gets so deperssed, he refuses to drink. Thus, he becomes loopy, and crashes the oil tanker on the preserve. Bender is sentenced to community service, and becomes one with the penguins... who begin reproducing at a rapid pace.

Review: 

When I was younger, I was quite the environmentalist nut. I though Al Gore was a god, I was wondering why there weren't more Prii on the road, and I always used wind power when playing SimCity 4. (TURBINES FOR LIFE!) Thing is, I wasn't one for nature walking, or cleanup efforts... in short, I was more Leonardo DiCaprio than anything else in my environmentalism.

This episode is Futurama's first to tackle the environmentalist topic, and in this case, does a pretty good job in skewering both sides of the topic.

Review: "The Luck of the Fryrish" (Season 3, Episode 4)

Airdate: March 11th, 2001.

Plot: Fry has been on a streak of what seems to be bad, bad luck. He loses at the racetracks, loses every dollar at said racetrack, gets electrocuted to try and retrieve his last dollar. This makes him think back to a simpler time... 1980s New York.

It was a quirky time to be a New Yorker. The Yankees were awful. Ed Koch was asking how he was doin' as New York's mayor. And one Philip J. Fry had a tense relationship with his family, most notably, with his older brother Yancy. In a city park, Fry manages to track down a seven-leafed clover, and luck winds up on his side. After Yancy tries to steal it, Fry hides it in a record vault.

A thousand and change years later, Fry decides to retrieve the clover from the record vault. Unfortunately, it's missing, and Fry immediately suspects Yancy. Making matters worse is the fact that, after his little cryogenic incident, somebody by the name of Philip J. Fry became handsomely famous. Fry comes to the conclusion that Yancy committed identity theft.

Review: My review of "Parasites Lost" seemed to concur with the idea that Season 3 showed Futurama leap from a merely funny sci-fi show to a great character dramedy. However, you would think that those dramatic episodes would be further apart than a whopping two episodes. "Luck of the Fryrish" is another gut-wrenching episode, focusing on Fry's relationship with his family. The end result is a very, very bittersweet half-hour of television.

Review: "A Tale Of Two Santas" (Season 3, Episode 3)

Merry Christmas, Everybody!

Airdate: December 16th, 2001. Yes, you read that correctly.

Plot: It's Xmas time again. Time to set the shutters, arm yourselves around the fire's glow, and pray to god that Robot Santa doesn't blow you off the face of the planet. For our favorite trio, they get the worst possible mission - delivering letters to Santa. On Neptune, attempts to finally destroy Santa are futile, but they do trap him in some ice. Bender, being the only robot there, takes up the mantle of Robot Santa. However, old fears die hard... and by that, I mean that Bender gets locked up.

Review: 

Back in September (of all months), I reviewed "XMas Story" - the introduction of Xmas which showed it as one of the most dystopic holidays possible. The bringer of joy to us is now a robotic bringer of destruction and hell. "A Tale of Two Santas" really drives home just how ingrained the terror of XMas has become to the populace of New New York, where even a benevolent Santa (bizarrely enough, Bender) can't change it.

Review: "Parasites Lost" (Season 3, Episode 2)

Airdate: January 21st, 2001

Synopsis: Fry grabs an old sandwich at a truck stop. After an unrelated work-related accident, Fry's body repairs itself. A colonoscopy reveals that Fry has worms lodged in his intestines. The crew shrink down to miniature size to try and remove the worms from power. Since the worms are linked to Fry's mind, however, they would defend themselves if Fry knew what was happening. Therefore, Leela must "distract" Fry from the mission.

While out on the town, Fry proves himself to be more articulate and verbose than ever before. A newly enamored Leela halts the mission, in order to continue living this fantastic experience with Fry. The experience reaches it's peak when Fry manages to play the Holophonor - an instrument infamous for it's challenge. Yet, who's actually performing these actions - Fry, or the Worms?

Review: While Futurama is plenty well known as a sci-fi parody, what really seems to sell fans on the show is that underneath the sitcom-esque clothes lies one of the best episodic sci-fi shows out there, full with drama and character development. We didn't see too much of that drama in Season 2, however. Therefore, one must present the question - at what point did Futurama go from "sci-fi comedy" to "complex dramedy"?

For most people, the line is crossed in "Parasites Lost".

And in the eyes of some people, it is Futurama's zenith.

Does the same hold true in my eyes?

(Warning: some Star Trek spoilers later in the review.)

Review: "Amazon Women In The Mood" (Season 3, Episode 1)

Airdate: February 4th, 2001.

Synopsis: Kif is unable to ask Amy out on a date, due to his eternal shyness. Zapp takes advantage of this, and manages to wind up on a "double half-date" with Leela, Kif, and Amy at Le Palm D'Orbit, an orbiting restaurant. There, Zapp tries to get Kif to use his boorish pick-up lines, and when Kif finally tries to show his true colors in a song, Zapp blocks it by "singing" his own tune. The restaurant abandoned by all except the four, the captain's attempts to pilot it back home end with them crashed on Amazonia, a matriarchal planet that has effectively eliminated all men.

Fry and Bender attempt to rescue them, and it ends with the crew arrested. After a tour of the planet, they are brought to the Fem-puter, the leader of the planet. There, Fem-Puter is infuriated by the fact that there are men that trespassed on the planet, and sentences them to die.

Review (SPOILERS): As far as I can recall, Season 3 is going to focus quite a bit more on continuity and the development of plot elements introduced in Seasons 1 and 2. Indeed, the season premiere, "Amazon Women In The Mood", fleshes out Kif and Amy, all while serving as a parody of sci-fi pulp, mocking both genders, and analyzing hypocrisy in radical politics. For the most part, the end result is good - although is the episode overrated?

Season 2 Wrap Up

Image found on Wikipedia. I do not own it.

So, that ends Futurama Season 2. When I first started reviewing this season, Stephen Harper and Tony Abbott were Prime Ministers of nations. Boy, how times have changed... and how lazy I was until, January-ish.

Seriously, though, let's analyze this season.

Review: "The Cryonic Woman" (Season 2, Episode 19)

"Welcome... to the world of tomorrow!"

Airdate: December 3rd, 2000

Synopsis: Bender and Fry's antics go too far, resulting in the trio's dismissal (Leela left the keys in the ship's ignition, and caused Bender and Fry to steal the ship... with the building and the rest of the crew in tow.) Jobless, Bender and Fry wind up at the cryogenics center. There, the duo unfreeze a motley crew of people, such as Pauly Shore and Fry's ex-girlfriend, Michelle. The latter gets back together with Fry, only to realize that the 31st century is a bit disturbing.

Review: "The Cryonic Woman", in theory, should be pretty good, given that it revolves around a character unseen since the very start of the show. Oh, and it's also the finale of Season 2. The idea was good, actually, but unfortunately, the execution of the episode is somewhat lacking - in fact, I'd even call it the worst episode so far.

Review: "The Honkng" (Season 2, Episode 18)

Airdate: November 5th, 2000

Synopsis: Bender's recently deceased Uncle Vladimir grants him a haunted castle in his will. In order to obtain it, however, he has to stay there for a night. (Groundbreaking tactic, there.) The spirits of the castle haunt him, though, and he flees into the wilderness, where he comes across a Werecar that runs him over. After returning back to Earth, he begins acting funky. That, and tire tracks are popping out across New New York, in areas where he has been.

Review: Futurama mainly tends to utilize and riff on science fiction tropes, with the past two seasons largely being inspired by Star Trek. However, it doesn't limit itself solely to the sci-fi genre. In this episode, it mixes in elements of horror and the supernatural, and the end result is surprisingly good, if not as brilliant as the past three episodes.

Admittedly, though, much like the last episode, I'm going to be reviewing this more on the character interactions and the comedy - not a horror movie fan. (I do love Gravity Falls, although it's less "horror" and more "supernatural". Take that however you will.)