Simpsorama
"Simpsorama" is the sixth episode of the twenty-sixth season of the animated television series The Simpsons, and the 558th episode of the series overall. It aired in the United States on Fox on November 9, 2014. "Simpsorama" is a crossover with Futurama, another animated series created by The Simpsons creator Matt Groening, that had previously aired on Fox and later Comedy Central before concluding in September 2013.
Plot
At Springfield Elementary School, Principal Skinner is showing the late Mrs. Krabappel's class a time capsule that they intend to open a thousand years later and tells the students to each put something inside of the capsule. Bart, having obviously forgotten to bring something to put in it, puts a sandwich that he blows his nose on into it. At a ceremony, Mayor Quimby lowers the time capsule into the town square in front of the statue of Jebediah Springfield. When they dig up the hole, they notice some green ooze pouring out and all eyes turn to Mr. Burns. It begins to rain outside during this.
Later that night, the Simpsons hear a strange noise outside like something falling from the sky. Marge then hears something glugging and belching downstairs. Homer and Bart decide to go to the basement and investigate. Homer decides to send Santa's Little Helper down to see what's down there, but the dog runs away. He then tries the same thing with Bart, but this does not work either. Homer decides to set a trap, using Bart as bait. Down in the basement, Bart sees a shadowy figure opening up a can of Duff Beer. Homer whacks at the shadowy figure with a broom and reveals it to be Bender, who reveals he is from the future. Homer and Bender become instant best friends. The next day, Lisa starts to doubt that Bender is actually from the future, since robotic technology is relatively advanced. So Lisa takes Bender to Professor Frink's laboratory. Bender admits that he does not recall why he was sent to the present, so Frink unplugs and replugs Bender's mission protocol, causing Bender to reveal his mission is to terminate Homer.
Homer is upset that his new bowling buddy wants to kill him. Bender admits he cannot do it. Suddenly, Bender's rear begins ringing and a hologram of Turanga Leela appears asking if he killed Homer yet. Bender claims he did, but Leela shows that thousands of rabbit-shaped creatures have invaded New New York and are multiplying. Leela catches Bender's lie. Philip J. Fry also encourages Bender to kill Homer. Lisa asks why, and Professor Hubert Farnsworth replies that the creatures have Homer's DNA and Bender was sent back to kill Homer before the creatures could evolve from him. So, the professor, Leela and Fry go into the past to kill Homer themselves. Leela attempts to shoot him with her ray-gun, but Bender bends it. Frink offers a team-up with the professor, who suggests Homer take the rest out so he can explain "freemium games". When they get to the house, Homer introduces Marge to Fry and Leela. Marge and Leela attempt to exchange pleasantries while avoiding talking about the other one's tall blue hair and one eyeball respectively.
Back at the lab, Lisa asks Farnsworth if he got to the present through a time machine, but the professor denies this. The professor explains they came through a portal which they equipped to Bender. He reveals that Bender, however, came here through a time machine. Just as Lisa is about to question this, the DNA sample the professors were working on completes. When Farnsworth, Frink and Lisa get to the house, the professor reveals that the DNA was only half of Homer's, with the other half belonging to Marge. Marge is relieved when Farnsworth says they do not have to kill her, just one of her children. Bender's rear shows a hologram of Channel √2 News, where Linda and Morbo report that the creatures have started evolving. One of the rabbits eats Linda and transforms into a lizard-like creature that resembles Bart. Frink wonders how Bart destroyed the future. Bart reveals, through a sepia-toned flashback, that when he put his sandwich in the time capsule, it touched Milhouse's lucky rabbit's foot and the toxic ooze in the hole touched the items in the time capsule mutating them into rabbit-like creatures with Bart's DNA. Lisa suggests they dig up the time capsule.
The Simpsons and the Planet Express crew arrive in the town square to dig up the capsule, but Groundskeeper Willie forbids them from doing so, since it cannot be opened for another thousand years. Bender's rear then shows a hologram of Amy who assumes the creatures got a hold of Scruffy, but Scruffy reveals they only got his mustache. Since he figures life is not worth living without his mustache, he shoots his own head off. They see in the hologram that the creatures have destroyed the portal, causing the crew and the Simpsons to be sent back to the year 3014. Marge does a head count and realizes they left Maggie behind. Bender decides to take Maggie to the race track since he knows the outcome of every single horse race in this time.
The Simpsons all hang out at the Planet Express headquarters. Homer kills all of the Bart creatures by strangling them. Marge is discouraged that they cannot go back to their own time. Marge notes that Homer works at a nuclear power plant. When asked if he is good at his job, Homer takes pride in the fact that he was named "Employee of the Month" for April Fools' Day. Farnsworth suggests that Fry and Homer fix the portal while the rest pray. Nibbler attempts to eat one of the creatures, but instead of pooping dark matter, he merely poops out another Bart creature. Lisa is surprised everyone has given up. The professor then proposes they shoot all the creatures into space. Lisa says she will round them up.
Back in Springfield, Bender bets on a horse named Bender's Bounty, even though he died during the race. When the horse starts to lose, Bender obliterates it in anger.
In New New York, Lisa tricks the Bart creatures into believing that Madison Cube Garden is full of Butterfinger bars and also annoys them by playing a saxo-holophonor showing images of things she likes such as unicorns and kitty cats. Hermes locks all of the creatures into the cube and the Planet Express ship lifts the cube up and hurls it into space.
Reconstruction begins in New New York (now called New New New York) and Fry and Homer successfully reactivate the portal, which sucks the Simpsons back to their present day home. Marge is happy to be reunited with Maggie, and notices her diaper is full. Bender volunteers to change it, revealing the diaper is full of money he won at the races. Bender bids the Simpsons farewell and shuts himself off to be awakened a thousand years later. Homer drags the robot to the basement, but also pours him one more can of Duff.
Back in the year 3014, it is revealed that the creatures ended up on Omicron Persei 8. Lrrr and Ndnd are both annoyed that the creatures are destroying the planet especially since "the Johnsons" are coming to dinner as they turn out to be Kang and Kodos. Ndnd runs away sobbing from Lrrr eating one of the creatures before dinner. Lrrr asks "the one of [them] that is female" to console her as both Kang and Kodos comfort her.
During the credits, there is a Simpsonized-version of the Futurama opening sequence.
Background information
The episode was first announced in July 2013, two days after "The Simpsons Guy" — the hour-long crossover between Family Guy and The Simpsons — was announced. It was originally planned to air as either the season 25 finale or the season 26 premiere.[1] It was ultimately slated for November 9, 2014.[2] In an interview with Entertainment Weekly about the episode, Groening said, "That was a really tough one to negotiate, because I had to talk to myself." Al Jean added, "They were going off the air, so I thought people would really love it if we had one more chance to see those characters"; adding, "We're always looking for things that are compatible with us, and I thought, 'Well, what’s more compatible?' We do a joke, actually, about how similar Bender and Homer look. Like, they just erased Homer's hair." Jean also stated, "There's a thing in Futurama code where if you solve it, it says, 'Congratulations! You're a nerd.'"[3]
Reception
The episode received an audience of 6.70 million. It was the most-watched show on Fox that night, beating Family Guy.[4] The episode received mixed reviews from critics. Max Nicholson of IGN called the storyline "a bit dull especially considering some of Futurama 's more epic storylines."[5] Zack Handlen and Dennis Perkins of The A.V. Club gave the episode a B-, stating, "There's no reason for this episode to exist, at least not in terms of storytelling. Seeing the Simpsons family interact with Bender, Fry, Leela, Professor Farnsworth, and the rest has a certain automatic thrill to it, like any half-assed Internet mash-up (that thing I like is in the same place as that other thing I like! THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING), but that thrill never deepens or enriches our understanding of these disparate groups."[6] Darren Franich of Entertainment Weekly stated, "...where 'The Simpsons Guy' fell down the meta-rabbit hole, 'Simpsorama' mostly settled for simple gags, with a hit ratio that was better than Futurama season 6 but not quite up to the standards of Futurama season 5."[7]
The episode revealed that The Simpsons aliens Kang and Kodos are a lesbian couple, in contrast to "Treehouse of Horror VII" which portrayed Kodos as the sister of Kang. Al Jean told Entertainment Weekly: "People are asking: is this episode canon? And I go, 'What really happened—did Homer really fall off a cliff all those times and live?' But that being said: Yeah, sure, they're Kang and Kodos Johnson. They're a gay female couple in their species. They seemed to be married." In response to a sign in the episode showing Ralph Wiggum to have died in 2017, Jean said that it was in reference to the episode "Holidays of Future Passed" in which Ralph requires clones as his stupidity causes him to die in accidents. He declared that there would be no more deaths in the show, following the season premiere "Clown in the Dumps" in which Krusty the Clown's father died.[8]
References
- ↑ http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/07/20/the-simpsons-futurama-crossover-episode/
- ↑ "'Simpsons' death in premiere; 'Futurama' crossover in Nov. - Inside TV - EW.com". EW.com. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
- ↑ "See the first image from the 'Futurama'-'Simpsons' crossover episode". EW.com. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
- ↑ "Sunday Final Ratings: ‘The Simpsons’ & ‘Brooklyn Nine-Nine’ Adjusted Up". TVbytheNumbers. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
- ↑ Nicholson, Max (2014-11-09). "BACK TO THE 31ST CENTURY!". IGN. Retrieved 2014-11-09.
- ↑ Handlen, Zack; Perkins, Dennis (2014-11-09). "The Simpsons: Simpsorama". The A.V. Club. Retrieved 2014-11-09.
- ↑ Franich, Darren (2014-11-09). "The 'Simpsons'/'Futurama' crossover: Two great tastes that go pretty well together". EW.com. Retrieved 2014-11-10.
- ↑ Snierson, Dan (10 November 2014). "'Simpsons' producer on the surprising Kang and Kodos revelation, 'death' of Ralph Wiggum". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
External links
- "Simpsorama" at the Internet Movie Database
- "Simpsorama" at the Infosphere, the Futurama Wiki.
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