The Inhuman Torch

"The Inhuman Torch" is the eighteenth episode of the seventh season of the animated sitcom Futurama. It originally aired on Comedy Central on July 10, 2013. The episode was written by Dan Vebber and directed by Frank Marino. In the episode, Bender becomes a firefighter, and ends up housing a solar flare who wants to blow up the Earth from the inside.

Plot

At a helium mining facility on the sun, Zapp Brannigan causes a cave-in that traps 15 miners inside the sun itself. Fry, Leela, and Bender venture to save the miners. When Bender attempts to abandon Fry and Leela and return to the ship, he inadvertently saves one of the miners. Prompted by Morbo, who is covering the breaking story on location, Bender goes on to rescue all of the remaining victims. He is hailed as the hero of the day, while Fry and Leela are recognized as his minor accomplices. A fire breaks out at their award ceremony. As Mayor Poopenmeyer explains, the fire department was sold to pay for Bender's medal. Fry, Leela, and Bender put out the fire, although Bender is very showy about it and once again receives most of the credit. Mayor Poopenmeyer decrees that the Planet Express crew are now the city's fire department.

After some time as successful firefighters, the other crew members notice that Bender was present just before every one of the fires they extinguished. They ask themselves whether Bender might be setting these fires deliberately in order to inspire continued hero-worship. Their suspicions are confirmed when, while on the videophone with Bender, they see a fire break out in the shop just behind him. When he returns to headquarters, they confront him and kick him off the team.

As Bender cleans out his locker, a strange, blue flame erupts from his shoulder. He tries to extinguish it, but the flame moves around as though deliberately dodging his attempts. Finally, the flame takes on the look of a shadowy face and begins to speak to Bender. It says that it is a "being of pure solar energy," a member of a race that inhabits the Sun's photosphere. It explains that billions of years ago, it was imprisoned for treason, but that Bender has unwittingly transported it to Earth. When it announces its plans to ignite the Earth and rule over it, Bender realizes that this creature is the source of the fires for which he has been blamed. When Bender accidentally leads it to the sub-basement and the lava pit, it realizes that it can go to Earth's core and transform the Earth into a miniature Sun. To prevent this, Bender captures the creature within his compartment of mystery and flees to an ice floe in the Arctic Ocean, where there is nothing flammable. He announces to the creature, which he begins to refer to as "Flamo", that they will be here for the next billion years.

At home, Fry accepts a package that contains Bender's hero medal, badly damaged in the fire at the Vampire Bank where Bender had kept it. Fry realizes that Bender never would have set a fire that would risk harm to this prize, and flies to the Arctic to retrieve and apologize to Bender. But when Bender explains that "it was a psychotic flame creature from the Sun who set those fires," Fry decides that he must have been wrong about Bender after all. Fry angrily returns to headquarters alone. Unbeknownst to Fry and Bender, Flamo has escaped from Bender and attached itself to Fry's pants. At headquarters, it leaves Fry and ignites the Planet Express building itself. The crew is unable to extinguish the fire, as Flamo eludes their hoses. Just as they express relief that no one is left in the doomed building, Fry appears, hanging from the balcony and in need of rescue. Bender had discovered the loss of his captive earlier, and had left the Arctic just in time to arrive at this moment. He arrives such that only Fry knows of his presence, and quietly pulls him to safety. Fry refuses to be rescued, but Bender forces the issue. Fleeing with Fry in hand, Bender falls through the weakening floor, ending up in the sub-basement near the lava pit. Fry scolds Bender sharply and walks out on him, just as Flamo arrives and dives into the lava pit. Fry returns to scold Bender further, but Bender dives into the lava to capture Flamo. Before Fry can leave, a strange light draws him back into the room. Two large flame creatures appear, announcing that they are the "mystic aldermen of the Sun." They await Bender's return, thank him for his heroism in capturing their escapee, explain that he is "now the greatest hero in Earth's history," and depart with a bound Flamo.

Fry finally understands the truth, and promises to vouch for Bender to the rest of the crew, but Bender explains that it cannot be. They wouldn't believe Fry either. And in fact, if Fry were to tell them that Bender is even present, they'll blame Bender for the fire. The only solution is for Fry to claim that he himself accidentally started the fire while Bender was thousands of miles away.

Cultural and Historical References

The opening act involves the rescue (by Bender, Fry, and Leela) of 15 trapped helium miners. The script was written a little over a year after 33 trapped miners were famously rescued from a Chilean gold mine (2010 Copiapó mining accident). Neither the DVD commentary nor any Futurama-related sites seem to mention any connection.

The chalkboard joke ("As Seen At The 1939 World's Fair") is a reference to the "Futurama" exhibit, part of the General Motors Pavilion at that fair. It showed the highway of the future (circa 1960), and gave the name to the series.^[1]

Reception

The A.V. Club gave this episode an A.^[2] Max Nicholson of IGN gave the episode a 7.3/10 "Good" rating.^[3]

References

External links

• "The Inhuman Torch" on IMDb
• "The Inhuman Torch" at TV.com
• "The Inhuman Torch" at the Infosphere, the Futurama Wiki.