The Officially Awesome Futurama Season 7 / Volume 6 Time!
- Thread starter bigdaddy
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For me the fact that Fry is really stupid sort of makes up for this. He's always been pretty oblivious to most things and somewhat ignorant. Personally I liked that they could go back to the idea of Fry coming across something new in the 31st Century, but something mundane to them, instead of needing to do some far out scifi story (although I enjoy both). I think it's an element that's been missing lately.
I thought this was a decent episode. It was resolved a bit too conveniently considering how out there it was, and the ghost thing was a bit weird, but aside from that it was a fun episode.
^If they wanted to justify it as Fry being stupid, then they should've had the other characters lampshade it by saying, "Come on, Fry, we tell you this every year." As it was, it just felt like an awkward stylistic holdover from the early seasons.
If it were any other character in other other show, I'd agree with you 100%. He's been in the future over a decade now, and we know that time passes in the show at our rate. If it were only a couple of years, then it's plausible that he was off planet. But after a decade, he must have seen it.
But with Fry, I'm willing to accept it without it hurting the story. YMMV, of course. But this is the same guy who didn't realize he lived on Earth, and failed a course about the 20th Century with questions about television.
But with Fry, I'm willing to accept it without it hurting the story. YMMV, of course. But this is the same guy who didn't realize he lived on Earth, and failed a course about the 20th Century with questions about television.
And that's part of the problem. I don't like it when they make Fry too stupid. It's sacrificing characterization depth for a cheap joke. It's the same problem that's befallen Homer Simpson and reduced him to a caricature of himself.
And it doesn't address what I said already -- that if it were just Fry being so amazingly stupid that he didn't remember such a thing as Parade Day when he'd seen the parade go by right outside the building for ten years running, then surely Bender or Leela or the Professor or Hermes would've responded to his stupidity with anger or impatience, rather than just taking his ignorance in stride and answering the question. This is not exactly a group known for its polite restraint. It's the reactions of the other characters that make the exchange feel like something that belongs nine or ten years earlier in continuity, at a time when the people around Fry would've expected him to be unfamiliar with their customs and in need of explanations.
And it doesn't address what I said already -- that if it were just Fry being so amazingly stupid that he didn't remember such a thing as Parade Day when he'd seen the parade go by right outside the building for ten years running, then surely Bender or Leela or the Professor or Hermes would've responded to his stupidity with anger or impatience, rather than just taking his ignorance in stride and answering the question. This is not exactly a group known for its polite restraint. It's the reactions of the other characters that make the exchange feel like something that belongs nine or ten years earlier in continuity, at a time when the people around Fry would've expected him to be unfamiliar with their customs and in need of explanations.
You're completely right, I just found that it didn't bother me one bit.
Maybe because I was just glad for them to do a classic setup instead of something more outrageous, or maybe I'm just used to the recent seasons having much more shallow characterizations. Or maybe I just didn't give a thought to the fact this would happen every year and he'd somehow missed it. I don't know. I am quite forgiving to continuity when it comes to cartoons though.
Well, it depends on the cartoon and the precedent it's set. If it's something like The Simpsons, you don't expect continuity. But Futurama, while still being loose about it, has generally managed to acknowledge the passage of time and allow its characters to grow, and that's one of the things that's given the show its own identity and character. So I don't like it when they fail to live up to that (like when they did a movie that was explicitly set in 3008 or '09 but still had Cubert and Dwight the same preadolescent age they'd been in episodes set 5 or 6 years earlier).
Classic Simpsons had just as good continuity as Futurama. It's shat all over continuity in the past decade or so, which is no surprise with a show going that long with writers who don't give a crap.
Futurama does generally have more continuity than some other cartoons that just ignore all history for the sake of humour (such as Family Guy), but it's never been perfect either.
They've had plenty of minor continuity issues, even in the pre-cancellation episodes. Like how even the mention of Star Trek was banned, yet Hermes had mentioned it before without any problem or anyone mentioning it.
And I'm sure they've probably had similar issues as this episode where Fry should have been aware of something in the future, but wasn't. Surely not as bad as missing an annual parade right outside their window for over a decade, of course, but it's not without precedent either.
They have tried to keep it consistent, but when it gets in the way of a good joke or episode, they have ignored it for the sake of entertainment. As this was only a 1 minute setup for the episode, and not a central part of the plot, I don't have a problem with the omission.
I agree with you that they should have dealt with the issue, even with just one quick line to dismiss it. Maybe it is indicative of less care and attention to detail as classic Futurama, but it didn't seem too out of place to me, despite the flaw.
In a different way. It never acknowledged the passage of time. As I said, that's one thing that made Futurama distinctive, gave it its own feel.
I acknowledged that already in my previous post when I said "while still being loose about it." Why lecture me on things I've already stipulated to?
Just because an oversight has happened before, that doesn't make it all right to do it again. One should always strive to do better. And as I said, it's less acceptable at this point, when Fry has been in the future for over a decade, than in the original series when it had only been 1-4 years.
And this was not a good joke. Surely there could've been a better, fresher way to explain Parade Day than just fall back on the timeworn approach of having Fry not know something.
At this point, I'm chalking a lot of Fry's stupidity up to "freezer burn." Niven, Pournelle, and Barnes posited it in The Legacy of Heorot -- the colonists who were frozen for the time it took to reach their new home planet suffered some minor neurological damage from the time spent in cold sleep. Fry spent a millennium in cold sleep. His brain has some "freezer burn," and that manifests as a kind of dementia, not unlike the kind brought on by minor strokes. Fry's probably not aware of his neurological problems -- for all we know, he's experienced the parade multiple times, only it's yet to register because of his condition -- but it's also not something he can overcome because the degenerative damage has been done.
Yeah yeah... and all the bullshit Berman/Braga Trek did fit in perfectly as well so long as you did some completely crazy mental gymnastics instead of just accepting that they screwed up.
I mean, it's a comedy, and a cartoon, so I can forgive it Fry not knowing Parade Day. But I could definitely do with funnier jokes.
I mean, it's a comedy, and a cartoon, so I can forgive it Fry not knowing Parade Day. But I could definitely do with funnier jokes.
The only reason Fry didn't know about Parade Day is because the writers needed a quick and easy way to explain Parade Day to the audience. Exposition is hard to write in a natural way, so I'm willing to overlook the writers slightly exaggerating Fry's ignorance for the benefit of the scene.
This last episode was fairly lame, not nearly funny enough. The problem is definitely that they're reaching for material because within the context of the not-so-hot premise, there was a fair amount of creativity on display.
Tonight's episode (Law & Oracle) is a solid premise where the jokes should practically write themselves. If it's a flop, too, that's gonna be a very bad sign.
Tonight's episode (Law & Oracle) is a solid premise where the jokes should practically write themselves. If it's a flop, too, that's gonna be a very bad sign.
I thought this week's episode was pretty good. I liked all of the parodies/references, and it was solid throughout.
And was I the only person who actually put on 3D glasses?
I guess it says a lot that I actually had 3D glasses within reach of me, but I was disappointed that it didn't look very good.
And was I the only person who actually put on 3D glasses?
I guess it says a lot that I actually had 3D glasses within reach of me, but I was disappointed that it didn't look very good.
I thought this week's episode was pretty good. I liked all of the parodies/references, and it was solid throughout.
And was I the only person who actually put on 3D glasses?
Hah, i did the same thing
The only time it looked really 3D was when you were on the bridge of the planet express ship, looking out the windows. As for the rest of the episode, it was easily the best one of this block of episodes so far.
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