After many, many pre-emptive starts, here is my piece about the
magnificent Futurama.
Originally, I was going to kiss the asses of Mr. Groening and Cohen, rant about the show's genius and how Bender should assume his rightful place as the prophet of a new millenia. But, if you're reading this, I'm pretty sure that you have reached these conclusions
on your own.
Instead, I want to discuss something else about Futurama. Something that has pretty much gone unmentioned in any other review I've read of this show, on DFFQI or elsewhere --- the MESSAGE.
"Ya gotta do what ya gotta do". This fairly-ominous mantra was
repeated several times during the show's premiere. A message drilled
into the conciousness of the denizens of this future Earth. Much like
the "Obey" or "Corps Is Mother, Corps Is Father", the mottos that
mesmerize the members of the Psi Corp on Babylon 5, or the classic "Big Brother Is Watching" from Orwell's "1984", this phrase has sub-text obvious to the viewer, yet the characters are oblivious to. "Ya gotta do what ya gotta do." Designed to place a fear of the new and unusual in the people, and to keep them in their station of life. Stay with your pre-designated job or be fired. Out of a cannon into the sun.
By the end of the first episode, the show's protagonists -- Fry,
Bender and Leela -- ignore this mantra and choose their own jobs,
albeit jobs chosen out of neccessity. But before this happens, we see
what has happened when they initially choose to ignore their jobs.
Bender, unsatisfied with his job bending iron girders (at any angle!)
for the construction of Suicide Booths, seeks a twenty-five cent suicide from one of the booths he helped construct, as his only escape. Fry, this stranger in a strange land, refuses to follow this regime of
conformity and as a result is chased by Leela, and subsequently, the
police. Once Leela sees how futile her pre-determined future is, she
joins Fry and Bender in their attempt of escape. The three of them are
trailed by the police and the evil, evil head of Richard Milhouse Nixon
(some people never change, I guess), who are prepared to kill the three
of them. Simply for not doing what they were supposed to do.
Matt Groening is way too smart to put this much into an expository episode and not have it set up something major. I'm sure, with the progession of Futurama's story, we'll see why "ya gotta do what ya gotta do", and who pulls the strings. After all, someone must have something HUGE to lose if all of the population does not continue
in their designated jobs. Mr. Groening has more than once listed the
writing of Philip K. Dick as a major influence on the feel of "Futurama", which leads further evidence to my thoughts that Futurama has a grander scheme than is being let on at this point.
Here's to Futurama! Our last, best hope for new quality television.
---
Michael Keegan
4.3.1999