Touch eyes to screen for cheap laser surgery. (Futurama - Season 1 (DVD))

Member Name: Critchyboy

Product:	Futurama - Season 1 (DVD)
Date:	01/07/03 (263 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great Characters, Incredibly funny

Disadvantages: Some extras are a little naff

Been away for a while - movin' an' groovin' - and thinking what to do with my Dooyoo life. I really enjoy watchin' telly so have spent many months in a darkened room watching DVD's for your enjoyment.

Therefore I have chosen to write a review of one of my favourite Digital Versatile Discs that I have in my ever expanding collection.

So without further ado and with little need for much more of an introduction that what you have already managed to read ? my thoughts on the DVD box set of Futurama ? Season One?

***THE BACKGROUND***

Futurama comes to you from the creator of that incredibly well known all-American family, ?The Simpsons?. Set 1,000 years in the future in the year of our Lord 3000, in the city of New New York ? which is built on the ruins of Old New York - Futurama revolves around the various ins and outs of an intergalactic delivery company called Planet Express and its staff of various species.

***THE CHARACTORS***

Philip J. Fry, known simply as Fry to his friends was a drop-out in the year 1999 and, through an accident with a cryogenic freezer, is a drop-out in the year 3000. A pizza delivery boy with a lousy life in the 20th Century is given a fresh start as a delivery boy in the future. How lucky is that?

Professor Hubert J Farnsworth is Fry?s Great (x many) Nephew and his only living relative. The Professor is the creator of Planet Express and invents many different contraptions ? some that work and others that are totally useless. He is over 150 years young and is slightly hard of hearing?

Bender is a robot programmed only to bend girders which was fine, until he discovered that the girders were being used to make Suicide Booths and then he could no longer live with himself. He is Fry?s closest friend in the future and is a chain-smoking, alcoholic thief. He is also a total layabout.

Leela Taronga was the Fate Assignment Officer at the cryogenic comp
any but left after chasing Fry around New New York. She is appointed Captain of the Planet Express ship. She stuggles with depth-perception as she only has one eye.

Dr Zoidberg is the company?s resident doctor and prides himself for being an expert on the human species. He is a lobster like creature whose race is responsible for the extinction of the anchovy.

Hermes Conrad is the company?s bureaucrat and is incredibly efficient in his work. He was the Earth?s Limbo Champion until a little boy died trying to imitate him at the Olympics.

Amy Wong is the intern and comes from a very rich family from Mars. Bender repeatedly tries to rob her of the cash from her wallet. She is a little thick too and takes people at their word.

Captain Zapp Brannigan is a total loss as a military commander regularly sending thousands of troops to their death in various battles. He is seen as a great leader by all around him, although Leela seems to have very well figured out.

First Officer Kiff Kroker is Zapp?s poor long-suffering assistant. Much cleverer than Zapp but very much put in his place by various sharp put downs.

***THE DVD PACKAGE***

The Season One box set consists of 13 episodes spread over three discs. Each disc has its own plastic box and the three are housed in another box to keep them all together. The outside of the main box is decorated with various scenes from New New York.

I find this style of presentation much better than a flimsy box set where the discs are spread over several folding pieces of card. The whole package looks much more secure, with little chance of the discs being damaged.

For each disc I will give an overview of each episode, followed by what special features can be accessed from them.

***DISC ONE***

There are four episodes on Disc One:

1) Space Pilot 3000.

It is December 31st 1999. Fry is stuck in a dead-end job delivering pizza. His
girlfriend has left him for another man and his bicycle has been stolen. Whilst delivering a pizza to a crank caller ? one I.C. Weiner at a cryogenics company ? Fry decides to eat the pizza himself, but whilst celebrating the dawn of the year 2000, tips his chair backwards and falls into an open cryogenic tube, which shuts and freezes him for 1,000 years.

He wakes up and is released on 31st December 2999 and is shown to the Fate Development Officer ? a one-eyed alien called Leela ? who, through genetic testing, discovers his permanent career which will be implanted into his hand on a microchip. From a drop of his blood, Leela informs him that he has one living relative ? Professor Hubert J Farnsworth, who is his great (x many) nephew.

When Fry discovers his permanent career is to be a delivery boy he runs away to try and find the Professor. On his escape he meets Bender ? an alcoholic robot ? and the two become friends.

When Leela catches up with them both, Fry discovers that Leela is as lonely as he is. Leela removes her career chip and the three team up to find the professor, who ? incidentally ? is looking for a new crew?

2) Episode Two ? The Series has Landed.

Leela is made Captain of the Planet Express ship and Fry is made the delivery boy and the crew set off to deliver a package to a theme park on the moon. Unfortunately Amy ? the intern ? looses the keys to the spaceship and Fry gets Leela and himself lost on the moon?s surface outside the park looking for the original space landing module.

With oxygen running low, the freezing dark side of the moon approaching and a farmer furious that Bender has had his wicked way with one of his daughters, will Amy manage to find the keys to the spaceship or will their first mission end in total disaster?!

3) I, Roommate.

With Fry living at the Planet Express office ? Hermes (the bureaucrat), has noticed that the water bills have shot up and there is
a serious infestation of owls around the building. The rest of the crew decide that Fry should move out of the office ? resulting in a journey around New New York to find a suitable apartment for him.

Matters are complicated by the fact that Bender ? who wants to live with Fry ? has an aerial on his head that plays havoc with the television reception in Fry?s new flat. This results in an unusually sober Bender suffering from alcohol withdrawal and a desire to do his best for his friend.

4) Love?s Labour Lost in Space.

Leela is having terrible trouble finding a man ? not even a night out with the rest of the Planet Express gang solves her problem.

The crew are sent on a ?tax deductible mission of charity? to the planet Vergon 6 which is collapsing due to the over mining of the planet?s resource: dark matter, a fuel for powering spaceships, which is a ?super dense substance of which each pound weighs over 10,000 pounds.? Their mission is to save the animals in a task not too far distant from the story of Noah?s Ark.

Unfortunately inept Captain Zapp Brannigan imprisons the Planet Express crew and puts their mission behind schedule. Leela goes to talk things over with Zapp ? but was talking the only thing that happened..?!

^^^SPECIAL FEATURES^^^

oOo A complete animatic from the episode ?Space Pilot 3000? showing the development of the animation process. Interesting to watch in small doses ? a must for people really into seeing how all the different levels of the animation process are put together.

oOo ?Space Pilot 3000? script and storyboards.

oOo Deleted scenes from ?Episode Two: The Series has Landed?, ?I, Roommate? and ?Loves Labours Lost in Space.?

***DISC TWO***

Disc two contains five episodes.

1) Fear of Bot Planet.

The gang are called in to take a parcel to the planet Chapek 9 ? a planet overrun by human hating robots. Bender is very upset at the
way robots are treating by human beings. He states that ?Humans only invented robots to make their lives easier? as the main cause of his hurt feelings. He refuses to do any work but is made to go along and deliver the package as it is too dangerous for either Fry or Leela to step foot on the planet.

While waiting for Bender to return, Fry and Leela receive a transmission from Bender who has been caught and taken away for working with humans. He becomes a hero to the robots with his extreme talk of annihilating all humanity.

Meanwhile, Fry and Leela have disguised themselves as robots to launch an audacious attempt to rescue him ? but will the plan work?

2) A Fish Full of Dollars.

Fry?s sleep is interrupted by a commercial broadcast into his brain whilst he is sleeping. This results in the whole gang going on a shopping spree where Bender is caught for stealing.

Whilst trying to stump up the money for Bender?s bail, Fry discovers that his old bank is still in business and decides to check his balance. The ninety-four cents that he had in 1999 has, with interest over 1000 years, turned into a whopping $4.3 billion.

Fry goes on a huge spending spree, renting himself a 20th Century flat with original asbestos and purchasing a number of crazy items including the only tin of anchovies left in existence. But in doing so he incurs the wrath of a ruthless old business woman named ?Mom? ? president of Mom?s Friendly Robot Company.

3) My Three Sons.

The crew have to deliver a package to the Emperor of the planet TriSol in the darkest depths of the Forbidden Zone in the Galaxy of Terror. Fry is nominate to carry the package from the ship to the castle after eating an incredibly salty meal prepared by Bender.

Fry walks across the scorching desert under the heat of TriSol?s three suns and when he reaches the castle he is desperate for a drink. He opens an innocent looking bottle on the throne and d
rinks it, not realising that he has just drunk the emperor of the planet?s liquid alien race.

Fry is declared the new emperor and promptly sets up Bender as his Prime Minister, but he soon discovers that the alien race has a ruthless streak as the reign of every emperor before him lasted, on average, a week before he was assassinated.
During the nocturnal phase of the alien?s cycle, the previous emperor shows up in Fry?s stomach and demands to be set free, resulting in a race against time to save Fry?s life.

4) A Big Piece of Garbage.

Professor Farnsworth invents the smell-o-scope, just like the telescope except that it enables the operator to sniff things that are a long, long way away! Handily, he does this just in time to discover that a huge ball of garbage, launched into space in the 21st century, is heading straight towards New New York.

The crew of the Planet Express launches a mission to save the city in an amusing rip-off of the Bruce Willis film ?Armageddon.?

5) Hell is Other Robots.

At a pop concert performed at Madison Cube Gardens, Bender meets up with an old friend who introduces him to vice of ?jacking-on? ? the pleasure obtained from abusing electricity.

Unfortunately for Bender he gets hooked and descends into a life of sin until he saved by the teaching of the Temple of Robotology and his baptism into new life.

Fry and Leela, concerned about his unbearable change manage to get him back into his olds ways of stealing, gambling and spending time with hookers. But he is taken away to Robot Hell where the Robot Devil torments him with a musical extravaganza and it?s up to Fry and Leela to rescue Bender from the depths of torment in the bowels of Robot Hell.

^^^SPECIAL FEATURES^^^

oOo Season One Trailer.

oOo Deleted scenes from ?My Three Suns? and ?Hell is other Robots?.

***DISC THREE***

There are four episodes on this the third, and
final, disc!

1) A Flight to Remember.

The Professor rewards his crew with the trip of a lifetime on board the maiden voyage of the new intergalactic space cruiser called ?Titanic?.

Unfortunately for them, the Honorary Captain for the journey is none other the Zapp Brannigan.

What follows is a mickey-take of James Cameron?s epic film ?Titanic? as Bender falls deeply in love with the Countess de la Roca ? a rich robot travelling in first class ? and they revisit some of the scenes that made the film famous: Rose?s flying scene at the bow of the ship, Jack drawing a naked Rose and the nookey in the car are all parodied in this episode.

Zapp, in a moment of daring stupidity, changed the course of the cruise to add a little bit of excitement, resulting in a disaster of epic proportions.

2) Mars University.

The gang all head off to Mars university to deliver a package to the Professor?s office containing something that he hopes will win him a Nobel prize.

Bender discovers his old fraternity is over-run by losers and nerds and agrees to help them out and make them a little more cooler than they are.

Meanwhile Fry is determined to succeed as a college drop-out and enrols on the professor?s course. While unpacking his bags in the dormitory he meets his roommate, a hyper-intelligent monkey named Gunter and the Professor?s ticket to a Nobel prize. Gunter?s intelligence comes from his hat that the professor has given him to wear. Fry and Gunter do not hit it off and Fry is continually upstaged by the monkey, until Gunter himself decides where his future should lie?

3) When Aliens Attack.

Back in 1999 Fry delivers a pizza to a TV station broadcasting the season finale of its most popular show ?Single Female Lawyer?. He accidentally spills a soft drink onto the console effectively knocking the station off the air. Whilst no-one on earth may notice or even care what has happened, 1,0
00 light years away and 1,000 years into the future it is a different story for the residents of Omicron Percei 8?

It is Labour Day and the whole crew decide to go the beach to catch the last of the summer sun. While they are there the Omicronians turn up and threaten to destroy the entire earth unless they are shown the season finale of ?Single Female Lawyer?.

Zapp Brannigan, fresh from his victory over the Pacifists of the Ghandi Nebular is drafted in to lead the fight against the invaders. Not surprisingly, his plan fails, and it is down our hero?s to stage the season finale and secure the future of the earth.

4) Fry and the Slurm Factory.

Fry is desperate to win a competition to ?party on? with a soft drink mascot called Slurms MacKenzie . In order to win the competition he has to find the golden bottle cap hidden in a can of the world? most addictive soft drink called ?Slurm?.

Eventually, Fry finds the winning cap and takes the whole gang on a visit to the ?Slurm? factory on the planet ?Wormulon?. What follows is a gentle mickey-take of ?Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?, complete with all-singing and all-dancing Grunka-Lunkas.

All is going well on the tour until Fry, Bender and Leela make a shocking discovery about the origins of ?Slurm? ? and it is not pretty?

^^^SPECIAL FEATURES^^^

oOo A five minute featurette with Matt Groening (the creator of Futurama) and other folk involved with the creation of the series.

oOo Deleted scene from ?When Aliens Attack?

oOo Image Gallery.

***OTHER INFORMATION***

@ Each episode has it?s own commentary provided by members of the creative team, crew and voice cast.

@ You can watch it in English, French or Italian.

@ Subtitles include English for the hard of hearing, French, Italian and Dutch.

***EASTER EGGS***

Each disc has it?s own Easter Egg, accessible through the main screen. Each
egg is an image of a different film from the future: eg Planet of the Clams (You can see where that came from!)

On Disc One highlight any episode title and press RIGHT. The white car should light up. Press Enter.
On Disc Two highlight the episode title ?Hell is Other Robots?. Press down. The Slurm lorry should light up. Press Enter.
On Disc Three highlight the episode title ?Fry and the Slurm Factory?. Press down. A car should light up. Press Enter.

***CONCLUSION***

I really like Futurama, as you have probably guessed. It is so well written and is incredibly humourous. The humour is more adult than in ?The Simpsons? and where as ?The Simpsons? had to build up the knowledge base of the family before it could start letting them into increasingly strange situations, that is not the case with Futurama. Obviously so, as it is set in the future and anything can happen.

The animation is of a consistently high standard and the hand drawn elements are regularly backed up with some superb computer generated effects.

Sadly, Futurama doesn?t seem to have caught the imagination of the television viewing public as powerfully as its stablemate ?The Simpsons? has ? and, as a result, its future may well be on the bleak side.

Do yourself a favour. You may not want to splash out on purchasing a box set of this before you?ve caught on episode. Instead, see if you can catch it on Channel Four, who seem quite content of shuffling it round the schedules. Try and find it and I can assure you it?ll be a good 20 minutes or so when you do.

The extras on some of the discs are a little pointless, but I cannot get over the fact that every single episode has it's own commentary. I've only listened to a couple of them as I am not really into the whole commentary phenomenon, but those I've heard throw out little pearls of information that are really quite interesting. The animatic on Disc One is really great looking
at the work in progress and how many layers of drawings actually go into making a one scene.

***PURCHASING INFO***

Available from all high street shops. Season Two is already in the shops (and on my bookcase, expect a review if this one is well received) and Season Three is landing very soon on these green shores.

Available from Amazon priced £32.79.
Available from Play.com priced £29.99

Shop around and bag yourself a bargain ? go on? you know you want too!

Thanks again for reading ? it really is appreciated.
C :)

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