Futurama
Warning: Spoilers ahead forFuturamaseason 12, episode 8, “Otherwise.
Just likeFuturamaseason 11’s ending,“Otherwise” ends its season’s run with a high-concept finale.
Season 5’s “The Farnsworth Parabox” is hailed by many as one of thebestFuturamaepisodes.
The installment includes a rare foray into the multiverse.
It may be anoverused sci-fi trope in TV shows, butFuturamararely visits other realities.
However, “Otherwise” adds to the sitcom’s sparse tally of basing its story on other universes.
It’s an interesting writing decision but also makes the risky move of potentially retconning a beloved episode.
When the episode was first aired in 2003, this was almost definitely a last-minute visual gag.
The twist in “Otherwise” changes that.
Futurama follows the exploits of Philip J. Fry, a pizza delivery boy from 1999 who is cryogenically frozen for 1000 years. Waking up in the year 3000, Fry befriends a cyclops named Leela and a roguish robot named Bender, and the three find employment with Planet Express, an interplanetary delivery service. Their work takes them to all corners of the universe, exploring space and the future as imagined by Matt Groening and the creators of The Simpsons.
Obviously,the universe isn’t squished in the episodes that follow “The Farnsworth Parabox.
“So, the 2003 multiverse episode could be the only installment set within that universe.
If so, that world could have been permanently squished and remains that way, even now.
In other words, skipping the episode could be argued to have no impact on the show’s continuity.
That being said, the nature of a long-running TV show means it does and has happened.
However, none of those discrepancies matter anymore.
Such a get-out clause for a team of writers that are often so careful sets a risky precedent.
