The date was May 28, 1998. I was a whopping 13 years old, and a week
prior, I had just graduated from grade school, back when that was still a
thing. My family was in the house for
our noon dinner... and yes, out in the country, we call lunch “dinner” and dinner
“supper”, just so y’all know. For some inexplicable
reason, our TV was on NBC and Days of Our
Lives instead of my mother’s preferred daytime channel, CBS. (Although, to be fair, her favorite soap
opera, The Young and the Restless,
had already aired that day.) As we were
waiting for dinner to be ready, I was lounging in the living room, either minding
my own business or just being bored. (Most likely, it was the latter.) And
then, John Williams’ NBC News Special Report music abruptly cut in – the kind
of news music that just screams, “Uh oh, this can NOT be good.” And, from a pop
culture perspective, it most definitely wasn’t, as Tom Brokaw reported that
Phil Hartman had just been shot to death by his wife, who then proceeded to take
her own life.
Even more so than the death of Hartman’s SNL colleague Chris Farley just five
months earlier, Hartman’s death was a tremendous loss, even for a young lad
like myself. Growing up, I experienced
the later years of his 8-year run on SNL,
enjoying such characters and impersonations as Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer, Bill
Clinton, and Frank Sinatra. But I was even more knowledgeable with his work on The Simpsons, where he voiced the highly familiar actor Troy McClure and one of pop culture's most incompetent lawyers, Lionel Hutz. Impressed with what he added to The Simpsons, Matt Groening offered him a role on his new animated Fox series Futurama: that of 25-star general Zapp Brannigan. However, Hartman's death prevented him from ever recording any episodes, and his role was subsequently given to Billy West, who also voices Fry, Professor Farnsworth, and Dr. Zoidberg.
And so, every time I see Zapp Brannigan on Futurama, I can’t help but think of what
could have been. Now, this is not meant
as a demerit against Billy West: in fact, West’s Zapp is an
excellent version of Hartman, and the Phil-like gusto just beams through every
line. Even during tonight’s episode, I
would’ve loved to hear Hartman work such dialogue as “Zapp, you magnificent
bastard!” and “Kif, return fire… and the cake.” In tonight’s episode, Zapp provides a lot of comic energy and dimwitted confidence, as he falls passionately
in love with Leela’s mother… to Leela’s sheer disgust.
But wait, how did we get there? Well, the episode begins with a 40th
anniversary celebration for Leela’s parents, Morris and Munda, where we learn
of their collegiate back-story: at Brown University, she majored in exolinguistics
(the study of alien languages), and he was a clueless sewer surfer. But, in a scene that is reminiscent of the
disintegration of Milhouse’s parents’ marriage on The Simpsons, Munda snaps at how Morris essentially ruined her
career goals, instead forcing her into a life in “the lucrative
pot-roast-making field”. After a
wonderfully swift divorce, Munda is revved up to rejoin the dating scene. And so, during a night out at the Mos Def
Cantina, Munda’s language skills gain new life, as she manages to defuse an
intergalactic war from breaking out between our world and the Carcarons. You see, Zapp Brannigan decided to ignore the
alien translator device and speak to the Carcarons directly. However, in true
Zapp fashion, Zapp mangles the word for “congratulations” with the word for “spank
your sister with bologna”. But, Munda
steps in, speaks to the Carcarons to correct Zapp’s error, and makes things
right. Before you know it, Zapp has
hired Munda as her personal translator, and they’re madly in love. (Zapp can’t help but appreciate “the cold,
lifeless touch of her tentacle on my body”.)
Now, given what we know of Leela and Zapp’s history, the concept
of Leela being disgusted by her mom’s new beau is highly viable… and the script
kicks it up a notch by having Leela make the ultimate sacrifice: by trotting
out the lingerie, working the stripper pole (well, her mom’s pole, that is),
and thrusting herself upon Zapp at her apartment, in the hopes that Munda will
catch them in the act and break up with him. But, it backfires majorly, as Zapp
uses the opportunity to propose to Munda.
This leads to the third-act marriage ceremony on Zapp’s ship, where Zapp
uses his captain powers to officiate his own marriage. But, all falls apart when the Carcarons meet
to sign the peace treaty, but learn that Zapp had every intention of going to
war against them. Enter Morris, who
stowed away via the Planet Express ship’s sewer tank… and who manages to save
the day, and remarry with Munda, by way of his surfing skills.
Morris is responsible for the episode’s best running gag, as
he responds to life as a divorcee by becoming a ridiculously mellow
surfer. This leads to a hilarious
montage where he invites Fry and Bender to catch some of the world’s biggest
sewer waves, including halftime of the Rose Bowl, Carnival in Rio de Janiero,
and St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin. The St.
Patrick’s Day scene is priceless, as Bender steals a pot of gold from a group
of leprechauns, whom Morris manages to disintegrate into a bunch of Lucky
Charms. The joke returns with a
vengeance in the third act, when Morris surfs El Torito and IHOP. It's a simple joke, and perhaps a tired one, but leave it to the Futurama folks to find a way to energize it.
But two strong scenes and a great runner doesn't mean that the episode's entirely great. Sewer surfing notwithstanding, the sewer-life scenes on the series have always struck me as a bit one-note, and that manifests itself here tonight, too. (For example, they went to Brown University... get it? Brown University!!!) And the episode’s finale, where Morris
uses his surfing skills to operate the ship’s auxiliary controls, is awfully
forced. But, as in most episodes, we’ve
got to get back to square one somehow. That's TV Comedy 101 right there! (Although, when we ended last week's episode, Calculon was still dead... will that stick? I hope not.)
Random notes:
- Here is the link to Comedy Central’s first Futurama Live! video chat, which was broadcast on comedycentral.com immediately after tonight’s episode. It features Matt Groening, David X. Cohen, Billy West, John DiMaggio, and Maurice LaMarche.
- You get George Takei to appear as himself (or, in Futurama tradition, his disembodied head), and he only utters three words? Well, it’s better than nothing, I guess. (I want to believe that the reduced budget for the show’s Comedy Central return is responsible for the lack of guest voices.)
- Bender lost two straight hands – his actual hands – to The Borax Kid: “I don’t really have any use for these, but you can’t have them back.”
- I loved Zapp’s request to have Kif re-enact the Twilight Zone episode “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” on the ship’s wing.
- And now, enjoy the comedic stylings of Nixon & Agnew!!!
- Next week: Futurama takes on performance-enhancing drugs. Comedy Central already set a high bar with South Park’s “Up the Down Steroid”, so Fry and his buddies had better BRING IT. :-)
- But wait, there's more: If you enjoy animated TV series (and given you're reading this, you just might, be sure to join us this Sunday night, when we'll start covering the [adult swim] series Black Dynamite!!!
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