#damn I LOVE fry and leela analysis even if a cant write

[ladybender]

I just watched beast with a billion backs for the first time and i was just wondering if there's any general fandom opinion on why fry was so quick to jump into other relationships and forget about leela right from the start of it?

i’m so sorry i’m only responding to this ask now… i was crafting the perfect response for days, because this topic rocks and i have so much to say, and then life got weird, and then i forgot… but now I’m here nonny, and this ask will get ANSWERED

Let me just start by saying, I have one solid hot take for this movie, but it wasn’t first formulated by me, but by my very fav fic author The Sophisticated Shut In, a longish time ago. i’m putting it together again from scratch and memory, so maybe now it belongs to a mix of the both of us? idk. It was her big brain that shock me into belief tho so she should get credit too. That said, let’s start!

So! a month had passed between BBS and BWABB. during this time Fry and Leela most likely didn’t talk much. Leela was mourning the death of Lars and she needed time to sort out all of her emotions (MANY of which are related to Fry). So, she does what most would do when things change drastically and you feel unbalanced, you wish for things to go momentarily “back to normal” just to have some stability and time to think.

But! if Fry and Leela have a weakness, is that they are so terrible at communicating. so while Leela’s seemingly pretending everything that happened actually never happened, Fry doesn’t understand why Leela is leaving him out of her life and is not talking to him. 

I’m gonna take a big step back here. after the opera, Fry most likely left it up to Leela to decide what she wanted to do with their relationship. the opera itself is the last big grand gesture Fry made in the show. after that, he thought he has done everything he could, and pretty successfully told Leela what he felt in a way she understood. So he stood still, giving Leela the chance to step forward. I’m never sure what really happens here, but they must have lost the moment somehow, because Fry's waiting for Leela to make a move and tell him how she feels, and Leela's waiting for fry to maybe prove that he meant it (don’t hate on her, she is basically going the equivalent of “but do you like me, like me?” in this moment and tbh i relate to that level of deep insecurity so much). The result on this: they got stuck.

Now, idk if that gap between TDHAIP and BBS really was 3 years long, that’s a bit to much imo, but if it really was it would make sense (in a sad, frustrating way) why Leela all but jumped into Lars’s arms, and Fry made those drastic and dramatic decisions like, in this order: leaving the future, staying in the past, leaving the past, pretending to be someone else for years, catfishing Leela, not telling anyone he’s dying and instead lying some more, “i’ll only tell the truth in the form of a video-confession at my own funeral” (I mean, I love the guy, but he made some questionable choices. i can understand everything and cry forever if you think it has been 3 + 12 + 2ish years total since he wrote the opera for Leela with no response).

Now, back to BWABB. Leela in ignoring Fry, with all the best intention in the world, but *surprise*, it turns out that it wasn’t a wise move (who would have thought!!), because now Fry is acting out of the ordinary and it confuses Leela more. and instead of saying "calm down mayhaps, i don’t hate you you big baby, i just need to think”, she goes ahead and only indulges him when they are with the others, playing along with the ‘everything is fine’ facade, but when it’s just the two of them and he needs her help (as a friend), she shuts down or lashes out at him. I mean look at this shit

She is outright telling him to leave!!! red flag

Fry, on his end, doesn’t really know what Leela is going through (bc talking? I don’t know her), so if you look at it in his POV it’s pretty depressing. Leela was about to marry Lars, the man she said she loved and was the only one for her, he thought that meant things would change between them now. But as it turns out, things were just the same after. until they turned worse than ever.

Just think about Fry and Leela most representative quote: “you are lonely and I am lonely, but together we are lonely together.” This is not true anymore in this movie. For the first time they are lonely apart. And really, their themes are all about that. For Leela it’s isolation, specifically. She is constantly isolating herself (at Amy’s wedding, for example. Or how she’s the only one not to “love the tentacle” AND to not want to go to heaven and be with Yivo. The only one. In the entire universe. immovable object).

As a contrast, Fry’s loneliness is unbarable to him, and is expressed in this constant and desperate need to have something that will return his love (this is where both his relationships with Colleen and Yivo fit. unstoppable force lmao)

Not but really, Fry’s relationships are so rushed, and clearly just an attempts to push his loneliness in a corner. Fry even put up with an open relationship (something he visibly didn’t want) to stay with Colleen. he was pretty desperate. This relationship with her is also a regression for fry - the way he didn’t want to break up with Colleen resembles a lot Michelle. but that isn’t even the worst of the two because then you look at Yivo, and I cannot even begin to laugh at how big of a Leela mirror shklim is (but I’ll get to that later). All I have to say about Yivo and Fry’s relationship is contained in this quote:

Fry says “it loves me” before he says “i love it”. That kinda says it all.

And finally let’s talk about mirror and color coding bc I thrive for that shit!!

So I think I can safely say Fry is represented by orange and Leela is represented by purple. nothing new under the sun. and those colors play a major role in this movie!! And they are about as subtle as you might think lmao

First let’s take a look at Colleen:

She is literally always wearing purple??? (only when she is in her cop uniform she isn’t). And if you think that’s not enough to prove my point look at this

I KNOW,, what the hell, right?!!

the animator coloring this, probably: “just a little bit of purple to show Fry is trying to get over Leela and failing big time *drops whole palette of purple into the frame* WOOPSY”

PLUS (and here comes the most subtle but BLATANT thing this movie has done so far) look at what Fry sees in the montage after he and Colleen break up

Fry just sees generic couples being happy and kissing!! No colleen resembling anything! Fry is not missing her, he’s missing something else 👀👀👀. all the women in this are wearing purple…. the guy making out with his psychiatrist is one of Leela’s ex-lovers……… the two characters fighting and then making up are orange and purple…..??? I JUST DON’T KNOW WHO COULD IT BE!

and this is not even touching the whole Yivo business. Can I talk about Yivo , I’ve been dying to talk about Yivo with you all day! One eye,? check. purple? check. tentacles??? Check. fry finding shklim after wondering alone in a strange new world, and the lonely monster will help him feel less alone??! CHECK!

I know the movies are weird in a shippy pov (took me so long to understand what the fuck was going on in Bender’s Game from a freela prospective, and i dont even know for sure if i have it right lmao) but the movies make a lot more sense if you look at them as Leela realizing her own feelings for Fry in BBS, and the next three films as her dealing with that until finally!!!!