#popplers

[texasthrillbilly]

[irlfuturama]

20oz Fishy Joe's tumbler with plastic straw available on Etsy!

[ask-ghostly-fifteen]

I don’t care if the snack is an external fetus. It’s the same thing as eating eggs. Especially in a world where every animal is anthropomorphic.

[dontbemeanmrbubz]

Hold on, an ORANGUTAN named LEELA???

Is this a threat?

[thesoftboiledegg]

The promotion around "That's Amorte" keeps implying that the spaghetti is made from something like ground-up aliens. I hope there's more to it because Futurama already did that with the popplers.

[chororine]

[deskmanic]

Does anyone else feel like they made Hulu-era Leela really dumb?

[basicmom]

Futurama popplers episode

[violentdevotion]

alhamdulillah i would survive sooo many sitcom plotlines purely because the inciting incident wasn't halal and i wasn't involved

[chaifootsteps]

Got any favorite fictional food(s) you lowkey wish to eat irl someday?

The stew from Wind in the Willows that contains nine animals.

Butterbeer

Flanders' hot chocolate

The biscuit-cookie things from Scamper the Penguin. They're infamous for making the ten people who've actually seen this movie crave Nilla wafers.

Skyrim sweet rolls

The ratatouille from Ratatouille.

Creme de la Creme a la Edgar, sans the dangerous amount of sleeping pills.

The marmalade roll from Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

The pizza from All Dogs go to Heaven

The slime-fed wild boar from Das Bus.

Popplers

Green eggs and ham. I've always imagined it tasted like eggs + ham infused with the way freshly cut grass smells.

Anything from Redwall, mostly to test my theory that it's not actually that good.

The leg cooked in clay from Hannibal

The Pale Man's grapes

The cake from Death Note

The burgers from Bob's Burgers

The ultimate sandwich from Adventure Time

Anything from any Ghibli movie.

There are probably a lot more. I love food, fictional or otherwise.

[nowhereelsetopost]

Food from TV and movies that I really want to eat!!!!! Part 4 (Part 1) - Crudités from Futurama - Popplers from Futurama - Donut from The Simpsons - Cheese from Tom & Jerry - Spaghetti from IASIP - Lemon Cakes from Game Of Thrones - Iced Buns from Brave - Pancakes from Matilda - Bean Bun from Spirited Away - Sushi from Madagascar

[itsjunetime]

I made some improvements to my little terminal pdf viewer, tdf (find it here!), and made it significantly faster. Specifically, I've made it much faster at rendering entire documents in the background (though the time that it takes to show the first page is only slightly improved, if at all; that still could probably take some work, though I'm not quite certain what would be the best move there). Peep the attached image for exactly how much faster (render_first_page is a benchmark that checks how much time it took to render the very first page, and render_full is how much time it takes to render the entire document. these are being compared against the performance before my recent changes).

It's been pretty interesting to work on this - specifically, I'm using c libraries (poppler & cairo, specifically) to render the PDFs, but that means that a lot of easy-to-use rust parallelism features aren't available to me, so I've had to read a bunch of c source code and try out different models of parallelism to get something that works reliably there while also improving performance noticeably and remaining safe (though I did have to use a bit of unsafe code to get there).

There have also been small improvements in other areas, such as preventing ratatui_image from doing image resizing, switching to flume for channels, disabling anti-aliasing in cairo's rendering, and a few more things.

If anyone would be interested in a full blog post on this, let me know! I think it would be interesting to write, but might not be very worth-it if nobody cares to read it lol.

[thesoftboiledegg]

I wasn't sure what to make of "That's Amorte" before it aired. When signs pointed toward "the spaghetti comes from aliens," I wondered if we had a rehash of Futurama's "The Problem with Poppers," where the crew finds a delicious treat on a planet only to learn that the "popplers" are underdeveloped alien offspring.

Rick and Morty's take on Soylent Green also seemed likely. Everyone knows the twist: Soylent Green is people! A dark sci-fi concept like that could be a ripe parody for this series.

However, "That's Amorte" adapted a concept that other shows have referenced a thousand times and took a right turn. No one's angry at the humans for eating their suicide victims: in fact, they love the spaghetti and turn it into a corporate product.

This is an obvious shot at capitalism and how companies will destroy the environment, brutally slaughter animals and turn cities into concrete wastelands just to make a buck. And I mean--chowing down on this spaghetti isn't that different from eating meat. I'm an omnivore, but I kept thinking that at least these pasta producers chose to die.

The suicide element gave this episode a poignant touch instead of turning it into an edgelord slog where the humanoids kill people and throw them in a meat grinder. Admittedly, the clones leaned in that direction, and that scene also shows how Rick struggles to understand the world outside himself. He doesn't react when the clones kill each other, but one of his daughters is a clone, and he'd be horrified if anything happened to her.

On its own, "That's Amorte" is a great episode. However, when you take the whole series into account, the plot retreads the same old Morty narrative: Morty tries to do the right thing, it backfires, Rick dodges responsibility while antagonizing Morty to be petty, Rick gets stuck fixing everything and Morty tries to pretend it never happened.

I keep waiting for something good to happen to Morty. Rick has plenty of episodes where he makes positive changes: going to therapy ("Analyze Piss," "Air Force Wong"), improving his relationship with Jerry ("Final DeSmithation," "The Jerrick Trap"), trying to do right by Beth ("Bethic Twinstinct"), being kinder to Morty ("Full Meta Jackrick"), etc.

Season five doesn't emphasize his character development as much, but plenty of scenes show how much he's changing. Even season four has moments where he's gentler.

Rick's being his petty season-two self in "That's Amorte," but even here, he does the right thing by showing the world exactly what--and who--they're eating. In earlier seasons, he would've done that just to be an asshole. Here, I don't think that he was trying to torment people as much as he just knew that this spaghetti shitshow had to end.

Same with the spaghetti itself. He didn't feed it to the Smiths, then show them the dead body just to torture them. I think he genuinely wanted to share the spaghetti because it was delicious, but he also figured that they don't want to know where it comes from.

On a similar note, I enjoyed Rick's moments of physical gentleness. Great animation detail.

So Rick gets a little character development and saves the day again, and Morty gets...nothing. Just a rehash of old storylines. "Mortynight Run" in particular has almost the same plot, beat-for-beat.

"That's Amorte" touched on Morty's depression and his family's coldness toward him but didn't go further than that. Morty keeps cycling through the same issues with no resolution. He blows up in one episode, then shuts down the next. His attempts to do the right thing go astray. When's this kid going to catch a break?

Again, this episode isn't bad. It's funny, original and well-written and has a lot to say about ethics and capitalism. Still, I don't understand why reviews on other sites keep emphasizing Morty's character development because I didn't see much.

I will say that everyone's horror at where the spaghetti comes from was a great takedown of the meat industry. Everyone loves sausage, but nobody wants to see how it's made!

Still, next time we get a Morty episode, I hope that it says more about him and less about the world outside his cartoon.

[its-a-hare-pom-pom]

He’s a 10 but he doesn’t pop a Poppler in his mouth when he comes to Fishy Joe’s 🙄

[mr-imagin8ion]

A project 3000 years in the making: every episode of Futurama ranked in increasing order of sci-fi, from earthiest to spaciest

Tier 10: Insulting - These episodes are hardly even sci-fi. They just address realistic situations in a hardly even futuristic setting.

148. Stench and Stenchibility - The earthiest episode. It doesn't even feel like a Futurama. It feels like a "King of the Hill" that wasn't selling, so the script people crossed out the name "Dale" and replaced it with "Zoidberg".

147. Three Hundred Big Boys

146. The Luck of the Fryish - I hate the flashback episodes. They defeat the purpose of the show.

145. How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back

144. A Leela of Her Own

143. Zapp Gets Cancelled

142. I, Roommate

Tier 9: Antiquated - These episodes are better at employing 4th-millennium technology, but their plots are still unmistakably 3rd-millennium.

141. That's Lobstertainment!

140. Naturama - It doesn't even use technology. The only reason it isn't completely below the scale whatsoever is that it's implied the narrator is from Omicron Persei 8.

139. Future Stock

138. The 30% Iron Chef

137. Cuteness Overlord

136. The Silence of the Clamps

135. Attack of the Killer App

134. Bender Should Not Be Allowed on Television

Tier 8: Earthy - While incredibly down-to-earth, these episodes do have one pretty important bit that makes them qualify as sci-fi, like a robot Santa or a head transplant.

133. Jurassic Bark

132. Yo Leela Leela - It is nearly my favorite episode, no doubt there - but let's face it. Change a few things, and it could easily happen in this era.

131. Raging Bender

130. Rage Against the Vaccine

129. Xmas Story

128. The Route of All Evil - It's the 31st century, but there are still newspapers????

127. The Impossible Stream

126. Put Your Head on My Shoulders

125. Fry and the Slurm Factory

Tier 7: Humble - These stories are a little futuristic, but they still feel plain for their day.

124. Bender Gets Made

123. Cold Warriors

122. Saturday Morning Fun Pit - Mostly grounded in the 1980s, but spared from a lower tier because it does have clones and lasers and the like.

121. The Cyber House Rules

120. Bendless Love

119. Near-Death Wish - The expensive panoramic bits were pretty epic, however.

118. The One Amigo

117. Attack of the Clothes

116. The Lesser of Two Evils

115. 31st Century Fox

Tier 6: Allegorical - These episodes use future crap as a metaphorical stand-in for present crap.

114. Bend Her

113. Into the Wild Green Yonder

112. Planet Espresso

111. A Big Piece of Garbage

110. Proposition Infinity

109. The Cryonic Woman

108. Mars University

107. The Futurama Mystery Liberry - Futurama is forgetting what Futurama is.

106. Bendin' in the Wind

105. Love's Labours Lost in Space

104. A Head in the Polls

103. Children of a Lesser Bog

102. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular

101. Quids Game

100. A Flight to Remember

99. Fun on a Bun

98. Lethal Inspection

97. The Temp

Tier 5: Type-Zero - Pretty standard sci-fi plots, unremarkable in their remarkability.

96. Anthology of Interest I

95. A Pharaoh to Remember

94. Beauty and the Bug

93. The Problem with Popplers

92. T.: The Terrestrial

91. Viva Mars Vegas

90. The Inhuman Torch

89. Amazon Women in the Mood

88. The Deep South

87. The Mutants Are Revolting

86. One is Silicon and the Other Gold

85. A Fishful of Dollars

84. Where No Fan Has Gone Before

83. Leela's Homeworld

Tier 4: Techie - Here's where it gets fun. These are the first plots to get out of this world. (As a bonus, we've hit the median point!)

82. The Tip of the Zoidberg

81. Fry and Leela's Big Fling

80. That Darn Katz!

79. Murder on the Planet Express

78. When Aliens Attack

77. The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings

76. Space Pilot 3000

75. A Clone of My Own

74. The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz

73. Where the Buggalo Roam

72. The Beast with a Billion Backs

71. How The West Was 1010001

70. Brannigan, Begin Again

69. The Farnsworth Parabox

68. A Taste of Freedom

67. Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love?

66. Less than Hero

65. Spanish Fry

64. The Sting

63. The Bots and the Bees

62. Meanwhile

61. Related to Items You've Viewed - It feels like it should be a tier-6, but just isn't. There is no mathematical explanation for this.

60. The Butterjunk Effect

Tier 3: Otherworldly: The epitome of Futurama. These have the ideal blend of science and fiction.

59. Fry Am Fry Is the Egg Man - Grammar, Stanley.

58. Parasites Regained

57. The Prince and the Product

56. Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch

55. Mother's Day

54. The Series Has Landed

53. Decision 3012

52. Hell Is Other Robots

51. A Tale of Two Santas

50. Anthology of Interest II

49. Bender's Game

48. Insane in the Mainframe

47. In-A-Gadda-Da-Leela

46. War Is the H-Word

45. I Know What You Did Next Xmas - A ponderance: does this episode nullify "The Late Philip J. Fry", now that they can go back in time the easy way?

44. Crimes of the Hot

Tier 2: Spacey - Mind-bending and heart-warping, these shows are good enough to make you (very, very temporarily) stop wishing Matt Groening would die.

43. A Farewell to Arms

42. Parasites Lost

41. Otherwise

40. Game of Tones

39. Overclockwise

38. Zapp Dingbat

37. Godfellas

36. The Thief of Baghead

35. Free Will Hunting

34. My Three Suns

33. Leela and the Genestalk - Fun side note: At first, it didn't used to occur to me that this episode was pronounced "JEEN-stalk". I'd been pronouncing it "JEN-ə-stalk", like the way it's pronounced in words like genetic, genesis, or generate.

32. The Why of Fry

31. Roswell that Ends Well

30. Calculon 2.0

29. Assie Come Home

28. Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences

27. All the Presidents' Heads

26. Forty Percent Leadbelly

25. Möbius Dick - Some episodes are ranked so low only because there are so many that rank higher than them.

24. I Second that Emotion

23. The Day the Earth Stood Stupid

22. The Duh-Vinci Code

21. Obsoletely Fabulous

20. Fear of a Bot Planet

Tier 1: Unreal - Creativity personified; these stories are chariots to the stars, moving so fast that they make the other nine tiers appear to stand still.

19. Ghost in the Machines

18. Neutopia

17. 2-D Blacktop

16. Law and Oracle

15. Love and Rocket

14. Rebirth

13. A Bicyclops Built for Two

12. I Dated a Robot

11. Bender's Big Score

10. The Six Million Dollar Mon

9. A Clockwork Origin

8. The Honking

7. Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles

6. Reincarnation

5. The Late Philip J. Fry

4. All the Way Down - Infinitely better than I expected from a Hulu episode.

3. The Prisoner of Benda - Nothing says sci-fi like inventing a whole new math equation just to give your story a proper ending.

2. Time Keeps on Slippin'

1. Benderama - The spaciest episode. Now this is what it is all about: half-sized clones and microscopic microbrewing and sensitive giants.

Other notes:

The spaciest season is season 6 (weighing in at a high tier-2), and the earthiest is season 9 (a heartbreaking tier-7).

This is intended as a ranking of the episodes in order of earthiness to spaciness, not as a ranking of my opinion on the episodes. A ranking of my opinion is over here.

Drafting this list took all night, and preparing it took all morning.