DVD Review: Futurama - Bender's Big Score

Fans can now rejoice at the return of their favorite 31st-century delivery team with this straight-to-DVD feature length ‘Bender’s Big Score’ which right’s Fox’s wrong of canceling ‘Futurama’ in 2003.

And much like ‘The Family Guy’, strong sales of the season boxsets and strong ratings for the reruns (on Adult Swim) spawned the resurrection. Although not a full-blown return to television like many had hoped, this first straight-to-DVD movie of four marks a joyous occasion regardless. Apparently, sixteen episodes were ordered for Comedy Central with the decision in the middle of production to package four episodes of the sixteen together seamlessly into four different features with the episodes still being presented separately on Comedy Central with extended cuts. Despite the rather peculiar return, the good news is that none of the behind-the-scenes hogwash is apparent on screen.All the notable voice and writing talent is back and in top form. For those unfamiliar with the show, I’ll assume you had some critical life and death issue to take care of every Sunday night from 1999 to 2003 (and if you didn’t…please exit this review right now and check out our archived ‘Full House’ reviews) and be nice and offer a broad overview of the series’ plot. ‘Futurama’ follows the misadventures of Fry (Billy West), a naïve not-too-bright (or is he smarter than he lets on?...ehh, nah) pizza delivery boy sap whose life crumbles around him on the eve of December 31, 1999 where he then manages to accidentally freeze himself in cryogenic/suspended animation machine. Waking up 3,000 years later, destiny rears its ugly head when he finds out his ‘life assignment’ is to be a delivery boy. Picking up some new friends Leela (Katey Sagal), a tough-as-nails, one-eyed chick along with Bender (John Di Maggio), a selfish, lazy smartarse robot, he locates his great, great, great, etc. nephew Professor Farnsworth (West Again) who runs an intergalactic delivery service. Also working for Farnsworth is the good-natured, but unfortunately lobster-shaped Dr. Zoidberg (West…again), the pencil-pushing Jamaican Hermes (Phil LaMarr) and Amy Wong (Lauren Tom), the cute-as-a-button Chinese gal pal – and so an oddball team of cohorts is born with many adventures ahead of them….Making its debut in 1999, ‘Futurama’ was immediately overshadowed by creator Matt Groening’s much more popular baby ‘The Simpsons’. While the show did well initially, it never matched the more broad audience that ‘The Simpsons’ attracted and that must have proved disappointing to Fox. Losing confidence in the show, Fox allowed constant interruptions and gaps in its schedule (i.e. pulling it due to Football) which led to even more disappointing ratings. While the irreverent humor matches ‘The Simpsons’, the sci-fi slant proved too esoteric for most viewers and Fox pulled the plug after four years. But vindication is ours! This 88-minute feature indeed carries on all the characters of the series (if they do somewhat tip-toe around events in the at-the-time series finale ‘The Devil’s Hands are Idle Playthings’ which might prove somewhat disappointing for fans expecting a complete acknowledgement of previous episodes) and the filmmakers were smart enough to give ‘Futurama’ fans what they want – a narrative surrounding Bender, the Fry/Leela love story and scenarios that allow all the series favorites to make a visit from Hedonisticbot to Zapp Brannigan. To go into detail about the plot would be to spoil surprises as much like ‘The Simpsons’, ‘Futurama’ will shoot off into a few different directions before falling upon the main thread of the pic and seeing how these scenes play out is half the fun. I will say that besides the aforementioned hints of what to expect, a page is also taken from the Emmy-winning episode ‘Roswell that Ends Well’ that include a few cool twists involving time travel. The flick moves at a surprisingly brisk pace considering all previous stories from the ‘Futurama’ universe topped out at 23 minutes and in my opinion works as well, if not better, than its recent animated brethren ‘The Simpsons Movie’. That being said, I can’t say the feature as a constant whole matches the series best – Bender, with an annoying plot development involving his character, gets most of his personality taken away for the majority of the running time and the songs, once a series highlight, didn’t quite work for me this time despite the presence of singing cameos from Mark Hamill and Coolio. This type of animation content is always hit-and-miss, though, and this feature still carries on the series tradition of much more hits than misses. This straight-to-DVD flick is presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen ratio and is enhanced for widescreen televisions. I got a screening copy that will only improve by street date but the sharp, vibrant colors were still in fine effect. The audio is presented with a 5.1 Dolby Digital track that works well enough with clear dialogue and a few sporadic surround f/x.Ample special features start off with an audio commentary from Matt Groening, David X. Cohen, Billy West, Dwayne Carey-Hill, Claudia Katz, John DiMaggio, Phil LaMarr and Ken Keeler. Whew, with that many people involved, y’know a good time is bound to be had…and it is. Everyone is excited to be back and happy to talk about their favorite series and the go into detail about the cancellation of the show, the making of the pic and future plans. Good stuff and never a dry moment. ‘Futurama Returns!’ is a live comic-book reading by the full cast. ‘Deleted Scenes’ provides three scenes in storyboard form. ‘Everybody Loves Hypnotoad’ is….well, proceed at your own risk! The animated promo for ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ is here with video commentary from Al Gore, Matt Groening and David X. Cohen. ‘Bite My Shiny Metal X’ is a funny addition that shows the creators taking part in a math lecture, and we also get an original draft of the screenplay, 3D Models/Turnarounds, New Character/Design sketches and the original 5-minute Comic-con promo. Some good stuff in here, meatbags!Well, this continuation definitely becomes a can’t miss for fans and provides a good rental for curious newbies. As long as your expectations are in check, I think everybody will be more than happy with this consistently funny flick with three more features that promise to carry on the story. One of my favorite shows when it aired, it’s great to have these characters back!Futurama - Bender's Big Score is now available at Amazon. As of yet, there is not a release date for the UK. Visit the DVD database for more information.