Rate and Review: "Near-Death Wish"

[Oh, that's raspberry!]

August 15, 2012: The Professor isn't happy when his parents return from the Near-Death Star! Discuss!

[Jims]

Thought it was pretty okay. It was sort of nice in a nostalgic way to see the Near Death Star again, although they seemed to rely on a lot of the same jokes. I think they must have re-watched the Cubert episode awhile ago and saw some unexplored territory in the cyber-retirement. The Matrix jokes were pretty decent, although they might have lampshaded too much how they were editorializing.

The Professor's parents were somewhat bland, though. There wasn't any sort of interesting quirk to them, other than them just being kindly elderly people. I didn't see the ending coming and I feel kind of stupid for not. Even though it was supposed to be a big revelation, it felt kind of pointless since we'd never even heard of all these characters before this episode. And they don't really foreshadow the final bit of information very well in the earlier flashbacks.

Weird how they opened the episode with Dwight at the awards and then he disappeared for the rest of it. Pretty much every time we see him (or Cubert), they're going to be used somewhere, even if it's just a B-plot.

3/5.

[Oh, that's raspberry!]

I thought it was fun and funny at times. It had some good stuff like Farnsworth sneaking around. I guessed he'd be the older boy instantly. Nothing spectacular but better than last week. 3/5.

[irvine_11]

I thought I'd start this review with a random observation - the wear and tear on Tress Macneille's voice. It might have been just me, but I thought her teen character in the beginning sounded too feminine. It sounded obvious that it was a 50-something-year-old woman was doing his voice.

That nitpick aside, I felt that this was a solid episode. I liked how we got to find out more about Farnsworth's past, even if some of it didn't make sense. The setup for Farnsworth not liking his parents was a bit weak, but the payoff was great, even if it was a little confusing. I will agree with @Jims, though, that it was a little strange to give Farnsworth a brother all of a sudden, especially since in the pilot, Leela said that Fry had only ONE living relative.

Still, I'll vote a low 5/5 (A-). Fourth best behind Free Will, Baghead and Bun.

EDIT: In A Clockwork Origin, we learn that Farnsworth was concieved through his mother having an affair with a milkman. It would have been nice to also have some light shed on that.

[ManiacalRoboKiller]

Eh I was REALY excited for this episode and was extremely let down...it was funny the Farnsworth in bath tub, Farnsworth as the phantom, and Farnsworth sneaking around the office...but the actual story was pretty boring....and the Prof. parents had no quirks to them. They just seemed like generic elderly people they had no quirks. Also the story about the brother and parents having no time with him was contrived and confusing overall a 3/5

[Captain_Smiley]

So wait. The Professor has a younger brother?

[D DEBBS]

So meh that I fell asleep and did not know how it ended.

[irvine_11]

So meh that I fell asleep and did not know how it ended.

At least we didn't have a naked Leela, though, right?

[TriforceBun]

Pretty good. I was hoping Farnsworth's parents would've been a little more memorable in terms of personality (or at least looked like ridiculously wrinkled old fossils), but they were still likable enough and I enjoyed their relationship with Fry. The naked professor jokes never fail to amuse me, and the visuals involved in the Near-Death Star were rather spectacular. But plot wise, the twist didn't really work as well as some past revelations, due to the pretty glaring inconsistency of Farnsworth remembering growing up on a farm earlier in the show.

4/5

[Shaunbadia]

I don't know how I feel about this episode, it was enjoyable...the ending was sweet. But I dunno, something seemed off about it...

Summary:
The opening with the awards ceremony was kinda stupid and the revelation about Professor's parents being alive seemed waaaay to casual.
I enjoyed Hermes having his little moments with Bender and Zoidberg (Sort of a nice continuity nod)
Leela being turned on by Fry's confidence was...sorta uneeded, it's amusing when Fry spurns her advances but it just feels like they need to keep reminding us that they're together. I know that might seem odd, considering how on board I was with them being in bed together last week, but there was a bit of shipper shock value in that instance. Also, I wonder which of the writers hated The Matrix so much that they gave Leela that speech.
Leela and Amy watching the Professor sneak around was funny and the whole visual of Fry, Bender and Leela falling into the virtual home was a cool visual.
The funniest moments of the episode were Professor saying that he came down with a case of "I don't give a crap", The Professor standing up in the tub and The Professor's parents little exchange of "How can I put this delicately?"/"He was a crazy ass nut job!".
Other good moments included Fry cutting Bender off, The robot guard being star struck "That's Philip J. Fry", "It's 40% safe", The old guy with the TV signal in his eyeballs and "That is one crazy uncircumcised old man".

Not a complete clunker, but not 100% gold.......I guess this episode was 40% good......or in my usual grading terms 3/5.

[Lionheart]

Another 3/5 episode for me, but unlike other episodes this season, i liked the beginning more than the end

[cloneasaurus]

this episode was really.... boring. i couldn't care less about the professor's family and there were barely any good jokes. ok this review sounds a bit d'ohmer-ish so i'll just end it here: 2.5/5 (harsh 2/5 in poll)

[Doh]

I've been meaning to review an episode of the new Futurama run for ages, but have never got around to doing it yet. So here's my two tuppences on this one.
When I first heard of this episode, I knew nothing more then "The Professor's parents are on the Near-Death Star". From this alone, I judged that it wouldn't be anything great, as I couldn't think of any where else the writers could go apart from a few cliche old people jokes. Not only this, but they were also doing the risky task of revisiting a classic one-time location from the show, which can often end in disaster (just look what happened to the Space Bee Hive in Holiday Spectacular ).

However, I think everything was pulled off great! Yes, the Near-Death Star came with some revisited jokes, but they came across to me more like callbacks as opposed to "we don't have anything new so we'll just leech off a past episode". It also didn't take up the majority of the episode either, which was also something I wasn't expecting . The animation (both on the backgrounds and characters) was great, and I found myself pausing at times just to take screen captures :P. Something I've really grown to appreciate in television shows lately (although I always have done to an extent) is the background score, and that was a lot of fun in this one (such as in the scene with the Professor sneaking around Planet Express). As for the storyline, in had me hooked from beginning to end, and I really didn't see the twist coming (and it's great when that happens!). I was also beginning to get reminded of '"Grandpa vs. Sexual Inadequacy' at the end when they go back to the old dilapidated farmhouse at the end

So yeah, 5/5 and probably my favourite episode of this run so far!

this review sounds a bit d'ohmer-ish

As, asides from the occasional lurking, I haven't posted on here in a long time, I might as well ask now - Is D'ohmer still active here?

[Handsome B. Wonderful]

He posted a blog saying why he isn't, but other than that, no.

[jbauer]

Gotta hand it to the writers. Nice job with this one.

It really went into the meat of the story without taking detours. Fry took charge, for a change, and both Bender and Leela shined in peripheral supporting roles.

This was Farnsworth's hour. Even though the nudity angle is somewhat worn, I did enjoy the visual reversal after Leela's bubble bath solution. Furthermore, this is exactly how I imagined Farnsworth's parents. Kudos to Cohen, Horsted and whoever else pitched ideas for these two. A perfect mismatch for Farnsworth's usual behavior.

Even though the idea of a Floyd Farnsworth feels tacked-on, the episode covers that as well, with a clever joke. I still hope to see that character in the future.

I loved revisiting the Near Death Star (and Leela's Matrix references were pretty nice, which makes me figure that the original Patric Verrone episode was written before that movie came out).

Animation-wise, this was outstanding, especially the Near Death Star sequences!

Lance Kramer has done some terrific Simpsons work since that show moved to HD, but I'll be the first to say the man should consider a permanent directing office on the Rough Draft stable. There were other Simpsons-turned-Futurama directors in the past (Rich Moore, Jeffrey Lynch, Gregg Vanzo, Carlos Baeza, Susie Dietter, and Swinton Scott), who've done the same move, but quite honestly, Kramer was by far the best one in making this transition!

4/5 - not quite the best show of the season, but still terrific!

Season 7 (production-wise) is turning out to be outstanding. And to think David Cohen said they were running out of ideas on the season 6 commentary tracks.

[Alex_Of_Darkness]

Before I saw the episode, I tought it would be a good one and I was right. The idea of bring the Professor Farnsworth parents was really good and I like it. I give a 3,75/5 to this episode or a 4 in the poll.