A Pharaoh to Remember
From Futurama Wiki
| Futurama Episode Guide | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Episode Title | A Pharaoh to Remember | Philip J. Fry | Billy West |
| Episode Number | 49 | Bender B. Rodriguez | John DiMaggio |
| Production Number | 3acv17 | Turanga Leela | Katey Sagal |
| Original Airdate | March 10, 2002 | Professor H. Farnsworth | Billy West |
| Intro Caption | Psst... Big Party at Your House After the Show | Hermes Conrad | Phil LaMarr |
| Intro Promotion | Amy Wong | Lauren Tom | |
| Intro Cartoon | Dr. J.A. Zoidberg | Billy West | |
| Script | Ron Weiner | Special Guests | |
| Director | Mark Ervin | Also Starring | Maurice LaMarche |
| Storyboard | Guest Starring | Tress MacNeille, David Herman | |
| Animation | 3D Animation | ||
| Page Navigation | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| A Leela of Her Own | ← Previous Episode | Next Episode → | Anthology of Interest II |
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Bender grows concerned that he will be doomed to obscurity, and sets off to rectify the situation. One of these schemes includes spraying graffiti on the side of a building, saying "Bender Lives Large And Kicks Butt." The building is demolished, and his phrase is reduced to "Bender Licks Butt". Bender returns the office to find out that the crew had staged a "funeral" for him, but it ends badly. The Professor assigns the crew a new mission: deliver a giant sandstone block to the planet Osiris IV.
Upon their arrival, they find a desert world whose society is modeled after ancient Egypt and who they claim introduced interstellar travel to them. The crew is enslaved to work on the building of the funeral pyramid of Pharaoh Hermenthotip. Their job is to work alongside the other slaves, moving heavy stone blocks manually. Bender, impressed by the Osirin Pharaohs' method of ensuring their place in history, becomes a workaholic, working so fast the slavedrivers can't even keep up with him.
Pharaoh Hermenthotip arrives to inspect his newly completed pyramid, and as he was about to set everyone free, he is killed when the nose falls off a giant statue of himself. The priests entomb Hermenthotip, and the next day they consult their wall of prophecy to select the new pharaoh. While the slaves partied over their few hours of freedom, Bender sneaks out and makes a few surreptitious modifications to the wall, therefore, declaring him the new pharaoh.
Newly crowned Pharaoh Bender demands a statue of himself, one billion cubits tall, so that he will be remembered forever. Construction proceeds, with Bender quickly establishing himself as an excessively dictatorial and ruthless pharaoh, and the massive statue is soon completed. Nonetheless, when it is unveiled, Pharaoh Bender announces that he is displeased with it, and wants it to be torn down and rebuilt. The high priests, disgusted and tired with Bender, wrap him for burial, and toss him into the tomb, along with Fry and Leela at Bender's request.
Fry and Leela want to blast their way out using the explosive Schnapps from the tomb's distillery; but Bender objects, worried that he won't be remembered if the statue is destroyed. Fry and Leela make a show of not remembering Bender, and he relents. After blasting a crack in the statue's foot, Fry, Leela, and Bender escape and run back to the ship. As the ship departs from Osiris IV, the statue explodes in a gigantic fireball. Bender is distraught, but Leela consoles him with the knowledge that his reign of terror will be remembered longer than any statue. Satisfied, Bender tells the crew to set course for Earth. As the ship approaches an Earth-like planet, Bender begins to laugh evilly. Leela points out that the planet isn't Earth and Bender stops laughing. The ship flies away from the planet, ostensibly towards Earth.
[edit] Continuity
[edit] Debuts
[edit] Reappearances
- The Australian Man who is seen as a slave for the Pharaoh Hermenthotip in this episode is also seen as a slave to Spa 5 in episode How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back.
[edit] Foreshadowing
[edit] Gadgets and Inventions
[edit] Quotes
Hermenthotip: And now, I have a grand announcement. In honour of your achievement, you're all hereby--
[The nose falls off the tomb and crushes him. The slaves gasp.]
Bender: (screaming) No!
[He runs forward and lifts the nose away from the Pharaoh.]
Hermenthotip: (hoarse) Tell the slaves they can all go--
Bender: Go faster? I told them but they're so damn lazy.
Hermenthotip: (hoarse) No. I mean they are all free--
Bender: Free-loading off you? I agree.
Hermenthotip: (hoarse) No, I--
[He dies. The slave driver puts a sheet over his body.]
Osiran: Pharaoh Hermenthotip is dead.
Bender: (crying) He's whippin' angels now.
[edit] References
- The title references the 1957 film An Affair to Remember.
- The wall message "Bender Lives Large and Kicks Butt" being turned into "Bender Licks Butt" is a parody of the fold-in joke pages seen at the end of every issue of MAD Magazine.
- At Bender's mock funeral, Zoidberg sings Danny Boy.
- Fry says "I've got a bad feeling about this", a quote from Star Wars which has passed into common usage.
- Osiris IV is named after the primary deity of the ancient Egyptian pantheon, Osirus. The man with the bird face is similar in appearance to the ancient Egyptian deity of scribes, Thoth. The guards look similar to the deity that guards the Dead in the ancient Egyptian afterlife, Anubis. The Prophet-Reader is also wearing the combined pharaohonic crown of Upper and Lower Egypt.[1]
- The Osirians mention being taught space travel and pyramid building by Earth's Egyptians, a role reversing reference to the Erich von Daniken books which introduced a plethora of circumstantial evidence to suggest that the Egyptians, and other ancient civilizations, had been aided in their progress by extraterrestrials. Daniken admits to having fabricated one piece of evidence.[2]
- The comedians Abbot and Costello are mentioned directly; their movie Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy references horror movies that concern archaeological digs in Egypt and their discoveries, and the modern myths of Pharaoh's curses and the like.
- Hamenthotep's statue's nose falling off references the missing extremities and protruberances of innumerable statuary, notably the Great Sphinx of Giza.
- At the end of Hamenthotep's funeral, the attendees are told, "You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here," a reference to old live show routines.
- The singer at the previous Pharaoh's funeral is a parody of Elton John, renowned at the height of his career in the 1970s for a great variety of elaborate stage costumes; he parodies the Elton John / Bernie Taupin songs "Daniel", "Benny and the Jets" and "Crocodile Rock", and spoofs the version of "Candle in the Wind", which he reworked and sang especially for the funeral of English Princess Diana.
- The Liberty Meadows Slave Quarters references similarly ironically euphemistic names used for propaganda purposes.[3]
- One of the slave masters is wearing a shirt upon which is written, "What would Pharaoh do?" which references the "What would Jesus do?" line of T-shirts and bumper stickers.
- The coronation ceremony of the new Pharaoh is a parody of the Egyptian-themed nighttime performance at the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas.
- Benders entrance, after being named Pharaoh, is a reference to the tour act by the then-standup comedian Steve Martin for his 1978 song King Tut, itself a parody. The dance move was perfected and popularized in the the 1980s by the The Bangles in videos and performances of their song Walk like an Egyptian.
- Bender's tomb is completely sealed off. This is a reference to the Egptian pyramids, which were designed with massive sliding blocks of stone for the purpose of sealing the giant tombs from grave robbers. Ducts through which thousands of snakes subsequently enter partially references the air vents built into the pyramids and is a more direct reference to the trapped tombs and treasure hoards in the Indiana Jones films amd the Tomb Raider computer game series that followed it.
[edit] Trivia
- 1.5 million cubits is approximately 284 miles (457 km).
[edit] Goofs
[edit] External Links
[edit] Footnotes
- ↑ Egyptian Pantheon
- ↑ Erich von Daniken's theories and manufactured evidence
- ↑ Propaganda
