Popplers is a brand name for a source of food found on an M-Class planet, that turned out to be a nursery planet for the Omicronian's young before they can walk, talk, and speak for themselves.
Poppler Sales[]
Popplers were sold for $1.99 a dozen. The Planet Express crew made $1 a dozen and Fishy Joe's made $0.99 a dozen. 198 billion Popplers were sold and Fishy Joe's made $16.335 billion.
"Pop a poppler in your mouth when you come to Fishy Joe's. What they're made of is a mystery. Where they come from no one knows. You can pick 'em, you can lick em, you can chew 'em, you can stick 'em; if you promise not to sue us, you can shove one up your nose." - Poppler commercial jingle - Futurama "The Problem with Popplers"
(sung to the tune of "The Sailor's Hornpipe")
Origin of Popplers[]
After making a delivery to the Planet of the Moochers, the Planet Express crew decides to land on a remote planet to find something edible (the Moochers had taken all their food). While searching for Roddenberries, Turanga Leela discovers a pit filled with what has been alternatively described as fried shrimp or fried prawns. After determining that they were not poisonous with her Wrist LoJack-a-mater, Leela, Fry and Bender discover that they were delicious and decide to take a shipload home with them. On Earth, the crew decide to sell the delicious fried food under the name Popplers, the only name left uncopyrighted besides "zitsels."
Initial sales were large enough that the snack was soon picked up by Joseph Gilman, CEO and owner of Fishy Joe's, and soon Popplers were one of the most popular foods on Earth. This success soon sparked controversy, as members of Mankind for Ethical Animal Treatment (M.E.A.T.) began protesting on the grounds of their belief that Popplers were alive. This theory was actually proved when Leela discovered an old bucket of Popplers lying around, one of which called her "momma". Despite proof that Popplers were not only alive, but intelligent, the food remained incredibly popular and only the invasion of the Omicronians put an end to the selling of Popplers.
After it became known that Popplers were actually Omicronian young who are piled into pits on nursery planets until they are developed enough to join Omicronian society as a whole, the Omicronians demanded that Earthlings stop eating their young and that they be allowed to eat one human for each Omicronian who had been eaten. As it turns out however, there were nowhere near enough humans to equal the billions of Popplers devoured and so they lowered the number to the first human to eat a Poppler: Leela. Despite an ingenious scheme by Zapp Brannigan to switch Leela for an orangutan, Leela's death seemed inevitable. But Jrrr, the Poppler that spoke and alerted Leela that Popplers were sapient, intervened and Leela was spared, although Free Waterfall Jr. was not. As a result, the selling of Popplers was banned and the remaining uneaten ones were recalled and sent back to the nursery planet.