REVIEW: Bender’s Big Score (Futurama)

It is fair to say that here at The Void, no DVD has been as keenly anticipated as this. It was quite a sight to see so many people clambering for the post bag to see whether our overseas order had come though, and more importantly, lived up to our great expectations. Thankfully, the wait and credit card bill paid off.

When Futurama was cancelled four years ago, university and college campuses mourned a great loss: a programme which not only made you laugh, but had many high-brow ‘geeky’ references in it that allowed sly chuckles at the ‘cooler’ person sitting next to you. However, like a space-phoenix from a supernova, the show was reborn and, like Family Guy before it, and returns for our viewing pleasure in the form of a feature-length straight-to-DVD film.

The show continues where it left off pre-cancellation, with Philip Fry, Leela and Bender working for the Planet Express delivery company under the watchful, though senile, eye of Professor Farnsworth. Together they travel across space (and occasionally time) to deliver packages and often end up saving the world or their own asses, depending on the situation.

Normally about now in a review the journalist would write some words explaining the plot of the film and how good or bad it is. But as fans of the show will know, Futurama episodes have never really had the easiest of plots to sum up quickly without either going off into highly descriptive prose or revealing the ending. This means that in this review, the focus will have to be on the quality of the humour which cocoons the plot of this film. Well, the programme is made by the same team that brought you that other cartoon… what’s it called… oh yeah, The Simpsons, so it is fair to say that you expect a certain level of quality, which is dutifully delivered with some fantastic one-liners, comical references and cameos by Al Gore, Mark Hamill and Coolio to name but a few.

One thing that can be said about this film is that unlike the Family Guy ‘film’, this does actually works as a feature. While Family Guy was three episodes taped together, this has a much more consistent plot throughout. So much so that at times the only thing carrying you forward are the many many jokes which litter the finely-crafted script.

Like all previous DVD releases by Mr Groening, the DVD also comes with a host of extras, such as deleted scenes, concept drawings and commentaries, which not only reveal some background into the show, but also help highlight some of the geekier references via a 20 minute lecture by a mathematician explaining the theory behind the jokes.

This is clearly a disc that has been made for the fans who have petitioned for this show to come back on air, and the fans of the show will no doubt rush out and buy this DVD straight away. For those who have not embraced Futurama before, you would probably do best to catch a few episodes before sitting down to watch this disc, not because it is too complicated to understand, but because you will appreciate it a lot more if you did.