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2ACV09: A Bicyclops Built For Two
First UK airing: Sky One, 7:00pm, 28-5-00
"Well, thanks to the Internet
I'm now bored with sex."
Does anyone remember when The Simpsons had at least
a vague connection with reality? I only bring this up because
'Missionary: Impossible' aired just before this Futurama
episode in the UK, and Bender had a cameo in it, which provides
a sort of connection. I'm just sure that there was a time when
you could watch America's favourite cartoon family and not get
the feeling that you'd accidentally wandered into somebody else's
toad-licking trip. But I digress.
'A Bicyclops Built For Two' was, for me, an episode
of two halves. The first half (well, 'half'), as a mockery of
the Internet, was superb -- hey, y'know, that geeky title at
the top of the page should give away that I've been on the Internet
for a while. And the fact that I was playing Unreal Tourney --
against bots including Fry (incompetent), Bender Unit 22 (sneaky),
Leela (deadly) and Amy Wong (runs around firing wildly) -- just
before switching on the TV may have helped. But once the crew
actually got to the alleged 'Cyclopia', it was all a bit 'it's
not what it seems'. C'mon, I've watched way too many episodes
of Star Trek to know that any potentially format-changing episodes
are going to have a final-act twist, and that Mr Right is going
to have a guilty secret.
That's not to say that it wasn't funny. But it wasn't
unexpected either, which always a bit of a muffler on the laughs.
Something else that was a bit of a stifler (from a non-American
point of view) was the number of Married: With Children refs
-- MWC was at best a late-night obscuro show over here. I've
seen it, so I got the jokes, but because it's not exactly a major
part of Brit pop culture it didn't really raise any laughs. (Though
Leela as Peg Bundy did manage to produce a bit of a smirk. I've
seen enough to get that joke.)
Still, the first part of the show had already put
the score up to high levels, so the rest of it would have had
to have been a real... I dunno, what's a really crap American
sitcom? We tend not to get the absolute worst over here. But
it would have to have been one of them to knock the mark down
too much. Anyway, 'Bicyclops' must have set a new world record
for freeze-frame gags, and the whole of the Internet sequence
was sheer genius. BTW, I have actually had requests (via
ANSTATMAW) to draw 'Amy Wong Naked' pictures myself, but A: it's
all tasteless and stuff, and B: not enough money has been offered.
(What can I say? I've been learning from Bender!)
Mind you, even outside the Internet, there were some
great gags, like Bender's jar-smashing spree to make room in
his chest cavity, the 'trillion miles' depth-perception joke
(which echoed back all the way to the pilot!) and "Do you,
Leela, copy and paste his response?" The real surprise was
that Fry, despite the twin handicaps of being locked in a dungeon
for half the episode and idiocy, uncovered Alkazar's plot and
saved the day. Something's going to happen between him and Leela
some day, and I'm not talking about the alternate-reality stuff
in the season finale. (Hey, sometimes I just can't avoid spoilers.)
Of course, the best thing about the entire episode
was the revelation that Macs win the format war. All those GUI
images were from OS 9. Yes! Steve Jobs 1, Bill Gates 0! I guess
the US Justice Department ruling really worked out in Apple's
favour over the next thousand years...
Rating: 
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