Review of Futurama: Bender's Big Score

The TV series was brought to an end in 2003, and there were rumours it would return, and this straight-to-DVD film is a good indication of that, the film even begins with a joke about a network cancelling them, and then reinstating them. The story sees Hermes (Phil LaMarr) decapitated and having to live in a jar while his body is fixed. Fry (Bily West) jealous because Leela (Katey Sagal) is falling for head museum worker Lars Fillmore (also West). Prof. Fansworth (West again) has accidentally sold Planet Express to some greedy conning aliens, or Scammers, led by Nudar (David Herman) and they can detect information with their Sprungers, and from a tattoo of Bender (John Di Maggio) on Fry's ass, they find the code for a time sphere, capable of time travel and paradox fixing too. So with the help of the obedience virus downloaded into Bender, he constantly speaks this code and travels back to bring back every priceless object in past history. When the aliens decide to get rid of the code from Bender, they realise Fry must also be disposed, and to escape, Fry travels back to the day he was frozen, half an hour after, and again to eat some pizza (lol), and Bender is sent back to kill him. Bender appeared to have killed Fry, after 12 years of looking in the past (2000-2012), but the real Fry managed to get back, and everyone wonders what happened to the copy of Fry. In a series of flashbacks (continuing through the story), we find out Fry lived the life he could have had if he had not been frozen, where he decides to let Leela go, and he looks after a rare female toothed narwhal named Leelo. Meanwhile in the future, Leela is about to be married to Lars, but he cancels, just after Hermes copy body, with his present head is decapitated, the Prof. mentions all copies are doomed. The alien Scammers have grown so powerful with greed they are ready to take ownership of the world, and so everyone decides to fight back against the many solid gold Death Stars, and Bender saves the day by throwing the doomsday device into their ship. Oh, in the end, it turns out that Lars was the copy of Fry that was looking after Leeloo, and Bender didn't kill him, merely lost him his hair and deepened his voice, and he refroze himself to become the head museum guy Leela fell for. Also starring Billy West as Zoidberg, Prof. Farnsworth, Zapp Brannigan and President Richard Nixon's Head, John Di Maggio as Barbados Slim and Robot Santa, Tress MacNeille as Linda, Maurice LaMarche as Kif Kroker and Morbo, Phil LaMarr as Ethan 'Bubblegum' Tate, Lauren Tom as Amy Wong, Frank Welker as Nibbler, Coolio as Kwanzabot, Al Gore, Mark Hamill as Chanukah Zombie and Sarah Silverman as Michelle. It might be a little complicated with the time travelling aspect, but it is a good return for a much-loved Matt Groening cartoon which is just as good, if not better than The Simpsons. The ending by the way where space is tearing continues in the next film, Beast with a Billion Backs. The TV series was number 26 on The 100 Greatest Cartoons. Very good!