Philip J Fry: A Man Made of Time 

"Thanks to denial I'm immortal!"

Fry unlocking his full potential by *objectively* oding on caffeine is peak show writing.

"Time made a fool for all of us" is such a good ending that I suspect this whole video was made just for that one line

SPOILER WARNING: The coffee thing at the end actually really convinced me, the idea that Fry is unknowingly a 4th dimensional being makes so much sense with that!

My interpretation of The Late Philip J Fry has always been That it's not a circular timeline but just the next universe. As every universe starts from the same initial conditions they end up exactly the same except one is lower than the other. They didn't kill themselves in the past they just killed 3 people that were exactly like them in the new universe.

I think covering the third time travel type before the second time travel type was just complete and utter genius

honestly the universal time code tattoo is the most interesting point for me because it only exists due to the larz paradox, to our knowledge he never went out of his way to get that tattoo cause the reason he left leela at the alter was due to finding out what happens to paradoxes and at that point both frys had the tattoo from future bender putting it on inside the freezer. it's not just an information paradox, the tattoo never was created, it simply just is and doesn't seem to degrade and yet nibbler was still able to laser it away so it isn't an indestructable object.

Traveling forwards in time for us "normal" beings is just *advanced waiting*

I was skeptical. Then you brought up breathing himself into existence. I'm in the cult now!

13:55 the timeline that Fry leaves behind in TLPJF isn't actually a paradox at all. Because the gang does not land in the first reincarnation of the universe, they leave that universe's forwards time travel machine unmolested, thus allowing that Fry/Bender/Farnsworth to make the same mistake they did. Thus, it must be that the Universe we follow in the beginning of the episode is one of the "even" universes that a previous Fry/Bender/Farnsworth skipped over as well. Therefore, the cyclic nature of the Universe is restored but in a cycle of two universe reincarnations instead of one. Because of this there is no paradox, only a longer cycle/time loop than you might at first believe.

I didn’t know what I was getting into when this appeared in my recommended, but arguing that Fry Futurama is a unique instance of time embodying itself for either agency (the universe needing an avenue to solve problems without tearing itself into holes) or stability purposes (load bearing fool) was not it, and I am not disappointed in the slightest. Cool descent into madness, dude, thanks for putting it on tape.

The way I look at it is that- When the universe ends with the forwards only time machine, that doesn't end the timeline. The universe recreates itself, the ship goes through again, and lands in the "past"- But it's like pulling out a tape measurer only to see the pattern repeats after you pull enough tape. It's not actually the same spot in the timeline as last time, it literally is in the future, just, now, repeating what was once the past.

"I watched as the universe began and I watched time run out." Philip J. Fry

The thumbnail is a work of art.

You know, the scene where he walks super fast due to coffee isn't a time power - it's just the effect of the coffee. I've had to limit myself to a maximum of two coffees a day so I don't go super fast again.

When is the next Futurama cult meeting

This was one of the most well-researched interpretations of canon put on RU-vid, I love thinking about Futurama in these nuanced ways

The What-If Machine vignette brings up an interesting point. Whether or not it was accurate to what would happen if Fry destroyed the cryotube or was killed is irrelevant. If the tale of interest is true, then what you said holds up. But if it's not, that means that the idea of what would happen in that case is incalculable, like it was asked to divide by zero. In which case, you're still right: Fry's existence and freezing is necessary to the structure of the universe.

I'd just like to point out how satisfied Fry was at riding the Scooty Puff Sr. Even if he was previously erased, he was content with his forsaken self's decision.

For "The Late Philip J. Fry" I always interpreted it as the professor always screws up and creates a gap universe, in which the three of them don't get crushed by the time machine

I only noticed right at the end of this video that we're watching this through the what if machine. Bravo.

For the Back to the Future thing, I always thought of it like this: Chuck Berry wrote Johnny B. Goode, otherwise Marty wouldn't know it. All Marty did was accidentally put himself into the song's timeline, and make his own guitar playing inspiration for the song he's playing. But that's the only change, that Marty is technically part of the song's history. I know the implication of the movie is that Marty inspired it, but I think it's just a slightly altered bootstrap paradox. Rather than Marty going back and becoming Chuck Berry when he discovers Chuck Berry doesn't exist, he just accidentally inspires the song that inspired him.

the explanation at 12m is effectively King Crimson explained lol

That thumbnail made me think: What about the Y of Fry? I mean, he gets his Y Chromosome from his dad, who gets it from Fry. Like you said about the difference between fry and Kyle Reese, Fry's patrilineal lineage originates from nowhere but himself. Atum in Egyptian mythology is (at least in some versions) the original and ultimate diety who thought himself into existence. Meaning he didn't exist and then he did because he wanted to, even though he couldn't have wanted to because he didn't exist yet. This is called Causa Sui, self-causeing. The way I see it, this is the fundamental miracle of existence. whether you want to personify it as god or rationalize it as the big bang, there had to be a prime mover, an effect without a cause. Even if you reject the idea that time ever began and instead believe that time is an infinite cycle (like in The Late Phillip J. Fry) we are still left asking, "why is there something instead of nothing?" And "why are the laws of the universe what they are and not something else?". It's kinda like that one episode where everything is pixelated and the Professor discovers the fundamental particle of existence. He's upset that there are no more questions to answer until he realizes that there are still metaphysical questions that can never be answered because you can always keep asking "but why?" What I'm getting at is that I think Fry's self creation is this miracle that created the Futurama universe. The timeline starts in the middle and expands forwards and backwards in time. A universe had to exist so that fry could be born into it. All of history from before Roswell That Ends Well had to happen so as to justify the conditions of Fry's self-creation. The Brains are also connected to this Causa Sui idea. They seem to me to be a reference to the concept of the Boltzmann Brain, a thought experiment that suggests that it's more likely for a brain to spontaneously form and just imagine the universe than for the universe itself to spontaneously form. It's a very solipsistic concept but The Brains from Futurama are themselves very solipsistic, viewing the universe as something that only exists to be studied. Fry and the brains are intrinsically linked in that it is the conditions of his own self-creation which makes him immune to their powers. In this way, they too exist to justify Fry's importance to the universe since he saves reality from the brains. The brains need to know everything and this means they will destroy everything to have complete knowledge. Fry is perfectly happy not understanding a damn thing and it's this acceptance that saves the universe. If Fry is the unwitting creator of his universe then that could explain why the world of Futurama is so ridiculous. I think the brains came about at the dawn of time as an attempt by the universe to make sense of its own absurdity. Since reality is inherently absurd, the brains can never succeed in their goal without destroying the universe in the process. Fry the father (of Yancy) Fry the son (of Yancy) Fry the holy spirit (god satellite/ time code)

12:15 I'm so glad Futurama took the time out to explain how King Crimson works.

i love futurama so much its what, 20 years and people STILL FIND NEW THINGS TO DISCOVER ABOUT THE FCKING SHOW holy shit

Ending this video with Fry's exploits in 300 Big Ones was one of the best punchlines I've ever experienced. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant.

Reality itself is seemingly altered by beings capable of perceiving it, existing and observing the flow of time inherently causing time itself to exist. Therefore in order to make a substantial change to the flow of time, that perception would have to be altered. Assuming the timeline is linear, time travel by physical means would have always happened(observed), but a change made in the present to the past(unobserved) may carry enough momentum to switch which "present" we reside in.

videos like this are what the Internet was made for

You opened with my favorite joke of the entire series.

"Time made a fool for all of us" is an outstanding closing line. Though, shouldn't it be "for us all"?

I'm just happy this show existed and made my teenage years brighter with its humour, imagination and clever plots.

Remember, the forwards only machine had the middle timeline altered by shooting someone along the way and someone different in the one they actually end in. So the loop is maybe not just one big bang, but includes multiple consecutive universes until it lines up again.

so two points: the forward time ship, they miss the universe on the first loop and have to catch it on the second pass. this means that the future where leela runs planet express can happen eveyother timeline. so it's not necessarily a mistake to be corrected, but a repeating pattern still. secondly, i feel the need to note another character from a different sci-fi humor series; red dwarf. the main character in that, one dave lister the last human, is his own father. he describes to his son that they are a paradox that means humans will always exist, a continuing infinite timeloop. No other significant similarities to the two i can think off, he might have also terminator rules influenced his own fate but i don't recall for sure off the top of my head, but i thought it an interesting note.

I like the knot theory it makes a lot of sense

15:10 You're not really interpreting the forward-only time travel correctly. Time isn't looping, the universe is. There is no paradox, no alternate timeline. The events in the universe still exists in the past on the same timeline and will always exist as events during the period in which that universe existed. Additionally the time machine isn't "always" in that spot. It inhabits one 4D position as it slides along the 4th (time). It won't any other time machines, even if they're on the exact spacial location, will not interact because the one from the next universe is always one universe-length of time ahead, and the previous one is one universe-length of time behind. It's like a giant game of musical chairs played along the 4th dimension.

Fry is the time exploring himself to see him again from both perspectives him time, and him in time

Love the video, I always thought that fry did break the timeline when he killed his grandfather but it corrected itself with him conceiving his father or whatever, breaking the timeline by having too many of a person results in deaths to make it correct again, fry killed his grandfather but existed in the correct time and place for him to still exist by becoming his own grandfather and stabilizing it, not on purpose but in the same way that random things coincidentally fell on people to resolve the timeline in benders big score. your interpretation of it is super interesting as well, great video!!

Homestuck, that series that had a large and direct influence on Undertale, also melds multiple time travel methods into a single narrative. Terminator rules are the main method, but the Back to The Future rules have a unique role. The timeline _is_ technically free to branch off into alternate timelines, over and over, but eventually, most of the time, these timelines end up reaching back around and becoming part of the main timeline, the alternate branches always existed, they simply roll back into the Alpha Timeline via someone eventually going back to instigate its continuation. The timelines that don't end up simply fading into irrelevancy, since they don't roll back around into the main one we follow. Homestuck, however, has a third method, that only exists due to the fact its a piece of fiction, with its future pages not yet being written, being an in-universe fact. At one point in the story, we have a gap in time where material hasn't yet been written by the author, we already know that the setting in the future is directly connected to the past due to it taking place on the same Earth, with objecrs strewn about that we know characters in the "past" setting are responsible for, but how point A got to point B wasn't written yet. Enter the main character, John, getting the power of literal author retcon, using said ability to rewrite the story by altering key points, for the purpose of saving all his friends. All his friends and allies dying didn't contradict the future we had been shown, it would make perfect sense for the story to continue naturally into that setting chronologically, but again, Homestuck being a work of fiction, with pieces of its history not existing, due to not yet being concretely written, is a fact of the universe, which enables John to use his newfound abilty to alter the story into a version of itself where all his friends are alive, while still also being a course of events that continues logically into that already established future.

man this is so unnecessarily brilliant, bravo

I've never seen Futurama but I understood everything you talked about because your just good at this. I was expecting 5-10k subs but alas no. You my dear friend are underrated

Man, you really didn't have to phrase it as "giving grandma Mildred a cream pie"

I am so glad I’ve found this channel! I’ve been a lifelong fan of futurama and I love watching content about it on RU-vid! This might be my new favorite thing for the next couple of months

that point where fry's paradox ended the universe is probably the strongest point in the video

This is way more in depth than I ever thought we could go into Futurama theory, and I'm here for it.

I watch a lot of long form stuff on youtube but I usually cut out halfway through cause it isn't engaging enough. this is top tier content watched all the way through, good job. subbed, keep it up

The forward’s Time Machine episode isn’t a number of different timelines or universes or anything like that, it’s just moving forwards in time, normally, just at great speed. The solution is that the universe collapses and then re-erupts over and over in a cycle, which repeats itself nearly exactly. All the stuff that happened during their run throughs did actually happen, it’s just in the past now.

The fact that the whole discussion is framed inside the what-if machine. Damn, man. A nice detail.

Only made it halfway through the video cuz I don't want spoilers but it's a great video so far!

I would love to see more videos from this channel

I just realized that the fact they were 10 feet above their normal universe was only to be a paradox fixer for their universe, just like every other fixed paradox through the show 😂

Dude, this is the best video I've ever seen. Hands down. Thank you for the love to Futurama you put into this

This was a very well done, nicely written, and thoughtfully researched video! It was awesome! I live for this kinda stuff. I disagree with the notion of the Late Philip J. Fry portraying a sort of reset of time rather than a linear, straight shot to a reset of the _universe_ itself, or rather a new universe, but I read your reply on another comment and honestly, I do think it's completely valid to leave up to interpretation. One of the very few things that bothered me about Futurama were the inconsistent, contrasting concepts of time being used in different episodes. I'm glad now that there's a good theory I can wrap my head around and consider my new headcanon. It adds up. Great video, I'm happy to subscribe.

If time makes a fool of all of us, then it only fits the only one able to "fool" time, is a fool like Fry

THIS SHOULD WIN AN AWARD IT WAS SO FRY DAMNED GOOD!

That bit about the universe not existing without fry really convinced me because every other time the timeline breaks the mistake is just deleted from reality, like nixon's opponent or the benders, but if reality itself can't exist without fry then the only way to ''correct' the timeline at that point is to delete everything that can't exist without fry's actions, which is the universe itself

absolutely phenomenal video

You deserve more subs and likes, great work!

Absolute banger of a video. Solid cadence and delivery and excellently put together. Very entertaining and got me thinking about time in groovy ways.

One of the best video essays I’ve ever seen. Great job!

This is the best video I have seen in a while, great job. Plus 25:52 is just so funny to me

Philip J Fry, a Time Lord?

I really really really really really really enjoyed this video thank you for sharing your overwhelming passion for this topic with the rest of us

If you make more videos covering the theoretical science of Futurama, I will find a way to get you 4 million dollars. This video was incredible.

Sick Thumbnail

..and that fucking opal lmao. subbed

This was absolutely brilliant! Thanks!

Didn’t know I needed Futurama video essays but here we are. I’m gonna binge watch every video on this channel now

Jesus isn't a demigod because he is fully man, fully god

Jesus is both God and man. It's not 50/50, but 100/100.

the alternate timeline with leela taking over planet express could be an alternating rather than alternate timeline. the universe switches between the two one after another forever.

This is now my new favorite video of Futurama

stopped watching, heresy :/

This is a really well-made video, with an implausible amount of clever wordplay and Futurama references. At 33:20 "...but that's not the only time the Nibblonians *pontificate* on Fry's brainwaves." I don't know what's worse: the fact that you made this reference, or the fact that I got it right away.

Time travel always just turn into linear multiverse time travel. You can jump between any line of time but each line of time requires you to have time jumped between the different lines just the way you did since you can't change a line of time, which means that you jumping between lines of time is all just a big line of time on itself.

Boy I loved this video. I never thought of Fry like that. But you make a lot of sense :)

I've had this thought before, having seen the show several times now, I'm glad to see someone put this thought to video. thanks :D

The fact that many people think Philip J Fry is dead (went missing and presumed dead then brother took his name and died too) makes most of his worries fall away, being this thing that shouldn't even be here but somehow is

Fry represents a dilemma we all have where we sometimes really want to go back in time when we were younger and had things easier. But did Fry really have it better back then than he did in the future? In 2000, Fry has a shitty job, with a terrible family, and a cheating girlfriend. In 3000, he has the opposite of all those things. He has a relatively good job (in comparison), he has a large loving family even if the Professor is the only one who's blood related to Fry, and he has a loyal badass girlfriend who would risk life and limb for him. I think what it all comes down to is fear of the unknown. We have no idea who tomorrow entails, and to an extent is scares us because we're so used to what we knew from yesterday.

RIght, now I gotta watch the new season. There really is nothing quite like the writing behind Futurama! Good vid

To quote Miles O'brien and Miles O'brien: "I hate temporal mechanics"

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

This is the best Futurama video on RU-vid!

This was a really good video. I'll enjoy watching it 40 years ago.

That was sick, bro. Well done!

Amazing video honestly. Any other content creator would have summarised the events of entire episodes instead of actually explaining things. This is a masterpiece.

Ah Fry the best Bootstrap Paradox out there. Really enjoyed your take on him and what he could be by this point.

Wish I could say "excellent", but that would such a huge understatement. Love the perspective on my favorite show.

A whole channel dedicated to futurama videos ??? Subbed.

Any other show I would say "You are looking way to hard into this" But it IS Futurama so it was 110% done on purpose.

That was brilliant. I'll watch that again yesterday.

wow that was so good, keep up the good work man!

this absolutely blew my mind, at first I had thought there could be no way it was believable, but this video was convincing

With regards to the episode late phillip j fry, its still linear. Fry, bender, and the professor always go forward in time and loop around, missing their target in the first loop and landing on themselves in the second. The loops alternate between them disappearing and them landing on themselves. This follows because time cannot be linear (a line) definitionally if it ends, so it must stretch forever. the universe beginning and ending is half of one loop in this regard.

Dang, I was so invested in this vid but I had to stop at 16:00 when you started talking about spoilers for something I haven't watched. Seems interesting and I gotta check it out now

I can truly appreciate all the thought and research put in this. Agree with it wholeheartedly. But funny enough the best part of this whole thing is using the bus driver reference from the Simpsons episode in which Lisa discovers Area 51-A. Truly a fellow man of culture.

TIME to rewatch this fantastic, brilliant, magnificent show.

This video is AWESOME!!!

Wow -- many valid observations and easter eggs/correlation I had never realized or observed myself..

“Zeus is just a regular dude” Zeus: “bro wtf I’m the son of a titan”