Futurama is my favorite show. What’s yours? Link to the brand new Patreon: www.patreon.com/nerdstalgicyt ALSO: You could argue that BBS creates an alternate universe/timeline in which a different seymour is saved of his fate. That’s fair! I still feel a bit cheated by BBS but that is a good counter point. However, this is a video that uses Futurama as a conduit for an altogether different discussion about media. So maybe I can dive into time travel in media in a different vid!
I personally enjoyed the recently airing "the good place" I don't think it was nearly as good as Futurama, but it's better than some of the other stuff on at the moment
The other episode that made me cry as much as "Jurassic Bark" was the one where Fry thought his brother took his name and became successful while pretending to be him but found out it was his nephew, who his brother named after him because he loved and missed him so much. I'm tearing up just typing this.
@@homealonetoo4570 that's sarcasm, a type of irony. What he said is also a type of irony and now that I think about idk if your original comment was made ironically in and of itself😂😂.
When fry has a dream about his mom, but then at the end, his mom was having a dream about Fry, that DESTROYED ME. I cried for quite a bit... Futurama is probably the best show ever made.
YES! omg I got so sad during that episode, and I don’t usually cry while watching these types of things, I just keep them repressed most of the time. But that’s one of the episodes that broke me.
I always remember two episodes. The dog episode and the brother episode. They hit hard I made this comment almost a year ago and I love that it still gets replies! Glad the futurama fandom is still alive! You guys are awesome
@@cheesegod6598 I liked that episode too, but it felt a little fake to me. Like it kinda feels like it's trying to be what the other 2 episodes are but in the new reboot. Like when they rebooted it they said "WE HAVE TO HAVE A SAD EPISODE LIKE THE ORIGINAL"
Bender's Big Score doesn't really retcon Jurassik Bark, the time travel in the movie is explicitly stated to be free of paradoxes meaning that it does and doesn't change past at the same time but never really explains how it works. As I see it it generates branching pasts that all share the same future, kind of like an alternative timeline that slowly fuses with the original one. So Jurassik Bark happened and didn't happen at the same time.
Yeah, if you pay really close attention to how that particular time travel works, it's like "fake" time travel almost, it sort of erases your tracks it seems? So fry did spend that time with his dog, but then THAT timeline "Un-happened" when THAT fry (Lars) died. It sort of "merged" those into Fry's normal timeline, which is why he gets mistaken for Lars (at least once?) and some of Lela's feelings for Lars seem to transfer to Fry. I'm clearly over thinking this, but I think that's about how it works.
Bruh a weight was collectively lifted off of people once they 'found out' that semour lived a happy life with fry. Yes it was fan service. Did it make me feel better? Yes. Does Jurassic Bark still make me cry? Yes.
Hell yeah, it was so emotionally rewarding to see Seymour get to live a happy life with Fry. And it wasn't really a retcon, either. It was a part of established Futurama lore that time could be changed. See: "Scooty Puff Jr. sucks!"
The point being made is that you're supposed to cry. Television so rarely captures true genuine emotion and sadness. The episode is great BECAUSE it hits deep. It's a wound that is SUPPOSED to bleed. Bandaging it, scars the truth of the original impact.
@@nates9536 Ah yes, just like bandaging a real wound scars the fact you were injured at some point? Scars form from healing. Wounds aren't meant to last. Life leaves scars, and even if you learn from them, or learn more about them, it doesn't change that feeling. You'll always remember skinning your knee or accidentally nicking yourself with a knife. Giving Seymour a happy life doesn't remove the pain of that first time watching his fate before Fry time traveled. Instead, now when you watch it again, you remember that initial pain, and then you remember that Fry was there with him until the end. If you think that Seymour being lonely for the rest of his very loyal life somehow improves it, you might want to consider why you want to only hurt. Even Fry wanted to believe that Seymour lived a happy life without him, and then Fry was the one who gave him a happy life.
Well if it’s any consolation there’s also the theory that hachikō waited where they did to be fed by the nearby butchers and such which is mirrored in Seymour being fed pizza. Obviously is sadder and more touching to just think about it missing it’s master but I can gleam a bit of joy thinking about it that way as the people feeding it in turn also become their masters
There's a similar story here in Australia. Look for the movie Red Dog, the difference being that Red Dog didn't wait for his owner, he went looking for him, with reports of Red Dog being spotted up and down the west coast of Australia, even as far as Japan, before finally returning home to die.
I'm a futurama sleeper. I don't really "watch" the show anymore, but it's on to provide background noise and keep my mind entertained whilst I try to sleep.
I always interpreted it as an alternate timeline being made Seymor waiting for fry didn't NOT happen anymore, it's just that in Lars' timeline, Seymore got to be with Fry.
Me too. Lars lost Leela but he had Seymour. While he was in the 2000s, he continued to think of her but decided she was happy without him Fry lost Seymour but he had Leela. While he was in the 3000s, he considered cloning him but decided he was happy without him Imo this isn't a retcon, it enhances the original episode more than it ruins it
I've had to watch the show 20 plus times. Had a hard time falling asleep when I was younger. Fell asleep watching Futurama every night for like 5 years
Same. If I need a show for background noise, 9/10 times I default to Futurama and even when I am not binging it, it is a regular program in the evenings on the SyFy Channel in my house
Consider this: you've written a Futurama story for a feature-length installment, in which Fry goes back to January 1, 2000 to live out the rest of his life as if he had never travelled to the future. You're writing the scene where he returns to the pizza place having completed the delivery, just after midnight. This requires an establishing shot outside the restaurant. Do you include Seymour, or not? Keep in mind that this is the series return after a long hiatus, and your audience is going to consist largely of existing fans of the show, all of whom have probably seen its most lauded episode. Just about everyone watching this scene will be expecting to see Seymour outside the pizza place, and will consider his absence to be, at the very least, odd. Some might infer this as an actual plot detail: if the dog isn't there, it's not really January 1, 2000, this isn't really Panucci's Pizza; something is up. I would say that to *not* include Seymour in this shot would be a retcon, in the truest sense of the word: you are establishing that this story and Jurassic Bark do not exist in the same canon; a break in continuity. If Bender's Big Score is a retcon for Jurassic Bark, then it's a retcon for literally every episode in the series.
Also as others have semi pointed out the original Montage in Jurrasic Bark can still happen. Seymour still is outside Panuccis for the next 12 years, he still stands there, waiting for Fry to come back from a delivery or come home. You can view the original Montage as a interpretation of what happened in those 12 years. With Big Score actually answering what happened. AND to a certain extent Big Score validates Frys decission in Jurassic Bark. Seymour did learn more songs and lead a happy life after Fry was frozen, with the Alternate Fry.
It's like Russian Dolls, where one big one has a slight smaller inside and on and on until the smallestis invisible. Only this is with boxes and its plays not only vertical but side to side above below forward backward and combos of all.
This could just be a technicism but Jurassic Bark would not happen if Fry wasn't at panucci in bender's big score. The dog in the 9:17 of the video its the same you can see in the museum in year 3000, the abandoned and dead Seymour would not be petrified without Bender
@@brianandrais1415 that's only if you're assuming when seymour lays down at the end of the episode he's dying - which again isn't necessarily what's happening as that very episode it talks about how he got petrified
Didn't undo the emotional impact at all. Who in reality would not go back to save their loved one? Fry had a change of heart in a looooong worked for maturity. Good for him.
@@deborahhanna9126 Fry didn't go back for Seymore though, he went back in time after assuming Leela's not into him anymore (which we learn later wasn't technically true). Him showing up the next day to greet Seymore was a bonus outcome to getting on with his life again after his adventure in the future.
Well let me rephrase: who, given the opportunity would not then save their loved one, even supposing that it had not been their primary objective? Fry had a change of heart once he saw Seymour still waiting there.
One of my favorite episodes 😊 I just laughed out loud right now, remembering when god chucks Bender back to earth and his ass burns up on reentry 😆 HOT HOT HOT
"It removes the impact" It doesn't change the effect the episode had when you first watched it though. Also is a retcon involving time travel the same as a regular retcon? I feel like it kinda gets a pass.
My thoughts exactly too. And there was a huge cost that Fry couldn't go back from. That version of Fry "lost" Leela twice, first when he chose to go back in time partially in response to her getting married, and a second time when, as Lars; he learned the "time clones" were doomed to be killed. In fact, if you think about it, the episode is still very much in line with that message of loss. Even with something as all-powerful as time travel, there's always something of yourself you leave behind as from your perspective, time persists in moving forward. Even if you were an immortal with a time machine, your loved ones aren't, and you can only spend so much time with them...perhaps in cruel irony even less if you were to try to spend as much as possible to the point they get overwhelmed with you.
i was thinking, i dont remember the film now, i havent watched futurama in too long..... but is it a retcon even? or does it have to take place in different lines of causality in the story because he's going back to change things etc
By definition, no retcon can effect the original feelings you had, the problem is it recontextualizes those feelings and effects your emotional attachment to the series moving forward
We got to sit with the ending for years, feeling all of it. A redemption arc, much later, was cathartic in a way that real life rarely is. Your take on this is good and fair, but I don't think you'll find that it's common. The writers did a good job of showing the fans that they cared. That's an artistic decision, and we can comfortably disagree about whether it was a good one. I need a few of these.
@@erinbutler2892 exactly. This is a huge fact that is left out of the video. The fry in Jurassic bark never got those years with his dog. That was "Lars" who through different experiences was pretty much a different person than the fry we know. Which was also kind of the point of that whole thing.
While the episode with Fry meeting him mom in her dreams for me was even harder to watch that Jurassic Bark, the reason the latter still hits me and so many others so hard is in its simplicity Any that has ever had a pet. dog, cat, hamster, whatever. We all know how hard it is to not only lose a pet but to let go. I had a shih tzu named shaggy. He was and still is my little buddy. He lived to be 14 years old and I was there in his final moments. I refused to have him go alone. The last thing he heard me say was how I love him. It's been over a year and still hurts to know hes gone. thats a kind of feeling many can understand with Fry. Losing that animal companion. Wanting one more day with them. Just one more. For me, I would love to have one last day with my buddy. But I know he lived a damn good life Losing a pet is always hard. But I cant imagine my dog waiting for me to come back, leaving the world still waiting. that for me is why that episode hurt. It connects on such a personal level for so many
there were three episodes of futurama that stand above most other shows and films in terms of emotional writing. The aforementioned Jurassic Bark and Game of Tones being two of them, but an overlooked one is the luckly clover episode where we learn about Yancy naming his child after Philip and imparting all of Phil's favorite things onto him, from a fascination with outer space, to the minutia of the lucky clover.
Fry is simply such a well written and interesting character, all 4 of the episodes that centered around his family members or Seymour were all perfect episodes
In such a show, where science is so powerful, and time barely matters, there's a lot of that happens. A lot of timelines change, a lot of things happen constantly and in the end it's one giant time loop. Futurama is good enough in the whole that, I feel fine letting one retcon weaken the impact of a powerful scene, to give an old dog a happy life he deserves.
In many ways that episode's impact was mostly because they didn't generally engage in Disney levels of crass emotional manipulation. Usually when they get serious they make their point and then diffuse the issue with another punchline. That episode stood out to me because it was so completely out of character with every other one.
I love Bender’s Big Score, I think it is the best piece of time travel writing ever. And the emotional impact is right there with Jurassic Bark,. It never occurred to me that the “retcon” scene should steal away from the original emotion.
Matt Groening apologized for the episode repeatedly after it aired in response to the hordes of fans angry a comedy show made them cry. It was definitely a little fanservicey. Even still, sending Fry back to the past was inevitable. So much of his character was the man of two worlds. So if Fry was going to end up in the past, there's no way he wouldn't try to reconnect. I think of it as more of a win for the character than a retcon.
You also have to keep in mind that there are some interpretations if time travel where this wouldn't constitute a retcon. Much as people theorize that there may be many versions of the future, all of which are equally "real", once time travel becomes a possibility you can think of the past in the same way.
Even knowing that overall Seymour lives a happy full life alongside Fry, it doesn't diminish the amount of emotional power Jurassic Bark carried. My girlfriend and I have re-watched Futurama easily 6 times, but Jurassic Bark always hits hard, thats good writing, even when you know it ends well, for the time being in hurts.
@@smileychess I really don't remember most of the episode. I have the bones, but every joke is blurred out because of that final scene and my refusal to watch it again. I was 17, it's been nearly 20 years.
@@evanhayes5891 I think it was when he found out he was defective and fell into a depression, and then Fry says some thing a long the lines of , "Bender have you been up all night not drinking? You drank too much or not enough, I forgot how it works with you. Either way, you haven't drank the exact right amount". Give or take.
Jurassic Bark still emotionally hurts me to this day, so the fact they remembered about Seymour in Benders Big Score not only brought a smile to my face when I first saw it but also shows how much attention to detail they were willing to give Fry going back and living his life in 21st century since Seymour is only ever really seen or referenced in that 1 episode before this
I didn't see this retcon as a bad thing. I think it was a way to make both characters happy and show that there are second chances in life, given the right opportunities.
@@robertastevenson I wouldn't mind that, considering it's supposed to be tragic, if Fry's choice weren't so illogical & out of character to begin with. The flawed logic of it makes it feel like forced sadness for the sake of having an impactful ending. And it is impactful but it's not satisfying & doesn't really serve much of a purpose since it doesn't make sense, doesn't teach us anything about Fry, & doesn't come up again until some random post-cancellation moments.
Nope the paradox fixing nature erased that since it's more likely that it keeps the outcome as close as was intended the first time not really caring what happened in between. Seymour still ended up petrified in the exact same shape. Changing nothing in the grander scheme. Seymour gets to have a happy life and he has to deal with it.
@@aurahoneydew9607 i mean the paradox fixing thing just kills paradox clones, it's never really stated that it reverts changes through all timelines or if timelines even exist in this universe
I have to disagree. I was very happy to get Seymour's retcon. But even then, it was too little, too late. I still can't bring myself to re-watch Fry's Dog. It didn't undo it enough.
I not only understand this opinion, but used to agree with it myself. It wasn’t until the last couples viewings that my opinion shifted. I lost my childhood dog a few years ago, and I think having to accept that, changed my appreciation for Jurassic Bark. I DEFINITELY understand where you’re coming from though.
I think that it was fine with me because I lived with that sad ending for years until the special came out. It wasn't like they retconned it two episodes later, they did it five years later in a tv special that gave us a lot of time travel tomfoolery. The retcon didn't feel like an intentional goal they achieved, rather it was a side effect of a fun plot they wanted to write independent of the dog. I don't really care that they removed the emotional kick to it, because I lived with that emotional kick years later. It also didn't feel cheap or manipulative, just an additional detail that happened to occur.
Same, hard disagree. Both the episodes still tell the stories and have the messages they were intended to have--one doesn't cancel out the other. And whether Seymour was miserable for the rest of his life or not makes absolutely no difference to the conclusion Fry comes to at the end of Jurassic Bark. He doesn't even know at that point.
The saddest thing about the Seymour episode is that it's based off a real life story. There was a dog called hachiko who waited 9 years at a train station for his dead owner to return from work
Yup. They made a movie based on it too, which I refuse to see because I would be reduced to a blubbering mess for two hours. Anything involving dogs really gets me. I still cry every time I see this episode of Futurama.
The hard part is that while thats the famous story this happens alot. There was a dog in Ireland who did the same thing, another dog somewhere in asia who spent every day by its owners gravestone, another dog who waited for its owner at the spot he died in a road side accident, and I read a story of a dog who spent every day sitting next to its owners truck because they used to ride together all the time. We moved my grandparents into the house next to my families business so we could take care of them as they got older and my dog visited alot, there's a little alleyway maybe 60 feet or 20 meters from my business to a gate that leads to their yard. Grandma died almost 3 years ago and my grandpa died a year ago. I take my dog with me to work sometimes and i have to make sure that gate is closed (which it almost always is) because she'll run over to the gate and try to get into their yard. She'll sniff all around the yard and run to their door wanting to be let in, one time even forcing her way through the new tenants door when he heard the noise and opened the door. She ran into the living room where my grandparents spent most of their day, looking for them. Dogs are loyal until their death, not just ours.
@variablestar never gonna happen. I cried just seeing the scene from this youtube video where we see Seymour sitting in front of the pizza place. I cant handle jurrasic bark. I've seen it once, and I'll never watch it a second time. The idea of watching an entire movie about that?!?!
I understand why people are upset on the retcon of this episode. It is by far one of my favorites too. But I don't look at benders bigs score as a undermining. Or a redfining, retelling. For me both Jurassic Bark and benders big score had something to say, with great impact. But for different reasons. No, I look at it as a futurama character might, as a separate reality. As a reality that redeems the heartache of that episode. A reality where Fry and semore do actually get be together. While the intial original reality of Jurassic Bark also remains intact, and just as true. Universe A doesn't undermine universe 1, instead it presents a different course of events that allows us to experience a new version of the story, and because we know the old version, we understand the impact and importance of this new one. Of course there's tons of things out there where this would be impossible to accept, but because of the nature of futurama itself, I find it easy to see and appreciate both stories, to their fullest. And that is how to experience this amazing show.
I don't think it removes the impact at all. I've seen the entire series front to back several times over and Jurassic Bark STILL hits me like a truck. Just seeing those clips in your video, I had to pause to compose myself. Knowing about Bender's Big Score doesn't change that at all, I think.
I saw that episode around 8 years old and bawled my eyes out. Even seeing the visual of Seymour sitting in front of that shop alone is enough to start the water works.
Being from the UK, there's a story called "Greyfriers Bobby" where an old man in Scotland dies suddenly leaving behind his dog. But his dog sat next to his grave for years waiting. That could of been a recreation of that story.
The one time that a video game brought a tear to my eye was when Fallout: New Vegas had an easter egg where you can find a petrified dog named Seymour in the Old World Blues DLC.
One minor issue I have with this is: For a HUGE chunk of the time Fry is in the 21st century, he's either looking after Narwhals, or he's out on a boat, if I'm not mistaken he spends 5 years on that boat, so for at LEAST 5 years, Seymour is just sitting there, sad, and lonely, waiting for Fry to come back from returning Leelu to the ocean. So if your biggest issue is with the fact the dog isn't left sad and alone, you can guarantee a big portion of his time is spent sad, and alone. The movie takes nothing away from the original episode, Fry/Lars' life isn't too different, and Seymour is left alone for a large chunk of the time that Fry/Lars lives in the present day, the movie handles the whole situation with the way Futurama does things best, time travel, time paradoxes and brilliant writing. They weren't trying to remove the initial meaning of Jurassic Bark, they were just trying to extend on it, and use a previously established canon to extend on it and expand the idea that Fry's life was bound to be the same, and so was Seymour's.
Can the same be said of Luck of the Fryrish, though? It was pretty clear in that one that Fry's disappearance was a huge motivator for his brother, and led to his nephew's being who he became, right down to his brother's naming him after "someone who I will miss every day". It can't be denied to me that changing that line from someone thinking his brother, whom he's always seemingly taken for granted, has suddenly died before he knew how much he meant to him, to someone who's a bit disappointed his brother's ended up buggering off and ditching his entire life for a whale kind of kills it. To me, all the little nods to the episodes regarding Fry's past kind of hurt because the filmmakers clearly remembered those moments, yet didn't care that they were built on the assumption that everyone from the 21st century never saw Fry again after he froze, and that saying they did again kind of kills the spirit of them.
Not to mention, even Jurassic Bark kind of gets ruined thematically by Bender's Big Score; the punch from the end of Jurassic Bark came from the irony that Fry believed he was doing Seymour a favour by letting sleeping dogs lie, and not trying to force him back into a relationship that he'd forgotten. That's what made it sting so hard to find out that actually, all Seymour would've ever wanted was to see his one friend he'd never forgotten again. In Bender's Big Score, Fry seemingly completely consciously ditches Seymour for a whale hunt, so there was no well-meaning, self-denying cause behind all that fruitless waiting (if you can even call it that, seeing as, Fry does come back for Seymour and greet him before he dies according to Bender's Big Score).
"Bridge to Terabithia" was the first time I cried for any piece of fictional media, but "Jurassic Bark" was the 1st time I legit cried over a TV Show. Futurama is in my top 5, one of the best shows ever created.
I never cry at literature anymore. I’m a big reader, and I read a lot of really dark books. The kind where you get attached he’d to child characters, throughout a book or two and then they get murdered.... yet I don’t cry, I get really upset and saddened, and sometimes I have to put the book down for a day or two to process it. Even when I read a novella where this little girl from the main series (who is mute) has a large bounty on her head yada yada yada. And this guy the main character is really poor, and he finds the girl after she gets in a car crash. He’s gets her and is going to turn her in, but on the way they form a kind of father to daughter connection, even though she never speaks. Eventually he changes his mind and devotes the rest of the novella to getting her to her uncles house because her parents are a holes that kicked her out and called her a freak. Where he is shot in the head and killed. And that’s how the novella ends. Yet I didn’t cry. I think I’ve become desensitized to that. And then I reread Bridge to Terabithia. And damn that book made me cry. A lot.
7:04 - "[The retcon] removes the impact, the emotional substance, from the original 'Jurassic Bark' entirely." NO, IT DOESN'T. The emotional impact of the original episode is fully intact.
Exactly, we the audience know what originally happened and how it hit us that Fry didn't know the truth but the altered-ish timeline (how was Seymour fossilized in the first, pre Larz, timeline?) gives us the happy ending we wanted to see and that the characters deserved. Just because things are different now doesn't invalidate what happened back then. Edit: If they wanted to remove the emotional substance from the original Jurassic Bark they could've just put in a scene after the sad fast-forward of Seymour's life with Fry changing his mind and going ahead with the cloning.
Agreed. I think the episode with Seymour hit alot of people, which is an amazing quality. The retcon used in futurama didn't change what Seymour went through. It created an alternate past. Running alongside the "real" past. One where Fry never came to the future, which would have meant the series didn't exist. This isn't rewriting, its adding to the world and story of futurama.
Yeah, and also that experience is still very much true for Our Fry. He never sees Seymour again except in the episode where they explore his memory of 1999. So he still went through that process and he doesn't get that resolution. It's just less cruel to the dog, and after all the tears I cried for Jurassic Bark, I can get behind that
heres the problem with the "benders big score" example, its not a true retcon, its not entirely replacing the events, nor does it invalidate jurrasic bark, it exapnds upon it, an alternate fry stays behind and lvies with seamore yada yada yada, but the oriignal fry NEVER experiences this jurrasic bark is still in place for him, plus when the timecode is discovered in benders big score it creates a multiverse point in the show where the timeline is changed MULTIPLE times, every time bedner goes back in time to steal something, at least 2 times with fry up until "benders big score" every previous example of time travel was predetermined to happen, which all changes with this episode. all the events of jurrasic bark still happens and is both intact and canon as part of fry's and seamores timeline as unlike predertined events timeline changign events still occur AFTER the originals did, like stacking stickert son top of eachother, tl:dr seamore has 2 quantum save files, "jurrasic bark" and "benders big score" if he was cloned during JB he would retain memories of the original file, and then cloned again after BBS he would have memories of that timeline and both seamores are true
I don't even watch this show and I don't know why I'm here, but based on what I've heard from this video I entirely agree. I think this video was a miss. Ironically it's missing the same point it's preaching about not trying to relive the past, absolutely nothing diminishes the impact of that episode. Not only is it not a direct retcon, but even if it was that episode still exists on it's own. It reminds me of when people argue about sequels "ruining" movies..when they don't effect them at all.
You make it sound like it was retconned the following season. Jurassic Bark aired November 17, 2002. Bender's Big Score on November 27, 2007. Giving Seymour a happy ending five years later doesn't diminish the impact of the Bark. If anything, we can watch that episode without the emotional weight attached to it.
@@nates9536 When writers resort to showing an animal having a hard time to get an emotional response from their audience then I'd say they've very much taken the easy option.
@@nates9536 In all honesty I was happy with the retcon when I saw Bender's Big Score. I was glad Seymour got to live a happy life with Fry. I didn't think about the loss of emotional impact of the scene where Seymour waits 12 years I just thought "Oh good now Seymour gets to be happy. Fry's still upset about Leelou the Narwhal and also unconsciously Leela, but now Seymour gets to live with his best friend and that makes me happy." See time travel is tricky, in the Jurassic Bark episode Fry has yet to go back so Seymour lives through the 12 years of loneliness until Fry cannonically goes back in time. If your watching the show and then watch Bender's Big Score then Fry changes the timeline making it Seymour's best timeline. The timeline where Fry never showed up still existed, but we moved into the new timeline with Lars/Time Travel Fry. I don't think this robs the emotional impact it's just 2 different timelines that exist in the same media multiverse.
@@peglor thats not what the writers did though, the writers proved that Fry was wrong to be mature and accept the death of his dog by showing that Seymour didn't do any of what he supposed. Seymour sitting alone at the end would be sad, as most of us really care about animals in connection to humanity, but what actually makes that scene as emotional as it is is the fact that Fry made the mature decision to allow Seymour his rest, after coming to the conclusion that Seymour must've lived a full life without him, when that simply wasnt the case.
@@nates9536 the weight doesn't go away after you've watched Bender's Big Score. This channel is trying to be poignant without reason. It's a show were time travel and alternate dimensions exist, just because they change something, doesn't mean the thing 'before' loses meaning.
I actually love this retcon. It explains how he got the way we see him in Jurassic Bark and gave the viewer a sense of happiness and relief that the dog wasn’t left outside waiting for 12 years.
This isn't even a retcon, fry lives in the past in an alternate timeline, jurassic bark still happened just to the fry that stayed the future, the original fry
I still enjoy Futurama a lot more, then Simpsons and even Family Guy. Sure, Futurama is made by the same people that did the Simpsons, but Futurama has something, that neither The Simpsons or even Faily Guy have. An end.
What impresses me the most about Futurama is the fact that all of its math and scientific claims are legitimate. Futurama is staffed by a roster of Ivy League graduates with backgrounds in science and math. As well as with The Simpsons since the both of them have the same creative teams.
I think that this retcon actually makes the story better. It shows that Fry made the right decision and that Seymour did in fact live a somewhat full life after the original Fry left. It means that Fry chose not to revive him in an act of maturity that was eventually the right thing to do. It also makes the story less sad while still keeping Seymour's love for Fry intact.
The first eight seasons of The Simpsons were some of the best television I've ever seen, and Futurama is one of the best shows that was perfect from beginning to end. You can enjoy both and appreciate the quality in both of them.
To be fair, the first seasons of The Simpsons were great, they even had the powerful moment in the Homer's Mom episode just like with Jurassic Bark. I agree that it can't live up to Futurama though.
I interpreted what happened in Benders Big Score not so much as “retcon” but as being given a more complete picture of how Seymour went on with his life. In Jurassic Bark it’s IMPLIED that Seymour died sad and alone waiting for Fry, but obviously there were moments of his life in between him waiting that weren't shown to the audience for the sake of time and obviously for the emotional impact they were going for. So Benders Big Score showed us that while he did spend a lot of time waiting outside Panuccis, it was our own assumption (albeit due to the implication) that he was sad and alone the whole rest of his life. I for one was extremely relieved when I found out Seymour got to live out his life with his best ol pal. And I’ve always hailed that as one of the best pieces of Futurama writing that they were able to give closure and relief without necessarily changing the story, just showing more of the story. I know this comment has gone on long enough and you probably get what I'm trying to say by now, but my point is that it’s like in any movie or show where someone is “killed” but you don’t actually see them die, and then we get emotional about it, but we're relieved later on to learn they’re still alive; not because it was retconned, but because we merely assumed they were really dead in the first place.
Clever interpretation. I like this. In this POV I wouldn't label it a retcon. A rather advanced and nuanced story stitching technique, but it in no way explicitly nullifies the original data given. Well played you, well played.
Yes exactly! A good example of what you’re talking about is in the movie Spider-Man 3, when Peter Parker is told by the commissioner about who Uncle Ben’s real killer was. During that scene Peter imagines how Uncle Ben’s killer took his life. But by the end of the film we hear the killer’s side of how it actually happened, still leading to the same conclusion of Uncle Ben’s death but with more details of the actual events that took place and lead up to him dying, which in the end gave Peter closure as he understood to accept the past and to learn forgive.
I always found that fururama had this unique quality to it where, even though it IS funny, don’t get me wrong, it never really made me laugh very much, but I would still watch it all the time at one point in my life, because it has this sense that it’s just GOOD, and it has other great more specific qualities too of course. I just always felt this, I don’t really know how to put it into words beyond that. It’s just got this underlying thing going on where in spite of never being too hilarious, or anything else, it’s just pure, good thing, that makes you love it for exactly what it is. I don’t know if this makes sense, but I feel like people will get exactly what I mean.
Definitely. I never found it very funny, but Futurama was almost always engaging, interesting, and often emotionally resonant. Only other show I can think of that worked on a similar level was Scrubs... another not-great comedy with way more depth than you'd expect.
I agree, and personally I think some of that comes from the very grounded character interactions. The comedy usually seems much more similar to "that one stupid thing my friend said that one time" than scripted jokes. There's nothing wrong with scripted comedy, don't get me wrong, but there's just a different feel to Futurama that's really great.
for me, the laugh out loud moments were mostly, if not entirely from the first season, quotes like "[...] with blackjack and hookers", were great. by the second season, when it wasn't as funny anymore, it still made me actually care about the characters. i wasnt watching it to laugh anymore, i was genuinely hoping to see fry and leela together.
Funny how you miss that Seymour was a retcon to start with. He was added to Fry's story where he quite clearly did not exist before. Others have stated that this is an alternate timeline created by Fry when he went into the past. This example doesn't really fit a retcon. In fact, Futurama several retcons that it handles quite well, for example having Fry being his own grandpa being an explanation for his missing brain wave. I think when retcons are done simply as a means of explaining things that didn't need explanation is the real issue. Using the Star Wars example, midochlorians aren't a bad retcon. It would make sense for a large counsel of Jedi to have a better scientific understanding of the force. The bad retcon is having Anakin meet Obiwan as a child as that means the episode 4 Obiwan lies to Luke rather egregiously. I think the number of ripples a retcon causes also effects how it is viewed by fans.
i'd like to add to anyone who may be tempted ot bash on the midichlorians thing, NO they dotn create the force they channel it, they act like force transformers like at the power plant or in your computer, they icnrease the potency of the conneciton you already have, and enable you to use the force at the correct/appropriate intensity for the task.
Obi-Wan lying to Luke actually is quite within his character, it's what he does. He lied to him from the beginning. What's one more lie for the old lie hound?
@@MewmewGrrl Again though the amount of outright lying is mostly created by the prequels. If you watch just the original movies on their own Obi-wan doesn't lie to Luke. Withholds information yes. The closest thing to a lie is about the death of Anakin, but as explained in the movie, that's how he perceived it. Anakin stopped existing as he knew him once he became Vader.
Nope. Midochloriands are the worst retcon of all time. It took the force away from being a spiritual endeavor accomplishable by anyone through training and self discipline (though some are "chosen" by this apparently conscience universal force, and are more inherently talented). It turned it into just one more dry, explainable sci-fi feature. The beauty of the original trilogy was the dance between science and religion. The mixing of the future and the ancient, the explainable and the mystical, WAS the appeal of Star Wars. To try and "explain" the force in any way is to devalue its role in the story as the yin to the technological yan. These types of retcons are a big part of why episodes 1-3 are not highly regarded. They show that the creators didn't even understand what they created.
The producers spoke on that, there are 2 timelines, happening in tandem. One where Fry was not his on GF and Seymour waited the whole time, and then the one where Fry became his own GF, and would become Lars. So they really did know what they were doing because time travel is an inexplicable process with profound effects on existence. That being said, that episode gets me every time and is one of the most tragically beautiful things I have ever seen.
Fry going back in time and trying to pick up his old life where he left off was necessary to the plot of the movie. If they hadn't acknowledged the dog it would have suggested he actively abandoned him which doesn't fit the character. Yeah it did retcon the story a bit, but it didn't go out of its way to soften the episode's impact, it just happened organically
It wasn't retcon! It was left vague on purpose and they left clues! Seymour was flash fossilized in that spot *standing up* but when we see him "die" he was laying down. Plus it doesn't explain how he was fossilized at that spot, seeing as if he died there he would be decayed or have been cleaned up in some way. What in fact we were seeing was Seymour waiting for Fry to return from his search for leelu the narwhal. With all the writers being as educated as they are im sure they had the ability to preplan something to be revealed in their big movie. What you're doing is basically what literature teachers do with books. "The writer had this guy die because it adds another layer to the protagonists pain" The writer: "I couldn't think of what I wanted that guy to do so I killed him off"
Almost no literature ascribed to authorial intent. You can read into the literature that having a character die helps another character grow. You can even back it up with text. The teacher didn’t say “the author did this.” For most of history we would have no idea why anything was done. Interpreting literature is about being able to see similarities and parallels across writers and say “get this message seems to be conveyed due to these ideas being presented. I could write a paper on that and let other discuss it.” People who claim that literature teachers claim that something is fact have either ran into bad teachers, or don’t care to engage with a text. I will always remind people Ray Bradbury said that Fahrenheit 451 was not as much about censorship as it was about tv degrading culture. Yet, if that was his intent, it was also a hell of a book about censorship.
@@OriontheLad unfortunately the bad teachers people run into are mostly highschool English teachers who read way too deep into shit. I've been to 6 high schools over my teenage years and in all of them I only found 1 decent teacher that would teach you to look into shit rather than just saying "this means this because of that, and I'm college educated so my interpretation is objectively correct". It's fucked. You know the song "bohemian rhapsody"? I was told it was about Freddy Mercury's guilt over giving someone AIDS. When i brought up he even said the song was nonsense I was told to leave the classroom and got written up for being disruptive to the learning environment. So the next day I took some stink bombs I'd ordered out of a Kennesaw catalogue (stuffs so strong it sticks to clothes for like 3 wash cycles) and stomped a vial in every corner of the room and got my class a free shoot the shit on the blacktop period because the teacher refused to use the classroom for the rest of the day.
Don't forget that in Bender's Big Score, the Time Code was a paradox-correcting method of time travel (though one could argue that ALL methods of time travel are paradox-correcting in the Futurama universe, such as Fry becoming his own grandfather, but there are semantics to look at in that aspect). The end of Jurassic Bark didn't show that Fry had never came back, only that Seymore was always waiting for Fry to come back over the span of 12 years. He could very well have seen Fry that very morning and was just anxious to have him return. This is left up to the interpretation of the viewer, and ultimately only adds to the story's depth and growth, because while time in the Futurama universe is circular, for the viewer it is a straight line. Fry didn't even know what actually happened to Seymore at the end of Jurassic Bark, because he hadn't lived through that period of time yet, even though it was in the past. For me, personally, I was GLAD in BBS to see Fry's return, because that meant that the 12 years of waiting wasn't an indefinite, hope-against-all-hope scenario for Seymore. It was just the story of a faithful dog awaiting his friend's return each day. This isn't a retcon, because a retcon means your perspective about the past was changed due to new or missing information. Rather, in a story segment, this is still a straight line. If you go by that, this is just further story building. Assuming time in the show moves roughly equivalent to the year it was aired, this is the events that take place: 1999 Fry (age 25) befriends Seymore → 1999 Fry (age 25) gets frozen → 1999 Fry (age 32) returns to NYC → 2012 Seymore is rapid-fossilized during Bender's assassination attempt against Fry (age 49) → 3000 Fry (age 25) arrives in NNYC → 3002 Seymore's remains discovered (Fry is aged 27) → 3005 Fry returns as Lars (age 49) → 3007 Time code is discovered → 3007 Lars (age 51) dies Fry started out as 25 years old in 1999. By the time he went back to 1999, he was 7 years older. 12 more years passed after that before he went back to the future. So while time may be circular, the show's growth is still linear. The only mistake the writer's made was that at 1:01 AM, Fry returns to Panucci's Pizza and clearly pets Seymore who is outside. This begs the question of why Seymore was looking for Fry on the afternoon of January 1st, 2000, where Seymore leads a food-poisoned Fry family to Applied Cryogenics, and why Fry was not at his parents' for New Year's Brunch of bologna sandwiches, as he obviously enjoyed reconnecting with his family. So how do you align this? Easy: space-time is circular and malleable, we already know that Fry, Bender, and Professor Farnsworth is already living in the 3rd known universe, and there can be micro-differences between universes. It's entirely possible that in one iteration, pre-Farnesworth's Forward-Only Time Machine, the scammers did not get Farnesworth's personal information and did not initiate a hostile takeover of Earth, so Fry never went back to 2000 and Seymore was never reunited with him. The odds of that actually happening are astronomically high; almost as high as life being able to exist at all.
Austin Perdue I think both shows are too different to be compared. Rick and Morty focuses on alternate dimensions while also being in the present day, while Futurama is in the Future. Morty is socially awkward, but intelligent while Fry is dumb but not socially awkward. Futurama is cartoony, Rick and Morty is dark Rick and Morty is action, Futurama is comedy. Both shows do have their moments where they look at the characters, but that's the only aspect I see comparable. There I can say Futurama did it better. Edit: Farnsworth and Rick are very similar in terms of their actual characters. I can't really compare with that though. -sincerely, a fan of both shows.
I like your interpretation, I however love the whole Seymour story; Jurassic Bark gave us a peek into the life of Seymour without Fry (our story's one at least) while Bender's Big Score fills in the blanks. For me it told the rest of the story without changing what we saw, but bringing it into new light. Seymour did wait for the duplicate Fry often; that fry worked at that sea-world like place, and went on an excursion to the north for years. Also we knew Seymour didn't die in his sleep as the end of Jurassic Bark made it seem, because of the flash fossilization the professor talked about. like I said your view is thought provoking, keep it up.
Is it bad I see it on the opposite way? After the ending of Jurassic Bark, the one thing I wanted to do was like, get in the TV and tell him that no, the doggo loved him and waited for him, and he should totally resurrect the dog. Like, that episode made me feel AWFUL. Bender Big Score brings a sense of relief on that sense. That Seymour did eventually live a happy life. Maybe it could have been handled better, but it is what it is.
Could you do a video comparison of the ending of Futurama vs HIMYM and the way Fry and Ted have different wins, even though they both got the girl? That is, if there even is enough content to talk about this for a full video. Thanks and great video as always!
Even at 11 years old, my fellow Boy Scouts and I talked about how the episode 'Jurassic Bark' touched us emotionally... and that was at a time when we all still laughed our asses off at the very thought of a fart joke. We had precious little emotional maturity, if any, and yet, that episode still really spoke to us.
I actually really like this retcon. Fry still has his moment to grieve, meanwhile another Fry from an alternate timeline gets to reconnect with his family and his dog. It's a win/win as far as I'm concerned.
"you were doing really well until everyone died" is my favorite quote in reference to God ever, and is also my personal motto when playing like a Sims-type game
The episode where he wants to get revenge on his brother for ‘stealing his identity’ is a beautiful episode and it’s an episode that made me realise that cartoons are not just a fun, thing for kids to enjoy but often carry an important and emotional message
you're looking at it like "oh we now know that 5 years from now, it's gonna be all right, so it loses its impact" but the viewers aren't "supposed" to know that, if they are watching the episodes in order, like they should, then they will see jurassic bark first, feel the impact, then later, they will see bender's big score.
@@nerdythespian1212 I rewatched the whole thing recently, I was told that by the end of the show the dog was fine, still after I watched that episode I was not.
I agreed with the arguments that were said, but I've always thought that those were more like alternative realities than clear retcons. Great video nonetheless. (:
Seymour was great. And based on a similar true story of a Japanese man whose dog would wait for him everyday after work until one day he never showed up. The dog still waited. A long time. Seymour also looks just like my dog Gary who is no longer with us sadly. Miss that lil guy. Legend!!
While I do agree that Bender's Big Score kind of took away from the emotional impact that Jurassic Bark left on viewers, they couldn't simply let that one scene disrupt the narrative they wanted to continue on with. The new story they wanted to tell NEEDED Fry to go back to the past. He needed to go through that emotional arc. He needed to become Lars in order to make the plot come full circle. Wanting the writers to never have Fry return to the past strictly on the grounds that it would interfere with the emotional ending of Seymour's dedication to him is a bit illogical to the structure. You could look at this negatively and say it made the episode less important since it now never happened. But I think a better way to see it is that Fry was able to make good on what he believed Seymour experienced. That rich, full life he thought Seymour had after he disappeared... he now got to have in reality. It's good closure for the audience to see a character they care for, human or otherwise, have their fate changed in a positive way. The original episode is still there and still leaves the same impact on us when we watch it, just like any great piece of media you're watching in the moment. But now we get to look forward to that happy ending for him in the future... well past, I guess. Remember, watching the entirety of Futurama over, or any series for that matter, is still entertaining and enjoyable even if you know all the surprises that are coming. This is no different.
I think part of this retcon was about the return of the show. Much like the abrupt end to Seymour’s relationship with Fry, Futurama fans were left behind and not ready to move on when the show was unfairly cancelled. Bender’s Big Score was the grand in-cancelling of the show, and the fans were given the chance to enjoy the show once more-represented symbolically through Seymour’s reunion with Fry, and his chance to live a full and happy life. Basically, I think that this retcon is fair and justified, given the context of its release. Of course that context is missing now that it’s out and every episode of the series can be played back-to-back without interruption, so it’s understandable that it would feel unjustified watching it today. I think a similar but reversed thing happened with Lost. So I hear, the ending was really disappointing for fans because having to wait a week between episodes in a season, and years for the show overall, gave them plenty of time to create and share theories about what’s going on in the show-all of which were better than the canonical explanation they got. Apparently, the show isn’t actually that bad when you binge it all the way through. I haven’t seen it though, so I can’t say for sure...
Steven Brunwasser For me and my family, it was nice. The ending wrapped it up nicely. It’s so hard to imagine an end to a show like this and I don’t think there could have been many other satisfying endings. Just my opinion though I dont know what was expected I guess
I think you have it there: this particular retcon was meta. First, it wasn't so much a retcon for the show (others have said it was clearly an alternate universe), it was Fry attempting a retcon for himself: he gets to spend the rest of Seymour's life with Seymour. And it wasn't even about that, it was a metaphor for how we can't undo the show being canceled, even by bringing it back.
In those last few minutes, from two years ago, you managed to articulate my exact issues with what Disney is doing to the Star Wars franchise in present day...and also my worries for the upcoming Futurama revival.
There are multiple points that change within any story that involves time travel. Back to the Future 2 with the Hell Valley timeline for example. Hell, the end of the original Back to the Future also. The Seymore Fry knew lived for 12 years after he was frozen and was flash fossilized outside the pizzeria. The one we see in Bender's Big Score was created by the act of time travel. That universe still exists, that Seymore still sat alone in front of the pizzeria for 12 years.
There was the other episode about the lucky 7 leaf clover, The Luck of the Fryrish, where Fry learns that his nephew was named in honour of him to 'carry on his spirit'. There's another, Game of Tones, that doesn't really have anything to do with anything until the very end where Fry is able to meet with his mother one last time in her dreams, and she tells him she's dreamed of him every night since he disappeared, and you know they actually do meet because you see her in the past smiling in her sleep. These are such beautiful and poignant messages about loss and memory that are absolutely just steamrolled by Bender's Big Score. And it's little, meaningful things like that that are the reason people fucking hate retconning.
Thanks for this head cannon and the one we co wrote. We have since through 1s n 0's we put our head up our ass and created an infinite loop where everything is reckoned so through information nothing matters. You nailed it that sublime pain being taken away. Thankfully YT sets clips to repeat. So I can keep living my emotions being taken away.
Ok so when you time travel you ended up in an alternate universe so the in Brenda's big score he gose back to separate Universe not the same one that he left so it doesn't take away from Seymour jurastic bark. Whether or not that's how time travel Works still doesn't take away that that episode happened we all experienced it it happened.
Little disagree, dont forgot this Fry "Time Clone" Goes to the sea, adopt a Narwhal, and this only in some years, then he return and benders try to blow him up, he see is reflection on the mirror, understand he as see himself in the future, and goes back to the 3000's, So in a case, the dog as still wait for him long years ...
While I agree on an academic level, I loved when bender’s big score showed Seymour having a happy future, just because I was so happy to see Seymour happy. The way I see it, Seymour did wait for Fry. And then, the universe was finally kind to him, and he didn’t have to wait for him anymore. Seymour was such a good dog. But, yes. Objectively speaking, you’re right. Seeing Seymour happy just gives me the warm fuzzies
BUT, Seymour would have never been fossilized without time traveling Bender blasting the pizzeria. There would have never been the episode of Jurassic Bark, which had the biggest plot hole: how would a dog become fossilized just laying outside a pizzeria?
