Futurama S 7 E 22 Leela And The Genestalk - TV Tropes

Spoiler alert: robots and whatnot

When Leela breaks out in suction cups, showing the first signs of what Dr. Tenderman refers to as squidification, Fry is sent to sell the Planet Express ship to pay for an operation that will, at most, only delay the symptoms a few months. The ship is bought for two giant, magic beans by a con artist, and the beans grow into a beanstalk that leads up to Mom's genetic engineering facility - Leela, curious despite her affliction, decides to climb it. Now Fry and Bender have to rise to the occasion to rescue Leela!

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Tropes

• Achievements in Ignorance: Bender is able to bend a wooden door, on the grounds that the door was too stupid to realize how flexible it isn't.

  Fry: You can't bend a wooden door.
  Bender: (whispering) I know that, and you know that. But this door looks pretty stupid.

• Bait-and-Switch: The giant-ass door covered in "keep out" signs. Mom proclaims it's just where she keeps her signs, and given her, well, everything it's not unreasonable to assume she's lying out her ass. Later on, it turns out there really was nothing sinister behind the door.
• Beanstalk Parody: Among the other fairy tales that are parodied, this episode's main plotline takes on the Jack and the Beanstalk story. Fry takes in old Bessie (the ship) to sell for Leela's operation but is swindled to trade it for "magic beans". However, Leela is the one who climbs the beanstalk, with the role of the giant being shared by Mom and the actual giant.
• Behind the Black: Leela is trussed by Mom's sons while she's standing in a wide-open area in broad daylight, and there's nothing for them to have been hiding in or behind. Even her eyesight isn't usually that bad, so she must have been seriously distracted.
• Big Damn Kiss: Fry after he promises he loves Leela unconditionally. He kisses her to show he is serious, and she returns it, even doing a foot pop with her tentacles.
• Body Horror: Leela when she fully undergoes squidification. Fry tries to be supportive but is unable to hold back his scream when she first pulls off the sheet and reveals what she's become. Bender's reply "That is nasty."
• Brick Joke:
  • Leela leaves a manhole cover off when she's distracted by the giant beanstalk before going into the sewers. Fry later falls into the open manhole while he's also distracted by the beanstalk.
  • When Larry tries claiming Mom made a pun, she slaps him, declaring it a "play on words". Later on, she makes a pun of her own... and, of course, slaps Larry again.
• Call-Back: This episode expands on Mom's genetic splicing research for profit established way back in "A Fishful of Dollars".
• Celebrity Cameo: Adam West and Burt Ward invert the Batman (1966)-style cameo.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Leela is attempting to end her and Fry's relationship, he thinks she's talking about goulash.

  Leela: Listen, Fry, whatever it was that you and I had together...
  Fry: Goulash?
  Leela: No! Well...I dunno...maybe it was goulash...

• Continuity Nod:
  • The Professor calls the Planet Express ship Bessie, the same name he gave it in "2-D Blacktop."
  • Leela's locker has her blernsball uniform and Oktoberfest chicken hat.
• Crossover Cameo: Bender finds Jake and Finn trapped in Mom's floating Genetics lab.

  Jake: What time is it?
  Bender: Time for you to shut up!

• Cursed with Awesome: Leela's tentacled body makes her amazingly strong, agile, elastic, and capable of clinging and climbing to any surface with rapid speed.
• Doppelgänger Crossover: Bender meets Jake from Adventure Time. Both are voiced by John DiMaggio.
• Drama Queen: The doctor who diagnoses Leela with squidification, who walks off wailing how he wishes he'd never been born.
• Exact Words: Bender declares that if he doesn't set a new club record on the bucking bronco, he'll eat his hat. He gets knocked off in 0.4 seconds, setting a club record for shortest ride ever, shortly tied by Farnsworth. Bender is happy enough with this result and doesn't eat his hat (Zoidberg does though).
• Fairy Tale Episode: The episode is a parody of Jack and the Beanstalk, though it also references other fairy tales like Rapunzel and Chicken Little.
• Foot Popping: When Fry reassures Leela he still loves her even if she's become a writhing mass of tentacles, he kisses her, and she pops about six tentacles.
• Foreshadowing: The chamber the Giant is held in contains a lot of things that make it look more like a place of residence, including a giant-sized recliner, table, chair, can of Slurm and mug full of pencils. It's an early sign that he's not a prisoner being held against his will for Mom's cruel experiments, but a patient being accommodated for while he undergoes an experimental medical procedure.
• Freakiness Shame: Leela, even more so than usual. She seems devastated by her condition, certain that her life is over, and believes that she'll never be loved again. Fry, who was always supportive of her, continues to be so in this episode, even after she fully undergoes squidification. He promises that he'll love her no matter how her body changes. She's clearly touched.
• Genetic Engineering Is the New Nuke: Inverted with Mom's genetic engineering that actually has benefits such as curing various diseases and improving crop yields. But the only problem it's banned on Earth for unspecified reasons.
• Green Aesop: Parodied. While it's shown that Mom's biotechnological agribusiness holdings are run purely for her own greed rather than any sort of charitable motivation, they have managed to cure various diseases and breed fast-growing crops (which, by the end, have totally blanketed New New York).
• Headbutt of Love: Fry and Leela do this when Fry tells Leela that he will always love her no matter what.
• Hypocritical Humor: Leela is outraged by Mom's genetic experiments and absolutely refuses to see the good they can bring despite all evidence to the contrary. Then she's told they can be used to cure her, and she's immediately onboard.
• Idiot Ball: Fry selling the Planet Express Ship for two 'magic' beans. He at least realizes he screwed up, though the others are bigger idiots for sending him off on his own.

  Fry: "Fry, you big dummy"?

  Bender: Very much so.

• Jerkass: When Fry and Bender go off to look for Leela, the rest of Planet Express decide to write them off as dead, but only after they've stolen and maxed out their credit cards.
• Kindness Ball: Mom of all people wants to help the poor by creating plants big enough to stop world hunger and using genetic engineering to cure diseases. While she's still doing it for profit, she specifically emphasizes that the plants would be cheap to the point where the poor could still afford them.
• Literal Metaphor: Mom's genetic engineering lab floats in the sky to make her literally above the law.
• Out-of-Character Moment: Since when does Mom behave in a considerate way toward the less fortunate?
• Pet the Dog:
  • Mom dabbles in genetic engineering to cure a person of being a giant and creates plants big enough to curb world hunger. She still intends to profit off the latter but emphasizes that the resulting plants would be so cheap that even the poor could afford them. She also cures Leela's mutations in gratitude for (accidentally) helping her perfect her work.
  • Also Fry trying to comfort Leela over her condition by giving her a kiss, which she sort of returns. Then later on when she tries to end their relationship, he assures her that he still loves her no matter what.
• Please Dump Me: Leela tries to convince Fry to end their relationship, saying there's no possible way he wants to have a life with her after what she's become. He refuses and says he'll always love her no matter what. She is clearly touched and thanks him for still wanting to be with her.
• Real Men Wear Pink: Fry grows marigolds, which are destroyed by Mom when she wants to demonstrate her new genetically engineered bean.
• Serious Business: The bucking buggalo has a whole team based out of a giant bunker in Texas to keep an eye on it.
• Shout-Out:
  • The crew go out dancing at THX1138's. The owner even wears all white and has ear tags like the characters in that film.
  • The bridge of Mom's flying castle has the same background noises as the Enterprise in Star Trek: The Original Series.
  • Adam West on a bat's body. He even appears during a climb up a building.
• Spanner in the Works: Although the crew thinks Fry is an idiot for giving away the ship for magic beans from a shifty salesman, the beanstalk that grows from them leads Leela to Mom's genetic engineering lab, where she eventually is permanently cured of her squidification.
• Understanding Boyfriend: Despite Leela's horrific transformation, Fry remains as loving and affectionate with her as ever. It never occurs to him a single time that he would break up with her or be any less loving to her than he always is and is surprised when she suggests they break up after her horrific transformation. He promises her that her squidification will not stop his love for her and passionately kisses her to confirm his devotion to her.
• Undying Loyalty: When Leela begins to undergo squidification, Fry promises her that it won't change his feelings for her. When she fully mutates into a squid hybrid, he still stays by her, even kissing her to confirm his devotion to her.

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