Futurama S 7 E 5 Zapp Dingbat - TV Tropes

[Cancel] >[OK]<

Zapp Brannigan loses interest in Leela and instead turns his attentions towards her mother, Turanga Munda, who just divorced her husband.

---

This episode provides examples of:

• Call-Back: Leela resurrects her disguise as "Lee Lemon" in order to spy on one of her mother's dates with Zapp.
• Caught Coming Home Late: Leela does this to her mother when she comes home from her date with Zapp. At two in the afternoon.
• Celebrity Cameo: George Takei's Head appears at the cantina being entertained by the holophonor image of a male dancer.

  Takei: Dance, slave, dance.

• Continuity Nod: In "Leela's Homeworld", in the flashback, it is offhandedly mentioned that Munda majored in exolinguistics, which was previously only used to explain how she wrote the Alien Language note Leela was attached to in order to pass her off as an alien.
• Description Cut: Leela assures her parents they are just having a bit of a lover's spat, and everything will work out just—

  (gavel bangs)
  Raoul: Divorce is final!

• Divorce Is Temporary: Leela's parents get back together in the end.
• Extra Digits: Morris is revealed to have twenty toes, ten on each foot.
• Footsie Under the Table: Zapp and Munda engage in this while negotiating with the Yarn People of Nylar 4.
• Funny Background Event: At the bar, you can see Al Gore's head with the nameplate "Captain Lance Starman", in reference to his closing line from the "Futurama Holiday Spectacular".
• Hypocritical Humor: The crux of the plot. After splitting up with Morris over the fact she wanted to see new sights and meet new people, Munda hooks up with Zapp, only the second person we and Leela see her meet, and the first person they have an extended conversation with. Essentially, she put herself in the exact situation she broke up with Morris over. Needless to say, even if Zapp wasn't her fling at one point, Leela was perfectly justified to be angry with her.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy:
  • Morris is initially fine with his former wife Munda getting together with Zapp, which is attributed to the zen state he acquired from sewer-surfing. However, he eventually changes his mind and crashes the wedding to confess his love again.
  • Despite his love for her, Zapp isn't too broken up about losing Munda to Morris and remarries them on the spot. He does try to kiss Munda, but gives up after Morris nails him in the gut a second time.
• Ignore the Fanservice: At some point, Leela attempts to prove her theory that Zapp is really interested in her by inviting him over for dinner. She tries to seduce him wearing seductive pink lingerie and dancing briefly on a laser stripper pole, but he refuses her.

  Zapp: Does your mother know you're using her pole?

• Irony: Morris and Munda split up because Morris is content spending the rest of his life living the same pattern while Munda wishes to see new sights and meet new people. After they split, however, the positions are reversed: Morris finds his calling surfing the sewers of the world, while Munda, almost immediately, is perfectly willing to commit herself into another relationship where she'd essentially stay at home the whole time, proving if anything that she was the one truly holding them back despite what she claims (with her situation arguably worse than before, as Zapp would be the one enjoying the sights across the galaxy had they actually got married).
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: This episode is the most sympathetic, honest and kind Zapp has ever been portrayed in the series, developing a genuine love for Munda. However, his typical war-mongering ways come out at the end of the episode, where he asks Munda to lie to the Carcarons by telling them the document they're signing is a peace treaty when really it's a declaration of war.
• Married at Sea: Parodied. Zapp uses his authority as a spaceship captain to conduct his own wedding. Played Straight at the end of the episode, where he remarries Leela’s parents to each other.
• My Friends... and Zoidberg: Used during Zapp's wedding, but not towards the Trope Namer.

  Zapp: Honored guests. And Kif.

• My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels: After negotiating a peace treaty between the DOOP and the Carcarons, Zapp attempts to congratulate them in their native language instead of using the Universal Translator provided. It comes out as "I'd like to spank your sister with a slice of bologna." Needless to say, the peace treaty was off until Munda intervened.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!: Munda realizes that Zapp plans to betray the Carcarons by secretly declaring war on them instead of signing a peace treaty. She is so disgusted by this she reveals this to the Carcarons, who then declare war themselves and immediately attack the ship.
• Noodle Incident:
  • Kif reminds Zapp that the last time he tried to speak to someone in their native language they not only got kicked out of a Mexican restaurant, the restaurant declared war.

    Kif: Oh, it's the battle of Paco's Tacos all over again!

  • Apparently, Leela slept with Zapp on more than just the one occasion.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Morris glumly stating that his wife Munda was his life gets him a sympathetic "Aw" from Bender, who ordinarily doesn't give a damn about anyone but himself. This of course causes Morris, Fry and Leela to stare at him.
  • Leela is so desperate to split up Zapp and Munda she outright tries to seduce him, when most times even his touch is enough to repulse her. Likewise, Zapp is so entrenched in the relationship that he, the man who would hump a pile of garbage if he thought it winked at him, refuses to even consider taking up Leela's offer for even a second.
• Operation: Jealousy: Leela suspects Zapp is dating her mother to get her jealous.
• Parental Sexuality Squick: Leela really doesn’t like hearing about how her mom and Zapp were having sex.
• Pretentious Pronunciation: Zapp brings up his love for "par-mee-see-an cheese".
• Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: Leela steals Fry's shtick of doing sound effects. Everyone just looks at her like she's a crazy person when she does it.
• Shout-Out:
  • Leela and Munda go out to the Mos Def Cantina. Similar music also plays.
  • Zapp asks Kif to go out on the wing and pretend to be a gremlin.
• Shown Their Work: Richard Nixon actually was a talented piano player, and even wrote a piano concerto.
• Sky Surfing: Morris saves the day by using the disabled Nimbus as a surfboard (which has feet-operated manual controls on the hull which only he can control with his 20 toed mutant feet) to ride the shock waves from the Carcaron's weapon blasts.
• Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace: Morris stows away on the Planet Express Ship to stop Munda's wedding to Zapp.
• Status Quo Is God: Leela's parents eventually get back together.
• Suddenly Shouting: A rare occurrence in which Kif raises his voice: "Our weapons are disabled AND YOU CAN'T RETURN ICE CREAM CAKE!! WE'RE DOOMED!!!!"
• Surfer Dude: After his divorce, Turanga Morris dedicates himself to surfing the world's sewers.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Morris decides to pursue his youthful dream of surfing the world's greatest sewers. Leela gets Bender and Fry, a man with a one-thousand year old immune system, to accompany him. Later in the episode, Fry is seen getting endless shots from a pile of syringes to combat the huge array of diseases he caught in the sewers.
• Swapped Roles: Played with a bit since Leela didn't grow up with her parents and thus didn't really get to experience being their child, but Munda living with Leela and starting a romance with Zapp leads to some typical mother-daughter arguments about who Munda is allowed to date, but with Leela as the "mother" to Munda's "rebellious daughter". She also admonishes Morris for not caring about the situation with this bit:

  Leela: "Look, I don't wanna jam a rat in your face cage, or whatever you kids say nowadays…"

• Turn the Other Cheek: All Zapp has to do is apologize to the Carcarons in their own language and the captain immediately accepts it and calls off the attack, with a real peace treaty being signed shortly afterwards.
• Two-Timer Date: Zapp scheduled his wedding to Munda on the same day he had rescheduled the Carcaron peace treaty negotiation.
• We Come in Peace — Shoot to Kill: Invoked. Zapp swaps the peace treaty with a document stating that the Carcarons are declaring war. Once they've signed it, he plans to blow their fleet away in "one glorious burst of quote-unquote 'self-defense'."
• Why Waste a Wedding?: Zapp isn't too broken up about losing Munda. He officiates her remarriage to Morris on the spot.

---