Things Of Interest

In "Space Pilot 3000", Fry's age is given as 25 on a computer screen on 31st December 2999, which gives us his birth year of 1974. (Chronologically he is 1025 years old at this point, of course, but it is established in "Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles" that in the future there are handheld detectors which can tell you your biological age.) However, only sporting references during Fry's birth scene in this episode narrow down the exact day.

Note: Fry's birth date is given as August 9th, 1974 on the script for "Space Pilot 3000", which can be found on the Volume 1 DVD; while widely quoted, this source is not canonical.

Nibbler hides underneath the desk that Fry will sit at as the new millennium rolls in, intending to deliberately make Fry fall in the cryogenics tube, so that in the future (specifically, the episode "The Why Of Fry") he can defeat the brains on behalf of all intelligent life.

An alternate version of Fry arrives from the year 3002 or so in a timeline in which he attempted but failed to defeat the brainspawn. He delivers to Nibbler the dire warning, "Scootie-Puff Junior sucks!" before disappearing.

Bender-B's internal conflict, unsatisfied need to urinate and "doomed time paradox duplicate" status combine to start his self-destruct sequence. Bender-A is still on the lavatory at this point.

Michelle, as we know from "Space Pilot 3000", just threw all of Fry's stuff out on the sidewalk. In this episode she says this happened roughly two hours ago.

Amazingly, this does not create a paradox. Presumably, Michelle and Constantine both assume Bender is some guy in a New Year's costume.

"Lars" finally recaptures Leeloo, but she has found a mate in the wild, so he sadly releases her a second time. "Lars" returns to Panucci's Pizza, where Seymour is still waiting for him. Bender blows up the building with "Lars" inside, flash-fossilising Seymour. "Lars" escapes alive, his appearance and voice altered, and realises that he is, in fact, "Lars Fillmore" from the 31st century. He hides inside Michelle's cryogenic tube, resetting the timer for the year 3002.

His mission apparently successful, Bender then hides in the limestone cavern underneath the future location of Planet Express until 13th December 3007.

Reminiscences of a girl Fry meets from the 21st century.

Although this event can theoretically be placed anywhere in this century, it would seem foolish to place it anywhere but here in 2012 where it can coincide with Conan O'Brien's "War of 2012". Conjecturally, this war could also be the origin of the advanced technology that would be required to transfer David (Calculon) Duchovny's mind into a robot arm (below), and possibly even mark the birth of robotkind as an independent race from humanity on Earth.

Stated by Farnsworth. Note that all existing light continues to move at its original slow pace (otherwise the plot of "When Aliens Attack" falls apart, if nothing else), and that it is never explicitly stated that the scientists in question are from Earth.

This is the reason why travel between extremely distant stars and galaxies is possible in the Futurama universe. Thus, this event probably marks the beginning of real interstellar travel on the part of humanity - and, conjecturally, every other species in the Futurama universe. ("FTL" travel by any species before this date has not been depicted onscreen. "Roswell That Ends Well" may provide a counterexample but maybe the 1947 end of the temporal wormhole opened up very near to Earth, who knows?) As a result, first contact between humans and extraterrestrials is quite likely to have occurred almost immediately after this. Read on.

Farnsworth says so (although Zoidberg's species won't be explicitly named for at least another season).

I hypothesise that this occurred shortly after the lightspeed increase in 2208, at which point humanity was probably contacted by every other spacefaring race in the universe more or less simultaneously. Certainly, this is the earliest given example of official contact between humans and aliens ("Roswell That Ends Well" and Nibbler's presence on Earth in "The Why Of Fry" notwithstanding).

According to Nichelle Nichols.

I think this came about largely as a result of 1) "FTL" travel suddenly proving possible and 2) the universe revealing itself to be crammed with other sentient species. Star Trek was right all along!

This is seen through the window during the thousand-year-sleep montage in "Space Pilot 3000". What actually happened is eventually revealed in "Bender's Big Score". Bender is fulfilling established history so no paradox is caused by his actions.

Note that the Applied Cryogenics building remains intact, with its cryogenically stored occupants still preserved, throughout this period!

Fry gives the year as 3000 in this episode, putting it out of sequence. Placement here is conjectural - this could theoretically be anywhere between "Fear Of A Bot Planet" and "Xmas Story".

Lars Fillmore is seen in "Bender's Big Score" to hijack Michelle's tube while she is frozen and reset its timer to open in 3002. However, Fry is playing practical jokes on unfrozen people in this episode, and probably wakes Michelle up two years early, following which Lars (off-camera) freezes himself for a further two years. This is probably why Lars' own unfreezing sequence is not shown in "Bender's Big Score" - he would be woken up from an otherwise empty cryogenic tube, which would be too confusing to explain.

Valentine's Day, probably 3002 - see 12th June 3001.

This date puts this episode out of sequence with the rest of season four, so it has been moved up here to 3002.

Date on wall inside the Planet Express ship. Note: If we assume the episodes take place in order of production code, this episode is out of sequence.

Episode dates beyond this point are largely indeterminate.

Farnsworth is 161 in this episode, placing it between 9th April 3002 and 8th April 3003.

The entire Planet Express crew gets rejuvenated substantially in this episode, explaining their apparently constant ages up until 3008.

Both Nudars return to the Planet Express building, where Nudar-B is crushed and killed by a falling Smelloscope.

Despite this and dire warnings from Nibbler, the scammers send Bender backwards in time to steal ancient treasures and then hide in a limestone cavern beneath the Planet Express building until the present day before revealing himself.

Bender travels back to 1351 BCE, 1509 CE, 2308 CE, and many other eras, retrieving priceless treasures and bringing them to the present day.

Many of his trips (e.g. acquiring the sarcophagus of pharaoh Amenhotep III and the 2308 Nobel Peace Prize) fulfill established history because the treasures in question are lost to history; however, equally many (the Mona Lisa, Vincent van Gogh's Self-portrait of Autumn 1887) result in the creation of doomed time paradox duplicates of the artifacts in question.

The final Bender - the one "from right at the end" - persuades all of his alternates in the basement not to surface after all, but to wait until after the scammers are defeated.

This creates several hundred doomed time paradox Benders, and a gigantic, cataclysmic paradox which the Time Code is unable to resolve.

Pursued by the scammers, who want to erase the Time Code forever, Fry travels back in time to 12:30am, 1st January 2000. Bender is sent after Fry to terminate him, and arrives at 12:28am on the same day. He immediately returns from the cavern underneath Planet Express, incorrectly claiming success in his mission. Fry is briefly reported dead and a small memorial is held, but then reappears, having just unfrozen himself for the second time. The Time Code tattoo is now erased from his rear.

By now, the scammers have taken possession of planet Earth and the Planet Express crew is living on Neptune. Leela assembles an invasion force to take back Earth and the scammers are defeated. All the ancient treasures which Bender retrieved from the past are destroyed by fire.

Nudar, the last surviving scammer, threatens Leela, Fry and Lars in the cryogenics laboratory. To protect Leela, Lars unfreezes Bender-B (last seen 12:31am, January 1, 2000) and blows himself up along with Nudar. At Lars' funeral, Bender, now in funeral wear, extracts the Time Code tattoo from Lars' butt cheek and travels back to January 1, 2000 one final to paste it onto Fry's ass, completing the Time Code causal loop. Finally, Bender-from-way-at-the-end and his hundreds of doomed duplicates emerge from the Planet Express basement, prompting Nibbler to hurriedly exit the universe entirely as the spacetime continuum begins to collapse...