Leela and Amy take the world of competitive floating by storm. 

SUMMARY

Fry and Leela (Billy West and Katey Sagal) are on a double date with Amy and Kif (Lauren Tom and Maurice LaMarche) where the ladies keep making catty comments to each other. Later, on a delivery, they attend a Butterfly Derby, a sporting event where women fight each other while floating using butterfly wings. Leela and Amy agree to compete, only to be beaten. However, they do well enough that they are offered a position as a competitive team named The Wingnuts. Unfortunately, they still lose every match, leading them to take the steroid-like Ocephalus Nectar. It improves their musculature and their performance in matches, but makes them mean and aggressive. They eventually qualify for the championships, but the entire Nectar supply is bought by their opponents. The crew journeys to Kif’s homeworld in order to harvest more. 

At the butterfly sanctuary where the nectar can be found, they are warned not to provoke the males. Fry soon does and is sprayed by a foul-smelling liquid. However, Amy and Leela both find the scent arousing, as the liquid was butterfly pheromones and the Nectar ingested have made the two act like female butterflies. They decide to go cold turkey while Fry slowly builds a cocoon around himself. During the match, the now normal Wingnuts are getting beaten badly, but Fry hatches as a butterfly and their opponents fly to him due to their Nectar abuse, saving the girls. Fry sheds his butterfly body and returns to normal.

END SUMMARY

I seem to have a soft spot for this episode despite not really thinking it’s a particularly well-written one. I like it mostly because I think the Butterfly Derby was one of the funnier “theoretically possible” things this show ever came up with. I don’t know if you can do it on the moon, but people, like XKCD, have pointed out that you can definitely do it on some of the moons of Saturn. Perhaps you can do it on the moon if there is a false atmosphere in place. Maybe if it’s more oxygen rich? I dunno. I could do the math but I haven’t slept in two days and I’m pretty sure I’d add it up to Llama. Llamas are bigger than bullfrogs. No, I’m not planning on editing this. 

Doing an episode about steroid abuse for laughs is a bit overused. I think the Simpsons have done it at least twice. Hell, South Park did it with the Special Olympics, something that they probably should apologize for, honestly. The subplot about Fry becoming a butterfly is kind of weak because you do know that eventually he’s going to come flying out. You probably even get the eventual twist because they already revealed he’s irresistible to Nectar addicts. However, I still think his final random popping out is pretty well-timed. They even mention that he has no brain activity and that is no different than normal.

Overall, not the best episode, but I still think it’s got a certain charm to it.

FAVORITE JOKE

It’s the exchange between Leela and the Professor about Nectar. When he says that the nectar worries him, the following follows:

Leela: Professor, there’s nothing wrong with Nectar. It’s all natural.

Farnsworth: So are carrots, but you don’t see me injecting them between my toes!

While this would be funny enough, he proceeds to put a carrot in his mouth and light it like a cigar before smoking it. This one amuses me to the point that I feel like I have thought of it every time I try to eat a carrot since. 

See you next week, meatbags.

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