Planet Michelle

"Planet Michelle" is the thirty-fourth comic issue, which was released 29 November, 2007 in the US.

Act I
Farnsworth has learned that employees in romantic relationships are more likely to do what they're told, and so takes the Planet Express Staff (except Hermes) to Elzar's for speed dating. Bender doesn't participate and instead meets a date doctor, whose racket he decides to horn in on. Several of the dates go well, with Farnsworth, Zoidberg, Scruffy and Leela all finding someone (or two in Scruffy's case). After rejecting Farnsworth's Brain Slug's friend, Fry wanders off and finds the Intergalactic Star Registry he bought a star from, for Michelle, back in 1999. Over the years, Star Michelle was reclassified and renamed Planet Michelle and Fry is its rightful owner. At work the next morning, Farnsworth does some research on Fry's planet - it is uninhabited and has compatible atmosphere. Fry would like to live there with Michelle to drive Leela nuts, and Farnsworth offers his cloning machine, luckily Fry has been carrying around Michelle's old scrunchie (with some hairs) that she threw at him after a fight in 1999. The cloning is a success and the clone starts complaining right away. Amy and Leela enter and Amy takes Michelle to get dressed. After everyone is filled in on the current situation and Michelle is dressed in one of Amy's old pink sweatsuits Fry says his goodbyes to the staff before the couple leave to go to Fry's planet. Suddenly Amy realises that Bender is missing.

Act II
Bender has launched a date doctor service and begins dispensing bad advice to his group of love-lorn losers. Fry and Michelle arrive on the planet, Fry is sent to find food and several hours later returns with fruit. Michelle continues her complaints and locks him out of the car, requesting a proper home. A week later, Leela and Bender have to deliver a replica of the cloning machine to the Red Cross to clone volunteers, the destination is near Fry's planet so they are also sent to give Fry Michelle's scrunchie. Bender receives a transmission from Leela and leaves his clients at The Hip Joint, which is full of men, so they can try their powers of "non-seduction". Fry is pleased when the rest of the crew arrive and, when she learns of the care package, so is Michelle, who leads Bender back to their shelter. Fry and Leela have a brief chat on the ship and she gives him Michelle's scrunchie. Fry decides to clone himself so that he can cope with Michelle's demands, but fails to make it work and accidentally drops the scrunchie inside before leaving the machine smoking. He goes back to the ships bridge and Michelle soon appears, having found and put on an orange sweatsuit from Amy's dry cleaning, she seems to have a slight case of amnesia and runs away from the "monsters". The crew return to the shelter (Fry's jacket on top of some tall sticks) and are soon met with two Michelles and Leela realises that the cloning machine must have triggered and there is soon hundreds of clones. Making their way back to the ship thanks to Bender's extendible legs, they deactivate the machine and send for Bender's clients, who agree to be cloned and pair off with the Michelles. After the crew returns home, Fry buys a star for Leela.

Trivia

 * Elzar's Fine Cuisine has had valet parking since 2973.
 * The cloning machine is a different machine to the Clone-O-Mat used for Cubert and almost Seymour, differences include instantaneous cloning and a portable energy source.
 * The comic ends on the night of the 28th of January 3007 - a Wednesday - this would contradict the fact they were 'cancelled' in Bender's Big Score, but since they don't deliver a package (at least not for the BOX network), it could fit. Or maybe it was just a printing error from the Star Registery. Although Leela pilots the ship, it could just be on auto pilot, so she cannot drive it in Bender's Big Score.
 * It looks as though the naked Michelle clones were going to start exiting the ship much sooner, but the colourer chose to ignore the change in drawing style until they were further away.
 * Bender's group's members, who agree to be cloned, are Dwayne, Fishy Joe, Hyper-Chicken, Igner, Sal, Smitty, Terry and Wernstrom. None of whom were involved in his previous dating service.
 * Larry was seen in "Put Your Head on My Shoulder" using Bender's dating service for the miserably lonely and pathetic. Once again, he is seen trying to get a girl, this time with speed-dating.

Inside References

 * Leela uses her wrist-thing to radio Bender and refers to herself as "One-B-D-I" as she does to Smitty and URL in.

Outside References

 * Hatch, and Bender's B-Plot, parodies the film Hitch.

Goofs

 * The "trusty Neptunian valet" at Elzar's has six arms instead of four.
 * Scruffy's blonde date seems to have changed the colour of her dress and swapped her earrings, however as there is technology for ties that change colour, this may not be a goof.
 * Mutants are not allowed on the surface, except when on surface passes or where raised as aliens. While Vyolet and Raoul were potentially on passes, Dwayne's would have expired after being out of the sewers for that long.
 * After Kif provided them with grandchildren the Wongs seemed to accept Kif as Amy's partner, here Inez has apparently forgotten that she already has these grandchildren and is trying to get non-green ones.
 * Morbo is married to Fawn, Mayor Poopenmeyer is also married. Neither would be using a dating service.
 * The Hyper-Chicken has children but may be single.
 * Fry says that Michelle broke up with him twice, the second time for Pauly Shore's head in 3000. It was actually 3001 and Pauly Shore had his whole body because, like Fry and Michelle, he was frozen.
 * As Amy and Leela enter the lab where Michelle has been cloned, Leela walks in front and right of Amy, but her pony tail is beside Amy's left eye.
 * When hiding from the Michelles, Fry is apparently completely behind Leela's right leg.
 * There was not that many sweatsuits in Amy's dry cleaning, although it is acceptable to assume she owns multiple colours.
 * Fishy Joe did not have spare clothes with him, technically his clones should have been naked just like Michelle's were.
 * The central plot device, Fry having bought a star, which he now owns as a planet, is based on a practice that is far from legally binding. On top of the multiple times the star would have been sold to naive Earthicans, similar stores may have been set up on other planets; not to mention most stars and planets fall under the claim of one or more (inter)planetary government(s).

Characters
(In alphabetical order)

Comic Credits

 * Inks
 * Andrew Pepoy
 * Script
 * Eric Rogers
 * Pencils
 * Mike Kazaleh
 * Colors
 * Nathan Hamill
 * Letters
 * Karen Bates
 * Editor
 * Bill Morrison