The Six Million Dollar Mon

"The Six Million Dollar Mon" is the one hundred and twenty-first episode of Futurama, the seventh of the seventh production season and the ninth broadcast season.

Act I: "When I fight machinery, machinery always wins."
After conducting an annual performance review, Hermes discovers that he is the most inefficient employee of Planet Express and has himself fired and replaced by a machine. Surprisingly, Zoidberg is the only member upset by his departure, as he believed that Hermes hatred for him was merely a friendly inside joke (rather than out of genuine malice) and shows open resentment towards the company's new accountant. After Hermes tells his family the news over his wife's nearly-fatal spicy goat soup, he and Labarbara go for a walk, where they are attacked by Roberto. Smitty and URL come to their rescue at the last minute using URL's robotic chest harpoon, leading Hermes to conclude that he could use a robotic upgrade for himself. Because of his multiple escapes, Roberto is taken immediately to the Electromagnetic Chair and executed. Using Bender's help, Hermes finds a shadowy surgeon to perform the operation on him and returns home to show his family, much to their surprise and shock, that he now has a robotic chest harpoon.

Act II: "Nice shiny metal ass, Hermes."
The next day, Hermes shows off his new chest artillery to the Planet Express crew. Everyone is impressed and, upon demonstrating it to retrieve a box just out of Mark's reach, re-hires himself as Planet Expresses accountant. Zoidberg is thrilled to have him back, and even though Hermes explicitly states that he's not Zoidberg's friend, Zoidberg laughs it off, saying how, "When he [Hermes] stops insulting is when [Zoidberg] worries." When the Professor's dentures fall down the

Act III: "He wants a brain. He wants a robot brain."
Hermes feels that he needs to perform the last upgrade, by replacing his brain with a computer. When Yuri does not want to do the brain replacement, Hermes, Professor Farnsworth, and Bender head to the robot graveyard to exhume a robot body for a processor card. Unbeknownst to them, the processor card belonged to Roberto.

In order for the procedure to work, Hermes locks LaBarbara, Dwight, and the Planet Express crew in the lab until Professor Farnsworth completes the transplant.

LaBarbara and Hermes' friends convince him to stop this. Unfortunately he still agrees to continue with the implant. With the professor's refusal, Zoidberg agrees to complete the operation using Hermes' human body to help him as he and Hermes sing a parody of "Monster Mash".

After the removal of the brain and placing it in Little Hermes, Hermes comes back to life in his original body and realizes that he has given up his humanity for the pointless pursuit of perfectionism. The crew later learns that after the transplant the processor card was that of Roberto (whose processor card was installed into the Hermes robot) as Roberto reshapes his head.

Still wanting to eat Hermes' skin, Roberto used the new robot body to remove a piece of Hermes' skin off his forearm, but realizes too late he cannot eat it because of LaBarbara's curried goat she cooked over the many years.

Roberto's new body then starts to melt quickly, thus saving the crew. Hermes ends up thanking Dr. Zoidberg for his part of restoring him. Dr. Zoidberg then dances to his "Monster Mash" parody much to the chagrin of everyone present.

Production
On 28 July 2011, it was revealed at that, in an episode of the seventh production season, "Hermes [would] realize he [was] less efficient than a machine, so he [would] chop some unnecessary parts of his body and [would] become a cyborg". On 30 August, a photograph of the cover of the episode's production script was posted on a blog - revealing the episode's title. On 29 February 2012, CGEF confirmed the episode's title and revealed its writer to be Ken Keeler and its director to be Peter Avanzino.

In June, Countdown to Futurama began releasing promotional material for the episode. It has so far released eight items: A promotional picture showing Leela, Amy, Zoidberg, Farnsworth, a  Hermes, Bender and Fry in the Planet Express employee lounge and a design of the mecha Hermes - together with the revelation that the episode was the one associated with the Hermes plot at the San Diego Comic-Con - on 6 June, a design of the cover of the magazine Astounding Tales on 7 June, part of the storyboard showing Bender suggest to Hermes getting an implant on 8 June, a design of a new character, Mark 7-G, on 9 June, a design of Hermes with an extendo arm and cycloscanner eyes and a design of four stages undergone by a ventriloquist dummy of Hermes on 10 June, a promotional picture showing Zoidberg controlling the Hermes dummy on 11 June and a video clip featuring Hermes - with the extendo arm and the cycloscanner eyes - and LaBarbara in bed on 12 June.

By 8 June, had revealed the episode's air date.

Comedy Central's website released another promotional picture, showing mecha Hermes about to drive a drill into Farnsworth's head.

On 12 July, following the broadcast of the episode "Zapp Dingbat", the public were given the opportunity to participate in a live chat with the Futurama cast and crew. Several clips of "The Six Million Dollar Mon" were shown during the live stream.

Allusions

 * The episode's title is a reference to the American television series  -  is, like Hermes here, a cyborg - and the fact that Hermes pronounces "man" as "mon".
 * Astounding Tales is a reference to the American science fiction magazine ' - which was initially published as "Astounding Stories" - and the American anthology comic book series '.
 * The book Lady Chatterley's Janitor is a reference to the 1928 book . In keeping with the running gag of Scruffy only reading sexually explicit material, Lady Chatterley's Lover is well-known for containing explicit descriptions of sex.
 * Hermes reads a book called "The Invisible Mon" - which is a reference to the H. G. Wells science fiction novella .
 * The song sung by Zoidberg is a parody of the .
 * The Professor showing Hermes' brain to his family is a possible reference to Dr. Mark Shelley, a Navy doctor who allowed the family of a deceased Marine to handle his brain and take pictures.
 * While Hermes and LaBarbara walk through the city at night, they pass the bridge where Fry and Leela spent Leela's birthday in "The Late Philip J. Fry".

Trivia

 * This is the second episode of season 7 where a recurring character has been killed (The first being Calculon in "The Thief of Baghead").
 * One of the gravestones in the cemetery reads Helper, another short-lived replacement for one of the main cast members.
 * Zoidberg's song is a reference to "Monster Mash" by Bobby "Boris" Pickett.
 * Mark 7-G's name is a possible reference to Sector 7-G, the name of the area works in at the  in The Simpsons.

Continuity

 * Yuri makes another appearence in the series who opperates on Hermes. Yuri had made his first appearence in "My Three Suns" who was about to give Fry gills.
 * The electromagnetic chair that nearly executed Bender, who masqueraded as Robot Santa, reappears to execute Roberto.
 * Farnsworth's operation clothes make their third appearance.
 * Farnsworth's operation clothes make their third appearance.

Goofs

 * Hermes's Robot Body starts talking like Roberto before his (Roberto's) brain is inserted.
 * It is discovered that if robots die a certain way, their software is uploaded into the computational cloud and capable of taking-over other electronic devices.
 * When Roberto melts, one of the three key-rings inside his chest cabinet does not.
 * The keys on the plot-driven key-ring (and only that key-ring) may be made of a different metal more resistant to heat (eg: Dolomite).
 * The magnetic waves from the electromagnetism chair would have fried Roberto's brain.
 * Magnetism, even at that power, would only really damage a hard-drive (in our time) Roberto's brain looks more like a motherboard with no indication of any kind of storage device on it.
 * Hermes robot body, goes from having a hole in its head, where the brain was taken out, to not having one, when Roberto attacks.
 * The reshaping of the head could have closed the opening.
 * Hermes stated Zoidberg didn't reattach his nerves in which case, he would have died the moment he tried to move.
 * It is possible that the autonomic nervous system was reengaged, but the parts of the somatic nervous system (i.e. pain receptors in the skin) were left separate.
 * Bender wears a spacesuit with an oxygen hosepipe attached to it while releasing ash into space, but from previous episodes it is clear that he can easily live in the vacuum without a spacesuit and he doesn't need air to breathe.
 * The hosepipe also anchors him to the ship, an important function that prevents the events from "Godfellas" from happening again.
 * When Hermes shows his firing tie, the Professor looks worried, but Hermes can't fire him, he owns the company.
 * Ethier the Professor feels bad for the other employees, or this is just a case of the Professor having a terrible memory.

Alien Language Sightings
Time:06:46

Location: Alley wall next to Organ Dealer's store

Language: AL1

Translation: If you lived here you'd be homeless by now

Characters

 * Amy
 * Bender
 * Dandy Jim
 * Dwight
 * Farnsworth
 * Fry
 * Gus
 * Hermes (Semi-Antagonist)
 * LaBarbara
 * Leela
 * Debut: Mark 7-G
 * Poopenmeyer
 * Roberto (Antagonist)
 * Robot Devil
 * Ron Whitey
 * Sal
 * Scruffy
 * Smitty
 * URL
 * Yuri
 * Zoidberg