Free Will Hunting

"Free Will Hunting" is the one hundred and twenty-third episode of Futurama, the ninth of the seventh production season and the ninth broadcast season. It aired 8 August 2012 on Comedy Central. As as a robot, Bender lacks free will so he embarks on a quest for the meaning of life.

Act I
Enrolling in college on a whim, Bender gets a questionable student loan from the robot mafia and falls into a bad crowd; he then promptly drops out of college, gets addicted to robot drug "Spark," and ends up doing questionable acts for Hedonismbot to earn money.

His downward spiral leads to his arrest and trial, but his lawyer argues that, as a robot, he lacks free will and it was his programming that led to the sequence of events. The judge rules Bender not guilty, much to Bender's dismay.

The Planet Express crew is hired to deliver a package to the robot homeworld, requiring a despondent Bender to come along due to the robots' intense dislike of humans. After delivering the package, Bender decides to stay on the planet, going on a journey of self-discovery.

Act II
As Bender wanders the wastelands of Chapek 9, he comes upon a robot monastery of the Order of the Binary Singularity. Inside, the temple's abbot, Ab-Bot warmly welcomes Bender, who then tells the abbot about his recent depression due to his lack of free will, the abbot tells him that there is no need to feel sorrow as he can find happiness through his programming and it is their pre-programmed nature that makes robots magnificent. Bender then becomes a member of the order and spends his days living a humble life of prayer and simplicity. However after Bender discovers the presence of a free will slot in his forehead, the abbot tells him that the Creatrix made those slots so that robots could have free will units installed in them, Bender then quickly leaves the order and heads back to Earth to steal a free will unit from the Creatrix, who is none other than Mom, CEO of MomCorp.

Production
On 27 November 2011, CGEF revealed the episode's title to be "Freewill Hunting". On 29 February 2012, it revealed the actual title, its writer to be David X. Cohen and its director to be Raymie Muzquiz. On 28 June, revealed the episode's plot and air date.

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 "Free Will Hunting" were shown during the live stream.

Trivia

 * Bender delivers a package to Mr. 147573952589676412927 — which is equal to 267 − 1, and is a reference to mathematician Frank Nelson Cole.

Allusions

 * The episode's title is a parody of the 1997 drama film, .
 * The robot tattooist has the name of the printer manufacturer, Epson, upside down on it's chest.
 * The Abbot reads from "The Whole eBook", a pun on "The Holy Book", a common name for The Bible.
 * The programming that prevents robots to harm the Professor is a (partial) reference to the First Law of the , where robots are programmed to never harm humans.
 * Bender wanting the big purple dinosaur is a reference to Barney the Dinosaur.

Continuity

 * When Bender became overclocked, he found out the meaning of life, which he later forgot.
 * When Bender became overclocked, he found out the meaning of life, which he later forgot.

Goofs

 * In this story, they can't charge Bender, because as a robot he doesn't have free will, but this has never been brought up before, when he or any other robot is on trial.
 * In all other cases, either he was found not-guilty because his programming didn't allow him to be charged guilty, or he was found guilty because his programming would not allow him to be found not-guilty. The closing statement about free-will is actually irrelevant except to trigger the coding for his soul-searching.
 * The Professor states he programmed all robots, so they would be unable to harm him, but in the Late Philip J Fry, Bender and him get into a fist fight, Also in Bender's Game he almost sells the professor out to the orcs, and in Bendless Love he three times bends the Professor's spine. Why has this never worked before now?
 * Regarding the fist fight, Bender isn't doing anything of major consequence to the Professor, while bending his spine merely affected him, though Bender was unaware of his actions and was on impulse. The other thing is part of a fantasy.
 * If the free-will device was built after the Robots, then how did they know what shape it was going to be, to give to the robots?
 * Farnsworth was designing it around that anticipated shape.
 * Bender seems incapable of overcoming his programming in this episode, but in Space Pilot 3000 he's able to after being electrocuted.
 * Even if the program has changed, it does not mean that Bender had free will.
 * Fry and Leela cannot land on Chapek 9's surface because of the anti-human sentiment, despite the robots cheering the humans for providing crucial lugnuts in Fear of a Bot Planet.
 * Entirely possible that human hatred did not completely vanish, or the elders continued using humanity as a scapegoat for issues.

Characters

 * Debut: Ab-Bot
 * Amy
 * Bender
 * Clamps
 * Debut: Dean Suspendington
 * Donbot
 * Debut: Fabricio
 * Farnsworth
 * Fatbot (cameo)
 * Fry
 * Hedonismbot
 * Hermes
 * Hyper-Chicken
 * Joey Mousepad
 * Judge 724
 * Leela
 * Mom
 * Debut: Paco
 * Mr. 147573952589676412927
 * Robot Elders
 * Ron Whitey (cameo)
 * Scruffy
 * Spotty Teen Robot (cameo)
 * Yellow and red lawyer
 * Zoidberg