Leela's Homeworld

"Leela's Homeworld" is the fifty-sixth episode of Futurama, the second of the fourth production season and the fifth of the fourth broadcast season. It aired 17 February, 2002 on FOX. Down in the sewers, Turanga Leela finds out the truth about her origin.

Act I: "Get back in the sewer, weirdy!"
Leela is named "Orphan of the Year" in the orphanarium she grew up in, the Cookieville Minimum Security Orphanarium, and attends a ceremony there receiving the award. At the same time, the Professor builds a new machine that produces glow-in-the-dark-noses, but also causes a great amount of toxic waste which Hermes wants the Professor to get rid of, so Bender disposes of into the sewers.

Act II: "Mu-tate! Mu-tate! Mu-tate!"
As Bender overdoes it, the Sewer Mutants strike back and pull Bender, Leela, and Fry into the sewers. All three are sentenced to be dumped into the Mutagenic Sewage Lake to be mutated (the liquid can't harm mutants as they already are mutated; nor can it harm robots because they don't have DNA-though the mutants get around this by stating they'll beat Bender up afterwards) and beaten up afterwards, but are rescued by two mysterious robed strangers who somehow know Leela's full name. While running from the mutants, the crew break into a house that has a complete biography of Leela pinned on the walls plus a lot of stuff she flushed down the toilet. They are caught by the mutants and sentenced to death, but the mysterious strangers intervene again and they are only banished from the sewers. Fry and Bender go to the surface, but Leela stays behind and dives into the Mutagenic Sewage Lake in pursuit of the strangers.

Act III: "Isn't that the same machine that makes noses?"
Leela finds that she is not mutated by the sewage and pursues the two strangers deep into the sewers. Fry, in the meantime, searches for clues on Leela's origins in the orphanarium, and acquires the note that was pinned to Leela's basket when she was abandoned. The note is written in an alien language, so he takes it to the Professor to analyze it. He uses the Nose Machine, pointing out that there's no reason it can't do other things. Although the Machine is unable to decode the language, it does find out that the note originated from the sewers.

Leela's parents are Sewer Mutants. Leela had so few mutations that they decided to give her up to the orphanarium to enable her to lead a real life on the surface. Her mother wrote the note in alienese to convince the warden Leela was an alien, not a mutant. Her parents chose never to reveal her true origins so she would not learn the shameful truth. The only connection between them is a bracelet they left with their daughter, of which her mother has a duplicate.

Meanwhile, Leela has caught up with the robed strangers and threatens them with a gun, desperate to retrieve information about her origins. She finds the duplicate bracelet on one of the strangers, and suspects they have taken it from her parents after they killed them. The strangers confess the deed, and Leela is about to kill them when Fry literally drops in from above and reveals the truth - the strangers are indeed Leela's parents. They were so desperate that their daughter should not learn her true heritage that they were prepared to die rather than reveal that piece of information, and they fear their daughter might despise them because of all they did.

Leela, realizing that after decades of searching she has finally found her parents, embraces them - the family is reunited.

Trivia

 * The eagle on Hermes' badge holds a folder saying "To Be Filed".
 * One of the orphans who won an award for "Often Seen in the Background of News Spots" appears in the background of Leela's interview one minute later (see picture).
 * Other awards include "Diligent Flosser", "Has Tasted Every Sandwich" and "Successfully Switched from Heroin to Methadone".
 * The closing song for this episode is "Baby Love Child" by Japanese pop-rock band.
 * Although the commentary states that the dead whale Bender stuffs into the sewer is Mushu, this is impossible, since Mushu doesn't appear for fourteen more episodes, and since that whale is a completely different type of whale than Mushu (probably an orca).
 * The orphanage offers espresso to the orphans.
 * The pedestrian crossing sign in the sewers had an image of a person with two heads and three legs.
 * Fry was lifting his shirt at Space Mardi Gras.
 * When the mutants gave the gang a tour, all of the buildings behind Fry said "Dry Cleaners".
 * Alien code: When Leela looks down at her bracelet, you see the first official appearance of Alien Code 3. The code hasn't officially been translated.
 * At grade-school, Leela was shown doing math homework. One of her answers is wrong.
 * This episode was named #23 on IGN's list of Top 25 Futurama Episodes.
 * Warden Vogel claims nobody on Earth, not even Brainzilla, can translate AL1 (Alienese), yet many other episodes contain AL1 written in places on Earth. For example, in "Bendin' in the Wind", Utah has been renamed Human Farm, written in AL1.

Continuity

 * News paper front page in the "Leela Museum" about the PE crew saving Earth from the garbage ball.
 * Leela's parents appear in a mutant crowd but don't make contact.
 * Picture of Leela in a karate robe seen in the "Leela Museum".
 * Bender tells the story about how he became known as Honest Bender.
 * Many of the orphans seen are the ones Bender adopted.
 * Leela gives Kif and Amy the basket her parents left her in at the orphanarium. However it is revealed that Vogel dumps the baskets in a pile and given they are all identical, it is unlikely that it was the correct basket.
 * Bender tells the story about how he became known as Honest Bender.
 * Many of the orphans seen are the ones Bender adopted.
 * Leela gives Kif and Amy the basket her parents left her in at the orphanarium. However it is revealed that Vogel dumps the baskets in a pile and given they are all identical, it is unlikely that it was the correct basket.
 * Many of the orphans seen are the ones Bender adopted.
 * Leela gives Kif and Amy the basket her parents left her in at the orphanarium. However it is revealed that Vogel dumps the baskets in a pile and given they are all identical, it is unlikely that it was the correct basket.
 * Leela gives Kif and Amy the basket her parents left her in at the orphanarium. However it is revealed that Vogel dumps the baskets in a pile and given they are all identical, it is unlikely that it was the correct basket.

Goofs

 * When the screen pans over the orphan's awards, the "often Seen in the Background of News Spots" orphan is on the far left, but appears on the right as Warden Vogel hangs Leela's photo.
 * The bracelet on Leela's mother's tentacle only appears when Leela notices it and snatches it from her.
 * At the end of the episode, it shows Leela as an adult sleeping and before her parents tuck her in, you can see that she is not wearing her "wrist thingy". In previous episodes, when you see Leela go to sleep or get out of bed, she normally has it on.
 * She could've just decided to take it off that night.
 * When they are in the hot-air balloon when they "fire up the sewer gas," Fry, Leela and Bender start coughing. Bender shouldn't cough when he is a robot who doesn't breathe or have a nose.
 * He may still have a sense of smell (one of his many senses), or he is just trying to fit in.
 * There are no ladders to reach the sewers, unlike in "Space Pilot 3000" and "I Second that Emotion".
 * The baby Leela in the basket has a card hanging around her neck saying "Hello! Turunga Leela". Later on when her parents remember leaving her there, she doesn't have it anymore.
 * After Leela's mother puts her bracelet back on when Leela is yelling at her, the bracelet vanishes in the next scene.
 * In "Mother's Day", Leela's Wristlojackimator abandoned her and there was no bracelet under it.
 * The other times we have seen Leela without the Wrist Thingy she had opportunity to remove the bracelet as well, so those are not considered goofs.
 * Hermes' badge says "Federal Bureaucracy", yet in "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back", he was working for the Central Bureaucracy.
 * Raoul Inglis is previously shown and said to have only one ear, but is now shown with both ears intact.
 * Maybe he is constantly mutating since it is only in "I Second That Emotion" where he has one ear.
 * Although the orphanarium was renamed the "Bender B. Rodriquez Orphanarium" in "The Cyber House Rules", it seems to have reverted to the original name "Cookieville Minimum Security Orphanarium".

Allusions

 * When Leela emerges from the green wastes, the octopus on her head looks like a reference to the movie, when the fishing boat explodes and Ramada exits the water with an octopus on her head, which in itself is an allusion to the short story.
 * The leg sewer mutant was wearing a baseball hat.
 * Among the parts of parade balloons used in creating the hot air balloon that returns to the surface is made from, , and  owner.
 * Professor Farnsworth says that deciphering the alien language on Leela's note could take an hour or a hundred million years. This is a reference to the in.
 * The wall upon which Leela's parents have chronicled her life is a reference to.
 * When Leela comes across the wall with her chronicled life, she gasps "Great Cheech's ghost!", which is a reference to the character, who often says "Great Caesar's ghost!" when angry, exasperated or surprised. A similar reference was also made in.
 * The computer on the Warden's desk appears similar to the personal computers used in.
 * Businesses in the sewers include, , and.
 * is referenced when Bender says he has to clean up the set and dumps a whale in the sewers.
 * The Professor's Glow-in-the-dark noses is an obscure reference to the movie.

Alien Language Sightings
Time:3:32

Location: Note attached to Leela

Language: AL1

Translation: YOUR PARENTS LOVE YOU VERY MUCH

Characters

 * Amy
 * Bender
 * Dwayne
 * Professor Farnsworth
 * Fry
 * Hermes
 * Leela
 * Leg Mutant
 * Turanga Morris
 * Turanga Munda
 * Orphans
 * Raoul Inglis
 * Vyolet
 * Warden Vogel

Episode Credits

 * Writer
 * Kristin Gore
 * Director
 * Mark Ervin
 * Swinton O. Scott III
 * Voice Actors
 * Billy West
 * Katey Sagal
 * John DiMaggio
 * David Herman
 * Tress MacNeille
 * Phil LaMarr
 * Lauren Tom
 * DVD Commentary
 * Kristin Gore
 * Billy West
 * Matt Groening
 * David X. Cohen
 * Swinton O. Scott III
 * Rich Moore