Commentary:Leela's Homeworld

Topics of Discussion

 * This episode's basis was planned before the series had been pitched to FOX. They needed to decide an appropriate length of time to wait before revealing Leela's origin as mutant rather than alien.
 * An idea that they didn't quite stick to was having different tiers of society. This was indicated by the Number 9 Man. There were groups of people "and they're like zombies or drones or something." This idea was abandoned, though the concept art was kept.
 * The alien language translates as indicated by the episode dialogue.
 * First episode of television written by Kristin Gore.
 * Whether panning across multiple jokes at once is a good idea.
 * The man shouting "Woooo" behind Leela is a call back to one of these pictures.
 * News broadcast was actually about the plaque, not Leela.
 * There was debate about whether to reveal Leela's parents to the audience before Leela learned the truth.
 * Al Gore's appearance in the show was due to it being one of his two favourite shows more than the fact that his daughter was on staff. He was actually on the show before her.
 * Leela's parents later receive a letter she flushes to them, in much the same way they gathered the items in their home.
 * Whisper acting.
 * Determining which bits are 2D and which are 3D.
 * Originally the Nose Machine and translator were separate machines.
 * Farnsworth's line "it may take a minute or 100 million years" is in reference to the concept of the halting problem; where in general you can't tell if a program is going to stop or not.
 * Leela's parents were last shown no more mutated than her and for this episode they needed more mutations.
 * Munda initially had one tentacle, because only one arm was hidden. Apparently, she sometimes wears a skin arm over one of her tentacles.
 * The montage was inspired by Homicide.

Highlights / Quotes

 * Matt Groening: I love it when characters are being pursued by a mob and they can just jump through a window and then everything's fine.
 * Unknown: Where'd he get that plank?

Goofs

 * The whale dumped by Bender is claimed to be Mushu, but this is impossible because Mushu doesn't appear for another fourteen episodes. They were probably confused by the non-sequential commentary recordings.
 * Mushu may be a trademarked name given to various whales, much like the name has been borne by multiple  since the 1960s, with some bearing the name simultaneously.

Related DVD Features

 * While not all deleted scenes mentioned appear on the disc, Warden Vogel dishing out dirt on the orphans does.