A Clockwork Origin

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Season 6 episode
Broadcast season 7 episode
A Clockwork Origin
Human Evolution.png
Professor Farnsworth and Dr. Banjo arguing about the human evolution.
No.97
Production number6ACV09
Written byDan Vebber
Directed byDwayne Carey-Hill
Title captionThis time, it's personal
First air date12 August, 2010
Broadcast numberS07E09
Title referenceA Clockwork Orange
Additional
Commentary
(Transcript)
Transcript

Pictures

Season 6
  1. Rebirth
  2. In-A-Gadda-Da-Leela
  3. Attack of the Killer App
  4. Proposition Infinity
  5. The Duh-Vinci Code
  6. Lethal Inspection
  7. The Late Philip J. Fry
  8. That Darn Katz!
  9. A Clockwork Origin
  10. The Prisoner of Benda
  11. Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences
  12. The Mutants Are Revolting
  13. The Futurama Holiday Spectacular
  14. The Silence of the Clamps
  15. Möbius Dick
  16. Law and Oracle
  17. Benderama
  18. The Tip of the Zoidberg
  19. Ghost in the Machines
  20. Neutopia
  21. Yo Leela Leela
  22. Fry Am the Egg Man
  23. All the Presidents' Heads
  24. Cold Warriors
  25. Overclockwise
  26. Reincarnation
← Season 5Season 7 →

"A Clockwork Origin" is the ninety-seventh episode of Futurama, the ninth of the sixth production season and the seventh broadcast season. Professor Farnsworth, fed up with Creationists in New New York, moves to the Robot Planetoid to escape the ignorance of humanity, only to inadvertently create mechanical life which evolved from small robots designed to clean tainted water on the rock. The crew goes with him, but leaves Zoidberg and Cubert on Earth.

The Story

The Professor travels to Wozniak Nerd Academy, where evolution is being questioned.

Act I: "I don't want to live on this planet anymore."

Professor Farnsworth finds out that his clone Cubert was unable to go to school due to the large mob of Creationist protesters outside. Outraged, he quickly takes the Planet Express Ship to Cubert's school, the Wozniak Nerd Academy. Once there, the Professor gets into a huge argument with the protesters and meets a talking orangutan called Dr. Banjo. The doctor claims that if evolution was possible, then there wouldn't be a "missing link," in the chain between the Great Apes and Homo Sapiens. The professor aims to prove him wrong and has the crew fly to Olduvai Gorge in Africa to find the missing missing link. While in the gorge, Farnsworth finally finds the fossilized skull of a previous unknown hominid that fills in the gap. He names it Homo farnsworth (which is a misnomer, since the hominid was too far back in the chain to actually be from the genus Homo), and takes it back to display at a museum. However, at the museum, Dr. Banjo returns and convinces the patrons that the Homo Farnsworth actually disproves evolution. Upset at everybody's ignorance, he makes the crew (except Zoidberg who stayed on Earth to take care of Cubert) drop him off at a lifeless planetoid where he will spend the rest of his days with only an inflatable shack, four grand pianos, and some pizza. He pours some Nanobots he invented into a nearby pond to eat up all the toxic minerals and give him a fresh source of water. However, before the crew could leave, the nanobots evolve into land mobile Trilobots, which eat the entire Planet Express Ship, thus trapping all of them on the planetoid.

On the Robo-Planetoid, a micro-evolution sets off.

Act II: "Look out for the next thing!"

The crew run into a nearby cave to hide from the matter-eating Trilobots. Having no edible pizza (due to all the pizzas having pineapple on them), the only food they have left is some dehydrated steak that the Professor brought, but they need water. The crew run out of the cave to get to the pond, only to find that the Trilobots have gone and a huge robotic jungle is now growing. They eat some steak, but are then attacked by Robot Dinosaurs which the Trilobots evolved into. Fry is dragged off by a robotic pterodactyl, while the rest are attacked by land dinosaurs. However, they are all saved by a magnetic solar flare, which destroys all the robotic dinosaurs, but was harmless to any biological beings, as well as smaller robots, hiding in caves, such as Bender. The Professor manages to build a new spaceship out of the parts of the dinosaurs, but they must wait to the next day to use it since it is solar powered. However, Leela and Amy are kidnapped by Robo-Cavemen. Meanwhile on Earth, Zoidberg is trying to take over as a father figure for Cubert, but is constantly put down by him. Cubert feels bad about this, so he goes to Zoidberg's dumpster and apologizes, saying that he makes fun of people because he is always getting picked on by bullies. Brett Blob shows up and threatens to beat the two of them up, but Zoidberg protects them by pretending to be as pathetic as possible. In doing so, he gains Cubert's respect.

Ascent of Bot.jpg

Act III: "You're under arrest for crimes against science."

The next morning on the planetoid, the crew wake up to discover that Leela and Amy have been captured by robo-cavemen and forced to be their wives. Professor Farnsworth is able to make a slingshot but because it took him twelve hours to do so, they must spend another night on the planetoid before they can rescue the women. However, once they get up, they find that Amy and Leela were already free of their own means and that the cavemen dissappeared. They then meet a fully evolved, sentient, humanlike robot named Dr. Widnar who discovers them as the first carbon-based lifeforms that their society has ever seen. She takes to their Museum of Natural Robo-History, where the Professor gives a speech. However, when he reveals that he invented the nanobots in the first place, he is arrested for speaking against evolution and believing in creationism, and is put to a trial. At the trial in the Superior Gort, Bender replaces Leela as Farnsworth's lawyer and claims that Farnsworth is innocent by terms of insanity. It then all comes down to the jury's opinion, which they wouldn't have decided until the next day. The crew are forced to sleep in the Gort. The next day, the crew discovers that all the robots have further evolved into highly intelligent Robotic gas forms. The gas forms believe that all physical lifeforms are yokels compared to them and that the trial they had was pointless in the grand scheme of things. They allow them to leave the planetoid. Once they return to Earth on the ship made of dinosaur parts, Farnsworth talks to Dr. Banjo and show him holographic pictures he took of the evolution on the planetoid, to prove that it is possible for small lifeforms to evolve into more complex ones. Dr. Banjo counters in saying that evolution on the planetoid was in fact put into action by an intelligent creator: Professor Farnsworth. In the end, they compromise on the fact that both their theories are feasible.

Reception

In its original American broadcast, "A Clockwork Origin" was viewed by an estimated 1.926 million households nearly identical to "That Darn Katz!" [1]

Additional Info

Trivia

  • We learn that Zoidberg is Cubert's godfather.
  • Cubert wears red oven gloves in the final scene, presumably to mimic Zoidberg's claws.
  • Professor Farnsworth indicates that his father wasn't actually his biological father. However, this does not help identify whether it is his mother or the milkman who is the descendant of Yancy.
  • The slogans on the human protesters' signs are:
  • The slogans on the robot protesters' signs are
    • "Evolution = True"
    • "Creationism" a la the Flying Spaghetti Monster's sign
    • "Creationist go home!"
    • "I believe in science"
    • "Create this!"
  • Professor Farnsworth's medicated steak dinner ratio is 4mg of steak per 1mg of fixin's.
  • Unlike other robot groups all the citizens of the planet retain the same basic physiological form, having common ancestors.
    • Hinged mouths is a robot feature seen only rarely outside the robot planetoid. Malfunctioning Eddie and the Robot Devil being the only significance examples of this.

Allusions

  • Before finding the elusive missing missing link in the 'rich vein of missing links', the Professor finds Java Man (fossils of Homo erectus erectus), Piltdown Man (an anthropological hoax) and Manfred Mann (a musician). Only the first was actually a missing link, but it wasn't found in the Olduvai Gorge.
  • When Bender makes a "robot" from a bedspring with googly eyes to try to prove robot evolution, the sign says "I Hate Mondays," a reference to Garfield.
  • Fry says the Professor's water supply looks like diet Dr. Pepper, a 21st century soft drink.
  • The "NANDerthal Cave Painting" exhibit at the robot museum is a pun on the Neanderthal, an extinct hominid, and a NAND gate, a basic electronic logic gate.
  • The "Ascent of Bot" displayed in the robot museum includes R2-D2, a robot from the Star Wars movies.
  • The iFad is a reference to Apple's iPad.
  • USB Today is a reference to USA Today. USB is a reference to the USB ports for computers. It is also the current USB logo in the heading of the paper. This could also be a reference to the infamous lack of USB ports and other communication methods in Apple's iPad.
  • The Superior Gort is a play on words, being a reference to both the Supreme Court and Gort, a robot in the science-fiction film The Day the Earth Stood Still. Gort was designed as part of an interstellar police force created to maintain peace in the universe.
  • The Flying Spaghetti Monster is a reference to the god of the Pastafarians. This is a double joke because the FSM and Pastafarianism started with a letter to the Kansas School Board parodying the idea of creationism being taught in schools.
  • Fry's fan dance is a reference to Cdr. Uhura's fan dance in Star Trek.
  • Much of the trial is a reference to Inherit the Wind.
  • The idea of a manmade society evolving rapidly (eventually beyond current humanity) was explored in The Genesis Tub, which borrowed from a Twilight Zone episode.
  • The way the crew's clothes are ripped references One Million Years B.C..
  • The evolution of nanomachines may have been inspired by prior science fiction:
    • In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Evolution" (1989), Wesley Crusher creates nanobots called "nanites" which unexpectedly evolve to the point of sentience; initially, an astrophysicist on board expresses skepticism concerning the possibility for machines to evolve.
    • In the 2002 novel "Prey", by Michael Crichton, nanobots evolve to other organisms in a short time. Whenever humans attempt to attack them, the robots have already evolved.
  • The evolution of the robots ends in a higher plane of existence which consists of pure energy is taken from Childhood's End.
  • The way Amy's clothes got ripped was a reference to Fantastic Voyage where Cora's clothes were ripped in the same fashion.
    • With that, Amy's clothes looked like a bikini.
  • The Steak Dinner pills are made by Bristol-Myers Squibb, a bio-pharmaceutical company. This is NOT a reference to Oscar Meyer.

Continuity

Goofs

Bender is seen twice in the same frame
  • The "missing missing link", Homo farnsworth, fills the gap between "apes" and the Darwinius masillae, and would not fall under the genus Homo, which appeared much later.
  • In the courtroom, when Bender tells the jury to find The Professor not guilty by reason of insanity, Bender can be seen twice when the court gasps. He can be seen both near the jury and between Fry and Leela.
    • When viewing the included picture in the context of the episode, namely while Bender is addressing the judge, it is very clear that the background and foreground were re-used, but they forgot to remove Bender from behind the defense table.
  • Despite what was established in the preceding episode, "That Darn Katz!", the Earth appears to be turning in the right direction again when the Planet Express Ship goes to the Wozniak Nerd Academy.
    • A solution could have been found to return the planet's rotation to normal.
  • Since the Professor watched the Universe be created twice, he was there as animals started to evolve and become primates to humans, etc. Granted the forward-only time machine didn't seem to have recording devices, but the Professor neglects to mention to the protesters that he, along with Fry and Bender, observed evolution firsthand.
    • Although this could also just be because he has a very poor memory.
  • It's possible for the Professor to come with actual proof of human evolution. To do so, he has to use his forward time machine to travel to the year 50 million. There, he can use the backwards time machine from the women of that era to go back in time when humans evolved from primates and record this.

Characters

(In alphabetic order)

References

  1. ^ [1]