Comics Review: Futurama Comics #81

We go medieval on Futurama’s ass.

Spoilers Below

“A Touch of Medieval”

Professor Farnsworth has perfected his latest invention: the Reversal Ray! It analyzes a machine’s function and then performs the opposite task. For example, it makes the television watch you! (There is a panel featuring a giant eyeball staring back at Zoidberg, a Big Brother-esque gag that deserves to be on a double bill with Everybody Loves Hypnotoad.) Spooked by the idea that the Ray could be used to turn him into an honest, hardworking employee, Bender convinces Fry that the Professor wants the device disposed of.

But first, they stop by the cryogenic lab, because Fry thinks he left a pack of gum there when he was unfrozen. Naturally, he proceeds to trip right back into a cryo tube and send himself traversing across many years again. But this time, he goes back to medieval times, as he uses the Reversal Ray on the tube just as it is closing. There (or then), he encounters Middle Age versions of the Planet Express crew (including Zoidberg as a dragon). When Fry’s backwards-time-travelling ability is interpreted as a sign of (à la Merlin), his “talents” are employed by Bender for a jousting tournament and for the sake of the whole village when “Mom Le Fey’s” army invades.

Our Take

The mechanics of “A Touch of Medieval” are more than a little confusing. If the Reversal Ray makes a machine perform the opposite task, then the cryo tube should take Fry back instead of forward in time. And it seems that this is what has happened at first, but then it is implied that it is the world, not the cryo tube, that has been reversed.

Examining the panel in which Fry actually shoots the ray, it is not clear what he is actually aiming it. But even if it is fired outside the tube, there is nothing to establish that it would reverse the entire world. Furthermore, the cryo tube is not technically a time machine. Its opposite function would not be going back in time but rather: either cranking up the temperature or setting someone aflame. This may sound nitpicky, but Futurama is at its best when it is thorough about following its own scientific rules.

Despite that fundamental shortcoming, this story is rather amusing. There are plenty of great moments of Bender being unscrupulous and the Professor being his over-the-top, arrogant self. The medieval versions of the characters do not particularly stand out, but it is always fun to see Fry bungle around in an unfamiliar situation. Overall, “A Touch of Medieval” is an enjoyable, chuckle-filled story despite its nagging lack of sense.