In Futurama Season 11, We See How Much A Key Supporting Player Has Changed
As fun as those first few seasons of "Futurama" were, there was admittedly something kind of depressing about the way it handled some of its minor characters. For instance, Zoidberg was (and is) trapped in his perpetual role as a bad doctor that nobody in the crew takes seriously. The poor crustacean will always be treated with disdain by Farnsworth and Hermes, and only tolerated by Bender, Leela, and Fry. He'll never learn to be better at human medicine or improve himself in any significant way, because that's just the way this show is.
Like "The Simpsons," creator Matt Groening originally designed "Futurama" as a show where things largely reset to normal at the end of each episode; just like Bart Simpson has been trapped in the fourth grade for the past 34 years, doomed to be strangled by his father and beat up by the local bullies for all of eternity, the characters on "Futurama" also seemed to be trapped forever in their show's status quo. It's been 24 years since Fry fell into that cryogenic chamber and everyone's still the same age, with the same basic flaws and attitudes. Luckily the characters don't seem to be fully aware of how much time has passed, because if they did they'd go insane.
"Futurama" does occasionally let its characters get what they want. Fry and Leela eventually get together, Amy gets her PhD, and Zoidberg ... well, Zoidberg's still Zoidberg. But the character who's truly improved the most over the years isn't even an official member of the Planet Express crew: It's Kif Kroker, the unfortunate Lieutenant to the horrendous General Zapp Brannigan. Kif started off as the biggest victim of the show's static status quo, but he's turned out to be one of the series' most pleasant surprises.
The Smithers to Zapp's Mr. Burns
In "Simpsons" terms, Kif's obvious parallel is to Mr. Smithers, the unfortunate henchman of the evil, abusive Mr. Burns. Just as Smithers is repeatedly punished for his loyalty and forced to endure all sorts of dehumanizing work conditions, Kif is repeatedly forced to endure the brunt of Zapp Brannigan's complete selfishness and utter incompetence. Zapp will casually use Kif as a scapegoat, ignore Kif's good advice, and carelessly do things that should've gotten Kif killed if this weren't a cartoon. Although season 1 depicts Kif as more of a Spock-like character, defined more by his sarcasm and annoyance, by season 2 his character type seems firmly established: he's the show's resident sad sack.
It's not a perfect comparison — Smithers has an unrequited love for Mr. Burns, whereas Kif has never been anything except repulsed by Brannigan's constantly-exposed body — but there's enough there for Kif's prospects back in the early seasons to look incredibly bleak. In "The Simpsons," after all, Smithers is trapped in that toxic relationship with Burns for 34 years and counting. Smithers' life gets to improve in a few small ways, like when he comes out of the closet 27 seasons in, but the fundamental dynamic between him and Mr. Burns never changes.
The same is almost true for Kif. He started off as the target of Zapp's abuse, and that's where he remains 24 years later. This latest "Futurama" episode starts off with Zapp literally using Kif's body as a loofa against his will; the disrespect is off the charts. But even before Kif reports Zapp and gets him canceled, he's still changed quite a bit throughout the show. But that shift didn't really begin until well into season 3. In the meantime ...
That one terrible season 2 scene
The low point for Kif's character writing came in "War is the H-Word," a season 2 episode in which Earth goes to war against the planet Spheron I. Fry is drafted, and soon General Brannigan punishes him by giving him a position that's even more demeaning than being Brannigan's assistant — being Kif's assistant. Fry thinks this doesn't sound so bad, but Kif turns out to be even worse than Brannigan. "You'll speak when I tell you to, you filthy worm!" he screams at Fry. It's a joke that almost seems to retroactively justify Brannigan's abuse, or at least to push us into losing any sympathy we had for Kif. If the shoe was on the other foot, this moment seems to tell us, Kif would treat Zapp just as poorly as he treats him.
It's a moment that falls flat on rewatch, considering that we never again see this side of Kif. But it also fell flat on first watch, precisely because of how mean-spirited it all is. We'd been rooting for Kif this whole time, and now the show seemed to be punishing us for doing so. It's a lot like how "The Simpsons" establishes Smithers as something of a shallow, petty weirdo sometimes, as a way to both explain why he sticks around Mr. Burns and to make sure we don't feel too conflicted for laughing as Mr. Burns tortures him. The difference is that Smithers' characterization was consistent from day one, whereas this characterization attempt with Kif came out of nowhere. Luckily the "Kif is abusive too" angle was dropped as quickly as it was introduced, as season 3 of "Futurama" finally gave the guy a break.
Kif and Amy, an unexpected surprise
As far as unexpected romantic pairings in sitcoms go, Kif and Amy are a stroke of genius. Prior to season 3's "Amazon Women in the Mood," both characters had fairly minor roles in the series. It'd had been established that Amy was fun and easygoing, but men never seemed interested in her personality, nor did they have any plans for any kind of long-term commitment. Meanwhile, Kif's been established as someone lacking in confidence, who would never in a million years believe that a girl like Amy would go out with a guy like him.
The episode where they get together originally seems like it'll follow the show's established pattern of kicking Kif while he's down; he manages to get a date with Amy, but Zapp ruins it by pressuring Kif to use his terrible pick-up lines instead of bothering to make a regular conversation. It's easy to imagine a version of this episode where Kif blows it entirely, and his feelings for Amy are never mentioned again. Instead, Kif saves the day, learns to ignore Zapp's dating advice, and summons the courage to confess his love for her.
It's with this relationship that both Kif and Amy really start to grow as characters. Just as Kif's pregnancy brings out a serious side to Amy, Amy's adventurous nature pushes Kif to be more assertive. He wins the approval of Amy's parents (sort of) in season 4's "Where the Buggalo Roam," punches Zapp in the 2008 movie "The Beast With a Billion Backs," and even disobeys Zapp's direct order in the 2009 movie, "Into the Wild Green Yonder."
Bad boy Kif
Kif continues to grow more comfortable with himself in the Comedy Central era, arguably a little too much, as season 7's "Proposition Infinity" shows. He and Amy are going through a bit of a rough patch, with Amy wishing Kif would be a little more of a bad boy, and Kif wishing Amy could stop flirting with other guys right in front of him. When Amy flirts with one bad boy too many, Kif breaks up with her. So begins Amy's brief fling with Bender, a passionate love story that causes an Earth-wide debate over the morality of "robosexual" relationships. Of course, these two characters were never meant to last — because Bender is Bender, after all — so the episode ends with Amy and Kif reuniting.
On paper, this doesn't sound like a good episode for Kif, but it reinforces how much Amy and Kif have become part of the show's status quo. By season 7 we'd reached a point where we could now take for granted that, if Amy and Kif ever split, they would almost certainly reunite by the end of the episode. It's a far cry from where they were in season 3, where the mere fact that their relationship lasted for more than an episode was a big surprise. Then there's the matter of how Kif and Amy reunite in "Proposition Infinity." There's no big dramatic apology scene between the two; Kif simply shows up outside her home riding a motorcycle, and Amy hops on. It's a moment that really underlines how well the two understand each other; Kif's simple gesture of embracing a "bad boy" persona is all the push Amy needs to give the relationship another shot.
A series of small but meaningful improvements
Since then, things have largely looked up for Kif. Zapp's become an increasingly pathetic, lonely character, whereas Kif gets to have a loving home with Amy and (as of this new season) their three children. Although on the surface this latest episode is just another repeat of season 2's "Brannigan, Begin Again," in which Zapp is removed from his role as general only to return to his station at the end, Kif's role is far more active this time around. He doesn't get punished alongside Zapp; he's the one who reports him, forcing Zapp to go through a painful eight-hour seminar while Kif gets to happily hang out with his family.
Of course, on paper Kif is still trapped in a Mr. Smithers/Mr. Burns' type dynamic, but he's far from the sad sack he used to be. Whereas even live-action sitcoms will have similar-type characters (Ted from "Scrubs," Toby from "The Office") stay the same throughout their whole run, "Futurama" at least gives Kif a clear upward trajectory, even if it's a slow one. Kif might still be trying to roll that boulder up the hill, but he actually seems to be making some progress.
Will Kif ever defeat the status quo?
Although "The Simpsons" is generally more resistant to change than "Futurama," it still lets its characters improve a little bit at a time. Whereas Homer spent the first fifteen seasons or so getting increasingly mean and stupid, modern Homer has actually grown kinder and softer. As Simpsons scholar The Real Jims once put it, "The true death of Jerkass Homer occurred in 'The Simpsons Movie' in 2007." Since then, he's mellowed out quite a bit.
Likewise, Bart no longer gets strangled by his father anywhere near as often as he used to, and minor characters get to enjoy a significant reprieve from their decades of romantic loneliness. The town of Springfield may be trapped in a terrifying time loop permanently hampering their ability to grow as people, but it turns out they are still able to meaningfully change their circumstances to at least some extent. It just takes much longer than it would for a regular person.
With that in mind, maybe Kif will grow even further from this point forward. You might think that him being Zapp's lieutenant is a crucial part of his character, something the show would never discard, but it also seemed like Barney's perpetual drunkenness in "The Simpsons" was a crucial part of his character too, and that guy was still allowed to go sober for three seasons straight. As "Futurama" continues, it feels like more of Kif's character is wrapped up in Amy and the Planet Express crew, not with Zapp. Kif may have returned to working with Zapp at the end of "Zapp Gets Cancelled," but if the trend with his character continues, maybe one day soon he'll finally leave the guy for good.