Futurama Season 11 'Space Italy' Continues The Show's Greatest And Laziest Joke
The latest episode of "Futurama," the season 11 finale entitled "All The Way Down," covers a lot of territory. Professor Farnsworth (Billy West) devises a new machine called the Simputron, which is able to render a full-scale simulation of the known world. Only, because he hasn't tapped a reliable power source for the process, the simulated universe is at first rendered in 8-bit.
The main action of the episode spirals into Nolanesque territory, pondering the dread-filled existential quandary of whether by now it's pretty much certain we're living in a simulation and, if so, whether that even matters. The Planet Express crew decide to send Bender (John DiMaggio) down into the body of simulation Bender, "Inception" style, and reason with them not to blow up a magnetar and thus glitch out the coding of their "universe," thereby revealing the man behind the curtain, so to speak. The episode ends with a powerful moment of pathos, as simulation Fry declares, "I think it makes no difference at all. Either way, the laws of the universe are way beyond our control, so what can we do? Make the best of it." He declares his love for Leela, the "only thing" he knows is real, and the pair kiss as the imploding magnetar scrambles reality into strips of code.
This being "Futurama," however, no episode is going to be pure pathos. Before we get to the simulations and the speechifying, and before the simulated Planet Express crew get a graphics upgrade once the Professor finds a power source, we get to join them on a delightfully stupid journey to Space Italy.
The genius of stupidity
You have to love "Futurama." It's the third millennium, sentient robots co-mingle with humans, and according to the season 2 episode "A Clone of My Own," even the speed of light has been increased — by government order in the year 2208. Yet in this wild, futuristic utopia, there's an actual place called "Space Italy."
"Listen up threeple, you'll be delivering this package to Space Italy!" simulation Hermes (Phil Lamarr) announces to the 8-bit crew. "Space Italy?" real Amy (Lauren Tom) asks incredulously while observing the simulation, to which the Professor responds, "I know, it's an embarrassingly lazy name. But when you're creating an entire universe from scratch, you can't make up a believable name for everything. Sometimes you just have to go with 'Space Italy.'"
The episode doesn't just toss off that meta joke about the exhausting work of inventing an entire universe from scratch — a nod to both Farnsworth's creation of the simulation and showrunners Matt Groening and David X. Cohen's creation of the series itself — they actually send the 8-bit crew to an NES-style version of Rome. Rather than climbing the Spanish Steps to deliver the package, Bender tosses it carelessly behind him. It hits and knocks out the Space Pope. "Pappa Pia! He hitta the Space Pope!" an 8-bit Papal Gentleman cries out. Bender is carted off to jail, so Fry and Leela see the sights: an 8-bit version of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, an 8-bit version of the Venetian canals, and an 8-bit version of Michaelangelo's David — "so lifelike!" Leela exclaims.
This kind of stupid genius is the true ingredient X in the potion that is "Futurama's" potent, long-lasting appeal. And it gets stupider! The show has actually taken us to Space Italy before.
Journey to (Space) Italy
"Futurama" has visited Space Italy on three previous occasions. The first came in the series' pilot episode, "Space Pilot 3000." At the end of the episode, as the crew outrun the police in Farnsworth's intergalactic cruiser, intercut scenes show the ten-second countdown from 2999 to the year 3000 across the globe. You have Space Paris, Space NYC — space itself, represented by several alien worlds — and finally, Space Italy.
We visit Space Italy again in season 2, in the Sarah Silverman and Pauly Shore-guest starring episode "The Cryonic Woman." There's a brief shot of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, looming over the space-Italian countryside. This is technically a bit of a continuity slip-up, as, in the second season episode "When Aliens Attack," we learned that all the world's great monuments were stolen by a former Governor of New New York, a kind of Ed Koch-esque supervillain who built his own trashy Mount Rushmore of architectural marvels called Monument Beach. The park was later destroyed by the Omicronians, and the Leaning Tower of Pisa along with it, but it shows back up in "The Cryonic Woman" — before being destroyed (and showing up again now).
Finally, we visit Space Italy for real in the seventh season episode "The Duh-Vinci Code," which takes place almost entirely in Space Venice. In that episode, the locale is introduced as "Future-Roma," but we do meet the same Space Pope (Maurice LaMarche), who's depicted as a giant reptile decked out in pontiff regalia. We love "Futurama" when it's offering blistering satires and leaning hard into the "sci" of its sci-fi roots, but the show is at its most endearing when it's just dumb fun.
"Futurama" season 11 is now streaming in full on Hulu.