(S01E13) So we've come to the last episode of Futurama Season One (or, if you believe Fox, the fourth episode of Season Two). As you can tell, it was a good start to a show that continued to get better over its four years on the air. Even in this season, you could tell that the characters became more refined, and the episodes got progressively funnier as the year went on. It all seemed to culimnate with this episode, which I think is the funniest of the season. It shows us what's really in the ubiquitous drink Slurm, whose tagline is the one I think Red Bull should use: "It's Highly Addictive!"

(S01E06) The ironic thing about Futurama is that, while it's not an earthbound show, its actual "universe" is much smaller than that of Matt Groening's other creation, The Simpsons. What I mean by that is that Futurama doesn't have nearly as many recurring side characters as its predecessor; however, it allows for those side characters to be both more broadly-drawn and better-developed.

We've already seen a few characters outside the Planet Express family -- Nibbler, Zapp, Kif, and Calculon -- and now we're introduced to Mom. Mom's a ruthless businesswoman who is trying to take over the world. Even though the picture she puts out to the public is the kindly old grandmother in a big hoop-skirted dress, she actually smokes, swears, chugs cream soda, and orders around her three sniveling hench-sons. Oh, and she also has it in for Fry.