History Recap / FuturamaS3E19RoswellThatEndsWell

* LawOfTimeTravelCoincidences: The Planet Express crew fly into space to watch a supernova. However, Fry when pops some popcorn in a metal container in the ship's microwave at the same time as the supernova, it ends up sending them all back to 1947, the day of the [[RoswellThatEndsWell the Roswell, New Mexico UFO incident]] (which they accidentally end up being the cause of, among other incidents).

* AmbiguouslyGay:
** Enos Fry questions ''why'' he has to go out with girls, and just before he dies, he's examining the male model on the pin-up calendar.

* {{Irony}}: Fry's efforts to protect Enos are what ultimately end up getting Enos killed. Had Fry simply avoided him outright, Enos would likely still be alive. However, [[spoiler: if Fry hadn't taken Enos out and slept with Mildred, his unusual brainwaves would not exist, and Earth would have been doomed by the brain spawn, the Dark One, etc.]]

* GetAHoldOfYourselfMan: After Fry freaks out about being his own grandpa, Leela smacks some sense back into him.

* FreezeFrameBonus: There is a small black-and-white photo of the Empire State Building above the phone when Mildred receives the news that Enos was killed. According to WordOfGod, this is deliberate {{futureshadowing}} to indicate that Mildred has an interest in New York City, showing how Fry's family ultimately ended up there.

The night of Enos' death, Fry comforts his fiancee Mildred, who comes on to him. Fry resists initially, but then accepts, thinking that she can't be his grandmother as his supposed grandfather just died. The next morning, the Professor tells Fry that he just became his own grandfather; Fry is understandably [[ScreamingAtSquick upset]]. The crew then decide [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere to steal a microwave dish from the base and rescue Zoidberg without regard for consequences]]. They do so, though Bender's head falls into the desert, remaining buried for a thousand years until his friends find him in the future.

* BodyPaint: Fry uses a can of spray paint that actually creates an army uniform.

* DissonantSerenity: Farnsworth takes Leela setting his tie on fire surprisingly well, merely scoffing in annoyance and muttering "...Women!" to the stove salesman.

* ExplodingCalendar: Done in reverse. As the Planet Express crew travel back in time, the ship's digital chronometer ticks backwards, eventually turning into a 1947 pinup calendar.

* FashionsNeverChange: In an attempt to fit in around 1947 New Mexico, Leela dons a poodle skirt and beehive hairdo, and Professor Farnsworth wears a zoot suit and fedora while swinging a pocketwatch on a chain. Leela also tries to fit in using Fry's 1990s slang, with similar success.

* FutureImperfect: Leela and the Professor's ignorance of the twentieth century is evident when they try to buy a microwave decades before they were commonly available (the "Radarange" having been introduced in 1946, but far from popular until the early 1970s), and Leela assumes people in 1947 speak like turn-of-the-21st-Century Fry.
* GaiasLament: On arrival at twentieth-century Earth, the Professor is baffled by the sudden ozone layer.

* HistoricalDomainCharacter: UsefulNotes/HarryTruman becomes a prominent figure in the narrative after the Army gets ahold of Bender's body and Dr. Zoidberg.

* {{Irony}}: Fry's efforts to protect Enos are what ultimately end up getting Enos killed. Had Fry simply avoided him outright, Enos would likely still be alive.

* MyOwnGrampa: Fry, after doing the nasty in the pasty with Mildred. It's the only reason he doesn't die after Enos is killed.

* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Fry's attempts to protect Enos [[{{Irony}} end up getting him killed by a nuclear explosion]].

* NormalFishInATinyPond: In the 31st century, the Planet Express crew is a RagtagBunchOfMisfits and {{Butt Monkey}}s who are pretty consistently always the underdog to their vastly more powerful foes (i.e., Lrr of the planet Omicron Persei 8, President Richard Nixon's Head, Zapp Brannigan, and Mom). But here, in 1947 Roswell, New Mexico? They can deliver a CurbStompBattle to an entire [=U.S.=] Army base equipped with tanks and jet fighters with barely any effort.

* PassThePopcorn: Actually works as a plot point that caused the Planet Express ship to be sent back to 1947.

* RomancingTheWidow: A rare unintentional version where Fry doesn't realize what's going on until Mildred takes off her shirt. Not that that stops him afterwards, mind.

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Farnsworth begs everyone to not do anything to severely damage the timeline throughout most of the episode. However, when it was revealed that Fry had accidentally killed his grandpa and mated with his grandmother, [[WhatTheHellHero he calls Fry out]] before deciding the temporal damage has already been done and the only way out left is to storm into the army base to get the radar.

** Bender's head ends up lying buried in the sand around Roswell for several centuries before it's re-discovered, much like how Data's head had also been lost in the past and subsequently recovered in the present in the ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' episode "[[Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS5E26S6E1TimesArrow Time's Arrow]]".

* TheSlowPath: As noted above, in a direct parody of the ''[[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration TNG]]'' episode "Time's Arrow", Bender's head is dropped in the New Mexico desert in the 1940s, and has to be recovered a thousand years later. Not only does Bender not mind being buried in the dirt for a millennium, he actually complains upon being rescued that his peace and quiet are being disturbed.
* SouthernFriedPrivate: Fry's would-have-been grandfather is a mild parody of this.
* {{Squick}}: [[invoked]] An in-universe example as Farnsworth, Leela and Bender check up on Fry and are sickened to find that Fry had slept with his grandmother. And in Fry's defense, he's just as horrified after he realizes that he's now MyOwnGrampa.
* StableTimeLoop: As this is ''Futurama''[='s=] first experience with time travel, they settle on this as their rule of time travel (Bender's body was the remains of the "spacecraft" found in Roswell, Zoidberg was the alien, and Fry becomes his own grandfather). "The Why of Fry", ''Bender's Big Score'', and "Decision 3012" would go on to [[TimeyWimeyBall completely muck around with this]] ("The Late Phillip J. Fry" may also cause some rule-bending as well).

** Fry eventually manages to conclude that he did nothing wrong, since the waitress at the diner ''clearly'' can't be his Grandma. He only learns this is ''not'' the case '''after they have sex'''.
* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodSandwich: Fry and his supposed-to-be-Grandfather order a coffee and meal respectively from Fry's will-be-Grandma, but after panicking over the potential hazards inherent in the diner Fry and co. run out before ever receiving their order.

* FreakOut: Fry is horrified to discover that by sleeping with his grandmother, he's become [[MyOwnGrandpa his own grandfather]].

* GaiasLament: On arrival at twentieth century Earth, the Professor is baffled by the sudden ozone layer.

* GrannyClassic: Mildred immediately starts acting like the archtypical grandmother immediately after Fry sleeps with her, wearing glasses and a shawl, talking in a slow, scratchy voice, knitting in bed, and needing to use a hearing trumpet to hear properly, despite being a young woman who didn't act like this beforehand ''at all''. It's what makes Fry realize he really did sleep with his grandmother.

* HypocriticalHumor: Farnsworth asks "who are we to judge?" regarding Fry being his own grandfather. This comes seconds after calling Fry a degenerate for being his own grandfather.

* SurpriseIncest: Mildred starts coming onto Fry after Enos dies, having no way knowing he's her [[KidFromTheFuture grandson from the future]]. While initially disgusted, Fry convinces himself they aren't related since he still exists after his "grandfather" died. This faulty assumption is the only reason he's willing to reciprocate her advances, and he's horrified when Farnsworth explains [[MyOwnGrampa how he still exists]].
* SweetheartSipping: The diner in the 1940's has a sign reading "ONE TEEN TO A MALT."

** Fry eventually manages to reach the conclusion that he did nothing wrong, since the waitress at the diner ''clearly'' can't be his Grandma. He only learns this is ''not'' the case '''after they have sex'''.

** Also in an inversion of this, their chronometer, that should work fine in the past, is [[RuleOfFunny turned into a pin-up calendar]].
* WhamShot: Fry looking back at the bed and seeing Mildred aged up and behaving like his grandmother ''after they had sex''.

* WhamShot: Fry looking back at the bed and seeing Mildred aged up and behaving like his grandmother ''after they had sex''.

--> '''Fry''': This means the flying saucer that crashed in Roswell... was ''us''!\\
'''Farnsworth''': And the alien they captured was...was...\\

'''Zoidberg''': Hello!

* DramaticCurtainToss: A military officer combines this with SayingSoundEffectsOutLoud when revealing what he thinks is a [=UFO=] to the on-site General.

-->'''President Truman:''' Whistling Dixie! I want this taken to {{Area 51}} for analysis. \\
'''Soldier:''' But sir, that's where we're building the [[MoonLandingHoax fake moon landing set]]. \\

* HumanMail: Truman is, for some reason, depicted [[HistoricalBadassUpgrade punching his way out of a crate of "canned eggs"]] being delivered to Roswell.

* InventionalWisdom: [[invoked]] Fry buys Enos a pinup calendar that for no apparent reason alternates between female and male models. Lampshaded in the commentary, when they [[FridgeLogic wonder who would buy such a calendar]] (and the obvious answer of them being bi/pansexual doesn't make sense given this was the [=1940s=]).

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Farnsworth begs everyone to not do anything to severely damage the timeline throughout most of the episode. However, when it was revealed that Fry had accidentally killed his grandpa and mated with his grandmother, [[WhatTheHellHero he calls Fry out]] before deciding the temporal damage has already be done and the only way out left is to storm into the army base to get the radar.

* SouthernFriedPrivate: Fry's would-have-been grandfather is a mild parody of this.

--->'''Farnsworth:''' No! That would alter history. Above all else, it is our sacred duty to preserve the past exactly as it was. \\