Recap / Futurama S 3 E 9 The Cyber House Rules

PLEASE RISE FOR THE FUTURAMA THEME SONG

Leela reunites with her crush from the Orphanarium, Adlai Atkins, who has become a plastic surgeon. He offers to give her two eyes so she can appear normal, a chance Leela leaps on, to Fry's dismay. Meanwhile, Bender adopts all of the orphans to get the stipends from the government but finds child-rearing to be a more costly venture than he figured.

Tropes

• An Aesop: Fitting in for shallow reasons is overrated, and people who are shallow and try to have you change your physical appearance don't care about you as much as you think.
• All of the Other Reindeer: Little Leela at the orphanarium. The photograph of her standing alone says it all.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Smitty listing the charges the NNYPD are arresting Bender for.
  Smitty: You're under arrest for child cruelty, child endangerment, depriving children of food, selling children as food and misrepresenting the weight of livestock!
• Attentive Shade Lowering: In one scene from the montage of Leela enjoying her newfound two-eyed "normalcy," she struts around in a new pair of sunglasses and flirts with some passing men by pulling the shades down and winking.
• Baby Fever Trigger: Adlai seeing Bender with his adopted orphans makes him want to have a child with Leela, despite Bender obviously being a terrible parent. When Bender is arrested and loses custody of the orphans, Adlai and Leela actually try to adopt one (specifically the three-eared orphan Sally), though Leela dumps Adlai when he refuses to adopt a disfigured orphan as she is, and the kids remain unadopted.
• Be Yourself: Fry insists Leela is better the way she is. Eventually Leela agrees with him.
• Big "SHUT UP!": Leela yells this to Fry when he shouts "YAAY!!!" to her telling off Adlai that she's happy being herself.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Adlai is still as judgmental as ever about other people's abnormalities, and only bothered to "correct" Leela's one eye on the grounds that he'd be able to date her afterward.
• Black Comedy Animal Cruelty: Bender's reaction to when he agrees to get the kids food.
  Albert: Can we have Bender Burgers again?
  Bender: No! The cat shelter's onto me!
• Brick Joke:
  • Zoidberg's ink pouch.
  • When trying to get rid of the children, Bender calls a restaurant to ask if they take children, and checks Albert (the fat kid)'s weight. When the police come to arrest him, two of the charges are "selling children as food" and "misrepresenting the weight of livestock".
  • Leela's Arch-Enemy at the orphanarium was a blind kid who mocked her for not having two functioning eyes. After she gets the surgery, she finds him and makes him feel her two eyes, leaving him disappointed.
• Cheerful Child: The orphans. It makes Bender slightly less monstrous when he tries to sell them for money.
• Children Are Cruel:
  • The orphans who bullied Leela, but especially Kurt the blind kid. They are still Jerkasses as adults.
  • The current orphans, who bully Sally for having an ear on her forehead.
• Continuity Nod: At the end of the episode, the Cookieville Minimum-Security Orphanarium is renamed the Bender B. Rodríguez Orphanarium.
• Didn't Think This Through: Bender adopts twelve orphans for the government stipends but fails to take into account that he'd need to buy things like food for them. Eventually, he spends so much that he ends up at a net loss and is forced to return them to the Orphanarium.
• Dine and Dash: Bender and his adopted human children go to a restaurant and run away without paying.
• Disobey This Message: When Fry argues against Leela getting the surgery, she turns his own message against him:
  Fry: If you ask me, you shouldn't care what other people think.
  Leela: You're right! I'll start by not caring what you think! I'm getting the surgery!
• The Dissenter Is Always Right: The Planet Express crew think that Leela should go ahead with the plastic surgery to make her look normal. However, Fry disagrees, bringing up the good point that she's perfectly fine the way she is. They dismiss him and get the surgery for her, with Leela taking until near the end of the episode to agree with Fry's point.
• Distracted by the Sexy: Two-eyed Leela briefly causes Mom's sons to become a Human Traffic Jam when she passes them on the street.
• Do-Anything Robot: Bender needs a calculator. He has one built in, but as he points out to Fry, he needs a good calculator. This is apparently a pet peeve of one of the Futurama writers.
• Dog Pile of Doom: The kids do a cute version on Fry at Bender's home and also on Bender in the closing shot.
• Doorstop Baby: Subverted. Leela finds what looks like a baby in a basket in front of the Planet Express building. It turns out to be an invitation to an orphan reunion.
• Dumbass Has a Point: While he does a bad job at conveying his argument, Fry is right that Leela gave up the main thing that made her unique, and that Adlai is only attracted to her now that she has two eyes.
• Eye Scream: Threatened when Leela wants to return to being a cyclops.
  Leela: Listen, buddy. By the end of the day, one of us is gonna have one eye.
• Flowers of Romance: Adlai orders a bouquet for Leela from a bouquet-vending tree. He wants "average", which is a simple bouquet of yellow flowers. The couple before them got something much more splendid.
• Fostering for Profit: Bender adopts a houseful of orphans for the government checks, but then realizes that the kids expect to be fed, which keeps him from making a profit. He ultimately tries to break even by attempting to sell the children to a slaughterhouse before he's caught.
• Freaky Is Cool: Unlike everyone else, Fry loves Leela just the way she is, one eye and all. He goes on to mention that the Planet Express crew's various quirks and disfunctions are good things that make them who they are.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: A newspaper clipping headlined "Primitive Human Found in Cryo-tube", and a picture of Fry.
• Heartwarming Orphan: invoked Exaggerated with the twelve orphans Bender adopts, who are always happy and laughing no matter what Bender does to them. The DVD Commentary admits this was the only way to make Bender's neglectful behavior funny instead of horrifying.
• Honest John's Dealership: The sign above Bender's home reads "Honest Bender's Stolen Car Parts Boutique".
• Hypocritical Humor:
  • One of the orphans who bullied Leela, who happened to be French, calls her as stupid as a French guy.
  • Another orphan who bullied Leela was blind, arguing that at least he had two eyes even if they didn't work.
  • The female robot praises Bender for being a man of responsibility. He agrees and proposes to ditch the kids in an alley so the two of them can have some fun.
  • When Bender presents the orphans he adopted to Leela and Adlai for their own adoption, Leela reflects back on the humiliation of being presented like livestock during her orphan days. Then she dismisses one orphan for being too fat.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: Leela's reason for getting the surgery.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: At the end we see that Bender is actually touched by the painting the children did for him.
• Keeping the Handicap: Leela eventually goes back to having one eye because she understands this is part of what makes her herself.
• Kick the Dog: The NNYPD also arrest Fry and the kids for being part of Bender's scam, despite the fact it's pretty obvious they couldn't have been involved (a deleted scene explains that Bender told them the kids were in on it to avoid doing hard time).
• Licked by the Dog: Bender's kids hugging him at the bar and later handing him a cute painting.
• No Name Given: Of the twelve orphans, only four get names: Nina (the black girl), Albert (the fat one), Sally (the girl with an ear on her forehead), and Bethany (who isn't identified).
• Not Helping Your Case: Fry has a point, but he phrases it really badly.
  Fry: So Leela, do you wanna be like us? Or do you wanna be like Adlai, with no severe mental or social problems whatsoever?
  Leela: [Beat] That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.
• Obsessively Normal: Adlai prides himself in being the Ridiculously Average Guy that he is. He tones down Hawaiian shirts (even though they still look loud due to the large floral patterns), every compliment he gives Leela is on how average and not-special she is, he specifically orders an average bouquet for her on their date, and when Leela decides to adopt the three-eared Sally, he only agrees on the condition that he has the third ear removed.
• Orphanage of Fear: The Orphanarium looks like a prison from the outside, and Leela is reminiscent of the metal bars in the windows.
• Parental Neglect: Just one of many of Bender's mistreatments of the kids. He and Fry are arrested for it.
• Ragtag Band of Misfits: In an attempt to dissuade Leela from getting the surgery, Fry tries to pass off the Planet Express company's various dysfunctions as good things.
  Fry: What's so wonderful about Leela being normal? The rest of us aren't normal and that's what makes us great. Like Dr. Zoidberg: he's a weird monster who smells like he eats garbage and does.
  Zoidberg: Damn right!
  Fry: The Professor's a senile, amoral crackpot. [Farnsworth gibbers and waves] Hermes is a Rastafarian accountant.
  Hermes: Tally me banana.
  Fry: Amy's a klutz from Mars. [Amy drops the glass she is drinking from and it smashes]
  Amy: Sploops!
  Farnsworth: And, Fry, you've got that brain thing.
  Fry: I already did!
• Raised by Robots: The B-plot has Bender attempt this. He adopts a dozen children from the Orphanarium to collect stipends from the government. Unsurprisingly, Bender is terrible with children.
• Ridiculously Average Guy: Adlai is so bland he has Hawaiian shirts toned down.
• Spit Take: When Bender learns about the $100/week child adoption deal, he spits his drink, drinks another, and spits that one.
• Status Quo Is God: At the end of the episode, Leela gets her one eye back. Even during the episode, it was noted that the operation only gave Leela the appearance of having two eyes; the second eye itself was purely cosmetic and she couldn't actually see with it. Bender also returns the orphans he adopted.
• Suddenly Shouting: Zoidberg, when Leela informs him that most doctors are actually rich.
  Zoidberg: What?! When did this happen? You're joking, right? (starts shaking Leela) THAT'S NOT FUNNY!
• Tempting Fate: Leela announcing the most beautiful moment of her life is followed by her being covered in Zoidberg's ink.
• This Page Will Self-Destruct: The orphan basket destroys itself after its message is read.
• Would Hurt a Child: Bender begins the episode trying to stomp on a basket, not remotely caring when Leela claims there's a baby inside, and later tries to sell some of the orphans to a Chinese restaurant.
• You're Just Jealous: What Leela says when Fry disapproves of her getting two eyes and entering into a relationship with Adlai.
  Fry: No, I'm not! Oh wait, I am! But my point remains valid!

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