Recap / Futurama S 4 E 1 Kif Gets Knocked Up A Notch

Bigfoot's choice

An accident with the Nimbus's Holo-Shed results in Kif getting pregnant. As Kif's "smizmar", Amy is named the mother of his children, and she starts to panic from the responsibilities of parenthood.

Tropes

• The Baby Trap: Kif getting pregnant makes Amy worry that her life will completely change, taking up all the time she has but, in the end, comes to Kif's side because she loves him that much. It's subverted when, although Kif delivers safely, it's revealed his spawn will spend two decades as tadpoles in a swamp before becoming land borne. Amy assures him she'll be ready to be a mother by then.
• Bad Mood Retreat: The Angry Dome, in which Professor Farnsworth retreats after being offended by a question from Amy.
• Bait-and-Switch: When Amy leaves the baby shower crying, Kif stands in the center of the shot, and we hear a weird wet sound and a baby crying. The camera then pans over to Zoidberg, who is crying like a baby.
• Behind the Black: Somehow no one notices Zoidberg in the Maternifuge until he gets ejected from it.
• Bizarre Alien Reproduction: Kif's species (it's never stated if they have genders or not) becomes "receptive" by being in love with someone, who they call the 'smizmar'. When they are "receptive", they take the DNA from the first person that touches them in any way and use that to become pregnant. The offspring then go through a very long tadpole-like phase in a swamp. Regardless of the biological parent (Leela in Kif's case), the smizmar (Amy) is considered the "true" parent by their culture.
• Call-Back: The term 'smizmar' was used in "Raging Bender".
• Call-Forward: Leela gives Kif and Amy the basket her parents left her in at the Orphanarium. The next episode would feature Leela discovering her past and meeting her parents for the first time.
• Changed My Mind, Kid: While Amy bails when the pressures of eventual motherhood get to her, she comes back at the last minute for the birth.
• Chekhov's Gun: Amy's party-board, which is introduced at the beginning of the episode, then ruined by Leo and Inez. Amy manages to use the redesigned party-board to get to the spawning ground.
• Comical Overreacting:
  • The Professor gets incredibly irate at Amy suggesting the crew take a detour just to drop her off at the Nimbus.
    Professor: We could but we won't! It's a spaceship, dammit, not a prom limo! Oooh, if anyone needs me, I'll be in the Angry Dome!
  • Bender loses his rag at Kif for getting pregnant, because he didn't know Kif could do that.
    Bender: What's the deal!? Just when I thought I'd figured out you biological creatures, it's something else! Lemme at 'im! [He goes for Kif, and everyone restrains him.] Come over here, Kif! You-!
• Daddy DNA Test: It's unclear who provided the DNA for Kif's babies, so a test is performed via the Professor's Maternifuge. The DNA came from Leela, but cultural traditions among Kif's people mean Amy is still viewed as the parent, as she was the one that triggered his "receptive" state. Despite the paternity being inconsequential in theory, Kif is extremely relieved when it's confirmed the DNA didn't come from Zapp, and Leela is protective of the babies for sharing her DNA.
• The Ditz: Zapp Brannigan doesn't know how anyone gets pregnant.
• Dodgy Toupee: Zapp is revealed to wear a toupee in this episode, as it almost blows off after he blows a hole in his ship.
• Dumbass Has a Point: It's Fry who points out that anyone could have gotten Kif pregnant since he touched everyone during the explosive decompression vacuum; ultimately, he's right, since it's Leela who got Kif pregnant, not Amy.
• Expy: The Nimbus' Dr. Veins McGee is a blatant copy of Dr. Bones McCoy.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: If you watch Kif's attempts to grab people during the decompression, you can see that he only had skin-to-skin contact with one other person besides Amy (he loses his glove, but then she grabs his face before he gets torn away) - he grabs Leela's hand with his ungloved hand, but Fry only gets grabbed by the pants, Bender gets grabbed (but has no DNA to pass on), and it looks like Kif avoids touching Zapp completely. So, in the end, it really only was the women who were really in the running for DNA.
• Hellish Horse: Spirit the Pony, after the Holo-Shed malfunctions.
• Here We Go Again!:
  • "Right-o, gents, it's another simulation gone mad, so murder and mayhem, standard procedure."
  • After nearly killing everyone trying to stop the simulations, Zapp decides he needs to relax... in the Holo-Shed.
• Hidden Depths: Amy's schedule, in addition to her typical party girl activities, has her setting aside time to work on her thesis and attend a Tolstoy seminar.
• Holodeck Malfunction: It's one of these that leads to the accident that causes Kif's pregnancy.
• I Want Grandkids: Amy's parents are indifferent to how Kif got pregnant; they are just happy they have grandchildren.
• Kindness Ball: Zapp is probably the nicest he's ever been, at least to Kif; they share enthusiasm when the Planet Express Ship brings their respective love interests, he attempts to grab him when he's at risk of being sucked out the ship, willingly takes part in the paternity test and is part of the effort to get him to the birthing grounds.
• Legion of Doom: The rogue Holo-Shed programs, including Professor Moriarty, Jack the Ripper, Attila the Hun (riding a version of Spirit with red eyes and pointy teeth) and Evil Abraham Lincoln.
• Let's Mock the Monsters: When the crew is faced with a giant froad, Bender just insults it. "What's that big ugly thing? A frog, a toad, or your momma?"
• Major Injury Underreaction: Dr. Veins McGee says the crew is fine... aside from a few broken bones, some internal hemorrhaging and a partially barfed up heart. Oh, and Kif's pregnant.
• Mama Bear: After returning to help Kif give birth, Amy protects his tadpoles from being eaten by the local wildlife by hitting them away with a giant leaf.
• Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: Gender-flipped and played with. While Amy loves Kif, after he gets pregnant, she's still not ready for parenthood, and subtly tries to urge him to consider how things would change if she wasn't the biological parent. When he assures her that in his culture, the one who inspired the feelings of deep love are still the "true" parent, she looks visibly troubled.
• Mandatory Line: Fry is present for the entire episode but is conspicuously quiet, speaking only on a small handful of occasions; Kif, Amy, Leela, and Zapp take up most of the episode's focus, heckled by Bender throughout.
• Mister Seahorse: Kif Kroker's species can be impregnated by absorbing genetic material through touch when experiencing deep emotions.
• My Friends... and Zoidberg: Zoidberg does this to himself at Kif's baby shower.
  Fry: Everybody we invited is here.
  Zoidberg: Also Zoidberg!
• Noodle Incident: Zapp refers to one involving one of his previous uses of the Holo-Shed.
  Kif: The Holo-Shed's on the fritz again! The characters turned real!
  Zapp: Damn! The last time that happened, I got slapped with three paternity suits!
• Not Drawn to Scale: The size of Kif's room goes from being small enough that a human has to crouch to big enough that everyone can stand in it.
• Perspective Magic: Kif tries to give Amy the moon on the holodeck display, but he's too weak to remove it from the sky and ends up hanging from it.
• Pet the Dog: Zapp actually assists Kif in getting through the jungle of his home planet and even compliments him sincerely when the birthing is complete.
• Poor Communication Kills: If Kif had just told Amy how his species' life cycle works, that the children would just be tadpoles left to their own devices who wouldn't even leave the water for 20 years, then she wouldn't have been overwhelmed by the sudden pressure of becoming a parent and run out on him.
• Tempting Fate: Kif says the Holo-Shed usually works, except when it doesn't, but so long as that doesn't happen, they'll be fine. You can probably guess what happens immediately after he says this.
• There Is a God!: Kif invokes the spirit of this upon learning Zapp didn't provide the DNA for Kif's offspring.
  Farnsworth: Nor is Captain Brannigan!
  Kif: [sotto voce] Oh thank you, merciful God!
• They Called Me Mad!: Even the Professor laughed at himself when he invented the Maternifuge, "but I guess I showed myself!"
• Wham Shot: Amy being thrown out of the Maternifuge, leaving Leela as the last one inside.
• When Things Spin, Science Happens: The Maternifuge, which determines who's the genetic mother by spinning everyone inside it, kicking out those who aren't.
• You No Take Candle: From Attila the Hun.
  Attila: Stop! No shoot fire-stick in space canoe! Cause explosive decompression!
  Zapp: Spare me your space-age technobabble, Attila the Hun!
• Your Mom: Bender asks what a gigantic amphibian on Kif's homeworld is.
  Bender: What's this fat, ugly thing? A frog, a toad or your momma?
  Kif: It's a poisonous froad!