Welcome to the World of October 1, 2026!

We all know the haters are gonna hate. So be it but this is the truth.

The original Fox run was full of topical eps if you put yourself in the early 00s. These are just some I can remember.

•    Al Gore (“Anthology of Interest” and the Vice Presidential Action Rangers)
•    1997-2002 Ally McBeal parody, “Single Female Lawyer” (“When Aliens Attack”)
•    Animal rights and PETA like protests ( "Popplers”)
•    Global warming (“Crimes of the Hot”)
•    80s Wall Street greed/hostile takeovers (“Future Stock”)
•    The 90s flag burning amendment fight in congress (“A Taste of Freedom”)
•    The 2001 Bush 300 dollar tax rebate (“Three Hundred Big Boys”)
•    Nixon running for president (“A Head in the Polls”)
•    TV violence / parent watchdog groups (“Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV”)
•    ADDED : thanks Jaleou: kid-napster and Lucy Liu in (“I Dated a Robot”. ) The whole plot is Napster related.
•    ADDED : thanks RTown: (“A Big Piece of Garbage”) aired 1999 based on the 1987 Mobro garbage barge.
•    ADDED : (“The Birdbot of Ice-Catraz”) aired 2001 based on the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill.
•    ADDED : (“A Bicyclops Built for Two”) uses AOL and Fry “it’s full of ads.”
•    ADDED : thanks spiderjjr (“A Flight to Remember”) uses 1997s Titanic 2 years later. THIS ONE’S CRAZY if the show today did a riff of a movie that came out two years ago a lot of you would lose your brains.

The Comedy Central run continued it:

•    Prop 8 (“Proposition Infinity”)
•    EYEPhone (“Attack of the Killer App”)
•    The Obama birther stuff (“Decision 3012”)

And the Hulu era same.

Was always a mix of scifi stories and anachronistic topical. And the fox run is no different than the others.

And some of you will then pivot to “but they’re not as good”. Yeah 20 years of watching the same eps is not gonna be the same as watching new ones. That’s how it works. But that’s another post.

What's your favourite segment from these special eps?

Since the spill, our penguins have been laying six eggs every 15 minutes. Also, the eggs hatch in only 12 hours. Also, the males are laying eggs

My hubby is an aquarium hobbyist and we have tanks of fish, shrimp, and snails. I now find myself watching the critters, particularly the snails, move around the tank and do their snaily things. I find it very relaxing and entertaining. The obsolete robots were indeed wise.

https://reddit.com/link/1x9rnu5/video/syu8vkiy0ewh1/player

But... the air is green, there's no sign of civilisation whatsoever, the people are all phonies, no one reads, everything has cilantro on it...

What's that? One of those Led Zeppelins I've heard so much about?

Hopefully everyone has had the chance to watch this episode now, if you haven’t then don’t read this i guess.

I have a question about someone important in Fry’s 20th Century life being frozen,

In “lord nibbler in the nothingverse” the niblonians mention a second “other” and in the conclusion episode theres quite a few shots of a cryogenics tube that seem like someone Fry knows from his time is frozen. I thought maybe Yancy or his Mom, but there’s problems with both those ideas i guess.

Did anyone else catch this and have any theories?

I was going to ask what the time code was or why it translated into !-3. But looking at it more is it supposed to be in the shape of something. Perhaps bender-esque?

EDIT: To clarify I've watched all the previous series before 8 like a million times over.

I watched series 8 and hated it. I get the sense this isn't such a hot take, from what I read a lot of people didn't like the shift to topical subjects.

I've heard more recent series are a return to form. For someone who didn't like series 8, is it worth skipping 9 and jumping back in at 10? Or was 9 the point where it became good again?

If you like all the series and think people should watch them all, good for you and more power to you. But the series 8 style definitely wasn't my thing.

I remember how vocal Groening was about The Simpsons and The Critic crossover, to the point of having his name removed from the credits and refusing to participate in the episode’s DVD audio commentary.

However, I watched that episode when it originally aired (and several times since), and I never felt that the two universes clashed. In fact, I thought they complemented each other quite well, and in a very organic way.

On the other hand, I watched the Futurama x Disenchantment crossover, and it couldn’t have felt more forced.

What exactly is Disenchantment supposed to be in relation to Futurama? A vivid dream Fry had? A “parallel dimension” that can only be accessed while sleeping?

And more importantly, hadn’t it already been established that both shows existed in the same universe thanks to that blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo in an episode of Disenchantment?

Animatic from 1st special shown at 42:50.

Shut up and take my money!

So New New York is on stilts above old new York. So Where are the Sewers the mutants live in? When we see them go down the ladder to the sewers where the mutants live I'd be led to believe it's above old new York?

Then what about the limestone cavern/basement below planet express? I say that because in one episode the basement of the pizza shop was panuccis pizza which in itself doesn't make sense.

So what are we looking at?

Earth ➡️ Old New York Sewers ➡️ Old New York ➡️ New New York Sewers ➡️ Basements ➡️ New New York??

Or, is Old New York ALSO the Sewers??

Id like your thoughts