Futurama episode
"The Farnsworth Parabox"
Episode no.	69
Prod. code	4ACV15
Airdate	June 8, 2003
Writer(s)	Bill Odenkirk
Director	Ron Hughart
Opening subtitle	BEATS A HARD KICK TO THE FACE
Opening cartoon	Unknown
Season 4 January 2002 – August 2003
Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch Leela's Homeworld Love and Rocket Less Than Hero A Taste of Freedom Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV Jurassic Bark Crimes of the Hot Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles The Why of Fry Where No Fan Has Gone Before The Sting Bend Her Obsoletely Fabulous The Farnsworth Parabox Three Hundred Big Boys Spanish Fry The Devil's Hands are Idle Playthings
List of all Futurama episodes...

“The Farnsworth Parabox” is the fifteenth episode of the fourth production season of Futurama. It first aired June 8, 2003. Futurama is an Emmy Award-winning animated American sitcom created by Matt Groening, also the creator of The Simpsons, and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox network. ... Image File history File links Futurama_ep69. ... is the 159th day of the year (160th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Bill Odenkirk is an American comedy writer. ... Ron Hughart is an American animation director. ... The complete Futurama DVD collection The following is an episode list for the FOX animated television series Futurama. ... Kif Gets Knocked Up A Notch is the first episode in season four of Futurama. ... Leelas Homeworld is the second episode of Futuramas fourth season. ... ‹ The template below (Unreferenced episode) is being considered for deletion. ... Less Than Hero is the fourth episode in the fourth season of Futurama. ... A Taste of Freedom is the fifth episode of the fourth production season of Futurama. ... ‹ The template below (Unreferenced episode) has been proposed for deletion. ... Jurassic Bark is the seventh episode of season four of Futurama, airing November 17, 2002. ... “Crimes of the Hot” is the eighth episode of the fourth production season of the television show Futurama. ... ‹ The template below (Unreferenced episode) is being considered for deletion. ... The Why of Fry is the tenth episode in the fourth season of Futurama. ... The subject of this article may not satisfy the notability guideline for Television episodes. ... The Sting is episode twelve in season four of Futurama. ... Bend Her is the thirteenth episode of the fourth production season of Futurama. ... Obsoletely Fabulous is the fourteenth episode of the fourth production season of Futurama. ... This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ... Spanish Fry is the seventeenth episode of Season four of Futurama. ... The Devil’s Hands are Idle Playthings is the 18th and final episode in season four of the TV series Futurama. ... The complete Futurama DVD collection The following is an episode list for the FOX animated television series Futurama. ... Futurama is an Emmy Award-winning animated American sitcom created by Matt Groening, also the creator of The Simpsons, and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox network. ... is the 159th day of the year (160th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2003 (MMIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Plot summary

After nearly dying because of an experiment, Professor Farnsworth decides to destroy the experiment—a yellow box—by dumping it into the sun. Keeping it overnight in the lab, he orders the Planet Express staff not to open it and assigns Leela as a guard to make sure. However, after her shift is over, Leela is tempted by curiosity, flipping a coin to decide whether to open the box. The coin comes up heads, and as such, she does, discovering the box is in fact larger on the inside. She falls into it ending up in a parallel universe where coin flips come out with the opposite result. Consequently, though everyone in the parallel universe have identical personalities to their counterparts, nearly everyone has a different color scheme (e.g., Bender is painted gold, Zoidberg is blue). Also, Fry and Leela dated and then got married after Leela flipped a coin to decide, and Farnsworth performed an experiment wherein he tried to remove his own brain. Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth (born April 9, 2841) is the extremely elderly proprietor of the Planet Express delivery service in the fictional animated television series Futurama. ... Futurama is an animated United States cartoon series (March 28, 1999-2003) created by Matt Groening (who also created The Simpsons). ... Turanga Leela (referred to as simply Leela) is the primary female character in the animated television series Futurama. ... Coin flipping or coin tossing is the practice of throwing a coin in the air to resolve a dispute between two parties or otherwise choose between two alternatives. ... A multiverse (or meta-universe) is the hypothetical set of multiple possible universes (including our universe) that together comprise all of physical reality. ... Bender Bending Rodríguez, more commonly known as Bender (assembled c. ... Doctor John Zoidberg is a lobster-like alien, Decapodian, in the television series Futurama. ... Philip J. Fry is the protagonist of the animated television series Futurama and is voiced by Billy West. ...

At first the parallel universe staff believe Leela is evil, and the parallel Leela forces the original Leela’s colleagues (except for Hermes) into the parallel universe. The two Farnsworths discover that, just as the original Farnsworth created a box containing the parallel universe, the parallel Farnsworth created a box containing the original universe. The two Leelas dub the original universe "Universe A", and the second "Universe 1". The two groups agree to watch their counterparts to determine if the other is evil, but after studying the Scriptures, the Professors decide that nobody is evil after all. Hermes Conrad is a character in the Futurama animated series. ... This Gutenberg Bible is displayed by the United States Library. ...

When Universe 1’s Hermes comes in to destroy the Universe A box by throwing it into the sun, the crew realize that Universe A’s Hermes must be doing the same thing. They decide to go back through the box to stop Hermes-A. However, the Universe A box is missing, stolen by the two Zoidbergs, who are tired of everyone in both universes ignoring and being disrespectful to them. The two Farnsworths try to recreate the Universe A box, but wind up creating a large number of boxes, all connected to different universes. Doctor John Zoidberg (born August 5), also known as Dr. Zoidberg or simply Zoidberg, is a fictional lobster-like alien from the planet Decapod 10 in the television series Futurama. ...

The two Zoidbergs return, and everyone else tries to get the box from them. The Zoidbergs jump into another box to escape, and in the process bump into the bookshelf containing the boxes, causing all of them to fall. Unable to tell which box the Zoidbergs jumped into, everyone selects a box to jump into and find them, grabbing a length of wire so they can find their way back. Eventually finding the two Zoidbergs, everyone makes their way back to Universe 1, then leaps into the Universe A box.

Meanwhile, in Universe A, Hermes-A, aboard the Planet Express Ship-A, has reached the Sun-A and is about to eject the box. At the last moment, everyone else pops out of the box into the airlock. Farnsworth-A orders Hermes-A not to push the eject button. After several moments of consideration, Hermes shrugs and obeys. The Planet Express Ship is a fictional spaceship in the animated series Futurama. ...

Back on Earth, both Farnsworths exchange their boxes by pulling each box into the other’s universe simultaneously. Farnsworth tells the staff to treat the box very carefully as it contains their own universe. Bender then shakes the box, causing earthquake-like effects. Afterwards, while the rest of the staff are watching television, Fry comes into the room and sits on the box, causing the universe to become short and squat. However, this detail is unnoticed by the characters. In differential topology, Smales paradox states that it is possible to turn a sphere inside out in 3-space with possible self-intersections but without creating any crease, a process often called sphere eversion. ... An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of stored energy in the Earths crust that creates seismic waves. ...

Perpendicular universes

• Universe A - The normal Futurama universe. Boxes in this universe are yellow.
• Universe 1 - The first alternate universe seen; coin tosses have opposite outcomes and almost everything is a different color. The sky is a spiraling array of vibrant colors. Boxes in this universe are light blue.
• Universe XVII - It appears to be in the era of the Roman Empire, hence the use of Roman numerals. Boxes in this universe are purple.
• Universe 25 - No one is born with eyes and are blind. Boxes in this universe are white.
• Universe 31 - Everybody is a robot version of themselves. Leela saying "Access Denied" to robot Fry made his head explode. Boxes in this universe are green.
• Universe 420 - A hippie universe wherein marijuana smoking is implied both by its smoky haze and its label 420. There appears to be a shortage of boxes in this universe - only one is seen. Boxes in this universe are orange.
• Universe 1729 - Everybody is an extremely rude bobblehead version of themselves. Boxes in this universe are pink. It is possible that 1729 was intentionally chosen to represent this universe by the Futurama writers, because 1729 is the Hardy-Ramanujan number.
• Other universes - One is very cold, freezing anything that enters it; another contains nothing but women and another has octopi, or at the very least it is inhabited by beings who have tentacles. Also, the Benders steal treasure from both a leprechaun universe (Bender-1) and a pirate universe (Bender-A).

The many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics or MWI (also known as the relative state formulation, theory of the universal wavefunction, many-universes interpretation, Oxford interpretation or many worlds), is an interpretation of quantum mechanics that claims to resolve all the paradoxes of quantum theory by allowing every possible outcome... Motto Senatus Populusque Romanus (SPQR) The Roman Empire at its greatest extent. ... Blindness is the condition of lacking visual perception due to physiological or psychological factors. ... Singer at a modern Hippie movement in Russia Hippie (sometimes spelled hippy) refers to a member of a subgroup of the counterculture that began in the United States during the early 1960s, becoming an established social group by 1965, and expanding to other countries before declining in the mid-1970s. ... Santa Cruz 4/20 celebration at Porter Meadow on UCSC campus in 2007 On April 20th 2007, at 4:20pm PST more than 700 people gathered at City Hall in Victoria, BC to celebrate Victorias 10th annual 4/20 celebration. ... A bobblehead doll is a type of collectible doll. ... 1729 Cardinal One thousand seven hundred [and] twenty-nine Ordinal 1729th Factorization Divisors 7, 13, 19, 91, 133, 247 Roman numeral MDCCXXIX Binary 11011000001 Octal 3301 Duodecimal 1001 Hexadecimal 6C1 1729 is known as the Hardy-Ramanujan number, after a famous anecdote of the British mathematician G. H. Hardy regarding... This article is about the number 1729. ... In Irish mythology, a leprechaun (Modern Irish: leipreachán) is a type of male faerie said to inhabit the island of Ireland. ... Look up pirate and piracy in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Cultural references

• According to the audio commentary, it was decided to make Zoidberg in the alternate universe blue because approximately one of every two million lobsters is blue.
• A woman who opens a box that should not be opened is the center of the story of the Pandora's box.
• The Universe 1 Farnsworth's statement that it is common knowledge that parallel universes are evil is a play on the Star Trek episode "Mirror, Mirror", where Kirk, Uhura, Scotty and McCoy are sent to the mirror universe.
• The gold Bender-1 could possibly be a reference to protocol droid C-3PO, a notion reinforced by his exclamation, "Our universe is doomed! Doomed!"
• Farnsworth's use of the word "Baldercrap!" is a portmanteau of "balderdash" and "crap."
• The labeling of alternate universe by using numbers is similar to that seen in DC comics and Marvel Comics.
• The title of this episode may be a reference to the EPR paradox
• The Benders saying "Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other's gold" is a quote from a children's campfire song.

Binomial name Homarus americanus H. Milne-Edwards, 1837 The American lobster, Homarus americanus, is a species of lobster found on the Atlantic coast of North America. ... For other uses, see Pandora (disambiguation) and Pandoras box (disambiguation). ... The starship Enterprise as it appeared on Star Trek Star Trek is a culturally significant science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry in the 1960s. ... Mirror, Mirror is an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series. ... James Tiberius Kirk, played by William Shatner, is the main character in the original Star Trek television series and the films based on it. ... Uhura, played by Nichelle Nichols, is a character in Star Trek: The Original Series and the first six Star Trek films. ... Scotty redirects here. ... Dr. Leonard H. McCoy (nicknamed Bones), played by DeForest Kelley, is a character in the original Star Trek series, and the first six Star Trek films. ... In the Star Trek television series, the Mirror Universe is an alternate reality. ... C-3PO (pronounced IPA: []., often shortened to Threepio) is a fictional character from the Star Wars universe, who appears in both the original Star Wars films and the prequel trilogy. ... A portmanteau (IPA pronunciation: RP, US) is a word or morpheme that fuses two or more words or word parts to give a combined or loaded meaning. ... Look up Balderdash on Wiktionary, the free dictionary Balderdash is a proprietary board game combining elements of bluff and knowledge of trivia. ... In DC Comics, the Multiverse is a continuity construct in which multiple fictional versions of the universe exist in the same space, separated from each other by their vibrational resonances. ... Within Marvel Comics, most tales take place within the fictional Marvel Universe, this in turn is part of a larger multiverse. ... In quantum mechanics, the EPR paradox is a thought experiment which challenged long-held ideas about the relation between the observed values of physical quantities and the values that can be accounted for by a physical theory. ...

Continuity

• In a prior episode, "I Dated a Robot", Farnsworth tells Fry that there is only one parallel universe. The only apparent difference between that parallel universe and the original Futurama universe is the presence of cowboy-style clothing. In the commentary, the writers claim that the other universe is the one that has many alternative ones. In the commentary of "I Dated a Robot", the writers say that there is only the one parallel universe, and that the ones in this episode are perpendicular (perhaps because the box is where they cross/become perpendicular).

• Before deciding to look in the box, Leela picks up a copy of the Nosy Enquirer (a parody of The National Enquirer) with the headline "Bigfoot Turns 80!" Bigfoot is later revealed to exist in Spanish Fry.

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The Farnsworth Parabox