With fuel prices skyrocketing, the Planet Express crew sets off on a dangerous mission: to infiltrate the world's only dark-matter mine, source of all spaceship fuel. But deep beneath the surface lies a far stranger place... a medieval land of dragons and sorcery and intoxicated knights who look suspiciously like Bender. So park your hover-car and saddle up your unicorn for Futurama's grandest adventure yet: BENDER'S GAME!
At once a merciless skewering of all things fanboy and an extremely satisfying addition to the Futurama franchise, Bender's Game is among the best of the animated series' feature length adventures. The game in question is Dungeons and Dragons, and Bender wants in--only robots aren't programmed with the necessary imagination. Naturally, Bender's plans to develop one go completely awry and land him in an android asylum. The role-playing plotline later re-emerges--in typically convoluted Futurama fashion--via a subplot involving Professor Farnsworth's conversion of dark matter into spaceship fuel, which created a key to a very D&D-influenced universe where our hapless heroes eventually find themselves. The alternate world storyline allows for much lampooning of fantasy tropes, with Lord of the Rings receiving the lion's share of the tweaks. Seeing as how the writers have already devoted much of the movie's running time to parodying Star Wars and Star Trek (and their Lego offshoots), one might think that Bender's Game might suffer from pop-culture overload, but surprisingly, it all feels fresh and frequently funny, and the writers are wise to ground the story in their eccentric characters rather than pinballing them through an endless string of gags. The result is probably the strongest of the direct-to-DVD Futurama releases to date, and one that newcomers to the show's cracked universe can appreciate as much as longtime fans.As with previous Futurama DVD releases, the extras come fast and furious on Bender's Game: commentary by members of the cast and production team (including Matt Groening) is both informative and funny, while interviews with the writers and producers discuss, among other topics, the influence of Dungeons and Dragons on the series and the 3D models used in the feature. Aspiring animators might appreciate "How To Draw Futurama in 83 Easy Steps and the storyboard animatic for the first part of the story, while the "Genetics Lab" feature allows for some amusing Dr. Moreau-style cross-breeding of the characters. Recording session bloopers and a deleted scene offer their own laughs, but the most enjoyable extra must be the preview for the next Futurama feature, Into the Wild Green Yonder, which suggests a shocking development for one of the show's regulars. -- Paul Gaita
Beyond Futurama: Bender's Game
The Simpsons
Family Guy
King of the Hill
Stills from Futurama: Bender's Game (Click for larger image)
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.0 / 5.0
Best of the best:
This was one of the better Futurama movies I seen. Plus the shipping was quick and the product was in superb condition.
Bender's Game:
Finally the Futurama that you have been waiting for! Lets face it the last two Futurama Movies have been just side of painful to watch, this one was the same recipe that you fell in love with when Futurama was still on Fox.
Disappointing:
I thought the first Futurama movie was excellent and the second was pretty good so I went ahead and bought the third before renting it. I regret that. It just wasn't funny. At all.
The Futurama movies are getting better, bit by bender.:
Futurama was under-appreciated in its time, and I'm glad that it's experiencing a rebirth of sorts. I didn't watch it when it was on the air - it was at the same time too much like The Simpsons, and yet not enough like The Simpsons. In the past four years, however, I've purchased all four seasons of Futurama on DVD, and love each and every episode. The show was GENIUS. The stories are hilarious, irreverent, cynical, hopeful, and even sentimental. The characters are wonderful, and the concepts mind-blowing.... more info
