Ethan Freedman
Queering Relationships
October 12, 2023
Prof. Adam Thomas
It is the year 3000 and the New Years Eve ball just dropped on the Fox channel, but this is no New Years Eve special – it is the first episode of Futurama. Having been frozen in time seconds after the calendar turns to the new year of 2000, Phillip J. Fry finds himself in the “world of tomorrow” where mutants, humans, monsters, aliens, animals, robots, and other anthropomorphic figures live amongst each other. 1,000 years into the future and Matt Groening, the creator of Futurama has set himself up for endless possabilities of post-human relationships and adventures for the Planet Express delivery team. Matt Groening is also the creator of The Simpsons, which is attached to many conversations about predicting the future through the massive amount of content that has accumulated since December 1989. While The Simpsons tells many tales related to the future possibilities of a postmodern world attached to the nuclear family of Homer and Marge Simpson, Futurama has had many thoughts about the inevitable future as well – I mean it’s in the name. Artificial intelligence has become increasingly more important and a necessary topic to discuss due to the rise of companies like Chat GPT, Meta, Snapchat, and others with AI products pervasively making their way into our lives, and Futurama took initiative in leading one of the many discussions.
In “Queering Relationships,” a course at Colgate University taught by Prof. Adam Thomos, queer as a verb for resistance is discussed. While resistance can take form in many ways like protesting, self-identification, or even creating an adult animated cartoon in 1989 during the rise of situational comedies and scientific fantasy television series, it can also reach facets of technology and human relationships. To consider the possibilities of technology queering our future, it is important to acknowledge that tech requires progression. Queering technology is becoming resistant to the idea that what exists presently will suffice, and implications of the present on the future provide increasing opportunities for the implementation of technology. On the other hand, queering relationships seems to involve resisting normalities of cohabitation, child rearing, sexuality, romantic ideals, and so much more. While Matt Groening’s Futurama is a wonderful example of queered relationships and the kinds of maintenance behaviors, resilience, and relationship quality that can stem from them, it simultaneously tackles questions about human relationships with technology. In Season seven, episode one titled “Rebirth,” (2010) the queered relationship of human’s and autonomous robots is discussed in tandem with the ways that relationships with technology might serve to better the lives of agents eager for companionship. In other words, this episode of Futurama serves wonderfully as an example of the kinds of affective understandings that are necessary when considering the adoption of artificial intelligence and their implication on the development of intimate relationships.
Before I delve into how Futurama represents queering relationships with AI technologies, I believe it is important to understand what queered relationships are and how the animated sitcom represents a queered narrative of companionship in a general capacity. In Barker and Scheele’s Queer: A Graphic History, the understanding that “queer has had many different meanings in different times and places” is brought to light (Barker, 2016; pp. 7). While queer takes root as strangeness within a cooperative movement, it has gone as far as to envelope into its very own theory. With derivatives in hate speech, “queer” has become the site of activism as a “strategy for dealing with racism, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of oppression has been for people to reclaim the very words that are used against them” (Barker, 2016; pp. 11). This gets us to understand queer “as an umbrella term for anyone who is not heterosexual or cisgender, as these identities have been normalized and safeguarded by constructs of present day society that reward becoming a part of hegemonic processes (Barker, 2016; pp. 12). In other words, “queer” as a verb is something “we do, rather than something we are (or are not)”, and Futurama situates itself in the domain of queer content. At the bare minimum, it is a show about how relationships with other identities can cross, create, or strengthen boundaries between agents using humans, monsters, robots, animals, and so many more kinds of characters to illustrate the power dynamics of certain relationships.
One of the best examples of queered relationships in the television series can be excavated out of analysis of Fry and Leela’s intimate relationships. While the show starts off with the two of them single, the linear progression of it allowed for character development. From the first episode, Fry is enamored with Leela, a one-eyed purple haired cyclops, who was abandoned by her sewer mutant parents for a better life. Fry yearns to create the most happy healthy life with Leela, but they struggle because sewer mutants have been exiled from the city of New New York making Leela’s existence a little more adverse and their relationship a little harder to maintain. In Ogolsky et al.’s “Relationship Maintenance: A Review of research on Romantic Relationships” (2017), relationship maintenance as a broad subject with many enhancement processes is discussed. Eager to find the mechanisms and methods for maintaining healthy relationships, Ogolsky looked at “relationship talk,” “social support and responsiveness,” “humor,” “joint leisure activities, and so many more to infer about cultural realms, marginalized identities, and their methods of maintenance (Ogolsky, 2017). In season six episode twelve titled “The Mutants Are Revolting” (2009) Leela gets sent to live in the sewers because mutants are prohibited from the surface and cohabiting with humans. Fry adopts relationship maintenance strategies of humor constantly throughout the show; however, in this episode he must maintain a relationship from a marginalized domain where “pervasive social stigmas of types of relationships has created major barriers on all levels” that keep the two from being together. Ogolsky (2017) would argue that Fry navigated this adversity via constructing a relationship reality using affective maintenance based on the context of their relationship in border society. This is exemplified by his emotional response of jumping into the polluted sewer lake to forever become a mutant as an attempt to court Leela and be with her forever instead of furthering the divide between their identities.
Throughout the show, Fry is an incredibly romantic, aloof, and silly character who seeks to maintain his relationship with Leela in an abundance of ways each episode; however, “The Mutant Are Revolting” touches on another realm related to the broader subject. In Ogolsky et al’s. (2019) “Personal Well-Being Across the Transition to Marriage Equality,” one can understand the ways the federal, state, and local marriage laws can influence personal well-being of individuals in same sex and different relationships. After taking a dip in the mutant lake, Fry has become completely mutated and begins to form an uprising of mutants eager to end their banishment to the sewers with a march on their town hall. Led by mutant Fry, the resistance group pushes for citizenship attached to marriage equality of mutants and surface species. Ogolsky’s longitudinal study articulated that marriage “provides legal rights and protections as well as emotional protections and benefits” for those who authenticate and legitimize their companionship (Ogolsky, 2019; pp. 422-423). With Futurama as an abstract representation, marginalized groups have had limited access to marriage and the lack of legal recognition has led to more psychological distress among specifically LGBTQ individuals (Ogolsky, 2019; pp. 422-423). In tandem, one could understand how mutants in Futurama living in the sewers might find legitimacy in validating inter-species relationships between surface species and sewer mutants as it would alleviate stresses of those more disadvantaged related to relationship satisfaction, level of support from friends, legalization, and a community climate capable of support. At the end of the episode, the city of New New York validates interspecies marriage legalizing and validating marginalized identities and giving them the same privilege of legitimized relationships to mutants in this fictional realm. This relates to the visceral response that was felt by the legalization of interracial marriage and gay marriage in modern day society as marriage legitimacy led to family members feeling more comfortable, social support being more accessible, and the overall validation that your environment has legislature in place that authenticates your existence (Ogolsky, 2019). If it were not for Fry legitimizing interspecies marriage in the show, Fry and Leela would not be able to get married in a later season.
Because Futurama is an animated show with stories in abstract spaces and fictional characters occupying the narrative, many episodes are representative of queering relationships simply because of the abstraction of reality. While the show can be broadly assessed to come to understandings of how relationships are maintained and developed, certain episodes offer more nuanced and intricate analysis of queered companionship. In “Rebirth,” season seven episode one, queer relationships related to artificial intelligence can be analyzed as a recent accident leaves Fry mourning Leela who is in an irreversible coma. After the characters tried to revive Leela via stem cell research, they decide to construct an artificially intelligent robot based on the movements, phrases, and overall data captured of Leela at work. Fry, who was once in love with the physical Leela, is now enamored with the artificial Leela for many reasons illuminated by Langcaster-James and Bently (2018) and Depointi et al. (2023).
In Langcaster-James and Bently’s “Beyond the Sex Doll: Post-Human Companionship and the Rise of the ‘Allodoll’, the prevalence of non-sexual post human companionship between dolls and their owners is discussed with “allodoll” being representative of the “broader non sexual relationship” of doll owners (Langcaster-James and Bently, 2018). In looking at allodoll forums, one can begin to understand why someone might indulge in artificial companionship as “entering or reentering a relationship is the means of substituting any previously lost kinship connection.” The bond between two beings is something that can be really powerful – enough to traumatize, validate, or alter the understanding of the agents involved. Upon hearing of her irreversible coma, Fry’s relationship with Leela was a dynamic not worth losing. While some people might indulge in post-human relationships with technology because of trauma faced in human relationships, artificial intelligence provides a sense of safety (Langcaster-James and Bently, 2018). This is because “post human kinship established with dolls parallels real life human relationships,” and Fry feels like he has lost his soul mate. While some agents might decide to seek out new relationships with living beings, Fry only wants Leela and settles for her robot self. Fry proclaims to the robot that he “still loves you… it… her?” (Groening, 2010; Season 7, Episode 1). While he may be confused about the entity he shares space with, he understands his feelings for the AI.
When a partner passes away, there is no chance at bringing them back to this world – and humans are familiar with this concept. Futurama grasps at this by shaking Leela’s dead character body and screaming “wake up;” however, they are also exposing that artificial intelligence will never replace human relationships or bring back your partner to the fullest extent. Depointi et al.’s “ Ideal Technologies, Ideal Women: AI and Gender Imaginaries in Redditors' Discussion on the Replika Bot Girlfriend” (2023) further highlights that there is an idealism attached to creating artificial intelligence for the sake of companionship. As a cartoon character, Leela is already representative of an ideal as the shape of her body, behaviors, and attitude might idealize certain gendered feminine behaviors. However, Leela is far from ideal with her one eye, purple hair, and other features of the show and the creation of the robot furthers this conversation. When constricting his robotic partner amidst the grief of his lost tangible partner, Fry tries to put two eyes on the robot as it would have been optimal – but the googly eye does not stick. Depointi et al. illuminates that people’s social imaginaries of AI play a key role in informing their interactions with artificial intelligence (Depointi et al., 2023). These imaginaries consist of gender roles with a feminization of robots. Whether it was their name, appearance, or role in a constructed relationship, AI imaginaries fit the narrative of patriarchal male dominance and heteronormativity. Similar to Fry falling in love with Leela’s artificial self, agents who indulge in artificial intelligence relationships for companionship intertwine their understandings of gender to customize, co-create, and train their partner (Depointi et al., 2023). While Fry ideally wanted a partner with two eyes, customization allowed for him to make his allodoll as similar to Leela as possible – closing the distance between his lost partner and their relationship together. In an extreme twist at the end, the Fry that had been rebirthed was also a robot who happened to fall for a robot version of Leela – leaving two robots in love. While constructing a doll might seem like an excessive act to others, the reality is that it is capable of filling a void within relationships – whether it is being in one or having agency in one. In the end, Fry’s love for robot Leela stems from the fact that he will “always and forever” love the real Leela and their AI reminds him of her.
Futurama is a show that can be incredibly confusing as it is fast paced and the writers love to have fun with it. Each character is archetypically constructed to allow for many possibilities in the episodes they released – and this is the beauty of the show being a cartoon. I am positive that I was unable to capture the extent of the episodes discussed due to this reason and can only prescribe one to watch it themselves with critical thought. In the medium of a cartoon, anything can happen! Whether it is legalization of interspecies marriage or legitimization of robots and human relationships, Futurama has consistently pushed the boundaries of our understandings of relationships. Futurama, like many shows, is capable of being more queer, pushing more boundaries, and expanding more domains, however in closing, I would argue that the show cannot become any more queer for the sake of itself.
Unlike other television series, Futurama has been canceled four times and revived four times. I believe this is due to the fact that it is an incredibly confusing show where anything conceived of by the writers is capable of being displayed. In its original conception, the show leaves room for any and all content in the shape of adventures, relationships, and broader narratives. Queer as a verb welcomes resistance to constructs and domains, and I firmly believe that the context of the show is domainless. In this infinite domain stems queerness as queerness is boundless in itself. While it is not their job to expose more constructs or resist more dominant forms of being all the time, Futurama has an endless capacity for abstracting social constructs of the real world and putting them into the context of adult cartoons.
Bibliography:
Groening, M. 2010. Futurama. “Rebirth,” Comedy Central
Barker, M. (2016). Queer : A graphic history. Icon Books, Limited.
Ogolsky, B.G., Monk, J.K., Rice, T.M., Theisen, J.C. and Maniotes, C.R. (2017), Relationship Maintenance: A Review of Research on Romantic Relationships. J Fam Theory Rev, 9: 275-306. https://doi.org/10.1111/jftr.12205
Ogolsky, B. G., Monk, J. K., Rice, T. M., & Oswald, R. F. (2019). Personal well-being across the transition to marriage equality: A longitudinal analysis. Journal of Family Psychology, 33(4), 422–432. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0000504
Depounti, I., Saukko, P., & Natale, S. (2023). Ideal technologies, ideal women: AI and gender imaginaries in redditors’ discussions on the replika bot girlfriend. Media, Culture & Society, 45(4), 720-736. https://doi.org/10.1177/01634437221119021
Langcaster-James, M., & Bentley, G. (2018). Beyond the sex doll: Post-human companionship and the rise of the ‘Allodoll’. Robotics (Basel), 7(4), 62. https://doi.org/10.3390/robotics7040062