Where No Fan Has Gone Before

"Where No Fan Has Gone Before" is the eleventh episode of the fourth season of the animated series Futurama. It originally aired in the United States on April 21, 2002.

Plot summary

Bender, Leela and Fry, along with most of the cast of Star Trek: The Original Series (TOS), are put under court-martial by Zapp Brannigan, who has the group recount the events that led to the court-martial. It started days earlier when the crew tried to rent tapes from the local video store, where Fry uttered the forbidden words "Star Trek". Fry is told that, after a series of mishaps regarding the religious cult of Trekkies, Star Trek became forbidden. All the episodes, films and "the blooper reel where the door doesn't close all the way" are jettisoned to a forbidden planet.

Upset by this, Fry runs to the Head Museum to talk to Leonard Nimoy’s Head (repeating an encounter the two had in Futuramas first episode). Nimoy's head tries to deny knowledge of the show, but Fry manages to weasel the story out of him, knowing that he can't escape the role that made him famous. "No, perhaps you're thinking of my role as Vincent van Spock... I-I mean Van Gogh! Dammit!" Nimoy's head then recounts how the rest of the cast on a spaceship left Earth after the Trek purge. Fry, Leela, Bender and Nimoy's head journey to the forbidden planet in the Planet Express ship. They crash on the planet, and there they find several original sets from TOS as well as the entire cast, complete with their bodies. Suddenly, a large energy/gas cloud named Melllvar reveals himself as the owner of the tapes and the giver of the casts' bodies. Melllvar then gives Nimoy a body, and orders the actors and the Planet Express crew to participate in a ''Star Trek'' convention. While Melllvar forces the cast to perform his fan script, Bender, Leela and Fry escape in the Planet Express ship. Fry then convinces the crew to go back for the actors, only to have Melllvar destroy the ship's engine as it crashes back on the planet.

After seeing the crew's cunning attempt to escape, Melllvar starts to wonder if the Planet Express crew, a group of "genuine space heroes" for trying to rescue them, are more worthy of his adoration; he decides to settle the question with a battle to the death. After fighting for several minutes, Melllvar is called by his mother (with whom he still lives, despite being 34). While he is gone, the two groups combine the engine of the cast's rocket with the life support of the Planet Express ship. In order to lose enough weight to lift off, the cast (reluctantly) jettison their bodies, before learning that Fry had brought the tapes of the Star Trek episodes aboard. Melllvar soon follows the crew into space, with his own spaceship (angrily crying that they made him take it out of its package). The Planet Express ship is then boarded by Brannigan, who starts the court-martial. At this point, Leela points out that during the course of the court-martial, Melllvar is continuing to chase them.

Everyone hurries back to the control room, where they still try to escape from Melllvar. Fry convinces Melllvar that he can't devote his entire life to Star Trek, and Melllvar eventually agrees to end the chase. The crew returns, with the tapes in hand, to Earth.

Cultural references

The ship that jettisons the last Star Trek videotapes to the forbidden planet is an Eagle Transporter from Space: 1999.
Shatner performs a spoken-word version of "The Real Slim Shady", a reference to his much-maligned album The Transformed Man, in which he performed spoken words of contemporary songs such as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Mr Tambourine Man."
Zapp Brannigan was partially inspired by both Kirk and Shatner.
"Where No Fan Has Gone Before" was the name of a Star Trek fan club in the 1970s founded by Joseph Ames, Jr., then a grammar school student in Maple Grove, MN (now living near Philadelphia, PA). The name was taken from a defunct fanzine of the same name listed in a 1974 edition of the "Star Trek Welcommittee Directory".
Nichelle Nichols' gymnastic attack and battle cry mock that of Xena.
The sign outside of the Star Trek church reads "The sci-fi religion that won't take all your money", a reference to Scientology.

''Star Trek'' references

The name of the episode is a play on the Star Trek saying, "…where no man has gone before".
The opening sequence begins with a flyby of the Planet Express ship fitted with nacelles like the ''Enterprise'', and a ''Shatner's Log'', a play on the legendary captain's log.
In this log, the line "The impossible has happened" is the same line given in the opening log in the episode "Where No Man Has Gone Before."
Zapp Brannigan says, "Bring in the accused," a line taken from the end of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
Fry enters the courtroom in a robotic wheelchair that emits beeps for communication identical to the one used by Christopher Pike in the episode "The Menagerie."
"He's dead, Jim!", one of Leonard McCoy's famous lines, is repeated during a scene when virgin Trekkies are thrown into a volcano.
A sign in front of the Church of Star Trek: "Ceiling of the Christine Chapel Closed for Renovation", refers to Dr. McCoy's assistant, played by Majel Barrett in addition to being a reference to the Sistine Chapel.
Star Trek "priest": "And Scotty beamed them to the Klingon ship, where they would be no tribble at all", referring to the events of "The Trouble With Tribbles." The crowd chants, "All power to the engines!"
Two people in this crowd have the appearance of the black-and-white aliens from "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield."
The Church's influence caused Germany to be renamed "Nazi Planet Episode Land" (referring to the episode "Patterns of Force"). In reality, because of laws limiting Nazi imagery, that episode is rarely seen in Germany.
All the tapes of Star Trek are fired out of a ship on a torpedo, and land on a nearby planet, just as Spock's body was at the end of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
Fry talks to Leonard Nimoy, asking him if he remembered the episode where he "got high on spores and smacked Kirk around" ("This Side of Paradise").
When Nimoy's head leaves the shelf, Jonathan Frakes' head moves forward to exclaim, "Yes! Front row!" Frakes played William Riker, first officer in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Nimoy to Shatner: "Bill, you are, and always shall be… my friend," a reference to one of Spock's lines to Kirk in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Star Trek III: The Search for Spock.
Omega III being off limits may came from the episode "The Menagerie," where the planet Talos IV is also off limits and any attempts by Starfleet officers to approach the world resulting in death, Starfleet "General Order 7." It may also be a reference to the Omega Directive from Voyager.
Various sets from the series can be seen on Omega III, such as those featured in the episodes "A Piece of the Action" (Bender gets a Tommy gun from this set), "The City on the Edge of Forever" (The Guardian of Forever), "Spectre of the Gun" (incomplete Wild West buildings), "Bread and Circuses" (TV backdrop of the Colosseum), and "Who Mourns for Adonais?" (Greek ruins).
Fry asks Walter Koenig to repeat something with his Russian accent, and then to say "nuclear wessels," a line from Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home.
Melllvar, the entity on Omega III, resembles the Companion from "Metamorphosis" and the vampire cloud from "Obsession" in appearance and various other energy beings from ST:TOS in its powers, and speaks lines reminiscent of the "God" on Sha Ka Ree from Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. It also borrows many lines such as "It is I," "You doubt me?" (paraphrased as "You doubt my power?").
The entity zaps Scotty's replacement (named Welshy), who happens to be wearing a red shirt. This is a play on Apollo zapping Scotty in the episode "Who Mourns for Adonais?," as well as the recurring theme of redshirt security guards being killed off.
During Ambassador Sarek's Trivia Challenge, one of the questions asks who Kirk left on Ceti Alpha V (as seen in the episode "Space Seed"). Shatner stands up and screams "KHAAAAAAAAAN!!!" as he did in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
During the trivia contest, the prize money's unit of currency are Quatloos ("The Gamesters of Triskelion").
Bender works inside a Jefferies tube on the Planet Express ship with the same camera angle as was often used on Scotty.
The starship fires down on Melllvar, as the Enterprise did on Apollo's temple in "Who Mourns for Adonais?" and Vaal in "The Apple." As in the original series, the beams are shown leaving the ship in diverging directions, but somewhere in between they converge so that both strike the target at the same time, in the same spot. The music from this scene is a remix of the incidental music from "The Doomsday Machine."
The consoles on the star ship explode at critical moments, as happens throughout the series and movies.
The Planet Express ship is pulled by a ray that resembles a giant green hand, much like the giant green hand that grabbed the Enterprise in "Who Mourns For Adonais?."
Melllvar forces the Planet Express crew to battle the Star Trek cast to see who is better. This is very similar plot-wise to "The Savage Curtain" and "Arena"
The music during the fight scene resembles that during Kirk and Spock's fight in "Amok Time" (and reused later in the series).
Shatner rips his shirt, as he did in nearly every Kirk fight scene in the original series.
Nichelle Nichols distracts Fry, Leela, and Bender with her famous fan dance as seen in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.
Nimoy attempts to use the Vulcan nerve pinch (unsuccessfully) on Bender.
The line, "There's no right way to hit a woman," is from the episode "Charlie X." Shatner's subsequent attack on Leela ("the wrong way") parodies Kirk's often-used but pointlessly acrobatic combat style. During their fight, Leela lifts a large rock over her head to strike Shatner, as Kirk was menaced by Gary Mitchell in "Where No Man has Gone Before." They eventually begin to make out, mocking Kirk's many relationships with women.
Fry makes the observation that Melllvar is "just a child," the same as Spock said of V'Ger in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, or Kirk said of Trelane, in the episode "The Squire of Gothos." Melllvar being chastened by his energy-being mother is a parody of the climactic scene of the latter.
A starship that resembles the Romulan Warbird from "Balance of Terror" combined with a Klingon battlecruiser decloaks and fires on the Planet Express ship.
George Takei quotes a self-destruct code, similar to but not exactly matching the Enterprise self-destruct sequence as seen in the episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" as well as Star Trek III: The Search for Spock.
Fry's speech to Melllvar regarding moving out of his mother's basement is a reference to William Shatner's appearance on a Saturday Night Live skit where he tells obsessive fans to "Get a Life" and move out of their parents' basements.
The line, "In a different reality, I could have called you friend," is from the episode "Balance of Terror," which, as Melllvar corrects Fry, was episode nine of the series (in recording order).
The last line in the episode (spoken by Shatner) is, "Let's get the Hell out of here." This same line was used by Kirk at the end of "The City on the Edge of Forever."
The ending credits feature a song that musically evokes the Star Trek Fanfare, and plays back images from the episode; the last image is Kif Kroker in a parody of the famous "Balok puppet" from the episode "The Corbomite Maneuver," and whose image was the last seen in the ending credits for the entire second season of The Original Series.
The story takes place on planet Omega III, however, Omega IV was a planet that featured a "parallel-Earth development" in the classic episode "The Omega Glory."
Melllvar and Fry's list of episodes featuring armed combat to the death included 19 (Arena), 46 ("The Gamesters of Triskelion"), 56 ("Spectre of the Gun"), 66 ("Day of the Dove") and 77 ("The Omega Glory").
Fry strikes Dr. McCoy with a two-fisted punch, used commonly in the series.
The mountainous Vasquez Rocks, where the episodes "Shore Leave", "Friday's Child", and most notably "Arena" were filmed, are shown on several occasions throughout the episode. They are also the rock formation where Bill and Ted are thrown to their deaths in Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (appropriately taking place after the two watch "Arena" on television).
In one line, Nichols refers to kissing Shatner in a Star Trek episode as something "heroic" she had done. While this was meant to be comedic, this actually was mildly heroic, as well as dangerous, as it has a debated claim as the first interracial kiss on TV (see "Plato's Stepchildren").
All of the original cast from TOS appears, except for James Doohan (Scotty), who said "No way". Writer Goodman joked that the title of the episode should be "We Got Everybody But Scotty". Additionally DeForest Kelley (Dr McCoy) is also missing, as he died in 1999. (Consequently, his character has no speaking part.) In addition, Jonathan Frakes, Commander William Riker on Star Trek: The Next Generation, has a small cameo voice role.
Doohan's absence is joked at when Shatner is suggesting a battle plan: "Wasn't there an episode where I threw my boot at the enemy?" To which Nimoy replies, "You mean Doohan?"

Production notes

In the DVD commentary, Matt Groening claims to have never seen an entire episode of the original Star Trek, however he stated he had seen the first Star Trek film.
When “Welshy” is introduced, he rattles off a sentence in (poorly-pronounced to the point of being almost incomprehensible) Welsh - According to the DVD commentary, he is allegedly saying "Dwi wedi meddwi'n chwil" ("I am very drunk" or more literally "I am reeling drunk").
Nichelle Nichols previously appeared in Fry's 'What If' question in "Anthology of Interest I".
Bender's line, "Another great science fiction show, cancelled before its time", may be a reference to Futurama's own cancellation, since the producers' knowledge of the cancellation would have been around the time this episode was produced.

Continuity

Even though it is stated that to mention Star Trek is forbidden, on previous occasions Futurama characters (namely Fry) actually openly talk about it. Notably in "Space Pilot 3000", when Fry and the head of Leonard Nimoy converse Leonard does not try to cover up his past as he does in "Where No Fan Has Gone Before." In other episodes references are also made, such as comparing D.O.O.P. to the United Federation of Planets, without any catastrophic effects.
In the end of the episode, Fry makes a remark about the episode of Star Trek "Balance of Terror" where he says its episode 10. Then Melllvar says it's episode 9, when it is actually episode 14. However the production code for that episode is 009.

The actual descriptive text portion of the article above (and its Contents menu) are licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License then in effect published by the Free Software Foundation. The text article uses material from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Where_No_Fan_Has_Gone_Before (retrieval date: 2007-05-27) and is provided "as-is" and without warranty. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify only the actual descriptive text portion of the article above (and its Contents Box) under the GNU Free Documentation License. A copy of the license is available at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_GNU_Free_Documentation_License. Any advertisements (or active links not embedded in the actual article) and the layout or selection thereof are excluded from such license.
(c) Ovidio Limited 2006-2009.

This website may utlize cookies and web beacons to help improve user experience and to collect aggregate usage data; we do not collect or otherwise use any personally identifiable information. Additionally, third parties may utilize cookies and web beacons in the course of serving ads on this website. Consult your web browser documentation for information about managing web cookies.