by Sol Harris
Futurama’s classic episode Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch, aired in 2003. In it, Kif is impregnated by Amy (sort of), leading to him giving birth to a clutch of tadpoles that go to live in a swamp on Kif’s home planet until they reach the next stage in their life cycle. “In 20 years, they’ll sprout legs and crawl back onto land as children”, Kif says. “And in 20 years, I’ll be ready”, says Amy.
It was a handwave designed to reestablish the status quo ahead of the following week’s episode. There’s no way the writers were intentionally playing a long game when they put that episode together – this is just a sitcom, after all. And, yet, against what anyone could possibly have imagined at the time (The Simpsons wasn’t even 20 years old at this point), here we are. Futurama is still being made 20 years later. And just as last week’s new episode, The Impossible Stream, served as a direct sequel to the classic episode Meanwhile, Children of a Lesser Bog serves as a direct sequel to Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch. Looking ahead, it seems like we’re getting at least two more sequel episodes in this new batch of episodes alone, so here’s hoping the show doesn’t succumb to anything but nostalgia and living off of past glories. Honestly, though, if Children of a Lesser Bog is anything to go off of, there’s nothing to be worried about. 
The episode feels like an organic bit of world-building and one that really serves to push the show forwards under the guise of looking to the past. Anyone who knows how television works will spend the episode waiting for a scene where the children conveniently have to leave for another 20 years, leaving Kif and Amy free to go on new adventures next week. I mean, come on, Bender also a kid once, and that episode ended with the child going to boarding school and having his memory wiped to ensure absolutely no chance of him ever turning up again in the future. But in this episode, that seemingly inevitable moment where things revert back to normal never comes. That this episode instead ends with Amy and her children embracing one another, leaving Newt, Mandy, and Axl seemingly now permanent additions to the cast, is a bold move and one worthy of real praise. It has the potential to keep the show fresh and provide some unique stories in the future – all while obviously allowing for a great deal of character development not typical of a cartoon. Futurama was always known for its surprising amount of emotional depth, so it’s heartening to see it getting immediately back into this territory so soon. 
Whereas The Impossible Stream felt messy, struggling under the weight of having to re-establish the show (among other things — such as bringing Calculon back from the dead for the second time), Children of a Lesser Bog feels far more assured, with solid pacing (in spite of the show’s increased runtime), decent structure and – while the humour still feels on the light side for Futurama – some great gags dotted here and there.
To nitpick, Leela feels out of character throughout and far too much time in the first act is dedicated to awkward exposition dumps reminding us (and characters that should really remember) that Kif and Amy had children together. It’s a strange move in the era of streaming, where people typically watch shows in order instead of just catching random episodes as they’re repeated on television like they used to – especially given that there aren’t currently any plans for this to ever actually air on broadcast television in any capacity. Still, just as The Impossible Stream was stronger than the premiere episode of the show the last time it was revived, Children of a Lesser Bog is hugely superior to the second episode of the last revival. Once again, season 8 is off to a very positive start assuming that it follows a similar trajectory of everyone involved getting back into their groove. 
On a side note, as well as Amy and Kif’s children, Children of a Lesser Bog shakes things up for the show in another way. While Futurama holds up remarkably well to today’s culture for a comedy that started over two decades ago, there is one glaring “they wouldn’t do that these days” aspect in the form of Leo Wong, Amy’s father. The character is technically Martian, but for all intents and purposes, he’s Chinese. The problem is that he’s voiced by the not-at-all-Chinese Billy West doing a thick, stereotypical accent. Or at least he was, because, now, Leo Wong is voiced by Feodor Chin. The spate of recasting problematic cartoon roles in recent years has been a mixed bag, but once you get over how jarring the change is, Chin is a truly fantastic replacement. He embodies everything about Leo as we know him but in an authentic way.
Another way in which the episode is jarring – this time in a positive way – is the use of Kooks by David Bowie during a sweet montage as Kif and Amy adjust to parenthood. Not only is Bowie always welcome, but one of the most obvious ways in which the show’s budget was cut back when it was on Comedy Central was the lack of songs during the montages. In those years, it was far more common to hear a synthesized original piece from Christopher Tyng. The use of such a high-profile song suggests that these new episodes are being produced with a bigger budget than the previous revival… and that bodes well for the rest of the season.
