The fourth, and presumably final, Futurama has arrived, and I actually checked this one out relatively quickly compared to the last three. Despite my lukewarm reactions to these direct-to-DVD movies, I was extremely curious to see how the Futurama saga would end. All in all, I enjoyed this movie a lot, and though it still felt a little bit disjointed, it did seem a lot more like one complete story than the last two flicks.

I thought I would be annoyed by the concept of a “green” storyline, as they can get awfully preachy awfully fast, but they were able to do it relatively agita free. I was hoping for something that maybe would have tied back into the brains or some other universe ending threat from the show’s initial run, but I understand the writers’ wanting to do something fresh. The story of the “Dark Ones” required an awful lot of exposition, but the way they poked fun at that part of the story-telling made it a bit more digestible.

The Fry-Leela story was given a bit of closure, although it did feel somewhat hollow. Leela should have trusted Fry from the beginning, and her “epiphany” moment lacked any real motivation. It’s nice to see her finally falling for him, but with all he’s done for her in the past, why now? Suddenly she just loves him? I know I’ve said this about some of the other movies, but they could have a lot more fun with getting these two characters together.

As for the very end, well, they didn’t go the conventional “they all lived happily-ever” route, and that’s pretty admirable. Of course, the door was left wide open for future episodes/movies, which is always a good marketing move, especially given that they’ve already been given one new lease on life so far. I would be happy to see more Futurama down the road, and the show definitely remains in my all-time favorites list. The “fifth season” isn’t my favorite, but that’s all right – the show still remains head and shoulder above most other shows out there, especially considering the geek quotient.

Now I just need to rewatch everything with the commentaries on. Wow, that was pretty geeky, even for me…