9. ...And Leela's Parents Before The Reveal She's A Mutant
20th Television
Nibbler appearing in Futurama's pilot episode is pretty fantastic, but you know what's also pretty great? The fact the series pulled the same trick TWICE - this time with Leela's parents.
Throughout the beginning of Futurama, it's taken as a given that Leela is an alien, and the only cyclops left alive in the galaxy. The series doesn't really entertain the thought that she might be a mutant for a second, making the eventual reveal that her parents were mutants and left her to the surface world a pretty seismic bombshell.
However, if you were paying close attention, you'll realise that Leela's parents actually make a split-second appearance in the Season 2 episode 'I Second That Emotion', pictured here in the upper left corner.
20th Television
It's a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, but one that again illustrates the level of detail put into Futurama's more pivotal arcs.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
