9. Zoidberg Finds Love
With its tongue firmly planted in its cheek at all times, Futurama always revelled in the suffering of its characters. Very few moments of genuine sweetness were permitted to exist without being undercut by pain or sarcasm, and Dr Zoidberg knew that better than anyone. Every comedy show has that character that the world permanently dumps on. 30Rock had Lutz, The Simpson has Moe, Family Guy has Meg. Futurama had Zoidberg, the penniless quack doctor who lives in the garbage and was victimised for often no other reason than it's simply his lot in life. But in the show's penultimate episode "Stench and Stenchability", the writers gave him a break. He finally found love. Miserable because his horrendous odour drives away any woman he meets, Zoidberg finds comfort in the form of Marianne, a flower vendor who has no sense of smell. The two are happy together, but Marianne wishes more than anything to one day be able to appreciate what flowers smell like. Zoidberg sacrifices his happiness to give her the medical procedure that will allow her to smell, but, having never learned what 'good' or 'bad' smells were, she discovers that she likes the smell of Zoidberg, because she likes him. Knowing Futurama like they did, the fans waited with baited breath for the writers to whip Zoidberg's happiness out from under him, but the moment of cruelty never came. It was a moment made even more touching by the fact that viewers knew the show was coming to an end and that the final, enduring image of Zoidberg would be him when he was happy.