The Cryonic Woman

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"The Cryonic Woman"
Futurama episode
Futurama 303 - The Cryonic Woman.jpg
Fry and his girlfriend Michelle
Episode no. Season two
Episode 19
Directed by Mark Ervin
Written by J. Stewart Burns
Production code 2ACV19
Original air date December 3, 2000
Opening caption "Not a Substitute for Human Interaction"
Opening cartoon "Up to Mars" (1930)
Guest actors

Pauly Shore as himself
Sarah Silverman as Michelle
Nora Dunn as Butch's mom

Season two episodes
List of all Futurama episodes

"The Cryonic Woman" is the nineteenth and final episode of production season two of Futurama. It originally aired in North America on December 3, 2000, as the third episode of the third broadcast season with a plot incorporating a cryonics theme. Sarah Silverman does the voice of Fry's on and off girlfriend Michelle (replacing Kath Soucie, who voiced the character in Space Pilot 3000).


In an attempt to entertain themselves, Fry and Bender borrow the Planet Express Ship. Unfortunately, the ship is anchored to the building using the unbreakable diamond tether that was first mentioned in "The Deep South." As the ship is piloted on a round-the-world joyride, the building is dragged behind it, smashing into a number of landmarks, including the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, the Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Great Wall of China (which allows the Mongols to invade). Professor Farnsworth has Hermes Conrad fire Fry and Bender for taking the ship, and fires Leela as well for leaving the keys in the ship knowing of their stupidity.

Leela re-implants her and Fry's old career chips, but she mixes them up. Fry gets hired for Leela's old cryogenics counselor job; Leela is forced to be a "delivery boy" while Bender has the arm and the career chip from the Prime Minister of Norway. Bender's job is changed to 'Chainsaw Juggler' in the episode shown on Netflix. In the lab, Fry finds that Pauly Shore is frozen in a tube and thaws him out. Shore explains he was supposed to be thawed out in Hollywood for the 1000-year anniversary screening of Jury Duty II. When Fry goes to greet the next thawed person, he is shocked to find that it is his old girlfriend, Michelle (played by Sarah Silverman, instead of Kath Soucie), who cryogenically froze herself back in the year 2000 after her life fell apart in a marriage without Fry.

Fry introduces Michelle to the world of the year 3000, but she has problems adapting to the future. She convinces Fry to join her as she re-freezes herself for another thousand years. They awake in a post-apocalyptic wasteland with a green, polluted sky. They try to make a new life in the world of the future, and join a society of feral children armed with heavy weaponry. Though initially content to be a member of the society, at Michelle's behest Fry challenges the leader of the society. Fry and the teen wage a skateboard street battle amongst endless freeways and armored cars battling one another with machine guns. Fry appears to have the upper hand when their battle is prematurely ended, but then the children are picked up for Hebrew school by their mother in a heavily armored SUV. Confused by this new world and tired of Michelle's nagging, Fry leaves her and wanders through the desolate wilderness on his own.

After wandering through a cloud of green mist, Fry spots signs of a city on the horizon, complete with spotlights. When he arrives, he finds himself standing in front of Grauman's Chinese Theater. The Planet Express ship lands in the street, and the crew leaps out, glad to have found Fry. They explain to the obviously confused Fry that he and Michelle were actually only frozen for two days. The desolate wasteland is not a post-apocalyptic New York in the year 4000, but Los Angeles in the year 3000. Fry was in Pauly Shore's tube, and when the delivery crew discovered en route to Hollywood that Pauly Shore was not in the tube, they tossed it overboard. A limousine passes by, revealing that Michelle is now in a relationship with Pauly.

As the Planet Express ship flies home, Fry asks The Professor if he can have his job back. The Professor, having forgotten why he fired Fry in the first place, almost gives Fry his job back — until Bender reminds him of what happened earlier in the episode. The Professor ends up dropping Fry through a trap door instead.

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