Planet Express Ship

] cite episode| episodelink=Episode Two: The Series Has Landed| title=Episode Two: The Series Has Landed| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama] though they do not usually accompany the crew on missions. Although Fry flies the ship with no problems in "The Cryonic Woman", he later flies it with some difficulty in "Amazon Women in the Mood" and "Birdbot of Ice-Catraz" (where Bender demonstrates his own questionable piloting skills while under the effects of a sobriety binge); by the time of "Time Keeps on Slippin'", Fry can (once again) fly the ship with a reasonable degree of skill.

Professor Farnsworth attempted to fly the ship in the episode "Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles" to find his lost pet gargoyle, Pazuzu. However, in stereotypical senior citizen style, he flies the ship at only 35 MPH, blocks lanes in space traffic, and turns the ship's high beams on, destroying a navigation sign and Deep Space Nine.

hip Features

As the Professor prefers to send the crew on dangerous missions in favor of higher profit margins, the ship is well armed and quite fast. The ship is capable of travel faster than the current speed of light, after the speed of light was increased to allow faster travel.cite episode| episodelink=A Clone Of My Own| title=A Clone Of My Own| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama] The ship can actually travel at 97% of the new light speed.cite episode| episodelink=Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles| title=Teenage Mutant Leela's Hurdles| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama] Its speed also makes it an efficient courier, as trips to most points in the universe can be done in a single day, and even a round trip to an edge of the universe in "The Route of All Evil" only takes the crew one week. In The Series Has Landed, a journey from Earth to the moon takes under two seconds.

In addition to its speed, the Planet Express Ship is very durable. In the episode "The Deep South", the ship is dragged underwater and survives being subjected to hundreds of atmospheres of water pressure, despite being rated for "between zero and one" atmosphere, according to the professor. Additionally, the ship has survived numerous crashes that ostensibly would have destroyed similar aircraft, but the ship usually sustains only quickly-repaired dents. It is unclear whether all vehicles in "Futurama" have this durability or if it is a special property of that particular ship.It also uses a Dark Matter Engine, which, instead of moving the ship, just "moves the universe around the ship". Made obvious in the episode, "A Clone of My Own" by Cubert Farnsworth. Certain episodes indicate that it has a manual transmission.

The current ship is not the first Planet Express Ship, as at least one was lost with its crew on a mission to collect space honey.cite episode| episodelink=The Sting (Futurama)| title=The Sting| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama] The current ship is first seen in "Space Pilot 3000", where the current crew signs on. It is unknown if the ship was previously crewed but it is implied that the professor's previous crew died with the destruction of the previous ship and no intervening members are ever mentioned. Other versions of the ship include a miniature one used to travel inside of Fry's body to counter an infection of worms.cite episode| episodelink=Parasites Lost| title=Parasites Lost| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama]

Design

The hull is roughly teardrop-shaped with three fins at the rear. A laser cannon turret is situated on the top side. It has tripodal landing gear, the front one doubling as a stair. Torpedo tubes are located to either side of the forward landing gear. The tubes also house the "primary lasers". The cargo bay has a bomb-bay style loading door on the bottom of the ship. Cargo too large for the cargo bay is either tethered to the top of the hull, or towed. The dark matter engines are at the rear on a gymbal, and steering is achieved through directional thrust. Supposedly the engines achieve 200% fuel efficiency by moving the entire universe around the ship, rather than moving the ship itself, a parody/homage to the "warp drive" technology of "Star Trek".cite episode| episodelink=A Clone Of My Own| title=A Clone Of My Own| series= Futurama| serieslink=Futurama] The ship is painted a light-green color (the previous ship was dark gray, as seen trapped in a space bee hive in "The Sting") and has the Planet Express logo painted on the main fin.

The series' writers acknowledge in the Season 1 DVD commentary that the interior design of the Planet Express Ship is not really consistent from episode to episode. They cited a fansite they once found which was devoted to trying to develop a definitive schematic of the ship's interior, an attempt which ended in frustration. While certain rooms such as the cargo bay remain more or less the same, corridors shift position and the location of rooms relative to each other is never truly consistent. However, in the commentary the writers point out that most obviously, the design of the "bridge" of the ship drastically shifts between episodes.

Modifications

The ship is occasionally modified to fit the purposes of the plot. In all cases the ship is returned to normal before the next episode.
* In "The Deep South", the crew had to replace the engines with a giant fish tailfin since the engines would not work underwater. Part of these repairs were made by papier mache.

* In "Where No Fan Has Gone Before" both the Planet Express Ship and a ship belonging to the cast of crashed on a forbidden planet. The Planet Express Ship had non-functioning engines but working life support, while the "Trek" cast's ship had functional engine but no life support. The Planet Express Ship was modified using the engines of the "Trek" cast's ship and was able to escape the planet. The latter ship's engines, bearing a visual similarity to "Star Trek"-style warp nacelles, gave the Planet Express Ship a rear profile similar to that of the original "Starship Enterprise", and several establishing shots in this episode present the Planet Express Ship in similar fashion to stock footage of the "Enterprise" from classic "Trek" episodes.

* In "Time Keeps on Slippin'", the ship has a "bad-ass" gravity pump installed, giving it the capability to move entire stars.

*In "The Route of All Evil", Cubert Farnsworth and Dwight Conrad have the the ship repainted bright red with flame decals when they take over the business and make it a newspaper delivery service. It is also presumably renamed the "Awesome Express Ship" in retrospect to the company title change.

Merchandising

The Planet Express Ship was featured as an action figure in a set by Moore Collectibles along with Fry, Leela and Bender. The set was listed as an "A+ pick" in Sci Fi Weekly and the Planet Express ship was noted as "the finest piece in the set". Features include a folding front landing gear and retractable rear landing struts along with a gun turret. Also included with the ship were two alien creatures and a crate full of tentacled beings.cite web| url=http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue216/cool.html| title=Matt Groening's futuristic follies inspire four of the coolest collectibles of the year 3000| last=Huxter| first=Sean| date=2001-06-11| accessdate=2007-11-27]

References

External links

* [http://home.earthlink.net/~mountfuturama/theship.html Ship's Description]
* [http://www.gotfuturama.com/Information/Encyc-22-Planet_Express_Ship/ Futurama encyclopedia entry]
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20011217202620/www.mooreaction.com/Futurama/index.html Planet Express action figure from Moore Action Collectibles (archived)]