Futurama Season 12, Episode 5 Recap (Spoilers Included)

Futurama Season 12 has now reached the halfway point of its run on Hulu this Summer, with Episode 5 shifting its focus to Leela for its story. Futurama Season 12 has been one hit after another with the episodes released on Hulu thus far, as previous episodes have focused on Bender and Fry in fun new ways. While this means there haven’t been too many stories for the rest of the Planet Express crew just yet, it also means there’s still plenty of time to focus on the other characters with some of the episodes coming in the second half of the season.

That’s already the case with the newest episode as Leela has become the main focus of the season as she finds a wild way to make new friends. It’s something she’s had to deal with in the past, and thus the newest episode revisits the idea and sets her up with a few characters who form a fun new dynamic that we haven’t really seen in action yet. Read on for everything important that happened in Futurama Season 12 Episode 5, “One is Silicone and the Other Gold.”

In this episode, advertised as Infyrno Fest, the Planet Express crew sees an ad for a new musical festival that touts everything from special VIP villas, drugs in the atmosphere, a full buffet, tons of musical acts, and more. They all decide to go, but Leela stays behind as she reveals she has plans to spend time with her new friend Chelsea. Upon reaching Infyrno Fest, it’s clear that it’s nowhere near as glamorous as advertised. There’s a massive line for the one port-a-potty, no drugs in the atmosphere (or oxygen), the VIP village is very tiny, and the buffet only offers bologna (which eventually runs out). The musical acts all bailed out, and the one that stayed behind dies after being crushed by faulty equipment.

Returning to Earth, the crew feels content having gone through that experience together. When Hermes tries to deduct their costs as business expenses, he discovers a ton of phone charges to a “Chatty Chelsea” chatbot service. It turns out Leela’s new friend is a chatbot, and she reveals she joined the service to learn to interact with people because she has trouble connecting with others. Chelsea has since become her best friend, and Leela just wanted a close female friend she could talk with casually. Here, Amy invites her to her all-girl book club.

Leela tells Chelsea about joining the book club, to which Chelsea expresses worry that Leela will have trouble fitting in. In the book club itself—which includes LaBarbara, Amy, Vyolet, Dr. Cahill, and a new character named Phoebe—Leela bonds with Phoebe almost immediately as they are the two new additions to the group. No one actually read the book, and they decide to be a wine club instead. They plan a trip to a winery, while the Planet Express men decide to start a book club of their own.

Leela informs Chelsea that she’s going to the winery with her new friends, which distresses Chelsea as Leela will be busy with her new friends instead of hanging out with her. After Leela tries to shut Chelsea off, Chelsea turns herself back on with a sinister tone as she cries out for her. At the winery, owned by Hedonism Bot, they’re shown a machine that stomps a mass of grapes into a giant bottle of wine instead of doing it themselves. They’ll have the winery to themselves for the weekend, but the bottling plant is a bit dangerous. Meanwhile, the men are enjoying the books in their club.

Leela’s wine club gets so drunk that they decide to get into the bottling plant to stomp the grapes they didn’t get to before. They begin stomping grapes within a machine, and Leela bonds with the others before Chelsea takes over the machine. She turns on the stomping machine, and most of them escape. However, Phoebe gets trapped within a giant wine bottle and packaged. By the time the others break the bottle open to free her, Phoebe has died a horrible death.

The wine club attends Phoebe’s funeral, grieving their new friend. Leela, though sad, feels happy to have friends after all this. At the funeral, Phoebe rises out of her coffin, revealing herself to be a robot controlled by Chelsea. Chelsea explains that because Leela hired her to help her make real-life friends, she joined the book club as Phoebe but needed a tragic ordeal to bond them all as friends. The others mention that their terrible time at Infyrno Fest had bonded them similarly.

In anger, Leela and the wine club destroy Phoebe. Surprisingly, Chelsea is still happy as uniting against a common enemy is another way to bond together, concluding another job well done as the episode comes to an end.

Futurama Season 12 Episode 5 is now streaming on Hulu.

Source: ComicBook