Last week, folks were saying how “The One Amigo” felt like a first draft. I had that same feeling this week – we got another just-kind-of-alright episode that feels like it could’ve been something special, if it had only gotten another rewrite or two.

“Quids Game” has all the ingredients of a great Futurama episode. In fact, it has the ingredients of several great Futurama episodes. There’s a spoof of Star Trek-style godlike aliens forcing people into bizarre competitions, done so memorably in “Where No Fan Has Gone Before” (also done to great effect in “Neutopia”, which is the exact opposite of a great episode, except for that one bit). There’s a setup where any and every character can be killed off in hilarious ways, as done in “Murder on the Planet Express” (an underrated gem of the Comedy Central years) and the “impulsive Leela” segment from “Anthology of Interest I”.

And, of course, there’s the story structure, which was lifted straight from beloved classics “Luck of the Fryrish”, “Jurassic Bark”, and “Cold Warriors”: something from Fry’s past comes up in the “present day”, and the story is intercut with flashbacks to Fry’s life in the 20th Century, leading to a poignant twist at the end.

Yet all of this produced an episode that’s merely okay. The problem here is …

… You know what? Rather than a conventional review, I’m gonna play script doctor this week, and say how I’d rewrite this episode to bring out more of its potential. I’m not gonna type out a whole script, going over every line I’d change or scene I’d tweak – I spend a lot of time on the Avocado, but I don’t have that kind of time. But just in general terms, here’s what I’d do:

The Rewrite

The main thing is to move the flashback story along faster. Not just ’cause the flashbacks are slow-moving and light on jokes, but because it takes them too long to reveal some necessary info.

The main conflict of the episode (beyond, y’know, alien death games) is that, at Fry’s eighth birthday party, the other kids all thought Fry was a cheating gloryhound after Fry won game after game after game. Losing all their friends that day is why being put into a recreation of their eighth birthday, and being pressured to cheat, messes Fry up so bad. Except we’re most of the way through the episode before the flashbacks get around to establishing this. And this isn’t the sort of flashback reveal that makes you go, “Whoa, that completely changes everything we’ve seen up till now!” It’s no “John Locke was in a wheelchair!”, that’s for sure.

So to speed things up, I say there’s no need to show all the party games in detail. Just show Fry winning the Barrel of Primates game at the start, then do a quick montage of Fry dominating at games the rest of the day, as the other kids get increasingly suspicious (and intercut with clips of the deadly games in the 31st Century for some amusing low stakes/high stakes contrast).

With the screentime this saves, we can expand on how our main characters (and assorted tertiary characters) navigate the contest the aliens have put them in. Given they’re competing against each other TO THE DEATH!!!, we should show some of the more cutthroat behavior that emerges, beyond just Mrs. Wong elbowing Amy in the face. In particular, have people besides Leela realize that, as the games are all based on Fry’s memories, Fry has the home field advantage. Have a bunch of them try to cajole Fry (or bribe Fry, or seduce Fry, or whathaveyou) into helping them cheat their way to victory. But the way the games are set up, Fry & allies winning means some other people have to lose, and thus, die.

This would make Fry’s adamant refusal to cheat a lot more sensible. Objecting to cheating out of sheer principle/childhood trauma, that doesn’t fit Fry – dude’s never been much of a rule follower. But not wanting to cheat at the expense of others, especially when the stakes are so high? That rings true for good-hearted people-pleaser Philip J. Fry.

With that taken care of, let’s skip ahead to the ending. For the flashback storyline, have everything play out the same, except when the kids leave the party in disgust at Fry’s cheating, mention that they’re all going to another birthday party, for a kid they don’t even like, but at least that kid’s not a dirty rotten cheater. Then, in the 31st Century storyline, keep the game of Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Giant-Killer-Donkey the same, up to the point where Fry accidentally kills Bender … but don’t have Fry get killed, too.

Instead, Fry just flat out wins the game. Then, when everyone’s brought back to life, the aliens say that, as an apology to all those killed during the games, they’ll be throwing a massive party with cake, and presents, and pinatas full of spiced rum. Everyone rushes to enjoy the party thrown by the aliens who just killed them all, while Fry, being the one person who didn’t die, isn’t allowed in. It’s Fry’s eighth birthday all over again, with Fry victorious but alone, abandoned by all their friends …

… until Leela comes out of the party, bringing Fry a piece of cake. Leela would rather spend the party out here with Fry, and after everything that’s gone down, still just wants to give Fry a good birthday. Fry is moved, and confesses that the worst thing about their eighth birthday wasn’t being called a cheater – it was feeling like there was no one in the world who cared about them. As Fry and Leela enjoy some cake together, Fry says they’re glad there’s at least one person who cares.

And that’s when we do the final flashback, showing that Fry’s mom cared so much about their little boy, they rigged all the games so Fry would win, thinking that’s what would make little Philip happy. In the episode we got, this flashback reveal didn’t quite work, because the story wasn’t about Fry’s relationship with their mom – it was a bit of sentimentality for sentimentality’s sake, but didn’t connect to anything. While the connection in my rewrite version still maybe isn’t the strongest, at least it creates a parallel between past and present (well, present-plus-1000-years), with the idea that even when you think you have no one, there can still be someone out there who loves you.

And, there you have it. That’s how I, an unpaid critic on the Internet, would tell a bunch of professional TV people how to do their jobs.

Do you think these changes would have made the episode better? Worse? Comparable? Better-but-not-by-enough?

Are there any parts of it you’d like to rewrite yourself? Or do you think it’s terrific as-is, and I’m being a Negative Nelly?

Let us know down below!

Stray Observation:

One thing about this episode I would not change one damn bit is the Gamemaster Aliens. An obvious shoutout to Star Trek‘s “Gamesters of Triskelion”, they are a perfect example of oddball Futurama characters, who think and talk in such hilariously off-kilter ways.

“Our motivations are three. Mine is to gain knowledge by making people crash on our planet and subjecting them to bizarre experiments.”
“As for me, I don’t have any motivations.”
“And I have two motivations!”