While at a support group for frozen people, Fry meets a businessman from the 1980s. At the Planet Express stockholder's meeting, Fry nominates 'That Guy' for CEO. That Guy quickly uses his knowledge of business from the 1980s to change the company, with plans to take on Mom!
Tropes
- An Aesop: Parodied; at the episode's climax, Fry makes a long speech about how at the end of the day, friendship is more important than making money... and in doing so, causes the value of Planet Express's stock to gradually collapse, eventually rendering the company worthless.
- Almighty Janitor: The episode reveals that both Scruffy and Zoidberg, the lowest people on the totem pole, own (or owned, in the latter case) most of Planet Express's stock.
- Chekhov's Gun:
- Zoidberg's stock, which he gives to That Guy in exchange for a sandwich, turns out to grant That Guy majority control over Planet Express.
- That Guy's boneitis comes back to kill him near the end of the episode, when it turns out he was so busy being an 80's guy that he forgot to cure it.
- Competing Product Potshot: When taking over Planet Express, That Guy creates a Dada Ad based off Apple's "1984" commercial against IBM, targeting Planet Express's main competitor MomCorp by depicting Mom as Big Brother. Granted, it's not far from the truth here.
- Contemporary Caveman: Fry encounters an unfrozen caveman at the support group.Caveman: As a caveman frozen in a glacier, I face different challenges. [crying] The hardest thing was seeing my wife on display in the British Museum.
- Context-Sensitive Button: Mom tells her sons to hit the retaliate button. "Any button! They all retaliate!".
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: That Guy. He once bought a company developing a cure for the very disease he's suffering from and liquidated it just for the money.
- Cruel and Unusual Death:
- Boneitis causes the sufferer's bones to horribly contort in random directions until they finally die. It claims That Guy's life at the end of the episode.
- The PlanEx ad has Mom announcing her enemies shall be "eaten by squirrels".
- Death by Irony: The whole reason why That Guy had himself cryogenically frozen was because he had contracted boneitis and he was the one responsible for liquidating the very company that was working on a cure for it. Not having learned anything since then, he was too caught-up in "being an 80's guy" (read:focusing on profit and ego at the expense of those around him) to get properly treated a thousand years later, succumbing to the disease in the climax of the episode.
- Decided by One Vote: The vote between Farnsworth and That Guy comes down to 49.9 percent each, until Hattie McDougal points out that she has one share, which she uses to vote for the latter.
- Deus ex Machina: That Guy's boneitis kicks in just as he's about to make the deal to sell Planet Express.
- Disco Dan: That Guy acts like The '80s never ended, a thousand and ten years or so after they actually did.
- Due to the Dead: Hilariously subverted by Mom after That Guy croaks.Mom: Pry out his fillings, feed him to the jackals and let's get on with the sale!
- Epic Fail: On a pad with two options, yes or no, Igner somehow gets confused and manages to vote for Pat Buchanan.Igner: The ballot was confusing!Mom: How about a hand recount?Igner: Okay...Mom: slaps him
- Funny Background Event: As Fry tries to give a speech on friendship and family, the stock ticker behind him plummets with every sentence.
- Hidden Depths: Scruffy owns 4 times as many shares as the rest of the company’s employees.Scruffy: Scruffy believes in this company! [sniffles]
- Hoist by His Own Petard: That Guy, through buying up and liquidating the only company in his time that could have developed a cure for his disease. He can't even break the trend in the future; he's so greedy and ambitious that he completely forgets to actually get the cure he froze himself for. Sure enough, he dies from the disease and it's entirely his own fault.
- Human Popsicle: Fry finds a support group for people who were this. One of the members is a caveman, another came from a century ruled by mutant carrots.
- Jerkass Has a Point: That Guy might have been a slimy and unethical businessman, but he is right to blame Professor Farnsworth for all of Planet Express' problems because it was shown to be a failing company under his leadership. Furthermore, while selling the company to Mom may have been immensely profitable to him, it would have made the rest of the crew rich as well. The only one who loses out in the deal is the utterly reprehensible Mom, whose MegaCorp could easily absorb Planet Express without significant loss. Plus, it's not like Farnsworth is that moral of a person either.
- Made of Shiny: That Guy's main business strategy is putting on the airs of success without actually doing anything, create vague commercials and going to rich guy parties with the company not delivering a single package in his time as CEO.That Guy: "Delivery" has nothing to do with the delivery business. "Image", people! Image!
- Majority-Share Dictator: That Guy manages to get controlling interest in Planet Express from Zoidberg. For a sandwich.
- Metaphorgotten: "I am proud to be the shepherd of this flock of sharks".
- Mindless Sheep: When 80's-style CEO Steve Castle takes over Planet Express, he starts out by separating the company into "sheep" and "sharks" (insisting that "Sharks are winners, and they don't look back, 'cause they don't have necks. Necks are for sheep."). He threatens to fire anybody who's a "sheep," and Zoidberg asks, "Which is the one people like to hug?" which prompts Steve to declare Zoidberg a shark (despite Zoidberg continuing to act like a total mindless bootlicker towards his new boss).Steve: I am proud to be the shepherd of this herd of sharks.
- Mooning: How Fry gives Mom his ultimatum.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Variation: during Fry's speech in the climax, he winds up causing the stock value for Planet Express to crash down toward $0.03. But since he was trying to prevent the takeover:Fry: (cheerfully) We're poor no matter what I do! The deal is off!
- No Name Given: That Guy. Word of God states that his name is Steve Castle.
- Noodle Incident: How (and when) the heck did giant carrots take over the world? We will never know.
- Only Useful as Toilet Paper: Professor Farnsworth mentions that the stock of Planet Express is so cheap that it's literally not worth the paper it's printed on, so he gave it away to Dr. Zoidberg whenever he needed toilet paper.Leela: Zoidberg owned 51% of the company?
Hermes: The shares were worthless, and he kept asking for toilet paper! - Parallel Porn Titles: Scruffy has an issue of National Pornographic.
- Plot-Induced Illness: That Guy was supposed to cure himself of boneitis, but he was too busy being an Eighties guy to get cured, and it kills him before he can sell Planet Express to Mom.
- The Power of Friendship: Utterly subverted. Once everyone realizes their stock makes them millionaires, they would prefer to be filthy stinking rich. They're pretty pissed at Fry screwing it up for them.
- Precision F-Strike: Mom's immortal line: "JAM A BASTARD IN IT, YOU CRAP!".
- Schmuck Bait: After Igner screws up, Mom offers a "hand recount". Igner innocently agrees and gets slapped in the face for his troubles.
- Shout-Out:
- That Guy's Planet Express commercial spoofs the Apple 1984 Super Bowl ad, while the logo that shows up at the end is reminiscent of real-life delivery company FedEx.
- A giant talking head named Jor-El, he does announcements at the stock exchange.
- Skewed Priorities: That Guy liquidated the only company that was working on the cure for his boneitis, before the cure was complete, in order to make a quick profit.
- The Sociopath: That Guy appears to be a high functioning version. He's not violent or murderous, but he is superficially charming, dishonest, deceitful, self-centered. He is only ever interested in pursuing his interests, which is being an aggressively profit-driven 80s businessman, and he is impulsive to a degree that endangers himself and others. While he and Fry hit it off quickly (with the latter convinced that they are friends) That Guy outright tells him that friendship means "for two bucks, I beat you with a pool cue 'til you have detached retinas". He also is completely incapable of feeling remorse, as his only regret in life was that he had boneitis.
- Something We Forgot: That Guy got frozen until they found a cure for his boneitis. While it is assumed that there is a cure now (otherwise he wouldn't have been unfrozen), he was too busy "being an eighties guy" to get himself cured, and it kills him.
- Space Station: The climax of the episode is set on the Intergalactic Stock Exchange in Earth's orbit.
- Status Quo Is God: Planet Express isn't going to be gutted, and the gang aren't going to get to keep their money.
- Take a Third Option: Torn between voting yes and no, Igner somehow manages to vote for Pat Buchanan.
- Take That!: Igner's screw-up with the vote is a jab at the results of the 2000 American presidential election and the "butterfly ballot"
◊ that led people who intended to vote for Al Gore to accidentally vote for Buchanan. - Too Dumb to Live: That Guy had two chances to get cured of boneitis, but in both instances he chooses money and power instead. First, he bought a company that was close to finding a cure, then liquidated it before it could. Then he froze himself until the time a cure was found, but then simply forgot to get it because he was too busy running Planet Express, which he was again going to sell for the money before his boneitis finally killed him.
- Tractor Beam: The security robots use them to get the Planet Express crew out of the room on the Intergalactic Stock Exchange.
- Trivially Obvious: That Guy's final words as he dies from boneitis.That Guy: My one regret... is that I have boneitis.
- What Were They Selling Again?: Parodied with That Guy's Planet Express commercial mentioned above.Leela: That was terrible! People won't even know what we do.
Bender: I don't even know what we do. Nah, just kidding! What are we, like, a bus or something? - Yes-Man: A female variant, Miss Johnson, the program built into Fry's intercom, designed to agree to whatever he says. Leela doesn't like her.
- Yuppie: Parodied mercilessly here, as That Guy, a typical '80s corporate raider who had been cryogenically frozen when he was in his 30s. He dresses in an expensive suit with suspenders, has a cell phone seemingly attached to his hand, is obsessed with the latest trends and gadgets, works in finance, and thinks greed is a virtue. He eventually takes over Planet Express and grooms Fry in the yuppie lifestyle, acting like the eighties hadn't ended a thousand and ten years before only to end up dying of the very disease he was frozen for because he had been too busy "being an eighties guy" to get cured.
- Zeerust: Invoked when That Guy plans to take Planet Express "out of the past and give it the slick, dazzling veneer of the 1980s".
