Episode Recap: Bender's Game: Part 1

A few boys sit around rolling dice. Bender thinks they’re gambling, and wants to join in. What they’re actually playing is Dungeons and Dragons, a game that requires the use of imagination. When he doesn’t seem to understand what they’re doing, they ask him if he was built without an imagination. Bender is horrified to think he may in fact not have one, and heads straight over to Fry to ask the dreaded question.

As Fry is telling him that you never know if you have an imagination until you try, the cabin lights begin blinking, and the computer tells them that they are almost out of dark-matter fuel. Suddenly the ship seizes, and begins floating through a very bad part of space, making everybody very nervous. As they look around at their trashy surroundings, a punk rocker jumps on top of their space ship, and steals their hood ornament before rocketing away. Fry frantically runs to Nibbler’s litter box, actually hoping for once that Nibbler has left a “present.” He drops it in the fuel tank, and it’s just enough fuel to make it to the nearest dark matter fuel station.

While pumping up at the station, and complaining about the rising cost of fuel, a couple of red-necks in another space ship begin making fun of them and their pukey-looking ship. Leela loses her temper, and lays right back into them. The rednecks brag about winning the demolition derby 5 times going on 6, and then race off. That’s all Leela needs to hear; her mind’s made up. They’re going to enter the demolition derby to prove their ship isn’t a piece of junk. Even when Farnsworth tells them he’ll be keeping a tight hold on the keys by swallowing them every night to ensure that they cut down on fuel, she still insists on entering.

She and Zoidberg sneak in on Farnsworth as he’s sleeping and use a magnet to guide the keys up from his stomach and out of his mouth without ever disturbing him. Off they go to the derby! When the rednecks spot the Planet Express, they begin taunting them again; but when the Planet Express (with Leela behind the wheel) begins pummeling them they think differently. The two ships race towards one another, and at the last possible moment they turn off, making the Planet Express the new champions. They’re psyched!

When Farnsworth discovers what happened, he punishes Leela by attaching a collar around her neck that electrocutes her every time she gets angry, utters a bad word, or has a sexual thought. Leela is being zapped constantly, and she’s not happy about it! Meanwhile, Bender discovers his imagination and becomes Titanius Inglesmith, Fancy Man of Cornwood while playing Dungeons and Dragons. He begins having trouble separating fantasy from reality. Fry becomes alarmed, and tells Farnsworth, who begs Bender to stop before he completely loses his mind.

Bender’s alter ego completely takes over. Thinking he is at Goblin Mountain slaying werewolves, he instead attacks Zoidberg at Leela’s parents house (where she and Zoidberg have been trying to get to the bottom of Leela’s anger issues), and then he burns their house down. Because Leela is wearing the electrical collar, she is unable to stop him. Thinking quick on his feet, Fry holds a ladle to him and uses it to cast the clone of coldness over him. Knowing in his imagination that the Fancy Men are defenseless against the clone of coldness, Bender goes insane. He is taken away in a straight jacket to the Hal Institute for Criminally Insane Robots.