The Thief of Baghead
| "The Thief of Baghead" | |
|---|---|
| Futurama episode | |
| Episode no. | Season 7 Episode 4 |
| Directed by | Edmund Fong |
| Written by | Dan Vebber |
| Production code | 7ACV04 |
| Original air date | July 4, 2012 |
| Opening caption | "If this show's a-rockin', don't come a-knockin'" |
"The Thief of Baghead" is the fourth episode of the seventh season of the animated sitcom Futurama. It originally aired on Comedy Central on July 4, 2012. The episode was written by series co-producer Dan Vebber and directed by Edmund Fong.
The crew go to the aquarium where Bender becomes obsessed with snapping pictures of celebrity actor Calculon. The crew is frustrated by the finickiness of Bender's photography, especially that he uses a film camera instead of digital. After reviewing the photos, Zoidberg suggests that Bender become a papparazzi photographer for a celebrity gossip magazine. Though his career is lucrative, he becomes determined to take a photo of the most lauded and mysterious actor, Langdon Cobb. Cobb is considered the greatest actor on Earth, but wears a paper bag over his head, disguising his face in all his roles and public appearances. Bender manages to sneak past Cobb's fungus-based guard dog and takes a picture of him without his paper bag. Cobb warns him never to show his face to anyone or the consequences could be dire.
Bender develops the photo of Cobb and shows it to Fry, Amy, and Hermes, and the sight of it causes their lifeforce to violently escape their bodies, leaving them as nothing but empty, deflated husks. Professor Farnsworth deduces that Cobb must be a "quantum lichen", a race of alien lichen parasites that feed off of attention and admiration. Victims who pay attention to the lichen are feeding it, but gazing at its face will cause a biological being to have their lifeforce sucked out. Quantum lichens are composed of an algae component, which serves as its id, drawing attention from its prey, and a fungal component that represents its ego, absorbing and growing from attention and lifeforce. Destroying the fungal ego will return its victims' lifeforces. However, unlike regular lichens, quantum lichen components are not physically connected to one another, so the fungal aspect may be anywhere apart from the algae component. Bender realizes that the guard dog fungus is Cobb's fungus component and that it is growing from Cobb's fame.
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