In a direct to DVD delight, Matt Groening’s misfit staff and crew of the Planet Express return in Bender’s Big Score, the first of four planned Futurama films. It makes a certain kind of crazy sense that a plot device so overused and abused by countless science fiction properties — time travel — is put again to glorious effect in this animated mega-parody.

All Futurama fans know that without Fry’s clumsy cryogenics “accident” in the last moments of the 20th century, there would be no Futurama (or universe) at all. What we could not appreciate until this most recent 31st century adventure, however, was the true level of complexity in Fry and Bender’s temporally-twisted timelines. Each new “paradox free” time travel loop they initiate confuses and illuminates more and more of their hilariously tortured and entangled past.

There are countless reasons to celebrate the triumphant return of Futurama and Bender’s Big Score in particular: character development far superior to the science fiction properties it mocks, revealing the full danger of SPAM, and the merciless abuse of FOX executives are but a few key points. Most importantly, the Futurama creative staff have redeemed themselves for what may have been the single most gut-wrenching television episode in history: Jurassic Bark.

“Good news, everyone” indeed.