'Futurama' Goes Viral After Dark Prediction Comes True

Futurama has been credited with foreseeing the use of assisted suicide pods, after they were portrayed as being on street corners on the cartoon series.

In Futurama, which was this year revived on Hulu, so-called "suicide booths" were portrayed as being placed on almost every street in the year 3000. The booths were shown to cost users 25 cents per use, and gave them options on how they would die.

Users were given a number of options, including a "quick and painless" setting or an equally self-explanatory "slow and horrible" choice. In an episode of Futurama, characters Philip J. Fry and Bender Bending Rodriguez were shown leaving a booth after the "slow and horrible" option failed to end their lives. Fry believed he was waiting to use a phone booth, while Bender had intended to end his life.

Fry and Bender first met in line for a suicide booth. The Futurama booths first made an appearance on an episode called Space Pilot 3000, which debuted on Fox in 1999. Almost two decades later, the booths have become a talking point on social media, years after the invention of assisted suicide pods.

Known as the "Sarco," the portable capsule designed for use in assisted suicide passed an independent legal review back in 2021. The pod is made with 3D-printing technology by Exit International. According to the company, the current version of the pod was shown at the exhibition Venice Design in 2019.

People seeking legal assisted suicide in Switzerland, for example, currently employ the method of intravenously taking liquid sodium pentobarbital. A person falls asleep within seconds of ingesting the drug and their heart stops within three minutes.

The Sarco offers a different option, in that the pods are flooded with nitrogen, causing the rapid reduction of oxygen levels. The person inside the pod would lose consciousness before eventually passing away in approximately 10 minutes.

At the time the pods were announced, it was revealed that it could only be activated from the inside, with an emergency button allowing for people to exit. It was also reported that the company was developing a camera that would allow a person using the pod camera to communicate with others outside, so as to provide a recording of their informed consent.

The pods became a talking point on Thursday, when @fasc1nate, a fact-sharing account on X, formerly Twitter, uploaded a post that read: "An assisted suicide pod that passed an independent legal review showing it complies with Swiss law."

"At the push of a button, the pod would fill with nitrogen gas, rapidly lowering oxygen levels and killing the user," the caption concluded.

The post, which has been viewed more than 22 million times, sparked a discussion among X users, many of whom spoke about having seen a similar invention on TV.

Sharing a photo from the show in the question, one social media user wrote: "Futurama predicted it first!!!"

"Suicide booths seemed like the only genuinely implausible part of Futurama when I was a kid but it turned out to be the only thing with any predictive power," another fan of the animated series commented.

"Ahead of schedule (Futurama, year 3000)," wrote another in reaction to the post.

"There's no way the new season of Futurama doesn't have a 'suicide pods were invented back in 2023' joke next season," said one fan of the show.

Sharing a GIF of a suicide booth with the "in use" sign flashing, another stated: "Futurama, much like the Simpsons, was ahead of its time..."

While it was widely reported in 2021 that the pods had been approved by the Swiss government, a fact check at the time by USA Today found that no such approval was given, nor did the creator seek it. An independent legal review came to the conclusion that the pods could be operated legally in Switzerland.

Futurama follows the story of Fry, a slacker who is cryogenically preserved and eventually revived 1,000 years later on December 31, 2999. It is the brainchild of The Simpsons creator Matt Groening. David X. Cohen, who served as a writer and producer on The Simpsons, developed Futurama with Groening.

As has been well documented over the years, The Simpsons' soothsaying abilities are unparalleled in the eyes of the internet.

The show is well known for seemingly predicting real-world events in their episodes, including Donald Trump becoming president, the uproar over Michelangelo's David's nudity, and musician Bad Bunny throwing a fan's phone into a body of water, among others.

If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text "988" to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.