Fry makes a deal with the Robot Devil so he can become a skillful musician and win Leela's heart.
WAR
40.3
Wins Above Replacement
“The Devils Hands Are Idle Playthings” ranks #82 of 137 Futurama episodes on the Humor Index, scoring 76.6 — Great. The episode packs 58 scored jokes at 3.6 per minute, averaging 6.9 on craft and 6.5 on impact, with Robot Devil landing the most laughs. Every joke is ranked below with its individual craft and impact scores.
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Top Jokes
Robot Devil: That makes me feel angry!
Zoidberg: The music's bad and you should feel bad!
Zoidberg Character Comedy Escalation ★ Rewatch Robot Devil: Your lyrics lack subtlety. You can't just have your characters announce how they feel.
Bender: And by devil, I mean Robot Devil. And by metaphorically, I mean get your coat.
Bender Escalation Misdirection ★ Rewatch Bender: You know, sometimes I wish your real parents were still alive. Not often, though.
Bender Dark/Subversive Escalation ★ Rewatch Standout Moments
Robot Devil: Your lyrics lack subtlety. You can't just have your characters announce how they feel.
Robot Devil: That makes me feel angry!
Zoidberg: The music's bad and you should feel bad!
Zoidberg Character Comedy Escalation ★ Rewatch All Jokes — 58 analyzed
Show all ↓ Hide ↑ Fry: I choose to not understand these signs.
Fry Character Comedy Deadpan/Understatement Fry: Bender! I was just not playing the holophonor.
Fry Wordplay/Pun Character Comedy Bender: Yeah, well, you should try not stinking at it.
Bender Irony/Sarcasm Character Comedy Bender: Isn't it time you gave up all hope of ever improving yourself in any way?
Bender Dark/Subversive Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Bender: You know, sometimes I wish your real parents were still alive. Not often, though.
Bender Dark/Subversive Escalation ★ Rewatch Mrs. Mellonger · Bender: Is it true that you're a robot? I prefer the term 'love machine.'
Bender · Mrs. Mellonger: Your kid is great. How hard you say you had to hit him? Fairly hard.
audience member: It's too grumpy!
Bender: You know what always cheers me up? Laughing at other people's misfortunes!
Bender Character Comedy Dark/Subversive Leela: I used to listen for hours while he sat naked on my couch and improvised.
Leela Cringe/Discomfort Observational Bender: So musicians really Rodger your Hammerstein?
Bender Wordplay/Pun Observational ★ Rewatch Leela: He was pasty and hunched. Pretty boy.
Leela Irony/Sarcasm Character Comedy Leela: Then one day I found someone else's couch fibers on his butt.
Leela Absurdist Observational ★ Rewatch Bender: And by devil, I mean Robot Devil. And by metaphorically, I mean get your coat.
Bender Escalation Misdirection ★ Rewatch Robot Devil: You hit a sour note about 200 years back, Doug!
Robot Devil: Hell is full of 10-Year-Olds who wanted exactly the same thing.
Robot Devil: With hands like that you'll be lucky to master a belt buckle.
Fry: Sure would. Oh, well, goodbye.
Fry Deadpan/Understatement Character Comedy Bender: I think he's willing to make some kind of deal with the devil with you.
Bender Deadpan/Understatement Character Comedy Robot Devil: It's just the sort of guy I am.
Bender: If you don't take this offer, I will lose all respect for you and punch you.
Bender Escalation Character Comedy Fry · Robot Devil: You sure I won't know him? Definitely probably not.
background character: I got 100 bucks on Rectal Exam-Bot!
Background character: I got 100 bucks on Rectal Exam-Bot!
Fry: It's not ironic, it's just coincidental.
Fry Meta/Self-Referential Observational ★ Rewatch Robot Devil: Oh, sorry. That'll wear off in a couple of days.
Robot Devil: These things are always touching me in places.
Fry: Yeah, they get around. But I'm afraid we had a deal.
Fry Deadpan/Understatement Zoidberg: Oh, Zoidberg, at last you're becoming a crafty consumer.
Hedonism-Bot: Your latest performance was as delectable as dipping my bottom over and over into a bath of the silkiest oils and creams.
Hedonism-Bot: You are the sole diversion in what has been a pale and unamusing season.
Hedonism-Bot: A man writing an opera about a woman? Oh, sirrah. How deliciously absurd.
Fry: So is a peacock, but you don't eat it until it's cooked.
Fry Absurdist Misdirection ★ Rewatch Leela: I've been a fool. A fully justified, prudent fool.
Leela Character Comedy Irony/Sarcasm Robot Devil: Ah! They're so cold! And yet hell is so hot!
Bender: I suppose I've always wondered what it would be like to be more annoying.
Bender Character Comedy Irony/Sarcasm Bender: Grabby and Squeezy? Never! I love these guys!
Bender Character Comedy Absurdist ★ Rewatch Robot Devil: My ridiculously circuitous plan is one quarter complete.
Robot Devil Meta/Self-Referential Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Bender · Leela: Pretty annoying, huh, Leela? What? Are you talking? Oh, God, I'm deaf!
Robot Devil: Oh, how delightfully ironic.
Robot Devil Meta/Self-Referential Callback ★ Rewatch Callback Leela: It's not ironic. It's just mean.
Leela Callback Character Comedy ★ Rewatch Callback audience member: I watch TV with that guy!
Leela: Amy, Fry's looking at me. What am I supposed to be feeling?
Leela Cringe/Discomfort Character Comedy Leela: I don't recall ever fighting Godzilla. But that is so what I would've done.
Leela Character Comedy Observational Robot Devil: I'll just have a Shirley Hemple.
Leela: I can hear like a safecracker!
Leela Observational Character Comedy Hedonism-Bot: Stupider? This opera's as lousy as it is brilliant!
Robot Devil: Now that is irony...
Robot Devil Meta/Self-Referential Callback ★ Rewatch Callback Robot Devil: 'I'll give you my hand.' In marriage... 'The use of words expressing something Other than their literal intention'... Now that is irony...
Robot Devil Wordplay/Pun Meta/Self-Referential ★ Rewatch Callback Bender: I can't believe the devil... Is so unforgiving... I can't believe... Everybody's just ad-libbing...
Bender Meta/Self-Referential Escalation ★ Rewatch Hedonism-Bot: Surgery in an opera? How wonderfully decadent! And just as I was beginning to lose interest.
Fry: My hands! My horrible human hands!
Fry Character Comedy Escalation Fry · Robot Devil: And what did you do to my nails? I cleaned them.
Zoidberg: The music's bad and you should feel bad!
Zoidberg Character Comedy Escalation ★ Rewatch newspaper seller: Greatest opera of all time sucks!
