After listening to Earth President Nixon deliver a campaign speech, Leela decides to throw herself into the political process.She pitches her support behind an idealistic, struggling candidate and uses social media to get him ahead.Unfortunately, Bender has been dazzled by Nixon’s ‘free beer’ initiative– and he wants the candidate to show the world his Earth certificate.

Unfortunately, this is another middling episode for me, leaning toward a thumb slightly tilted up for the number of jokes it manages to get across and make stick.There’s a number of fun one-liners, and a decent amount of satire afoot in regard to the birther movement.The new character of Chris Travers was sympathetic, and the solution to the mystery of his earth certificate is fairly unique.

But the biggest flaw of the episode definitely centers on Bender’s initial characterization.For the first half of the episode it felt like I was watching Homer Simpson running around New New York.When he finally becomes his schemey, greedy self by the middle of the episode, it feels far too late.

Then the show denouement arrives, proving to be the most cynical in its history, and one that quasi-recycles their previous electoral outing, ‘A Head in the Polls’.The moral is that it doesn’t matter who you vote for – history will repeat itself – which matches more closely with South Park when it comes to general show outlooks and cynical world views.

Flawed but fun, “Decision 3012” has a good assortment of

LETTER GRADE: B-