Al Gore voices a fictionalized version of himself in the first of a handful of appearances on Futurama. At the time this episode was made and broadcast, Gore was still serving in office as the Vice President of the United States and would have been in the middle of the Democratic Primary for the 2000 Presidential Election.
Bender's "what if" bears a striking resemblance to The Iron Giant (1999) Leela's to a Sherlock Holmes novel (albeit with an incompetent detective in Zoidberg), and Fry's to a logical paradox often expressed in Star Trek (1966) lore.
Scruffy the janitor gets a name for the first time.
The music that is played while Bender is flying through space towards plant earth is the song "Iron Man" by Black Sabbath, which is about a man made of metal who terrorizes humanity.
During Bender and Zoidberg's "Godzilla" fight, Bender picks up Shea Stadium, which the sign next to it accurately states, is the "Home of the 1969 & 1986 World Champion Mets," implying that they are so historically terrible, that even 1000 years later, they still have yet to win another World Series. As of 2020, this joke still holds true. (Ironically, in the MLB season that followed this episode's airing, the Mets miraculously returned to the World Series, but lost to the New York Yankees in 5 games. They would also lose the 2015 World Series in 5 games to the Kansas City Royals.) Technically, since the team's home stadium as of 2009 is no longer Shea Stadium, but rather the adjacent Citi Field, even if they do someday win another World Series, the sign in this episode will remain true, as no additional Championships will have ever been won at Shea Stadium.