Futurama: I'm Not Back Baby

[JamesTC]

Futurama is back for the third time, this time via Hulu. But John DiMaggio is currently in negotiations and some talk says he will be replaced.

Fry, Leela and Bender are set for more 31st century adventures. After months of negotiations, Hulu has finalized deals for 20 new episodes of Matt Groening and David X. Cohen's cult animated sci-fi comedy Futurama to premiere in 2023 on the streamer. In addition to Groening and Cohen, set to come back is the majority of the series' voice cast, including Billy West, Katey Sagal, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr and David Herman.

Missing from the list is one of the three lead voice actors, John DiMaggio, who voices foul-mouthed robot Bender among half a dozen characters. The role is currently being recast ahead of the first table read on Monday. The decision was made after DiMaggio's negotiations with Futurama studio 20th Television Animation came to a standstill though there is a desire on both sides to have him rejoin the cast and reprise his role.

[Video Game Fan 2000]

Oh God no. The 2012 series is some of the worst shit I've ever seen, bailed after five episodes. And I enjoyed the movies. Aside from the Lord of the Rings/RPG one I'm not mad.

[JamesTC]

Oh God no. The 2012 series is some of the worst shit I've ever seen, bailed after five episodes. And I enjoyed the movies. Aside from the Lord of the Rings/RPG one I'm not mad.

It would be a shame if you bailed after five episodes. Lethal Inspection and The Late Philip J Fry are great. The latter is one of my favourite episodes.

EDIT: Got mixed up, that was the 2010 season.

The last revival has some classics and some of the worst. Very rarely in between. The sad thing was they seemed to front load the worst episodes. Each of the four final 13 episode runs seemed to open with a proper clanger.

[chip]

Nothing is allowed to die anymore; just to be cryogenically frozen.

[Alberon]

While it'd be nice to get all the voice cast back, the writers are at least as important.

While we'll never get back to the golden age of the first four seasons if they can match the later ones there will at least be some good episodes in the mix.

[Video Game Fan 2000]

I remember enjoying a quite a few episodes in the 2010 series. There were a few boring duffers but nothing terrible iirc. Then the 2012 series was just stinker after stinker so I bailed. It seemed like a case of where the writers forgot how to write the characters and everyone was obnoxious all the time. Like Jerkass Homer but somehow even worse.

[Thursday]

Thought there were a few good episodes amongst the Comedy Central series, but it's so long ago I don't even know how much I'd hold that opinion now. But it at least felt like they'd had a chance to end it properly, so quite why anyone has any desire to bring it back is beyond me.

[Thursday]

While it'd be nice to get all the voice cast back, the writers are at least as important.

While we'll never get back to the golden age of the first four seasons if they can match the later ones there will at least be some good episodes in the mix.

It was the same writers for the comedy central series, so I think I'd rather they took chances on a mostly new team of writers.

[Captain Z]

I'm not really into Rick & Morty, but I feel like there is no need for both these shows to exist at the same time. Thinking about it, R&M makes me feel how I felt about later Fururama - weirdly detached and uninterested in the fate of the characters, and just a load of blah.

[madhair60]

all the movies and every one of the comedy central episodes were fucking worthless garbage.

i really loved that initial run of 72 though. very few duffers.

[Poirots BigGarlickyCorpse]

urgh WHY

it's FINISHED

stahp

[Ferris]

This will not end well.

[Pink Gregory]

Who is this *for*?

Basically nobody except me and 3 others liked some of the reboot series, it's ended about 3 different times, without John DiMaggio it's basically Billy West talking to himself 70% of the time; just who?

[Dayraven]

I AM BENDER, PLEASE INSERT ACTOR.

[BritishHobo]

I don't really remember much of the final final revoot series. A lot of people seem to say the finale was perfect and shouldn't be ruined, but the Leela/Fry romance has been completed and then rebooted so many times that I don't really care any more to be honest.

[Jerzy Bondov]

I watched the finale and it wasn't that good. Certainly not as good as the S4 finale.

[Small Man Big Horse]

I don't really remember much of the final final revoot series. A lot of people seem to say the finale was perfect and shouldn't be ruined, but the Leela/Fry romance has been completed and then rebooted so many times that I don't really care any more to be honest.

That was my problem with it, my memory may be faulty but in the final season it felt like one week Leela and Fry were a couple and happily loved up, the next week Leela didn't want anything to do with Fry, and so on and so forth.

[Thursday]

Yeah I remember the whole series being unsure whether or not they were actually supposed to be together, always felt like such a strange reticence from the writers.

[Old Nehamkin]

I remember thinking that the first Comedy Central season hit a streak of half a dozen episodes or so that were surprisingly decent. Outside of that the revival run was hugely unmemorable to me and I never quite got the hype around the supposedly brilliant series finale which I thought was just a kind of B-grade retread of similar high-concept-with-pathos type stories they'd done in the past. A fine episode to go out on all things considered, but the original run capped things off in a much more elegant way and those first four seasons are still the only Futurama I'm particularly interested in.

As for John Dimaggio, I'm assuming he'll be back and this is just a bit of brinkmanship, but who knows. I remember when the show went to Comedy Central there were reports of an intense salary dispute between the voice cast and Fox Television (who were still producing the series) which culminated in Fox announcing that they would hold open auditions to replace the entire cast, before backing down shortly afterwards.

[king_tubby]

I hope they do more stuff about Susan Boyle and iPhones! That was great!

But seriously, fuck these guys. The feature lengths were dreadful and the Comedy Central seasons were so bad I had to stop watching them.

[Petey Pate]

Nothing is allowed to die anymore; just to be cryogenically frozen.

Can't wait for the season six premiere of Simpson Babies in 2036, followed by a new episode of Rick and Morty: In the Army.

[Pink Gregory]

There's not even a possibility of giving it to new writers because they'll all be Futurama fans.

[Povidone]

Matt Groening seems to have a weird obsession with running his shows into the ground. I was just having a look at wikipedia and this quote from Katey Sagal caught my attention:

In an August 2013 interview with Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Katey Sagal said regarding the series finale, "So I don't believe it... I just hold out hope for it because it has such a huge fan base, it's such a smart show, and why wouldn't somebody want to keep making that show; so that's my thought, I'm just in denial that it's over". Sagal also mentioned during the same interview that Groening told her at Comic-Con that "we'll find a place" and "don't worry, it's not going to end"

Sounds like a threat.

There will be an audience for this though, some people just latch on to an intellectual property and will consume anything it puts out regardless of quality, see also: Star Wars.

I hope they do more stuff about Susan Boyle and iPhones! That was great!

Why have you reminded me of this, the fucking nadir of a once funny show.

[idunnosomename]

Why would they do this. Theyve ended the universe multiple times and had the main characters grow old together WHY WOULD DO ANYMORE OF THIS TIRED OLD GARBAgE

I AM BENDER, PLEASE INSERT ACTOR.

always amuses me

[Thursday]

It's weird, even just looking in all the replies to any site announcing it, there's very little enthusiasm for this. Previously there'd always been fan campaigning and pushing for it, but I wasn't aware of anyone thinking this needed to come back.

Side note, I just noticed the new series of Disenchantment is out now. A show I've continued to watch even though I've never particularly enjoyed it, but even that's more interesting than this.

[chip]

Katey Sagal is 68 years old.

Not to knock her voice acting ability, but where's she getting 'it's not going to end' from?

Still yes, by the way.

[Video Game Fan 2000]

Who is this *for*?

Someone did some research on what memes are popular and noticed that people still use Shut Up And Take My Money and Fry narrowing his eyes. Then they asked their parents what show those are from.

[sutin]

Boring-ass show that should've been cancelled after the first season. Simpsons godwill went far in the early 21st Century.

[Wadded Beef]

Can't wait for this to turn into another 'season 5 of Arrested Development' situation.

[idunnosomename]

Someone did some research on what memes are popular and noticed that people still use Shut Up And Take My Money and Fry narrowing his eyes. Then they asked their parents what show those are from.

hahaha

Oh wait you're serious. Let me laugh even harder