David X. Cohen Interviewed on New Futurama

eldavojohn writes "Toyfare has a short but exclusive interview with co-creator of Futurama David X. Cohen. There's a lot of information about how they plan to continue the series. He also reveals they're halfway through writing the new season and just starting animation. When asked about his favorite minor character of the show, Cohen responded 'Hypnotoad. By the way, we are looking into producing a full 22-minute episode of Everybody Loves Hypnotoad for the DVD release. I am serious.'"

Hypnotoad

[epsilon720 (307234)]

All glory to the hypnotoad!

CLAP

CLAP

(Would have been more dramatic in all caps, but the filted doesn't like it.)

Re:

[mrchaotica (681592)]

The funny thing is, anybody could go splice together "Everybody Loves Hypnotoad" themselves right now by just running the existing footage in a loop!

Re:Hypnotoad

[agami (1040010)]

http://r33b.net/ [r33b.net] For all your home hypnotoad viewing needs.

ALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD!

Re:Hypnotoad

[krakelohm (830589)]

Gesundheit.

Re:Hypnotoad

[feepness (543479)]

Wrong. Star Control = 1991; Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus = 1953.

1) I was joking about Futurama lifting from Star Control rather than from Asimov.
2) You really, really, really think I didn't know that Asimov came before PC Games?

Ok, I guess toothpicks really do need instructions.

Check slashdots' headers

[ZeroExistenZ (721849)]

For those who don't know it yet, if you view the raw headers of slashdot, you'll find Futurama quotes.

I'm so excited Futurama is back that I hardly can contain myself!

Re:Check slashdots' headers

[defile (1059)]

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2006 21:15:40 GMT
Server: Apache/1.3.33 (Unix) mod_gzip/1.3.26.1a mod_perl/1.29
SLASH_LOG_DATA: shtml
X-Powered-By: Slash 2.005000138
X-Bender: Curse you, merciful Poseidon!
Cache-Control: private
Pragma: private
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1

Wow, you weren't kidding.

Re:Check slashdots' headers

[jlarocco (851450)]

#!/bin/bash
lynx -head -mime_header http://slashdot.org/ [slashdot.org] | sed -n '6s/^X-//p'

All Hail the Hypnotoad!

[tgd (2822)]

*drool*

of course

[by Anonymous Coward]

the hypnotoad is everyones favorite minor character

all hail the hypnotoad

Hypnotoad is hardly a minor character

[by Anonymous Coward]

In fact, a recent poll of fans ranked hypnotoad as one of the most lickable characters on Futurama.

"No, it isnt'"

[Lurker2288 (995635)]

I prefer the brain slugs. ::dazed voice::

Re:

[kv9 (697238)]

Won't brain slugs starve on most /. readers? :-)

he said slashdot not digg

Seymour the Dog!

[Calmiche (531074)]

(Quote) We will also be shedding light on several lingering questions from the original run, including ... Seymour the dog. (/Quote)

Oh Man, oh man, oh man! Jurassic Bark, the episode featuring Seymour the dog, has to be one of the best written pieces of television I've ever seen, as well as one of the saddest. Look, I'm a grown man, and every time I see that episode, I cry. Anything that can do that is good television.

Oh, yah. If you can't tell, I'm REALLY excited about the return of Futurama.

Re:Seymour the Dog!

[0racle (667029)]

Ya I hate that episode, and by hate I mean I don't like feeling depressed for hours after it.

You son of a bitch, why did you even have to bring it up.

Re:

[msuzio (3104)]

I agree. That episode makes me cry, everytime. Anyone who has owned a dog knows how much it sucks that they are loyal to the end, but can't stick around long enough to share all the time they want with us. I know my dog would wait for me too...

Oh man, now my keyboard is all wet. :-(

*shakes fist* Damn you, David X. Cohen!!!

Re:Seymour the Dog!

[thc69 (98798)]

Try owning dachshunds. That'll fix that problem.

They live long, but you wish they wouldn't. Well, _I_ wish they wouldn't.

The damnfool idiots need surgeries all the time, produce twice their body volume (that's twelve times their body weight) in feces daily (most of which they do indoors; these days they have their own room with a doggy door and a sheet of rubber under a scrap carpet), and never shut up. Oh, and they smell awful (must be from rolling around in shit). For awhile, in their own room, they were quiet, but lately they've taken to fighting with eachother...

My wife got them before we were married. I wish she had gotten a hypnotoad instead. ALL GLORY TO THE HYPNOTOAD.

Re:Seymour the Dog!

[tdc_vga (787793)]

For those of you who don't know the episode is based on Hachiko [wikipedia.org] the famous Japanese Dog who returned to the Shibuya train station in Tokyo for 11 years in an attempt to greet his dead master. So I don't know if I'd say it was the best writing ever, but a nice adaption from reality and a damn fine episode.

Cheers,
    TdC_VgA

Re:

[glwtta (532858)]

So I don't know if I'd say it was the best writing ever, but a nice adaption from reality and a damn fine episode.

That's what all great writing is, in one way or another.

Re:

[bitt3n (941736)]

well.. I don't know if you can say that they copied from that. After all, Odysseus' dogs waited ten years (or whatever it was) for him in the Odyssey, and then died promptly upon his return to Ithaca. Does that mean the Japanese dog was copying Homer?

Re:Seymour the Dog!

[Sloppy (14984)]

No, no, no, Homer is in the other show.

Re:

[Tsuzuki (442471)]

Or even the Dog on the Tuckerbox [wikipedia.org]!

Re:

[Itsacon (967006)]

My favourite tearjerker has always been `Luck of the Fryrish', but maybe that's because I don't have a dog, and I do have a brother...

It is ranking no. 2 though...

Re:

[jandrese (485)]

Don't forget the one where (spoiler alert)Leela discovers who her parents are(end of spoiler). I ended up picking up the Pizzacato 5 CD based on that ending alone.

Re:Seymour the Dog!

[defile (1059)]

Yeah, they pulled a fast one on many of us with that episode. I mean, here we are, watching one of the funniest TV shows ever, and they spring that tear-jerker, heart-warming ending on us. Gads! See...just thinking about it and I'm about to start bawling again. :'(

When I watch Futurama, it's usually on late at night and sometimes I pass out near the end. Every time I've watched the episode with Fry's dog, I've passed out right at the ending and woken up to a everyone else in the room crying. Happened three times now.

I don't think I ever want to see the ending.

Re:

[NFNNMIDATA (449069)]

Every time that music gets to me and I start to tear up, I remember that the dog's name is Seymour Butts and I start laughing instead.

Re:

[interstellar_donkey (200782)]

Perhaps, but the Daily Growl is not a reputable journal of opinion.

Hypnotoad

[hedley (8715)]

If we can just get him to handle elections... Oh wait, thats why we have
Diebold machines.

About the "X"...

[Bones3D_mac (324952)]

For those of you who never watchd the full set of commentaries on the Futurama DVDs, there's an interesting story behind the "X" in David X. Cohen's name.

Back in the late 90's, he attempted to register his real name, "David S. Cohen", with the writer's guild. However, they already had a David S. Cohen registered with them. Due to the rules of the writer's guild, all names registered with them must be unique to avoid confusion. So, David decided to change his name over to David X. Cohen for identification purposes.

So what's the meaning of the "X" in the name? Not a damned thing! It was chosen entirely because it was weird enough to be easily recognizable.

Re:About the "X"...

[Nasarius (593729)]

The Futurama DVD commentaries are seriously funnier than the shows sometimes, which is saying something. David X. Cohen and Ken Keeler are huge nerds, and John DiMaggio and Billy West are just plain hilarious.

Hypnotoad sucks!

[by Anonymous Coward]

He has got nothing on the brain slugs. I'm sure once you try one, you'll see how much better than hypnotoads they are. Email me and I will send you a complementary brain slug of your own. Brain slugs also make the perfect x-mas gift. Axe me nice and I will send you a whole gross.

I'm so excited ...

[Vaibhav_Locke (1010373)]

that I feel like I was mauled by Jesus

Nerdgasm!

[Scrameustache (459504)]

One down, two to go!

(frell you if my sig can't let you guess what I mean)

Re:

[KillerBob (217953)]

How the hell does this get modded troll? Not trolling at all. :(

And I agree with you. I'd have a hard time breathing if either of the other shows you're referencing were to make it back to the air. Sadly, I don't think that the one in your .sig will get done, since they killed off two of my favourite characters in the movie. I still think that Jaynestown was the best episode. ;)

As for Farscape... well, they could. I dunno... it'd be really cool if they did, though. Dying in each others' arms would be hard t

Good news, everyone!

[Dorceon (928997)]

Great Zombie Jesus, how can you submit a news story about new Futurama and not use Prof. Farnsworth's catch phrase?

Re:Good news, everyone!

[Babbster (107076)]

It would be inappropriate since news about new Futurama episodes is actually good. Now, if the story was about said episodes being cancelled, THEN "Good news everyone!" works just fine. :)

Re:

[Dorceon (928997)]

Okay, how about this one?
Farnsworth: Good news, everyone! We were supposed to make a delivery to the planet Tweenis 12, but it's been completely destroyed.
Leela: What's good about that?
Farnsworth: They paid in advance.

Berkeley

[Frisky070802 (591229)]

And to think, David, you gave up a PhD in Computer Science from UC Berkeley for the obscurity of a career writing silly cartoons. Have you no ambition? :)

David X Cohen is cool!

[AbRASiON (589899)]

I emailed him once after finding his address out there on the net.
He responded politely and promptly - was pretty cool too, I also found his commentary on the Futurama DVD's to be excellent.

Re:

[revlayle (964221)]

...or posting on slashdot.... all glory to the HYPNOTOAD

Re:

[crimson30 (172250)]

you techno-hedonist nerds all deserve to die in an anthrax attack

That'd be great! With me being vaccinated against anthrax, maybe then I could get a sweet job :)

Re:Who gives a fuck

[MobileTatsu-NJG (946591)]

"there are more important things than some jagoff cartoon"

I did an experiment where I spent a lot of time simply worrying about North Korea's nuke program. I read about it until my eyes bled. I bitched on various websites about it. I even had a T-Shirt made. In the end, the results were surprising: I couldn't stop the bomb!

So.. yeah.. Futurama makes more productive use of my time.

Re:More Futurama?

[DaveM753 (844913)]

I just slurmed my pants a little.

Re:new episodes of Futurama...

[Jerf (17166)]

I doubt it will. I like Family Guy, but Futurama's got much better fundamentals. Better characters, better actual stories (as opposed to joke hooks), and Family Guy has never actually affected me emotionally like several of the last season Futurama episodes. I think they'll be fine.

Re:new episodes of Futurama...

[slashbob22 (918040)]

We can't dunk ..

but Futurama's got much better fundamentals

Zap: Oh that's Rich. Stop it your killing me. [gets hit] You're really killing me.

Re:

[zerocool^ (112121)]

I completely agree. Futurama's humor is episode derived, whereas the Family Guy humor is completely independant of the episodic content. FG basically comes up with great scenes or one liners, and puts them into the episode randomly (as flashbacks or whatever).

The thing is, though, sometimes I like that part of family guy. Family Guy has been milk-out-the-nose funny on multiple ocasions. And even bad episodes of Family Guy are fairly funny. This is contrasted with Futurama, which in every way you think

Re:new episodes of Futurama...

[Viper Daimao (911947)]

Am I the only one who read the announcement and thought "Good news everyone!"

Re:

[DragonWriter (970822)]

Or we could just watch the Futurama episodes in which Zap Branigan, et al., appear and pretend they constitute the new Star Trek animated series, and it would still probably be better...

Re:

[Babbster (107076)]

My weird Futurama reaction: Every time I watch an episode with Zap in it, I get misty thinking about how that character should have been voiced by Phil Hartman...

Re:

[spike1 (675478)]

There're too many good characters to pick one favourite... But one of the best lesser charactrers has to be...

Lurr of omicron persei 8.

Woaaaaa... I think there was something funny in that hippy...