'Futurama' Revival Ordered at Hulu (variety.com) 92
"Hulu has ordered a(nother) revival of Futurama," writes Slashdot reader aitikin, sharing a report from Variety. From the report: Variety has learned that the streaming service has ordered 20 new episodes of the adult animated sci-fi comedy series. The revival hails from David X. Cohen and Matt Groening. Cohen developed the original series with Groening, the series creator.
Original series cast members Billy West, Katey Sagal, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr and David Herman will all return. John DiMaggio, who voiced Bender and several minor characters, is not currently attached. According to an individual with knowledge of the project, the producers are hopeful DiMaggio will return. Should that not happen, Bender will be recast. Production will begin this month with an eye towards a 2023 premiere. "I'm thrilled to have another chance to think about the future... or really anything other than the present," said Cohen. "It's a true honor to announce the triumphant return of 'Futurama' one more time before we get canceled abruptly again," added Groening.
Original series cast members Billy West, Katey Sagal, Tress MacNeille, Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr and David Herman will all return. John DiMaggio, who voiced Bender and several minor characters, is not currently attached. According to an individual with knowledge of the project, the producers are hopeful DiMaggio will return. Should that not happen, Bender will be recast. Production will begin this month with an eye towards a 2023 premiere. "I'm thrilled to have another chance to think about the future... or really anything other than the present," said Cohen. "It's a true honor to announce the triumphant return of 'Futurama' one more time before we get canceled abruptly again," added Groening.
Mix feelings (Score:4, Interesting)
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I remember it had a few good gags in most episodes, and towards the end started finding more and more excuses to put the female characters in skimpy outfits or just nothing at all. I guess they had to chase the ratings.
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I'm also one of those people who would rather have a series that didn't end on a bad note just be like that instead of making it worse. But for people who want to watch it, because they enjoy it, why not? Just like I don't have to watch the new Star Wars or Star Trek. Thus it doesn't affect the way I enjoyed the previous installations of that franchise.
Lore-wise the Futurama writers
Re: Mix feelings (Score:2)
All three futurama final episodes have been great. The Comedy Central episodes werenâ(TM)t in general wonderful, but some of them were hilarious, and some of them have really smart gags, like the Banach Tarsky Dupla Shrinker.
I have high hopes that they can come up with more solid stuff. I just hope it doesnâ(TM)t become the Simpsons in its later years.
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It's even worse for those who don't get Hulu, because what's the chance the new season will get put on DVD? Probably never.
Being in Canada, Hulu isn't available, either. Maybe I'll get lucky and it'll be on TV. But I'd rather get it on DVD.
But DVDs are dying as a medium, as it seems owning content is passe.
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I don't use Amazon Prime, so I don't know if you can download the episodes and back them up on officially, but you could certainly record them while streaming.
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Worst case scenario, you could also download them while streaming!
owning content (Score:2)
But DVDs are dying as a medium, as it seems owning content is passe.
Depending on your local jurisdiction and how much **AA and other similar organization have leverage on it and twisted your local variant of DMCA:
Even back then you might not have been considered "owning content" (because that would have allowed you to do, e.g., format shifting and anything else that is still tolerated under your local copyright law - see saner countries like .ch).
But merely having bought the licence to view it in a certain way from a certain specific medium - these "certain"s being defined
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Seriously if a company won't sell you something because they don't want people from your country having it, that should cancel out any moral or ethical reason to not just pirate it. If you really feel that's some sin against the creators of Futurama, take the money it would have cost and buy something Futurama related that is legally licensed. Buy a copy of some existing DVDs for a friend. Now if you do that you're crossing over into suppo
Re:Mix feelings (Score:4, Insightful)
Every 'final' episode has been great. I'm looking forward to it being revived so it can end well again.
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Every 'final' episode has been great. I'm looking forward to it being revived so it can end well again.
Oh, yes. <sarcasm>This can only end well.</sarcasm>
"Without @TheJohnDiMaggio #Futurama & @hulu can bite my metal shiny ass," read one fan message shared by DiMaggio via his official Twitter account.
https://deadline.com/2022/02/f... [deadline.com]
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I love Futurama, Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who... And Unlike a lot of people, I don't have a big issues with the the sequels, reboots, reimagination... of the stories.
However, it is taking more and more effort in these fictional universes to make sure they are consistent to appease the fans that know every detail in and out, and also try to make new stories that are interesting and relevant to the current culture. If we want new stories, we really should be creating a new fictional universe, vs tryi
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cos you know what they are going to do....
Re:Let it die already (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: Let it die already (Score:1)
Scifi woke can wrap around to antiwoke.
Let's say you have effortless and reversible sex swaps, then what is gender any more? There will be no more gender roles except the biologically essentialist ones, nothing about this is safe for a woke to think about.
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Pinky's Brain posited:
Let's say you have effortless and reversible sex swaps, then what is gender any more? There will be no more gender roles except the biologically essentialist ones, nothing about this is safe for a woke to think about.
Allow me to recommend John Varley's Steel Beach [wikipedia.org] for your reading pleasure ...
(Posted anonymously only so as not to undo positive mods to previous comments on this story.)
--
Check out my novel [amazon.com].
Re:Let it die already (Score:5, Informative)
I really don't get sci-fi fans who don't like "woke" depictions of the future. In all of sci-fi it basically boils down to either a utopia free from bigotry, or a dystopia run by Space Nazis. What shows were there that showed a future which didn't fit one of those two tropes?
Star Trek is the most bizarre for me. The original series was extremely preachy and in-your-face. It had literal Space Nazis, aliens who where half black half white split down the middle, a very diverse bridge crew at a time when even having a woman on comms was a big deal, let alone a Japanese man and a Russian... Then came TNG, men wearing dresses and a councillor on the bridge. It's always been that way, and yet they complain about it on Discovery. What series were they enjoying back in the day? Maybe Voyager, that was probably the least "woke" one.
Re:Let it die already (Score:4, Insightful)
I think "woke" is a meaningless in this context because from the characters point of view this is exactly how the world is and should be. Every member of the crew in TNG exists in a world where race and gender don't matter and the characters are franky usually obvlivious to the opinion that it ever would or could. Sometimes that state of mind is used for plot effect when they have to deal with an alien culture where those things do matter and they have to resolve their state of society versus the other one and whether they have a right to enforce their morals on other cultures.
I think it's also interesting to think if of this "space hippy" unity comes about because Trek is a futue without resource scarcity or money. When we have the ability to supply everbody with everything they ever need with no cost do things like racism and gender issues exist anymore on their own? Much like war is that a conflict that simply dissappears becuase materially there's really nothing to fight over anymore? It's an interesting question.
Discovery is bad not because of it's wokensss but because it's badly written, has boring characters, its stories are usually incomprehensible and oerall Alex Kurtzman is a literal hack-fraud and it hardly makes an attempt to write episodes that challenge the viewer about anything.
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I'm not sure it's "space hippy" culture because there was that episode of TOS with literal space hippies who all ended up dying because of their naivety. I see what you are saying though, in the future the Federation is basically Fully Automated Luxury Communism. Almost anything you could want or need can be replicated for free, and work is optional. All menial tasks are automated.
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The Star Trek economy will make your head explode if you try to examine it too closely. There's depictions of property ownership (Sisko's Creole Kitchen, Picard's family vineyard). People are also depicted doing menial jobs they'd clearly rather not be doing if they had the choice. Then there's also the whole risking life and limb in various wars.
I've just come to accept that the society depicted in Star Trek actually is rather dystopian underneath all the technological advancement, where most people unq
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Re:Let it die already (Score:4, Insightful)
Clearly you are not understanding what people are complaining about when they complain about "woke". Most people are not complaining about diversity. Diversity is good. Diversity is and has always been a part of Star Trek.
When people are complaining about "social justice" - eg, "social revenge" - they are complaining about shows where the men are always incompetent morons or evil and the women are flawless fearless genius ninjas responsible for every achievement ever and don't have to undergo any character journeys to get to that state. Eg, Michael Burnham being described by some as "female space Jesus". This isn't equality, and it isn't a picture of a Eutopia or even a remotely realistic attempt to show a real future. It is transparent attempt to "punish" certain classes of people and promote others to super-human levels of ridiculousness in what is not a superhero show.
Contrary to your statement, Voyager was actually the most diverse and indicative of equality of any Star Trek that has ever been made. Voyager had a female Captain, an Indian (Mexican in real life) first officer, a Black second officer, a female Klingon (Hispanic in real life) Chief Engineer and half the cast was female. In fact out of 10 principal characters it had only two white males - neither in executive positions (not counting Neelix, who while played by a white actor was totally covered in makeup, and was a fool regardless). And out of 172 episodes they never did a single one where the men were made to look like incompetent fools in need of a woman to save them. Cast members contributed equally to solving problems completely blind of race or gender.
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they are complaining about shows where the men are always incompetent morons or evil and the women are flawless fearless genius ninjas responsible for every achievement ever and don't have to undergo any character journeys to get to that state. Eg, Michael Burnham being described by some as "female space Jesus".
You should definitely watch Discovery then, instead of relying on whatever rubbish you heard on some forum.
Burnham starts the series off by accidentally starting a war between the Federation and Klingons, and getting her captain killed. She is punished with jail time and has to redeem herself. Meanwhile two of the most competent characters in the show, Stamets the head of engineering and Culber the chief medical officer, are male. So is Saru for that matter, the real break-out character of the series. In co
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You should definitely watch Discovery then, instead of relying on whatever rubbish you heard on some forum.
I haven't watched Discovery, but I have seen a couple of scenes from "The trouble with Edward" short and these were quite scary.
To think that people would write such dialogue by a spaceship captain makes me wonder if they ever watched Star Trek, particularly TNG.
Quinn: But according to your report, this entire calamity was all caused by one crew member. How do you explain that?
Lucero: He was an idiot.
Also, as quite a few people pointed out, Star Trek specifically avoided modern expletives to be consistent with enlightened future. The f-bombs in this particular setting are just jarring.
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Dr. Spock, I never realized this for voyager. While there were episode I did not enjoy it wasn't a bad show and I never really thought of it as a overly progressive show, this was a very good point.
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When people are complaining about "social justice" - eg, "social revenge" - they are complaining about shows where the men are always incompetent morons or evil and the women are flawless fearless genius ninjas responsible for every achievement ever and don't have to undergo any character journeys to get to that state. Eg, Michael Burnham being described by some as "female space Jesus". This isn't equality, and it isn't a picture of a Eutopia or even a remotely realistic attempt to show a real future. It is transparent attempt to "punish" certain classes of people and promote others to super-human levels of ridiculousness in what is not a superhero show.
This sounds like that thing where certain people get their panties in a bunch when a female character in science fiction or fantasy is a "Mary Sue" but they're somehow oblivious to the fact that superhuman male characters are all over the place. I can't even count how many times I've seen people complaining about female superheroes or fantasy warriors, etc. because they're too strong or effective, etc. Making all sorts of arguments about how women just don't have the muscle mass to do X in universes where s
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I totally agree.
We've grown up watching male heroes save the day against impossible odds. Often they are the nerd or the average joe, like one of us. Maybe in the course of the story, they are shown training or growing in during a period compressed time (the training montage!). Other times, they are just the average dude thrown into a fantastic situation and finding a way to save the day despite the odds. There are times that it's presented in a "realistic" way in a somewhat "real world" and other times it
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Rey from the new Star Wars movies is a great example of that. Luke went from country bumpkin to ace pilot and Force user in about a day. Rey spends most of her life working on ships, struggles to fly one and crashes it into the ground before getting away, and they complain that she's a Mary Sue.
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I agree with what you've said here, largely. Except that I think you may be extending your own quite reasonable assertions and objections to other people who complain about "social justice" and "wokeness" in a way that is simultaneously admirable and naÃve. Not everyone who appears to be on your side of this is actually on your side - giving you the benefit of assuming (safely, I believe) that you're not a white nationalist. Some of them *are*. Just like some of the people on the other side are just pe
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I don't see "social revenge" anywhere. But I do see people who thinks it exists. Probably if they, their gender+race+politics are not the heros then they feel something is worng. But things are also addressing past oddities (or wrongs, but if I say wrongs them someone goes ballistic about how it wasn't their fault).
Ie, Spock was played by a Jewish person, despite being an alien. So when another Vulcan later was played by someone of African descent some people were incensed and pissed off. No one was bi
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Men wearing dresses! OMG, everyone knows Jesus wore Levi's (despite being the tribe of Judah). And all those "woke" foreign locales where men don't wear trousers like Scotland, Greece, Turkey, China, well just about most places... I mean what sort of bizarre science fiction do the anti-woke people want? The Americanization of space, with space McDonalds and space Starbucks with a big wall around the universe to keep other universes out?
I do think the original Star Trek was extremely mild and plain on th
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What shows were there that showed a future which didn't fit one of those two tropes?
"Expanse", "The Fifth Element", "Star Wars I", "Alien" series probably would fit, and I am sure there are many more.
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I haven't see The Fifth Element but the others are dystopian.
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I haven't see The Fifth Element but the others are dystopian.
Then I guess so is the reality we live in.
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It's always been that way, and yet they complain about it on Discovery.
The problem is the "one story per season" serialization leads to a lot of boring sub-plots revolving around so-called "woke" characters dealing with issues related to the nature of their being. I'm saying this as a gay man myself. I think it's great to see representation in the show, but I'm not watching Star Trek for space opera, I want to be entertained.
The more the show drags on and the more you watch episodes where literally nothing happens that progresses the main story arc in any meaningful way, the
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Race is irrelevant? No, no, no, no, no, no, no...it is the most important thing about us. Wokists told us this.
"The opposite of "racist" isn't "not racist." It is "anti-racist." What's the difference? One endorses either the idea of a racial hierarchy as a racist, or racial equality as an antiracist. One either believes problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an anti-racist. One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a ra
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For example, if a black customer and a white customer entered a store at the same time, and the white sales assistant approached the white customer to offer help first, this could be identified as racism because it prioritized the white person's needs.
However, if the sales assistant approached the black customer first, this is also racism because it could be read as indicating a distrust of black people and unwillingness to have them browse the shelves unsupervised.
And here's the problem, reading a racist motive into every action, as well as an assumption that racism can only be perpetrated by whites against blacks.
Perhaps the sales assistant approached the white customer first because they distrust white people, or approached the black customer first to prioritise them.
Or they could approach the black customer first out of fear of being accused of racism.
Or they could approach the white customer because they're afraid of dealing with black customers incase they get a
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The problem is in the logical flaw way humans think. (conformation bias)
If you assume the world is bias against women, you see a statistic like the majority of people who lost of the jobs lost due to COVID where women, you see it as proof of bias against women. If you look at the statistic that 62% of people who died from COVID where men you assume there must be another reason than bias against men, since men have the advantage.
It is very hard to contradict your assumption because all evidence to the contra
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Race is still relevant, unfortunately. Racism is real, structural racism is real, historical consequences of racism that persist into the modern day are real. "Woke" people are concerned with these things because they are things that need to be contended with.
"Non-woke" people want to ignore all the problems that currently exist and pretend that everything is already equal. They want race to be irrelevant because it's inconvenient and uncomfortable for them to think about.
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Wokism happens to represent the present values of a small segment of mostly upper-class urban elites. Wokism and its constant screaming about racism have resulted in horrors like this: "You can't be pro-Black and be in an interracial relationship." [theblackdetour.com]
"Non-Black men don't understand the struggle or systematic oppression that Black people face. A non-Black man can only be sympathetic to my struggles with no deep level of understanding. Contrastingly, a Black man can empathize with me because we have faced a
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31st Century?
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Yes, 31st century. Fry is transported 1000 years in the future on New Years Eve 1999.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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That's the phrase people use to let the world know they are racist misogynists without using the exact words.
Written like a true feminist and not an equalist. Your use of misogynist instead of sexist proves how slanted your so called woke point of view is.
There's plenty of women who would say there's something mentally wrong with lesbians. I say that the world would be a better place if everyone were bisexual. I am however fine with what ever legally consenting sexuality someone might have.
Congratulation on outing yourself as prejudice.
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they'll try and make it all woke
That's the phrase people use to let the world know they are racist misogynists without using the exact words.
I'll rephrase it into a long form.
They'll try to make it such that women are absolutely flawless with demi-god level powers, while every single man is incompetent and weak.
Example? Look no further than Wheel of Time adaptation.
The story was selected because it had a very strong female representation. Two of the five main protagonists are female, women rule in quite a few places, and are just as integral to the story as men.
The TV adaption had shown us that all women (even as 10-year-old girls in a coup
But, but but... (Score:3)
*presses button*
And now they're gone."
The year is 2294 (Score:5, Funny)
Good News, Everyone! (Score:5, Funny)
Remind me again -- Rebooting, fatal or non-fatal in your species?
In the words of Bender... (Score:1)
Re:In the words of Bender... (Score:4, Funny)
Remember kids: What's right isn't as important as what's profitable.
Shut up and take my money!
Yay (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Yay (Score:5, Funny)
I look forward to 23 forgettable meh episodes and one true gem that makes the whole thing worthwhile.
Don’t you worry about blank. Let me worry about blank.
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Blank? BLANK! You're not looking at the big picture!
(I did a Futurama marathon last night to celebrate the new season)
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What are we, like, a bus or something?
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I look forward to 23 forgettable meh episodes and one true gem that makes the whole thing worthwhile.
I fear a much, much worse outcome. Have you seen every single reboot/continuation that happened lately?
When you dial-up-to-11 a franchise that already has strong female representation to begin with, things like Wheel of Time adaption happen.
How about they create a new show? (Score:2)
At first this sounds like a good idea, but they sort of already had a nice ending (damn you onion-wielding ninjas!)..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Would love to see something new and edgy from Matt Groenig though
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I thought that was the pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-prequel?
Re: How about they create a new show? (Score:2)
Disenchantment had an entire "steampunk" story arc. It's plausible that it could actually take place on a distant/forgotten human-colonized alien world in the far future (like... say... circa 3000). I don't see any purpose in MERGING the two shows, but they're certainly ripe for CW/DC-style crossovers.
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I didn't think Disenchantment would be very good, but it has a lot of ties to and in jokes about Futurama.
It's a fun show.
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The best of which was when King Zog (voiced by John DiMaggio, who also voiced Bender) attacked someone while yelling, "Bite my shiny metal axe!"
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There already is, it's called "Disenchantment" and it airs on Netflix.
Oddly enough, season 4 just dropped on Netflix.
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Don't forget Jurassic Bark's ending. :~(
The first time Futurama was revived (Score:3)
The episode began with...
“On the count of three, you will awaken feeling refreshed, as if Futurama had never been canceled by idiots, then brought back by bigger idiots. One. Two.” – Bender
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I can't wait for Futurama to be cancelled by HOLO Network.
I hope I hope.. (Score:1, Troll)
To shreds you say... (Score:2)
I'm glad to hear this. The characters are good enough that with a refreshed writing staff, great things are possible.
Auto eroticism (Score:2)
Copying yourself usually leads to crap.
Without Bender It's Nothing (Score:2)
If they can't get the voice actor to reprise the role of Bender, I don't see this show lasting very long. Unless you can find someone who can do a very accurate impression. Sort of like how The Simpsons was originally meant to be focused more on Bart before Homer ended up stealing the show, Bender is basically everyone's favorite character on Futurama since he gets to say a lot of the things we all think but aren't allowed to say in polite society.
How dare they cast a human to play Bender? (Score:1)
I'm for this, all in all.... (Score:2)
I agree with the people who said that last "final episode" was pretty amazing and it's hard to see how you'd top that, or make more episodes that don't ruin it?
But this is also a series where anything goes, really, since it's about the future and far away places. They could make the new series take place entirely in an alternate parallel universe if they wanted to.
I'd also say that IMO, Futurama really does best as a TV series full of smaller episodes. The feature films they made lost my interest part way t