164-547: This article lists the many characters of Futurama , an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox Broadcasting Company . The series follows the adventures of a late-20th-century New York City pizza delivery boy, Philip J. Fry , who, after being unwittingly cryogenically frozen for one thousand years, finds employment at Planet Express, an interplanetary delivery company in
328-514: A masseur for Bender , but he was later added to the cast as an infrequently-seen staffperson at Planet Express with the second-season episode " Anthology of Interest I ". Scruffy generally approaches both his job and the rest of his life with a high level of apparent apathy, as shown in " Parasites Lost ", in which he ignores a broken boiler in the Planet Express headquarters to read a pornographic magazine , and continues to read even after
492-417: A tie-in comic book series , video games, calendars, clothes, and action figures. In 2013, TV Guide ranked Futurama one of the top 60 Greatest TV Cartoons of All Time. Futurama is essentially a workplace sitcom, the plot of which revolves around the Planet Express interplanetary delivery company and its employees, a small group that largely fails to conform to future society. Episodes usually feature
656-468: A "thing" and not a person. Zoidberg is generally oblivious to this, considering Hermes his friend, but upon learning the truth in " The Six Million Dollar Mon ", he callously calls out Hermes for his treatment of him. Later episodes show them building an uneasy rapport, with Hermes slowly softening to Zoidberg. He is also known to dislike labor unions, once referring to Labor Day as created by "fat-cat union gangsters", though seconds later he exclaims "Hot damn,
820-450: A Jamaican accent?" This resulted in making the character more workable and less bland, according to Groening. John A. Zoidberg (voiced by Billy West ), "M." D., commonly known by his surname Zoidberg , is the staff doctor for Planet Express , despite his poor understanding of human physiology and allusions to his questionable credentials. He is a Decapodian, an anthropomorphic crustacean -like species of alien. His character parodies
984-413: A better contrast between her and Leela . In the season four episode " Kif Gets Knocked Up a Notch ", in which Amy's boyfriend Kif becomes pregnant, there was some disagreement among the writers as to whether Amy should be the real mother of his children. It was eventually decided that having Amy be the mother and reject the children would make her too unlikeable. Zapp Brannigan (voiced by Billy West )
1148-646: A binge-state that overpowers his mind while watching the final season of All My Circuits . To save Fry from mental whiplash from returning to reality, Leela and Bender pitch a revival of All My Circuits to the robot executives at streamer Fulu, who make a deal with the Robot Devil to bring Calculon back from the dead. Morbo the Annihilator (voiced by Maurice LaMarche ) is the misanthropic alien anchor for √ 2 News , Entertainment and Earth Invasion Tonight , Good Morning Earth , and other shows on
1312-580: A bow, once again thinking that his life is worth living, a massive lighting fixture falls, crushing him. His life as Calculon 2.0 is honored; he watches the ceremony in Robot Hell where his soul resides once more much to the annoyance of the Robot Devil. Calculon is brought back from Robot Hell in the first episode of the Hulu-produced revival season, "The Impossible Stream." In an attempt to watch every episode of television ever produced, Fry enters
1476-419: A bullied orphan . She first believes herself an alien but later is revealed to be a mutant . Leela is also an environmentalist. The series also follows the relationship between Fry and Leela, as they start off as friends but later develop feelings for one another. Bender Bending Rodríguez (voiced by John DiMaggio ), designated in-universe as Bending Unit 22 , unit number 1,729 , serial number 2716057 ,
1640-447: A career assignment officer for cryo-preserved people waking up in the future, Leela quits her job after meeting Fry, joining him and Bender at Planet Express where she becomes the delivery ship's captain. She is one of the few characters in the cast to routinely display competence and the ability to command, and routinely saves the rest of the cast from disaster, but suffers extreme self-doubt because she has only one eye and grew up as
1804-477: A classic cartoon clip. Several episodes begin with a cold opening before the opening sequence, although these scenes do not always correspond with the episode's plot. The opening sequence has been lampooned several times within the show, in episodes including " That's Lobstertainment! ", " The Problem with Popplers ", as " Future-roma " in " The Duh-Vinci Code " and as " Futurella " in " Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences ". "Decision 3012" and "The Problem with Popplers" are
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#17327973288131968-528: A closet labeled P and NP respectively, referring to the possibility that P and NP-complete problem classes are distinct), electronics (an X-ray – or more accurately, an "F-ray" – of Bender's head reveals a 6502 microprocessor), and genetics (a mention of Bender's "robo- or R-NA"). The show often features subtle references to classic science fiction. These are most often to Star Trek – many soundbites are used in homage – but also include
2132-484: A day off!" upon learning that it was that very day (" When Aliens Attack "), and consulting Glurmo about firing the entire crew and replacing them with Grunka-Lunkas for half the pay (" Fry and the Slurm Factory "). It is a recurring gag that Hermes wants to kill some or all of the members of the Planet Express crew; in " The Farnsworth Parabox ", he suggests that Leela shoot the rest of the crew and ponders ejecting
2296-477: A dead-end job, is cryogenically frozen on December 31, 1999, waking up 1000 years later just before the year 3000. After meeting Leela and Bender, the trio find employment at the Planet Express delivery company, owned by Fry's distant descendant Professor Farnsworth. Ironically, Fry becomes the delivery boy for Planet Express after rejecting his predetermined job of being a delivery boy upon waking up in
2460-471: A different voice. DiMaggio described Bender's voice as a combination of a sloppy drunk, Slim Pickens and a character his college friend created named "Charlie the sausage-lover". Phil LaMarr voices Hermes Conrad , his son Dwight, Ethan Bubblegum Tate, and Reverend Preacherbot. Lauren Tom voices Amy Wong , and Tress MacNeille voices Mom and various other characters. Maurice LaMarche voices Kif Kroker and several supporting characters. LaMarche won
2624-665: A disaffected, indifferent, sardonic lackey, although his personality develops through the course of the series, becoming more emotional, tender and sweet-natured later on. Zapp thinks Kif to be his best friend and loyal confidant, whereas Kif sees Brannigan as an incompetent and vain buffoon, going so far as to call him a jackass in "Love's Labours Lost in Space". Despite this, Kif seemingly has some loyalty to Brannigan, even continuing to associate with him after Brannigan caused him to be court-martialed along with him in "Brannigan, Begin Again". Kif
2788-493: A distinctive opening sequence featuring minor gags. As the show begins, blue lights fill the screen and the Planet Express Ship flies across the screen with the title of the show being spelled out in its wake. Underneath the title is a joke caption such as "Painstakingly drawn before a live audience" or "When you see the robot: DRINK!" After flying through downtown New New York and past various recurring characters,
2952-465: A fan broke his back trying to emulate Hermes left him traumatized, and he could not bring himself to limbo again until decades later when it was needed. The series also alludes to Hermes using cannabis , though he is never seen using it, partially due to prime-time television censorship standards at the time of Futurama 's original run. Hermes frequently admonishes the staff for not working hard enough, and strongly dislikes Zoidberg, often treating him as
3116-566: A fifth broadcast season. According to Groening, Fox executives were not supporters of the show. Although Futurama was never officially cancelled, midway through the production of the fourth season, Fox decided to stop buying episodes of Futurama , letting it go out of production before the fall 2003 lineup. In 2003, Cartoon Network acquired syndication rights to Futurama and Family Guy , another animated show Fox had cancelled, for its Adult Swim block. Both shows proved to be successful immediately, leading to sister network TBS picking up
3280-646: A fifth season of the show. Since no new Futurama projects were in production at the time of release, the final movie release Into the Wild Green Yonder was designed to stand as the Futurama series finale. However, Groening had expressed a desire to continue the franchise in some form, including a theatrical film. In an interview with CNN , Groening said that "we have a great relationship with Comedy Central and we would love to do more episodes for them, but I don't know... We're having discussions and there
3444-588: A grade of A-minus (for poor penmanship ), the two became bitter rivals (established in " A Big Piece of Garbage "). Many episodes' major plot points are introduced by Farnsworth announcing, "Good news, everyone!" or some variation thereof, either to unveil his latest invention or describe the company's latest delivery assignment. On the very few occasions he has actual good news, he often opens with "Bad news, everyone!" After Fry resigns from his job in " Law & Oracle ", he states that he only says these phrases to make Fry "feel better about his pointless job." Another
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#17327973288133608-495: A hero when he saves Earth from enslavement to his own kind in " A Taste of Freedom ". Fry and Professor Farnsworth are usually the only ones to refer to Zoidberg as a friend, and in Bender's Big Score , Zoidberg says of Fry, "He was the only one of you who never struck me!" during the latter's memorial. Zoidberg has ambitions to be a comedian, but he is entirely unsuccessful at this endeavor. In " That's Lobstertainment! ", his uncle,
3772-419: A jar. Recurring guest stars included Tom Kenny , Dan Castellaneta (as the Robot Devil ), Dawnn Lewis , Nicole St. John, Al Gore , Phil Hendrie , Coolio and George Takei , among others. Bumper Robinson used to be a cast member of the series (who played Hermes' son Dwight ), but left the series after season 4 which caused Phil LaMarr to take over the role afterwards. John Goodman was meant to reprise
3936-707: A joke referring to the binary numeral system (Fry assures him, "there's no such thing as two"). The series developed a cult following partially due to the large number of in-jokes it contains, most of which are aimed at " nerds ". In commentary on the DVD releases, David X. Cohen points out and sometimes explains his "nerdiest joke[s]". These included mathematical jokes – such as " Loew's ℵ 0 {\displaystyle \aleph _{0}} -plex" ( aleph-null -plex) movie theater – as well as various forms of science humor – for example, Professor Farnsworth, at
4100-413: A klutz. Groening was interested in exploring the idea of using slapstick comedy and physical humor with a female character since most of this humor was done by male characters in his previous work, The Simpsons . Amy's personality was initially different. Lauren Tom has stated that she was originally supposed to be "a car mechanic , really tough lesbian sort of character". She was changed to provide
4264-464: A racetrack, complains about the use of a quantum finish to decide the winner, exclaiming "No fair! You changed the outcome by measuring it", a reference to the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics . In the season six episode " Law and Oracle ", Fry and the robot peace officer URL track down a traffic violator who turns out to be Erwin Schrödinger , the 20th-century quantum physicist. On
4428-450: A robot supremacy society. Bender cheats in a duel with Calculon, resulting in the loss of one of Calculon's arms and the destruction of the league's headquarters. Calculon subsequently becomes outraged at Bender and resigns from the league, relinquishing the presidency to Bender. In Into The Wild Green Yonder , it is said that his operating system is Windows Vista . In re-airings of the movie on Comedy Central , he says his operating system
4592-400: A seat belt like the rest of the crew, Bender is flung through the windshield on impact and smashed to pieces. The crew and Bender's disembodied head seek out a way to return to the 31st century, leaving Zoidberg behind to pick up the pieces. Zoidberg is captured by the U.S. military and taken to Roswell Air Base for experimentation. Assuming the pieces are the remnants of a flying saucer ,
4756-403: A skeleton-thin, malevolent, and foul-mouthed old crone. She has three sons, Walt, Larry and Igner, whom she terrorizes and often employs to do her dirty work. Mom has a romantic history with Hubert J. Farnsworth , who worked at MomCorp when he was younger, and she was previously married to Dr. Ogden Wernstrom. In Bender's Game , it was revealed that Farnsworth is Igner's father. Her given name
4920-413: A strong desire in the mid-1990s for Matt Groening to create a new series after the success of his previous series, The Simpsons ; Groening began conceiving Futurama during this period. In 1995, he enlisted David X. Cohen , then a writer and producer for The Simpsons , to assist in developing the show. The two spent time researching science fiction books, television shows, and films. When they pitched
5084-409: A table meeting of writers, who discussed the plot ideas as a group. The writers are given index cards with plot points that they are required to use as the center of activity in each episode. A single staff writer wrote an outline and then produced a script. Once the first draft of a script was finished, the writers and executive producers called in the actors for a table read. After this script reading,
List of Futurama characters - Misplaced Pages Continue
5248-537: Is Windows 7 . Calculon dies in " The Thief of Baghead " when he tries to defeat Langdon Cobb in the World Acting Championship after Leela and Bender advise him to do the Romeo and Juliet scene and give him water and food coloring. Unfortunately, food coloring is fatal to robots. Calculon decides the only way to win the award is to actually drink the food coloring and die. After he dies, Cobb wins
5412-579: Is cryogenically preserved for 1,000 years and revived on December 31, 2999. Fry finds work at the interplanetary delivery company Planet Express , working alongside the one-eyed mutant Leela and the robot Bender . The series was envisioned by Groening in the mid-1990s while working on The Simpsons ; he brought David X. Cohen aboard to develop storylines and characters to pitch the show to Fox. Following its initial cancellation by Fox, Futurama began airing reruns on Cartoon Network 's Adult Swim programming block, which lasted from 2003 to 2007. It
5576-584: Is a 25-Star general in the military of the Democratic Order Of Planets (D.O.O.P.), although his title varies. Brannigan was first seen in the episode " Love's Labours Lost in Space " as Captain of the starship Nimbus , where he imprisons Fry , Leela and Bender for violating "Brannigan's Law". Zapp is generally incompetent, egotistical, boorish, vain, cowardly, sexist and short-sighted. He will often mispronounce words, such as champagne ("sham-PAGG-Enn") and guacamole ("GWACK-a-mole") in
5740-414: Is a backdrop, and the writers are not above committing continuity errors if they serve to further the gags. For example, while the pilot episode implies that the previous Planet Express crew was killed by a space wasp, the later episode " The Sting " is based on the crew having been killed by space bees instead. The "world of tomorrow" setting is used to highlight and lampoon issues of today and to parody
5904-399: Is a humanoid industrial robot who rounds out the main trio of characters. He fulfills a comic, antihero -type role in Futurama and is described by fellow character Leela as an "alcoholic, whore -mongering, chain-smoking gambler". Fry meets Bender at a suicide booth (which Fry mistakes for a telephone booth ) after exploring the city following his escape from the cryogenics facility he
6068-585: Is a prominent part of society, although the dominant religions have evolved. A merging of the major religious groups of the 20th century has resulted in the First Amalgamated Church, while Voodoo is now mainstream. New religions include Oprahism , Robotology , and the banned religion of Star Trek fandom . Religious figures include Father Changstein-El-Gamal , the Robot Devil , Reverend Lionel Preacherbot , and passing references to
6232-450: Is a workaholic bureaucrat and the accountant at Planet Express. He is from Jamaica and speaks with a heavy accent. He manages the Planet Express delivery business with responsibilities that include paying bills, giving out legal waivers, and notifying next of kin. Hermes is very enthusiastic about the Limbo and was once an Olympic limbo athlete. An accident in the 2980 Olympic Games in which
6396-425: Is as the lead character in the long-running robot soap opera All My Circuits . It is claimed in " The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings " that Calculon received his acting ability from the Robot Devil. Calculon is from the 21st century, having been created as a standard industrial robot called Calculon 1.0. He changes his name and appearance every few decades to conceal his true age, claiming that one of his disguises
6560-648: Is brought back to life, he returns to acting. He first performs a one-man show. When the show receives poor reviews where it was claimed that some people were taken to the hospital as well as a news report stating that Calculon's star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was replaced with another one for Robert Wagner , Calculon determines that maybe he should not be acting and should have remained in hell. Leela, who opposed Calculon's return to acting, now wants to help him return to All My Circuits . She explains that he should go to an audition in disguise to play Calculon for
6724-535: Is convenient for a given episode's plot, as shown in Bender's Big Score when he proclaims, "I can wire anything directly into anything! I am the Professor!", proceeding to link Hermes' disembodied head to the ship's computer. Approximately 100 years before the series' timeline, he taught a young (not yet Professor) Wernstrom , whom Farnsworth regarded as a prized student. After he returned a pop quiz to Wernstrom with
List of Futurama characters - Misplaced Pages Continue
6888-815: Is edited to include educational material ostensibly for youth. Television is still a primary form of entertainment. Self-aware robots are a common sight, and are the main cause of global warming due to the exhaust from their alcohol-powered systems. The wheel is obsolete (no one but Fry even seems to recognize the design), having been forgotten and replaced by hover cars and a network of large, clear pneumatic transportation tubes . Environmentally, common animals still remain, alongside mutated, cross-bred (sometimes with humans) and extraterrestrial animals. Ironically, spotted owls are often shown to have replaced rats as common household pests. Although rats still exist, sometimes rats act like pigeons, though pigeons still exist, as well. Anchovies have been extinct for 800 years because of
7052-439: Is established in the episode " Mother's Day " that the Professor was once Mom 's lover and employee. However, they could not maintain their relationship due to Mom's lust for power, including when she decided to weaponize his "Q.T. McWhiskers" toy, prompting them to break up. When Mom takes control of all the world's robots to cause an uprising, her sons Walt, Larry, and Igner attempt to get the Professor to seduce Mom and retrieve
7216-482: Is eventually dropped. He is shown several times to read porn magazines like National Pornographic and Zero G Juggs (parodies of actual magazines, National Geographic and Juggs ). The Season 6 episode " The Prisoner of Benda " reveals that he is in love with his robotic wash bucket, but avoids entering into a relationship with it. He is murdered by Robot Santa in the non-canonical anthology episode " The Futurama Holiday Spectacular ". In " Law & Oracle ", it
7380-467: Is given by the summation of all previous letters plus the current letter". The codes often provide additional jokes for fans dedicated enough to decode the messages. The third language sometimes used is Hebrew . Aside from these alphabets, most of the displayed wording on the show uses the Latin alphabet. The show predicts that several English expressions will have evolved by the year 3000. For example, in
7544-514: Is good friends with President Richard Nixon . His co-host Linda van Schoonhoven seems blissfully dismissive of Morbo's hatred and usually responds with an empty-headed laugh to Morbo's contemptuous outbursts. He is married to Mrs. (Fawn) Morbo, a member of his species. Futurama Futurama is an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company and later revived by Comedy Central , and then Hulu . The series follows Philip J. Fry , who
7708-416: Is his exclamation, "Sweet zombie Jesus!" He often says "Eh Wha?" when unaware of the situation, or when someone questions a statement he has just made. The Professor often makes mutually contradictory statements just moments apart; this happens especially often when briefing his employees, with the prevailing second statement canceling a much more reassuring first sentence. The Professor rarely worries about
7872-425: Is implied to have routinely sent his former crews on suicide missions . He wears very thick glasses and has a gift for creating doomsday devices and atomic supermen. He has put at least one parallel universe in peril with his inventions and visited dozens more. The Professor teaches at Mars University and has worked for Momcorp on several occasions but spends most of his time inventing ridiculous devices and sending
8036-473: Is in a long relationship with Amy Wong , and he compares his body plan to a sea cucumber . Lord Nibbler (vocal effects provided and voiced by Frank Welker ) masquerades as an innocent, cute and unintelligent pet during most of the series. In reality, he is a highly intelligent Nibblonian and capable of communication, but tries to avoid suspicion while he protects the Earth in general and Fry in particular from
8200-453: Is masterful". Groening and Cohen wanted Futurama to be shown at 8:30 pm on Sunday, following The Simpsons . The Fox network disagreed, opting instead to show two episodes in the Sunday night lineup before moving the show to a regular time slot on Tuesday. Beginning with its second broadcast season, Futurama was again placed in the 8:30 pm Sunday spot, but by mid-season the show
8364-470: Is merely using him for material gain. Calculon proposes, and Coilette accepts and then decides that she cannot continue the deception, and subsequently fakes her death at their wedding. In the conclusion of the episode, Coilette undergoes surgery to become Bender again, and Calculon makes a film in tribute to Coilette. In The Beast With A Billion Backs Calculon is seen as the leader of the League of Robots,
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#17327973288138528-417: Is no longer important and the crew storm Roswell Air Base by force to get the microwave dish, throwing the entire complex into disarray. Fry and Leela rescue Zoidberg from an alien autopsy while Farnsworth grabs Bender's body. As the ship leaves Earth's atmosphere and triggers the microwave dish for the time jump, Bender's head falls out and has to be left behind in 1947. Back in the 31st century, Fry laments
8692-409: Is not eager to do. They are often shown to be rather unkind to their daughter, including during an incident in which Amy's father repeatedly made fun of her for being fat as a child. On the show, between her roles as expert technician and occasional theorist, Amy is known for being somewhat shallow, kind, and ditzy. When Doctor Zoidberg had lost his mind due to hormones and was forced to be tied up, she
8856-534: Is occasionally remixed for use in specific episodes, including a version by the Beastie Boys used for the episode " Hell Is Other Robots ", in which they guest starred as their own heads for both a concert and as part of the Robot Devil's song. The original version of the theme also samples a drum break originating from "Amen, Brother" by American soul group The Winstons . The theme has been noted for its similarities to Pierre Henry 's 1967 Psyché Rock . It
9020-578: Is one of four featured in the Monster Robot Maniac Fun Collection , marking it as one of Matt Groening 's favorite episodes from the series. Claudia Katz , producer of Futurama , has also stated that this is one of her three favorite episodes of the series. In 2013, it was ranked number 5 "as voted on by fans" for Comedy Central 's Futurama Fanarama marathon. Although the episode was well received by critics, it continued to do poorly in its time slot. The original airing
9184-441: Is revealed that Scruffy died at some point and was brought back to life as a zombie , remarking that "Life and death are a seamless continuum." Scruffy was seen in the 2014 The Simpsons crossover episode " Simpsorama " with the rest of the Planet Express staff, in which his zombie status is referenced. Carol "Mom" Miller (voiced by Tress MacNeille ) is an aggressive, threatening and Machiavellian harridan , reminiscent of
9348-568: Is revealed to be Carol in " The Tip of the Zoidberg ". In the episode " Leela and the Genestalk ", Mom works out of "Momsanto", a floating castle that hosts a genetic engineering facility. Its name is a reference to Monsanto , an American agricultural company known for genetic engineering of plants . Calculon (voiced by Maurice LaMarche ) is an acting robot renowned for his melodramatic roles and dramatic speaking style. His most famous role
9512-471: Is some enthusiasm but I can't tell if it's just me." Futurama left Adult Swim's lineup on December 31, 2007, following a week-long marathon of the entire series. Comedy Central began airing the show the next day, with season 5 making its broadcast debut on March 23, 2008. In June 2009, 20th Century Fox Television announced that Comedy Central had picked up the show for 26 new half-hour episodes that began airing on June 24, 2010. The returning writing crew
9676-444: Is stationed at the base, as he might kill Enos and erase his own existence . However, Farnsworth's advice has the opposite effect; Fry becomes determined to seek out Enos and encourage him to pursue a sexual relationship with his fiancée Mildred. After several bumbling attempts to keep Enos safe (as well as discovering that Enos is a latent homosexual), Fry resorts to locking him in an abandoned house. The house turns out to be located in
9840-510: Is taken from Gomer Pyle , such as his accent and use of Pyle's trademark "Go-oooly!", which was parodied as "Gadzooks!". The episode won an Emmy Award in the Outstanding Animated Program (Programming Less Than One Hour) category in 2002, marking Futurama ' s first win in this category. Rich Moore also won an Annie Award for "Directing in an Animated Television Production" in 2002 and in 2006, IGN ranked
10004-572: Is that he is named after the American inventor and television pioneer Philo Farnsworth who appeared in the Futurama episode " All the Presidents' Heads " as an ancestor of the Professor and Philip J. Fry. Billy West uses a combination of impressions of Burgess Meredith and Frank Morgan . However, in the "Action Delivery Force" segment of " Reincarnation ", the Professor is voiced by David Herman . Hermes Conrad (voiced by Phil LaMarr )
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#173279732881310168-648: Is the biological mother because she grabbed Kif's ungloved hand to keep him from being blown out of his spaceship, not knowing that, in his receptive state, this would impregnate him (some of the children even have only one eye like Leela), the Smizmar is considered to be the true mother in Kif's culture. Amy's love for Kif is undeniable, and she has been seen crying when Kif goes on dangerous missions, fearing for his well-being. When creating Amy's character, Matt Groening and David X. Cohen decided that she would be something of
10332-472: Is voiced by Billy West, though he was originally intended to be voiced by Phil Hartman . Hartman insisted on auditioning for the role, and "of course, just nailed it" according to creator Matt Groening . However, after Hartman was murdered on May 28, 1998, West was given the role. On a Futurama DVD commentary, Groening claimed that Zapp's character and mannerisms were established in West's original audition for
10496-704: The Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode " Little Green Men ". Bender's head lying buried in the sand for centuries recalls the same thing happening to the android Data 's head in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode " Time's Arrow ". The episode also features a digital clock resembling the ones used for the DeLorean time machine , as well as a clock resembling a cat from Back to the Future. Much of Enos' character
10660-411: The √ 2 Television Network. Morbo is an advance scout for an upcoming alien invasion and does not bother to be subtle about it, often expressing his contempt and extreme hatred for mankind during live news broadcasts and commenting frequently on his species' extremely violent invasion plans. He appears to be using his job to gather information about the human race to aid the planned invasion. Morbo
10824-592: The Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance in 2011 for his performances as Lrrr and Orson Welles in the episode " Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences ". David Herman voiced Scruffy and various supporting characters. During seasons 1–4, LaMarche is billed as supporting cast and Tom, LaMarr and Herman billed as guest stars, despite appearing in most episodes. LaMarche was promoted to main cast and Tom, LaMarr and Herman to supporting cast in season 5, and promoted again to main cast in season 6. In addition to
10988-490: The retro-futuristic 31st century. Along with the employees of Planet Express, Futurama includes a large array of characters, which include co-workers, media personalities, business owners, extended relatives, townspeople, aliens, and villains . Many of these characters were created for one-time gags, background scenes, or other functions, but later gained expanded roles. Other characters started out as background characters, and have been used to personify new roles later on in
11152-405: The silent hologram star Harold Zoid (a parody of Harold Lloyd ), advises him to give up on comedy and finance a film whose script Zoid is writing. Billy West performs the character with a Yiddish -inflected accent inspired by actors George Jessel and Lou Jacobi . Zoidberg is named after an Apple II game that series writer David X. Cohen created in high school called Zoid , similar to
11316-598: The Brainspawn. As with all Nibblonians, Nibbler's feces consist of dark matter , which can be used as starship fuel. It is an extremely dense material, "each pound of which weighs over ten thousand pounds," according to Professor Farnsworth in the season 1 episode, " Love's Labours Lost in Space ." After he accidentally reveals to the Planet Express crew that he can speak in Bender's Big Score , he forgets to wipe their memory of his intelligence, which it turns out does not affect them much, and from then on he speaks freely to
11480-471: The Decapodians. Earth still suffers the effects of greenhouse gases , although in one episode Leela states that its effects have been counteracted by nuclear winter . In another episode, the effects of global warming have been somewhat mitigated by the dropping of a giant ice cube into the ocean, and later by pushing Earth farther away from the sun, which also extended the year by one week. Religion
11644-445: The Planet Express delivery crew on suicide missions . What he is a professor of is never explicitly stated. In the episode " Mars University ", when asked what he is teaching, he responds: "The same thing I teach every semester, the mathematics of quantum neutrino fields. I made up the title so no student would dare take it"; however, this declaration has not precluded the professor from demonstrating mastery of whatever field of science
11808-462: The Planet Express ship crashes through a large screen showing a short clip from a classic cartoon. These have included clips from Quasi at the Quackadero , Looney Tunes shorts, cartoons produced by Fleischer Studios and Famous Studios , a short of The Simpsons from a Tracey Ullman episode, the show's own opening sequence in " The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings " or a scene from
11972-407: The Professor's tendency to send his crews on suicide missions . Her cocktail party personality and general klutziness get her in and out of trouble. She is the ditzy, spoiled daughter of wealthy agriculturalist-industrialist Han Chinese rancher parents who raise buggalo (a hybrid of " buffalo " and "bug") on their property, the western hemisphere of the planet Mars . A graduate student for most of
12136-477: The Space Pope, who appears to be a large crocodile-like creature. Several major holidays have robots associated with them, including the murderous Robot Santa and Kwanzaa-bot. While very few episodes focus exclusively on religion within the Futurama universe, they do cover a wide variety of subjects including predestination, prayer, the nature of salvation, and religious conversion. Futurama ' s setting
12300-487: The Wicked Witch of the West. She manages and owns 99.7% of MomCorp, a large, multibillion-dollar industrial complex with numerous subsidiaries and a monopoly on robot production, as well as being the company that created Bender. Publicly, she retains the corporate image of a sweet, bustling old woman who often slips into the stereotype of a Deep South grandmother; behind the scenes, she removes her fat suit and emerges as
12464-604: The Wild Green Yonder , " Overclockwise ", and " Meanwhile " have all been written to serve as a final episode for the show. Roswell That Ends Well " Roswell That Ends Well " is the nineteenth episode in the third season of the American animated television series Futurama , and the 51st episode of the series overall. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on December 9, 2001. The plot centers on an accidental time travel event that results in
12628-497: The [vocal artist] Billy West characters. I see it. The bottom line is, the producers are trying to make sure the shows are completely different entities. In an interview with Diego Molano, creator of Victor and Valentino , in April 2019, he said that he found Futurama "incredibly influential", calling the humor smart but "not alienating ". He added that it makes him "feel smart" and adding that Groening's "sense of comedic timing
12792-512: The animation being done by Rough Draft Studios . The studio would receive the completed script of an episode and create a storyboard consisting of more than 100 drawings. It would then produce a pencil-drawn animatic with 1,000 frames. Rough Draft's sister studio in South Korea would render the 30,000-frame finished episode. In addition to traditional cartoon drawing, Rough Draft Studios often used CGI for fast or complex shots, such as
12956-474: The award instead of him, making his death pointless. In "Calculon 2.0", Bender and Fry decide to revive Calculon after deciding that they do not care for his replacement on All My Circuits , Vaxtron. They journey to Robot Hell and obtain Calculon's soul from the Robot Devil. The Professor has the crew perform a series of ritualistic "scientific" tasks to put the soul of Calculon back in his body. After Calculon
13120-463: The background of episodes, usually in the forms of graffiti , advertisements, or warning labels. Nearly all messages using alternative scripts transliterate directly into English. The first alphabet consists of abstract characters and is referred to as Alienese, a simple substitution cipher from the Latin alphabet . The second alphabet uses a more complex modular addition code, where the "next letter
13284-604: The boiler explodes, declaring, "Scruffy's gonna die the way he lived." In " Future Stock ", it is revealed that he is deeply fond of the company, and owns four times as much stock as the other employees. The first several times he is referred to or seen by his co-workers, they ask who he is, to which he replies, "I'm Scruffy. The janitor." A running gag in Scruffy's early appearances is that no one remembers having met Scruffy before, nor does he remember them, even after they have been seen interacting in multiple previous episodes. This gag
13448-422: The cause of time travel is different, in " The Late Philip J. Fry ", which involves a time machine that can only travel forwards in time – to specifically avoid creating a paradox, and in " I Know What You Did Next Xmas ", involving a time machine that can travel both forwards and backwards in time. In this episode, director Rich Moore used screen position and character movement to mimic the time travel aspects of
13612-483: The central trio of Fry, Leela, and Bender, though occasional storylines center on the other main characters. Futurama is set in New New York at the turn of the 31st century, in a time filled with technological wonders. The city of New New York has been built over the ruins of present-day New York City, which has become a catacomb-like space that acts as New New York's sewer, referred to as "Old New York". Parts of
13776-433: The character, and any similarity to Phil Hartman or his other well known cartoon characters ( Lionel Hutz and Troy McClure ) is simply coincidence. On the other hand, in an interview for the website TV Squad , Billy West states that his Zapp Brannigan is an imitation of Hartman and also "modeled after a couple of big dumb announcers I knew." During a live event, West stated that he partially modelled Brannigan's cadence after
13940-405: The close of each episode, the 30th Century Fox Television logo is displayed. While it is the same logo as that of 20th Century Fox, it is modified to fit the show's futuristic setting. Syndicated episodes use a 30th Television closing logo instead of the 20th Television one, while episodes from Season 8 onward use a 30th Television Animation logo. Initially, Fox did not want this logo to be used on
14104-466: The crew watch a supernova , Fry puts a metal pan of popcorn into the ship's microwave oven . The radiation causes the pan to emit sparks, which interact with the particles thrown off by the supernova and send the ship back to 1947. Since GPS technology does not yet exist in this time period, the crew have no way to navigate the ship accurately and crash-land in Roswell, New Mexico . Refusing to wear
14268-551: The crew. In the pilot episode , Nibbler's shadow can be seen as Fry falls into the cryogenic freezer, alluding to the reveal in the fourth season episode " The Why of Fry " that he helped send Fry to the future. Scruffy (voiced by David Herman ) is the Planet Express gruff janitor and a recurring supporting character. He tells Hermes he is responsible for "Toilets and boilers, boilers and toilets, plus that one boiling toilet. Fire me if'n you dare." A character looking very much like Scruffy first appeared in " A Fishful of Dollars " as
14432-401: The difficulty of animating the sequence. It took four to five weeks to fully animate the sequence, and it consists of over 80 levels of 3D animation composited together. It takes approximately one hour to render a single frame, and each second of the sequence consists of around 30 frames. The Futurama theme was created by Christopher Tyng . The theme is played on the tubular bells but
14596-426: The earlier episode " How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back ", he risks his bureaucratic license to rescue Bender, sorting the entire Master IN pile in under four minutes to recover the disc containing Bender's downloaded brain. Hermes is married to LaBarbara Conrad, with whom he has a son Dwight. LaBarbara was formerly married to Hermes' former Limbo rival Barbados Slim , and reunited with Barbados twice when Hermes
14760-573: The end of a message from Maurice LaMarche sent to members of the "Save the Voices of Futurama" group on Facebook, LaMarche announced that the original cast would be returning for the new episodes. The Toronto Star confirmed, announcing on their website that the original cast of Futurama signed contracts with Fox to return for 26 more episodes. Similarly, an email sent to fans from Cohen and Groening reported that West, Sagal, DiMaggio, LaMarche, MacNeille, Tom, LaMarr, and Herman would all be returning for
14924-550: The entire crews of both universes into the sun. Despite his disdain toward most of his coworkers, he is later portrayed as one of the most compassionate characters in the series, and seems to have a soft spot for Bender . In the Season 6 episode " Lethal Inspection ," it is revealed that Hermes worked at the robot factory in Tijuana, Mexico where Bender was constructed, as Inspector No. 5, checking robots for defects as they came off
15088-404: The episode as the sixth best Futurama episode. In 2013, they reassessed the list and upgraded it to third best. In 2001, executive producer David X. Cohen noted that this was one of his favorite episodes of the series. Sci Fi Weekly gave the episode an "A" grade and noted that it was "a half hour of pure entertainment". Zack Handlen of The A.V. Club gave the episode an A. This episode
15252-454: The episode. Most episodes in Season 6 and Season 7 use an abridged opening sequence, omitting the brief clip of a classic cartoon. " Rebirth ", " That Darn Katz! ", " Benderama ", " Yo Leela Leela ", " Decision 3012 ", " Forty Percent Leadbelly ", " T.: The Terrestrial ", " Leela and the Genestalk ", and " Stench and Stenchability " have been the only episodes since " Spanish Fry " to feature
15416-537: The episodes " Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV " and " Spanish Fry ". As the series began high-definition production in 2007 with the four direct-to-DVD movies and season 6 on Comedy Central, the opening sequence was updated to match, and a slightly slower and revamped remix of the theme song, which replaced the Amen break with a higher-fidelity drum recording and was previously used in the Futurama video game , replaced
15580-428: The episodes "Love's Labours Lost in Space" and " The Problem with Popplers " (respectively). Soon after first meeting him, Leela has sex with him out of pity. He mentions this encounter repeatedly in later episodes while remaining convinced that Leela lusts after him despite her opposition to the idea. He is known to make catastrophic mistakes (such as destroying D.O.O.P. headquarters in " Brannigan, Begin Again "), yet, in
15744-442: The face or body, improving legibility of an expression. PowerAnimator and Maya were used to draw the comic-like CGI whilst Toonz was used for digital ink and paint and compositing. The series began high-definition production in season 6 , with Bender's Big Score . The opening sequence was re-rendered and scaled to adapt to the show's transition to 16:9 widescreen format. For the final episode of season 6 , Futurama
15908-654: The front seat of the car is a box, and when questioned about the contents, Schrödinger replies "A cat, some poison, and a cesium atom". Fry asks if the cat is alive or dead, and Schrödinger answers "It's a superposition of both states until you open the box and collapse the wave function." When Fry opens the box, the cat jumps out and attacks him. The run is a reference to the Schrödinger's cat thought experiment of quantum mechanics. The series makes passing references to quantum chromodynamics (the appearance of Strong Force -brand glue), computer science (two separate books in
16072-419: The future. Fry is a goofy, dim-witted, slovenly but well-meaning individual. The series follows his transition from the 20th century to the 31st century. Billy West used an impression of his own voice at age 25 to create Fry's voice. Turanga Leela (voiced by Katey Sagal ) is the female lead of the series. She is a one-eyed mutant who Fry meets after waking up 1000 years in the future. Originally working as
16236-556: The game Qix . The game was rejected by Broderbund . One of Cohen's inspirations for the character of Dr. Zoidberg was the fact that Star Trek character Leonard McCoy , the ship's doctor, frequently administered medical treatment to aliens such as Spock , so Cohen wished human characters in Futurama to be in the uneasy situation of being treated by an alien doctor. Amy Wong (voiced by Lauren Tom ) works as an intern at Planet Express, supposedly kept around because she shares Professor Farnsworth 's blood type and doesn't notice
16400-547: The humor tradition of Groening's two series, finding that The Simpsons echoes the strains of American-Irish vaudeville humor – the beer-soaked, sneaking-in-late-while-the-wife's-asleep comedy of Harrigan and Hart , McNulty and Murray, the Four Cohans (which, yes, included George M. ) and countless others: knockabout yet sentimental, and ultimately about the bonds of blood family. Futurama , conversely, stems from Jewish-American humor, and not just in
16564-480: The idea for this episode when they were planning the three plot lines for " Anthology of Interest II ". As the idea developed they eventually had so much material for it that they broke it out as a separate episode. The reason the concept was originally under consideration for the "What if..." scenario was that when Groening and Cohen originally created Futurama they decided there would not be any time travel; however they changed their mind and decided to go forward with
16728-492: The idea. The writers did not want to create a situation that would leave fans wondering why the Planet Express crew could not simply travel through time on a regular basis. For this purpose they chose to have it occur unintentionally during a supernova as that was deemed to be a suitably rare occurrence. Futurama has returned to the theme of time travel three times since; in Futurama: Bender's Big Score , although
16892-525: The lights that appear in the opening sequence. All four movies' end credits utilized an edited version from the full-length remix of the theme instead of the original end credits theme, and an even shorter edit was introduced in season 6. Another update of the opening sequence in season 8 for Hulu added more visual gags, and the end credits theme was replaced again with an edit of the 2012 digital download release version, which added an extra layer of beats. There are three alternative alphabets that appear often in
17056-468: The loss of Bender, until he realizes that his head must still be where it landed in New Mexico. The crew return to Roswell's ruins with a metal detector and dig up the head, still intact and functioning. They attach it to Bender's still-mangled, hovering, " UFO " body and return to New New York, content that their misadventures in 1947 have not changed history in any way. The writing team came up with
17220-410: The main cast, Frank Welker voiced Nibbler and Kath Soucie voiced Cubert and several supporting and minor characters. Like The Simpsons , many episodes of Futurama feature guest voices from a wide range of professions, including actors, entertainers, bands, musicians, and scientists. Many guest-stars voiced supporting characters, although many voiced themselves, usually as their own head preserved in
17384-520: The main characters participating in the Roswell Incident in 1947. The episode was written by J. Stewart Burns and directed by Rich Moore . "Roswell That Ends Well" scored a Nielsen rating of 3.1 during its original broadcast, and it received acclaim from television critics, with many hailing it as one of the best episodes of Futurama . It won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (Programming Less Than One Hour) in 2002. As
17548-458: The marine theme in a playfully absurd way, with just about any marine Arthropoda or Mollusca being implied to be akin to Zoidberg. The crew are often disgusted by his foul habits, such as squirting ink or eating from trash cans, though he is mostly oblivious to their true feelings about him, having referred to Hermes Conrad and Bender as friends. Hermes seems to have the most intense dislike of Zoidberg, seeing him as even more expendable than
17712-549: The middle of a nuclear weapon testing range, and Enos is killed in a bomb test. When Fry visits Mildred to console her on Enos' death, she begins to seduce him. Realizing that his existence has not been erased, he concludes that she cannot be his grandmother. The two have sex that night and are found by the rest of the crew the following morning. Seeing that Mildred has begun to act like his grandmother, Fry panics after Farnsworth tells him that he has become his own grandfather . With time running out, Farnsworth decides that secrecy
17876-400: The military "reconstructs" Bender's body as such. Meanwhile, the microwave oven needed to return to the future has been destroyed and a replacement is not yet commercially available. A microwave antenna from the army base would work as a viable alternative, but Professor Farnsworth warns that stealing it could change history. He likewise warns Fry against visiting his grandfather, Enos, who
18040-549: The movement of spaceships , explosions, nebulae , large crowds, and snow scenes. The opening sequence was entirely rendered in CGI. The CGI was rendered at 24 frames per second (as opposed to hand-drawn often done at 12 frames per second) and the lack of artifacts made the animation appear very smooth and fluid. CGI characters looked slightly different due to spatially "cheating" hand-drawn characters by drawing slightly out of proportion or off-perspective features to emphasize traits of
18204-403: The movie Into the Wild Green Yonder , she tells her father that she wears the sweatsuit because she knew he always wanted a son. When provoked, Amy can swear in poorly spoken Cantonese , such as "Aiya, da sei nei", which roughly translates to "Oh my God, I'll beat you to death". According to her, because of her supreme cuteness, Amy had cuteness reduction surgery on her cheek and nose when she
18368-463: The network would have any creative input into the show. With The Simpsons , the network has no input. Fox was particularly disturbed by the concept of suicide booths , Doctor Zoidberg , and Bender 's anti-social behavior. Groening explains, "When they tried to give me notes on Futurama , I just said: 'No, we're going to do this just the way we did Simpsons .' And they said, 'Well, we don't do business that way anymore.' And I said, 'Oh, well, that's
18532-563: The obvious archetype of Dr. Zoidberg. From vaudeville to the Catskills to Woody Allen , it's that distinctly rueful humor built to ward away everything from despair to petty annoyance – the 'You gotta do what you gotta do' philosophy that helps the Futurama characters cope in a mega-corporate world where the little guy is essentially powerless. Animation maven Jerry Beck concurred: I'm Jewish, and I know what you're saying. Fry has that [type of humor], Dr. Zoidberg, all
18696-518: The only episodes that directly tie into the opening, with Bender deliberately crashing the ship after seeing an advertisement for free beer in "Decision 3012", while in "The Problem with Popplers", Leela crashes through it during an ad for Popplers, with Fry saying "That's the second billboard you've crashed through this week!". " Viva Mars Vegas " features a unique handmade variant of the opening, using cardboard, plastic, and model ships guided by strings and rods. Series director Scott Vanzo has remarked on
18860-429: The only way I do business.'" The episode " I, Roommate " was produced to address Fox's concerns, with the script written to their specifications. Fox strongly disliked the episode, but after negotiations, Groening received the same independence with Futurama . The name Futurama comes from a pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair . Designed by Norman Bel Geddes , the Futurama pavilion depicted how he imagined
19024-411: The original theme. Bender's Big Score has an extended opening sequence, introducing each of the main characters. In The Beast with a Billion Backs and Bender's Game the ship passes through the screen's glass and temporarily becomes part of the environment depicted therein—a pastiche of Disney 's Steamboat Willie and Yellow Submarine respectively—before crashing through the screen glass on
19188-525: The plot. In the planning stages it was decided that actions that played to screen left would represent events from the past or a setback to the plot. Likewise, screen right indicated progress or moving past their problems. TV critic Rob Owen perceived the episode to have touched upon many of the plot devices and themes commonly seen in time travel stories, most notably the Back to the Future and Terminator movies. The episode also shares much in common with
19352-408: The present. Groening notes that, from the show's conception, his goal was to make what was, on the surface, a goofy comedy that would have underlying "legitimate literary science fiction concepts". The series contrasted " low culture " and " high culture " comedy; for example, Bender's catchphrase is the insult "Bite my shiny metal ass" while his most terrifying nightmare is a vision of the number 2,
19516-442: The production line. Bender was built without a backup module, but Hermes' compassion for the baby robot led him to override Bender's "defective" assessment and give him a chance at life. He turned in his resignation afterward, and later destroyed all evidence of his employment there to prevent Bender from learning the truth, almost being killed in the process. At the end of the episode, he smiles as he watches his personnel file burn. In
19680-427: The proprietor of Planet Express , he alternates between intelligence and amoral senility due to his greatly advanced age, stated to be at least 150 years old on multiple occasions (160 years old as of " A Clone of My Own "). He demonstrates a mastery of any field of science necessary for the series' plots and is suggested to be one of the most brilliant inventors on Earth. However, he falls asleep constantly, and he
19844-703: The public eye, he is seen as an established and reputable leader of the Earth's army. Though viewed publicly as a respected hero for his numerous military victories, almost all of these victories are against comically weak opponents or achieved through tactics that wantonly disregard the safety of his own soldiers. The character is based on the Star Trek captain James T. Kirk , played by William Shatner . The show's executive producer David X. Cohen has described Brannigan as "half Captain Kirk, half actual William Shatner". Zapp
20008-609: The radio persona of Doug Tracht , also known as "The Greaseman." Lieutenant Kif Kroker (voiced by Maurice LaMarche ) is the long-suffering assistant to Captain Zapp Brannigan, consort of Amy, and Fourth Lieutenant on the Democratic Order of Planets (DOOP) starship Nimbus . Kif is a short and thin green-skinned alien from the planet Amphibios 9. His frustration with Brannigan's arrogance, general incompetence, and lack of personal boundaries in Season 1 leads him to be
20172-490: The reference to the origin of the word robot made in the name of the robot-dominated planet Chapek 9, and the black rectangular monolith labeled "Out of Order" in orbit around Jupiter (a reference to Arthur C. Clarke 's Space Odyssey series ). Bender and Fry sometimes watch a television show called The Scary Door , a humorous parody of The Twilight Zone . Journalist/critic Frank Lovece in Newsday contrasted
20336-464: The remote for the robots. They get back together briefly, but break up once more when Mom learns the Professor had been initially using her. It is revealed in Bender's Game that the Professor is the biological father of Mom's youngest son Igner — the one whom Mom despises the most. Many references to the pulp science fiction magazine Weird Tales indicate the Professor may be named in honour of its editor Farnsworth Wright . Another possibility
20500-759: The rest of the crew. However, when Fry reads Hermes' mind in Into the Wild Green Yonder , it is revealed that Hermes sees him as "pathetic but lovable". In " The Six Million Dollar Mon ", after Hermes quits Planet Express and trades his own body parts for robot parts, a depressed Zoidberg recovers the discarded parts and sews them together to create a full-fledged ventriloquist dummy of Hermes, which he later uses to transplant Hermes' brain out of his robot body and back into his original body. After Hermes thanks him and admits that they had never been friends, Zoidberg callously calls out Hermes for his treatment of him, leaving Hermes impressed with this confrontation. Zoidberg briefly becomes
20664-487: The revival. Cohen told Newsday in August 2009 that the reported 26-episode order means "[i]t will be up to 26. I can't guarantee it will be 26. But I think there's a pretty good chance it'll be exactly 26. Fox has been a little bit cagey about it, even internally. But nobody's too concerned. We're plunging ahead". Two episodes were in the process of being voice-recorded at that time, with an additional "six scripts ... in
20828-425: The role in future episodes. Following Coolio's death in 2022, David X. Cohen has revealed on TMZ that he recorded new dialogue for Kwanzaabot before his death in an upcoming episode, scheduled to be released in 2023. Futurama is produced by The Curiosity Company and 20th Television Animation (which was previously credited as 30th Century Fox Television and is now credited as 30th Television Animation) with
20992-416: The role of Robot Santa after " Xmas Story " in future episodes but was unable to reprise the role due to scheduling problems. As a result, John DiMaggio took over that role starting with " A Tale of Two Santas ". In that same episode, Dan Castellaneta was unable to reprise the Robot Devil due to his work on The Simpsons . Maurice LaMarche took over that role for that episode only as Castellaneta did reprise
21156-450: The role. West claims that the voice of Fry is deliberately modeled on his own, so as to make it difficult for another person to replicate the voice. Doctor Zoidberg's voice was based on Lou Jacobi and George Jessel . The character of Zapp Brannigan was originally created for and intended to be performed by Phil Hartman . Hartman insisted on auditioning for the role, and "just nailed it" according to Groening. Due to Hartman's death, West
21320-478: The safety of the crew, viewing them as a means to an end, as evidenced in the first episode, where he is indifferent to what happened to his previous crew and only focuses on getting a new one. Farnsworth's employees later discover that their predecessors died while gathering honey from Space Bees (" The Sting "). The Professor issues his new crew the previous crew's career chips from a manila envelope labeled "Contents Of Space Wasp's Stomach" (" Space Pilot 3000 "). It
21484-479: The same treatment; Los Angeles, for example, is depicted as a smog-filled apocalyptic wasteland. Numerous technological advances have been made between the present day and the 31st century. The Head Museum, which keeps a collection of heads alive in jars thanks to technology invented by Ron Popeil (who has a guest cameo in " A Big Piece of Garbage "), has resulted in many historical figures and current celebrities being present, including Groening himself; this became
21648-485: The science-fiction genre. This list follows the season box sets, which feature the episodes in the original production season order, ignoring the order of broadcast. The Hulu revival has alternatively been titled the eighth and ninth seasons (production), and the eleventh and twelfth seasons (broadcast). The tenth and eleventh production seasons will also be considered as Futurama 's thirteenth and fourteenth broadcast seasons. The television network Fox expressed
21812-452: The series to Fox in April 1998, Groening and Cohen had composed many characters and story lines; Groening claimed they had gone "overboard" in their discussions. Groening described trying to get the show on the air as "by far the worst experience of my grown-up life". Fox ordered thirteen episodes. Immediately after, however, Fox feared the themes of the show were not suitable for the network and Groening and Fox executives argued over whether
21976-564: The series' run, in season six, she earns her PhD in Applied physics from Mars University, earning her the title of Doctor . Amy is also able to fly the Planet Express ship, and will sometimes pilot the ship if Leela is unable to. By the end of the series, she is the " Fonfon Ru " – the rough equivalent of a Common Law wife – of Kif Kroker, and the "true" mother of his offspring. Amy's stereotypically Asian meddling parents frequently pressure her to get married and give them grandchildren, which she
22140-548: The series. The main characters are listed first; all other characters are listed in alphabetical order. Only main, supporting, and recurring characters are listed, with brief descriptions of the main and supporting characters also given. Philip J. Fry (voiced by Billy West ), primarily known by his surname Fry , is the main protagonist of the series. He is a 20th-century pizza delivery boy in New York City who, after getting dumped by his girlfriend and being stuck in
22304-474: The sewers are inhabited by mutants . Various devices and architecture are similar to the Populuxe style. Global warming , inflexible bureaucracy , and substance abuse are a few of the subjects given a 31st-century exaggeration in a world where the problems have become both more extreme and more common. Just as New York has become a more extreme version of itself in the future, other Earth locations are given
22468-482: The show later in 2003. The run on Adult Swim revived interest in both series, and when Family Guy found success in direct-to-DVD productions, Futurama ' s producers decided to try the same. In 2005, Comedy Central entered negotiations to take over the syndication rights, during which they discussed the possibility of producing new episodes. In 2006, it was announced that four straight-to-DVD films would be produced, and later split into 16 episodes comprising
22632-524: The show the word Christmas has been replaced with Xmas (pronounced " ex -mas"), and the word ask with aks (pronounced axe ). According to David X. Cohen, it is a running joke that the French language is extinct in the Futurama universe (though the culture remains alive), much like Latin is in the present. In the French dubbing of the show, German is used as the extinct language instead. At
22796-438: The show, but when creator Matt Groening purchased the rights to the logo, the network had a change of heart and allowed the altered version to be aired. Although the series uses a wide range of styles of humor, including self-deprecation , black comedy , off-color humor , slapstick , and surreal humor , its primary source of comedy is its satirical depiction of everyday life in the future and its parodical comparisons to
22960-427: The show. When he lands the part, Calculon returns to his former ways. Leela then makes him feel bad by saying that he has no acting skills, and that the world had forgotten he had even been alive within the first month of his death. She then explains to Bender and Fry that it was a ploy to save his part in the show. The show crew is smitten by his down-to-earth acting skills, and he reveals himself as Calculon. As he takes
23124-422: The supposed wealth and automatic respect of modern doctors—for example, his incompetence at human medicine makes him extremely poor despite his profession, and he is implied to be frequently homeless when not at work. The Decapod (named after the actual Decapoda order of ten-footed crustaceans) are an extended parody on Yiddish culture—the bigger joke being that shellfish are not kosher . The writing riffs on
23288-399: The voices of Philip J. Fry , Professor Farnsworth , Doctor Zoidberg , Zapp Brannigan , and many other incidental characters. West auditioned for "just about every part", landing the roles of the Professor and Doctor Zoidberg. Although West read for Fry, his friend Charlie Schlatter was initially given the role. Due to a casting change, West was called back to audition again and was given
23452-426: The way out. In Into the Wild Green Yonder , a completely different opening sequence involves a trip through a futuristic version of Las Vegas located on Mars. The theme tune is sung by Seth MacFarlane and is different from the standard theme tune. The end of the film incorporates a unique variation of the opening sequence; as the Planet Express Ship enters a wormhole, it converts into a pattern of lights similar to
23616-552: The works, ranging in scale from 'it's a crazy idea that someone's grandmother thought of' to 'it's all on paper'. When Futurama aired June 24, 2010, on Comedy Central, it helped the network to its highest-rated night in 2010 and its highest-rated Thursday primetime in the network's history. In March 2011, it was announced that Futurama had been renewed for a seventh season, consisting of at least 26 episodes, scheduled to air in 2012 and 2013. The first episode of season 7 premiered June 20, 2012, on Comedy Central. In July 2011, it
23780-414: The world would look in 1959. Many other titles were considered for the series, including Aloha, Mars! and Doomsville , which Groening notes were "resoundly rejected, by everyone concerned with it". It takes approximately six to nine months to produce an episode of Futurama . The long production time results in several episodes being worked on simultaneously. The planning for each episode began with
23944-504: The writers collaborated to rewrite the script as a group before sending it to the animation team. At this point the voice recording was also started and the script was out of the writers' hands. The writing staff held three Ph.D.s , seven master's degrees , and cumulatively had more than 50 years at Harvard University . Series writer Patric M. Verrone stated, "we were easily the most overeducated cartoon writers in history". Futurama had eight main cast members. Billy West performed
24108-613: The writers' device to feature and poke fun at contemporary celebrities in the show. Several of the preserved heads shown are those of people who were already dead well before the advent of this technology; one of the most prominent examples of this anomaly is former U.S. president Richard Nixon , who died in 1994 and appears in numerous episodes. The Internet, while being fully immersive and encompassing all senses—even featuring its own digital world (similar to Tron or The Matrix )—is slow and largely consists of pornography, pop-up ads , and "filthy" (or Filthy Filthy) chat rooms . Some of it
24272-434: Was David Duchovny . It is revealed in " Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV " that throughout his entire time on All My Circuits , he has only ever done one take for each scene; in " Calculon 2.0 " Calculon professes to not know the meaning of a "second take". In the episode " The Honking ", it is revealed that his first job was in 2019 as a motorised service arm building the most evil car in existence, Project Satan. Calculon
24436-442: Was a teenager. Amy has dated a few men, and she expresses a sexually adventurous attitude. In Bender's Game she portrayed bisexual characteristics. In " Proposition Infinity ", she had a robosexual relationship with Bender ; she also has a thing for 'bad boys'. She dated Fry for a time in " Put Your Head on My Shoulders ", but the relationship was brief as Fry quickly got sick of her. However, during their relationship, he
24600-481: Was completely reanimated in three different styles: the first segment of the episode features black-and-white Fleischer - and Walter Lantz -style animation, the second was drawn in the style of a low-resolution video game, and the final segment was in the style of Japanese anime . Much like the opening sequence in The Simpsons with its chalkboard gags , Lisa’s sax solo , and couch gags , Futurama has
24764-533: Was fooled multiple times into untying him, despite the dangers. As she said herself, "Fool me seven times, shame on you, fool me eight or more times, shame on me." She uses Martian slang, which is simply American slang with altered consonants. Amy tends to wear rather provocative outfits. Her standard outfit is a midriff baring pink sweatshirt, matching sweatpants, and brown boots, with other outfits consisting of anything that reveals her navel. She confesses to Fry that she dresses that way to rebel against her parents; in
24928-432: Was frozen at. After Fry gives Bender a reason to keep living, the two are caught by Leela, who joins them in going to Planet Express . Bender fulfills a variety of odd jobs at the company, including the head chef, and is also Fry's best friend and roommate. Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth (voiced by Billy West ) is Fry's great (×30) nephew and great (×31) grandson because of time reef paradox . A mad scientist and
25092-465: Was given the role. West states that his version of Zapp Brannigan was an imitation of Hartman and also "modeled after a couple of big dumb announcers I knew". Katey Sagal voiced Leela , and is the only member of the main cast to voice only one character. The role of Leela was originally assigned to Nicole Sullivan . In an interview in June 2010, Sagal remarked that she did not know that another person
25256-479: Was involved in an accident, which caused her to have his head grafted onto her shoulder to save his life. She still carries a disfiguring scar from the incident. She has been dating Kif Kroker since 3001. Although she is not ready for total commitment, Amy is sure that one day she will be. In " Kif Gets Knocked Up A Notch ", she became the "Smizmar" of Kif's children; that is, she inspired the feelings of love that caused Kif to be receptive to procreation. Although Leela
25420-474: Was moved again, this time to 7:00 pm on Sunday, its third position in less than a year. Even by the fourth season, Futurama was being aired erratically. Because the show was regularly pre-empted by sporting events, it became difficult to predict when new episodes would air. The erratic schedule resulted in Fox not airing several episodes that had been produced for seasons three and four, instead holding them for
25584-422: Was nominated for 17 Annie Awards , winning nine of them, and 12 Emmy Awards , winning six. It was nominated four times for a Writers Guild of America Award , winning for the episodes " Godfellas " and " The Prisoner of Benda ". It was nominated for a Nebula Award and received Environmental Media Awards for the episodes " The Problem with Popplers " and " The Futurama Holiday Spectacular ". Merchandise includes
25748-404: Was originally intended for the Futurama theme to be remixed in every episode. This was first trialled in the opening sequence for " Mars University ", however it was realized upon broadcast that the sound did not transmit well through most television sets and the idea was subsequently abandoned. Despite this, beatbox renditions of the theme performed by Billy West and John DiMaggio are used for
25912-502: Was renewed for a seventh season , with the first half airing in 2012 and the second in 2013. An audio-only episode featuring the original cast members was released in 2017 as an episode of The Nerdist Podcast . On February 9, 2022, Hulu revived the series with a 20-episode order, which premiered on July 24, 2023. In November 2023, the show was renewed by Hulu for two more broadcast seasons, which will air through 2026. Futurama received critical acclaim throughout its run and
26076-511: Was reported that the show had been picked up for syndication by both local affiliates and WGN America . Broadcast of old episodes began in September 2011. On September 19, 2011, WGN America began re-running Futurama , carrying it until 2014. Futurama doubled its viewership in syndication in 2012. Due to the uncertain future of the series, there have been four designated series finales . " The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings ", Into
26240-420: Was revived in 2007 as four direct-to-video films, the last of which was released in early 2009. Comedy Central entered into an agreement with 20th Century Fox Television to syndicate the existing episodes and air the films as 16 new, half-hour episodes, constituting a fifth season. In June 2009, Comedy Central picked up the show for 26 new half-hour episodes, which began airing in 2010 and 2011. The show
26404-441: Was run over by Project Satan, and became a were-car (the robot equivalent of a werewolf ). The curse is broken at the end of the episode, when Project Satan is destroyed. In " Bend Her ", Calculon begins a relationship with Bender while he is disguised as Coilette of Robonia; Bender undergoes temporary gender reassignment to participate in the fembot league of the 3004 Earth Olympics. He becomes smitten with Bender's alter ego, who
26568-412: Was smaller than the original crew. It was originally announced that main voice actors West, DiMaggio, and Sagal would return as well, but on July 17, 2009, it was announced that a casting notice was posted to replace the entire cast when 20th Century Fox Television would not meet their salary demands. The situation was later resolved, and the entire original voice-cast returned for the new episodes. Near
26732-456: Was temporarily decapitated in Bender's Big Score . Hermes is also overweight, caused by over three decades of overeating including LaBarbara's goat curry , which has made his skin too spicy and acidic for consumption by others. Phil LaMarr stated that he was originally named Dexter, did not have a Jamaican accent, and was more uptight. Series creator Matt Groening walked up to LaMarr after an early table read and said "Hey Phil, can you do
26896-458: Was to originally voice Leela until many years after the show first began. John DiMaggio performed the voice of the robot Bender Bending Rodríguez and other, more minor, characters. Bender was the most difficult character to cast, as the show's creators had not decided what a robot should sound like. DiMaggio originally auditioned for the role of Professor Farnsworth, using the voice he uses to perform Bender, and also auditioned for Bender using
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