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David X. Cohen Talks About Futurama's New Season
joelkeller writes "I spoke to David X. Cohen, executive producer of Futurama, about the upcoming season, which premieres on June 24 on Comedy Central. He talks about the season finale (!) and how the show is always on the precipice of cancellation."
Don't forget to set your DVR's for the new episodes starting tomorrow...
Personally, I think it's always on the precipice of cancellation because it's never been as good as The Simpsons (although The Simpsons has been less and less entertaining over the last few years).
The reason why Fox ruined the original airings of Futurama was because they slotted it at 7:30pm on Sundays... a time slot that got murdered by NFL runovers in the Eastern and Central time zones. Fans couldn't reliably tune in because they didn't know if the episode would air, if the episode would be joined in progress, or if the entire airing would be deleted by an overtime NFL game. Fox's policy of running Sunday primetime as soon as possible... either at 7pm sharp if there was no NFL game, or as soon as it concluded if there was one, made whether Futurama's slot would air and when dependent on which NFL game your city saw that afternoon.
What a mess... since getting the NFL, Fox never had a successful Sunday 7pm hour. A few years after repeated throwing good shows into a bad time slot, they finally got the clue. Fox Sports now produces a postgame show called The OT (a play-on-words based on The OC, which this show has outlasted) that is joined like the halftime show as each game concludes, and can show bonus coverage of games still going to stations that get stuck with an early finish, and always ends at 8pm ET sharp. Thanks for watching Fox NFL Sunday, The Simpsons is next.
Fry, it's been years since medical school, so remind me. Disemboweling in your species, fatal or non-fatal?
Futurama's been on the air so long they should name the season-1 DVD's "Pastarama".
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Death,
By snu snu!!
Carry on.
After the wormhole plunge in the 4th movie, I was a little worried they'd be somewhere new with only their core characters if more new episodes came out. Nice to know Zapp Brannigan is still around.
Global warming and other natural disasters are a direct effect of the shrinking number of pirates - Gospel of the FSM
Yes, it was canceled, and rightly so.
It may make me unpopular, but I fully believe that it's important to bow out before you're useless. Far too many shows wait until they're beyond all hope before bowing out.
It may not have been the choice of the Futurama crew to bow out when they did, but they had one of the best endings I've ever seen in my TV viewings. It was emotional and inspiring.
Then Comedy Central comes along an tries to bring it back to life. It's like Frankenstein, creating a monster that is, but not completely, unlike anything a human would ever enjoy.
I agree the second was better than the first, though I also thought the double take by the guys *after* Amy's reaction was even better ("Oh wait, will you guys be there too? Ummm maybe not!").
I love Futurama, but not just for the intellectual side. How many comedy cartoons have had really good tear-jerker moments? Fry's dog, the story of his five-leaf clover, Leela's parents, etc. That's a damned rare thing for me, and like most guys pretty hard to admit, but Futurama's been able to pull it off more than a couple times.
You, and whoever modded me troll, seem to misunderstand me. I'm in no way saying that Futurama will never be good again.
What I'm saying is that it died a good death. Perhaps it died far too early, but it had the best death imaginable.
I know that we all are left wanting more, but it ended at exactly the right time.
Phew, for a moment there I thought i'd have to order more Torgo Executive Powder.
"The only way they can tell if you watch it is if you are selected for a Nelson survey. And that's why"
That I think, is the root cause of why TV is generally so terrible.
Busy interesting people don't have time for Nielsen surveys. People good at math realize that the time and effort spent will yield about the same results as voting. People who love really good mysteries (or insert your favorite type of show) likely have nothing to watch and comment on during the time of the survey. Really, imagine all the people who actually take part in the Nielsen ratings getting together for a BBQ.
Would you attend?
Operator, give me the number for 911!
When I launched, I checked it out. I was a Simpson's fan at the time so made sense. I was amazed at how good it was. Very rare to have a show that polished out of the gate. If you watch the first season of most animated shows you'll discover that it takes awhile for the voices to get in their groove, for the animation style to solidify and so on. Not Futurama, it was dynamite out of the gate.
However, I found it very hard to keep up on. The fucking thing was never on when it was supposed to be. I'd try and tune in and it wouldn't be on the air. Then they seemed to start shuffling it around. They'd move it to a time slot, I'd learn that, and it'd vanish and move.
I finally gave up.
I suppose it makes less difference now what with DVRs but pre DVR and pro digital cable, it took some effort to track down a show that got moved all the time, and it was real annoying to be on the correct channel at the correct time according to the guide and not see what you want.
I believe the distinction is that Futurama is produced by 20th Century Fox (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/20th_Century_Fox), which is not exactly the same as the Fox TV Channel that killed their distribution originally (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fox_TV). So, I think 20th Century Fox still owns the rights to production and Viacom/Comedy Central are just acting as new distributors.
This post was generated by a Cadre of Uber Monkeys for Monkey-Man2000 (603495).
To an extent I agree. I always find it interesting that British comedies tend to have 6-episodes per series, and most of the greatest comedies have only done a few series. My favourites like Blackadder, Fawlty Towers, Black Books, The IT Crowd, Fast Show, League of Gentlemen etc. have as many episodes in their entire run as one series of Scrubs, but most are remembered as being brilliant. I would of course love to see more episodes of each, but as you say, it would a be a terrible shame if they did more episodes for the sake of it and in doing so ruined the memory of how brilliant the existing episodes are.
No soul? Nothing to say about the people? Okay, it doesn't force the sentimentality down your throat like some shows (and that's a good thing IMO), but there are many moving moments - the four leaf clover episode gets me no matter how many times I watch it with subtle overtones of sibling rivalry overruled by brotherly love spread over a thousand years, and with comedic intervention throughout to stop it becoming too cloying. It's an incredibly clever piece of television because of the human insight.
Futurama never had a soul. -Which is a shame, because it could have done. It offers a huge and fun world to explore, but it never gets serious for even a second
Are you fucking *kidding* me? Have you never watched "Jurassic Bark", "Luck of the Fryfish", or "The Sting"? The Simpsons had some brilliant, emotional moments in it's golden years, but Futurama is easily its equal.