Futurama is an American animated science fiction sitcom created by Matt Groening and developed by Groening and David X. Cohen for the Fox Broadcasting Company, and later revived by Comedy Central and then Hulu. The series follows Philip J. Fry, a young man who 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 Cohen, a Simpsons writer, 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 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 production season, or the sixth to be broadcast (2008–2009).
In June 2009, Comedy Central picked up the series for 26 new half-hour episodes, which aired in 2010 and 2011, constituting the sixth production season, or the seventh (2010) and eighth (2011) to be broadcast. The show was renewed for a seventh production season, airing as the ninth (2012) and tenth (2013) broadcast seasons. On February 9, 2022, Hulu revived the series with a twenty-episode order, which was released as two separate production and broadcast seasons. In November 2023, the series was renewed by Hulu for a further twenty episodes, taking the series through to an eleventh production (fourteenth broadcast) season. Futurama resumed airing new episodes on August 3, 2026. Three extended-length specials are in production, which are expected to premiere in 2027.
Futurama has received critical acclaim throughout its run and 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 a tie-in comic book series, video games, calendars, clothes, and action figures. In 2013, TV Guide ranked Futurama on its list of the "60 Greatest TV Cartoons of All Time".
Premise Characters
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 the central trio of Fry, Leela, and Bender, though occasional storylines center on the other main characters. Philip J. Fry (voiced by Billy West) is a slovenly, gullible, yet good-hearted and sensitive pizza delivery boy who falls into a cryogenic pod, causing it to activate and freeze him just after midnight on January 1, 2000. He reawakens on New Year's Eve of 2999 and gets a job as a cargo delivery boy at Planet Express, a company owned by his only living relative, Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth. Fry's love for Leela is a recurring theme throughout the series. Turanga Leela (voiced by Katey Sagal) is the competent, one-eyed captain of the Planet Express Ship. Abandoned as a baby, she grows up in the Cookieville Minimum Security Orphanarium believing herself to be an alien from another planet, but learns that she is actually a mutant from the sewers in the episode "Leela's Homeworld". Prior to becoming the ship's captain, Leela works as a career assignment officer at the cryogenics lab where she first meets Fry. She is Fry's primary love interest and eventually becomes his wife. Her name is a reference to the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Olivier Messiaen. Bender Bending Rodriguez (voiced by John DiMaggio) is a foul-mouthed, heavy-drinking, cigar-smoking, kleptomaniacal, misanthropic, egocentric, ill-tempered robot manufactured by Mom's Friendly Robot Company. He is originally programmed to bend girders, and is later designated as assistant sales manager and cook at Planet Express, despite lacking a sense of taste. He is Fry's best friend and roommate. He must drink heavily to power his fuel cells and becomes the robot equivalent of drunk when low on alcohol. Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth (voiced by Billy West), also known simply as "the Professor", is Fry's distant nephew, and technically descendant. Farnsworth founds Planet Express Inc. to fund his work as a mad scientist. Although he is depicted as a brilliant scientist and inventor, at more than 160 years old (between 10–20 years off from death, according to "The Numberland Gap") he is extremely prone to age-related forgetfulness and fits of temper. In the episode "A Clone of My Own", the Professor clones himself to produce a successor, Cubert Farnsworth (voiced by Kath Soucie), whom he treats like a son. Hermes Conrad (voiced by Phil LaMarr) is the Jamaican accountant of Planet Express. A 36th-level bureaucrat (demoted to level 37 during the series) and proud of it, he is a stickler for regulation and enamored of the tedium of paperwork and bureaucracy. Hermes is also a former champion in Olympic Limbo, a sport derived from the popular party activity. He gave up limbo after the 2980 Olympics when a young fan, imitating him, broke his back and died. Hermes has a wife, LaBarbara, and a 12-year-old son, Dwight. Dr. John A. Zoidberg (voiced by Billy West) is a Decapodian, a squid/lobster-hybrid alien from his home planet Decapod 10, and the neurotic staff physician of Planet Express. Although he claims to be an expert on humans, his knowledge of human anatomy and physiology is woefully inaccurate (at one point, he states that his doctorate is actually in art history). Zoidberg's expertise seems to be with extra-terrestrial creatures. Homeless and penniless, he lives in the dumpster behind Planet Express. Although Zoidberg is depicted as being Professor Farnsworth's long-time friend, he is held in contempt by everyone on the crew. Amy Wong (voiced by Lauren Tom) is an incredibly rich, blunt, ditzy, and accident-prone yet sweet-hearted long-term intern at Planet Express. She is an astrophysics student at Mars University and heiress to the western hemisphere of Mars. In the second episode of season one, the Professor states that he likes having Amy around because she has the same bloodtype as him. Born on Mars, she is ethnically Chinese and is prone to cursing in Cantonese and using 31st-century slang. Her parents are the wealthy ranchers Leo and Inez Wong. She is promiscuous in the beginning of the series, but eventually enters a monogamous relationship with Kif Kroker. In the show's sixth season, she acquires her doctorate, and in the eighth season, she and Kif become parents.
Setting
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 the sewers are inhabited by mutants. Various devices and architecture are similar to the Populuxe style. Global warming, capitalism, 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 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 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 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 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 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 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, Kwanzaa-bot and (in a couple of appearances) Hanukah Zombie. 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.
Futuramas setting 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.Verrone, Patric M (2003), DVD commentary for "The Sting", Futurama. Original air date June 1, 2003. No. 12, Season 4. 20th Century Fox. The "world of tomorrow" setting is used to highlight and lampoon issues of today and to parody the science-fiction genre.
Episodes
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 thirteenth and fourteenth broadcast seasons.
Production Development