
Futurama Canceled Again - erre
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/04/22/futurama_canceled_bad_news_everyone.html
======
steven2012
I'm as big a fan as anyone, having watched Futurama since day 1. I was lucky
enough to randomly bump into Billy West at Comicon 2010 and nervously muttered
how much I loved Futurama, and he was especially gracious, saying fans like me
were the ones who brought it back.

That being said, I felt that the new episodes never captured the quality of
the original run. They tried too hard at tugging at our heart strings and
never really felt legitimate, unlike the episodes like "Luck of the Fryish",
"Jurassic Bark", etc. I thought the last season was actually bad, and the
plots never made any sense, so I guess it was about time for it to end its
run.

~~~
T-hawk
I'll give a dissenting opinion. I've loved the Comedy Central reboot. The
material is quick and snappy in a way that the earlier seasons weren't,
packing in rapid-fire jokes. And it still consistently throws in bits of real
science and mathematics, like the famous brain-swapping problem and solution.
The movies were uneven, but season six hit a new and sustained peak starting
with the fourth episode.

I often felt like the earlier seasons got too caught up in their own
worldbuilding and forgot the funny. "The Why of Fry" was my personal least
favorite, retconning the entire premise of the show and Nibbler's nature, and
straining on a single joke of Fry's stupidity for the entire episode. Other
low points included the forced Amy-Kif relationship that had little comedy
content and less meaning, Leela's retconned family, and any time filled by
Zapp Brannigan's one-note attempts at jokes. Futurama can't credibly do gross-
out or shock humor in a world where Family Guy cranks it up to eleven every
week.

Futurama is best as a joke turbine playing off the future setting, and IMO
strains for misguided impact whenever it brings up how Fry's family lost a
son. I never bought in to the heartstring-tugging. The characters are too
broadly drawn and fantastical to care about, unlike the Simpsons. The Comedy
Central seasons seem to have figured this out, realizing that it's too late in
the game for any more meaningful character material. Instead, the show has
seriously stressed the pacing and density of the comedy, which for me really
shines now.

~~~
SatvikBeri
_retconning the entire premise of the show and Nibbler's nature_

Opinions on humor are subjective, but I'd like to point out that this was set
up from the beginning and not at all a retcon. For example we can see
Nibbler's shadow in the first episode:
<http://theinfosphere.org/Nibbler%27s_shadow>

Edit: link corrected thanks to meandthebean

~~~
meandthebean
Corrected link: <http://theinfosphere.org/Nibbler%27s_shadow>

------
Svip
To be technically correct - the best kind of correct - the show has only been
cancelled twice. In fact, to be even _more_ technically correct, it hasn't
actually been cancelled, just not renewed.

People tend to confuse the times after the films where there were no new
episodes to show and none in production with a cancellation, because the films
themselves did not bring the show back to television. That's like saying
Arrested Development is cancelled after the film is released, because no new
film or television episodes has been ordered.

~~~
emehrkay
Yeah I've been reading the wikipedia section to see how many times it was
cancelled because the title makes it seem like it was three times.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurama#Cancellation_and_revi...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurama#Cancellation_and_revival)

~~~
DaNmarner
I did the same. Whoever submitted this need to learn what "again" means.

~~~
erre
I submitted this, and as far as I can tell I have a pretty reasonable idea of
what "again" means. If you actually click the link, you'll see that it's the
title of the original article, by Phil Plait.

------
bane
Same story, submitted hours before (by me), is the actual primary source
(follow the slate links to vulture then to my story), flagged

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5592733>

[http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/futurama-not-renewed-
comed...](http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/futurama-not-renewed-comedy-
central/)

 _edit_ I'm not complaining, but it _is_ a little bit frustrating to have it
flagged then see a 3rd-level derived article show up. How can I prevent it in
the future?

~~~
erre
I'm the submitter (not the author) on this story. I searched for "futurama"
before submitting, and didn't find anything related to this cancellation (or
"not renovation", as some threads here would prefer).

I haven't flagged your submission (I've never flagged anything, around here).
FWIW, though, I still find the article I linked to much more interesting that
the EW one, because it focuses on the science and geeky aspects of futurama. I
don't see it as "a 3rd-level derived article", but as "a scientist's take on
the show and its cancellation".

Under that light, then, I'm not sure it _should_ be prevented.

Edit: By "not sure it should be prevented", I don't mean that I think your
submission should have been flagged. I mean that I think the same fact can
allow for multiple submissions, and a derived article may be more interesting
than the original source.

~~~
bane
Absolutely no disagreement from me on anything you wrote here and sorry if I
came across as diminishing the article you submitted. I was not, I was merely
evoking a common thread in many thousands of HN articles where a great story
is posted that is based off of a primary source, but somebody always asks for
the link to the primary source. I think derived articles are not always "blog
spam", and can usually offer interesting and unique commentary and insights
above and beyond what's more or less a press release. Your submission
definitely rises to that level. But it's irritating that the actual source of
the news got killed (regardless of who submitted it).

In this case the opposite happened, but the primary source was killed. I know
this is all a bit meta for HN, but even more meta, I'm finding it more and
more frustrating to submit things as so many sites are now set to auto-kill.

Sorry if such and such news site is considered too biased, but it may be the
only or primary source for a story. The autokill is also surprisingly biased
in and of itself. For example, an article posted from Android Police will get
killed, while an article MacRumors won't.

~~~
erre
Fair enough, I agree that this (subconscious?) auto-kill is silly.

------
_crumbs
> But if I had to pick one that idea laser-focused itself directly into my
> brain, it would be from “The Late Philip J. Fry”.

This is the first episode I watched start to finish. I never really got into
Futurama from just passively watching it but this episode also stuck in my
mind, it was fantastic. Although the author's book may have been used, the
influence of the episode was Poul Andreson's Flight to Forever[1].

[1]<http://theinfosphere.org/The_Late_Philip_J._Fry>

------
SG-
Great show, but I sort of lost interest for some reason after the movies came
out. Regardless it's had 7 seasons which is just as much as Star Trek TNG.

~~~
1qaz2wsx3edc
You know, I somewhat think this is because fans distrust the fate of what will
happen to futurama. However, if it were picked up by another party which
produced smaller amounts and for quality, Futurama could continue forever.
(I'm thinking mini-series 4-7 episodes a season).

I think the biggest problem tv-media is the hiatus, the blanks between seasons
cause an eraser from the general public. If they good give a consist stream of
content, fans would be much more in-tune with it, and less to forget about.

~~~
erre
I think that is a matter of expectation. In England (AFAIK), series aren't
(necessarily) expected to be as continuous, nor even to run through the whole
year. So, for instance, Doctor Who could "get away" with a specials-only year,
between the 4th and 5th series.

~~~
vidarh
Yes, it's quite common here to have series where a season is 6-8 episodes,
once a year or less frequent.

E.g. Red Dwarf have had seasons ranging from 3 (if you count "Back to Earth")
to 8 episodes, with most seasons having 6, and occasional multi-year gaps
between seasons.

~~~
upthedale
I wouldn't just say 'quite common'. I'd say it's the norm.

<http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BritishBrevity>

...usual warning about a tvtropes link, and your subsequent drop in
productivity

------
aquadrop
I hope some company will pick up the whole producing team and will continue
series. Even though someone can say quality of "after movies" episodes wasn't
as high as "before movies" but it's still the best western world animation
there is (considering South Park decline). Also, Futurama's main theme has
been my only cellphone ringtone for many years :)

~~~
mhaymo
> the best western world animation there is

Even restricting ourselves purely to mature comedy shows, I would argue that
Archer and Venture Bros are better than the latest season. I highly recommend
checking them out.

------
_glass
I don't want to do this, but I am really asking myself, how could this be on
the front page of Hacker News?

~~~
nandemo
Because enough people upvoted it? I wish it was possible to downvote stories.

~~~
erre
Well, I won't try to guess why people upvoted it, I can only tell of why I
submitted it: the article (which I haven't written, only come across) is not
just moaning about a cancelled series. It discusses the science that permeates
it, and its geek appeal. Which I thought fitting for hacker news.

~~~
leephillips
Indeed: I've only watched a couple of episodes, and never got into it. But I
was fascinated to read about the "Futurama theorem".

------
clux
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXmYnMuDxUs>

------
conanbatt
Agree, Futurama's last season was quite unentertaining. Not as funny, and too
focused on the emotional stuff, which was more effective being spaced out.

I think that the 'Fausto' episode, finale of the S05, was by far the best
ending Futurama had.

------
lightblade
Netflix should buy the IP off of them and continue the show.

------
andridk
Loved the "Killer App" episode of the new series. Everything else was pretty
meh. Rest in peace, Futarama.

------
thenicepostr
I wish/hope netflix can take on the show, like they did for arrested
development

