Futurama's back and everything is good again. Probably forever.

Solid Snake · 06-24-2010, 02:00 AM

...The real problem with Futurama is that I thought the first four seasons (+ the first movie) were so perfectly well-contained and told such a cohesive storyline that I'm not sure what the heck Futurama's going to be about anymore. I just sort of feel like the show's explored all the interesting avenues and continuing it may result in yet another Family Guy style letdown in quality.

I'll put it this way: When I watched the first movie my initial reaction (Aside from "This is awesome! A Futurama movie! I thought I'd never witness another episode!") was that the writers essentially crammed all the "deep" or "serious" remaining material they planned to explore in future Futurama seasons into said movie. The first movie seemed to resolve all the unanswered questions that the show subtly asked us to examine, like "Why did Fry go to the future?" and "Why is Fry special?" and "Who is Nibbler and what is his purpose?" and "Why did it appear that an alien race destroyed the Earth during that montage when Fry was frozen?"

...With all those questions essentially resolved, Futurama's either going to have to create new mysteries out of thin air or completely ignore the deeper or more serious series-wide content in favor of just seeking out quick laughs. I've always felt the strongest Futurama episodes were the ones with the heavier content, though (such as Luck of the Fryish, and of course the one with Fry's dog.) Those episodes tended to be ones that Groening and his cowriters had planned from the very beginning, and the series benefited from it; that same dynamic isn't going to be present now.

Oh, there's still plenty of stories that could be told about a cast of lovable characters getting into random shenanigans in the future, but I feel that Fry and Leela and Bender's stories are all done, or they should be done. If Fry and Leela aren't in a strong relationship together in upcoming season(s), it will only be due to artificial reasons (the writers ignoring the character's past development in favor of continuing the tension.) That holds true with Amy and Kip, too.

06-24-2010, 02:00 AM	#11
Solid Snake Erotic Esquire Join Date: Nov 2003 Posts: 5,563	...The real problem with Futurama is that I thought the first four seasons (+ the first movie) were so perfectly well-contained and told such a cohesive storyline that I'm not sure what the heck Futurama's going to be about anymore. I just sort of feel like the show's explored all the interesting avenues and continuing it may result in yet another Family Guy style letdown in quality. I'll put it this way: When I watched the first movie my initial reaction (Aside from "This is awesome! A Futurama movie! I thought I'd never witness another episode!") was that the writers essentially crammed all the "deep" or "serious" remaining material they planned to explore in future Futurama seasons into said movie. The first movie seemed to resolve all the unanswered questions that the show subtly asked us to examine, like "Why did Fry go to the future?" and "Why is Fry special?" and "Who is Nibbler and what is his purpose?" and "Why did it appear that an alien race destroyed the Earth during that montage when Fry was frozen?" ...With all those questions essentially resolved, Futurama's either going to have to create new mysteries out of thin air or completely ignore the deeper or more serious series-wide content in favor of just seeking out quick laughs. I've always felt the strongest Futurama episodes were the ones with the heavier content, though (such as Luck of the Fryish, and of course the one with Fry's dog.) Those episodes tended to be ones that Groening and his cowriters had planned from the very beginning, and the series benefited from it; that same dynamic isn't going to be present now. Oh, there's still plenty of stories that could be told about a cast of lovable characters getting into random shenanigans in the future, but I feel that Fry and Leela and Bender's stories are all done, or they should be done. If Fry and Leela aren't in a strong relationship together in upcoming season(s), it will only be due to artificial reasons (the writers ignoring the character's past development in favor of continuing the tension.) That holds true with Amy and Kip, too. __________________ *WARNING:* Snek's all up in this thread. Be prepared to read massive walls of text.