Animated series' Ratings

    318 195

    All seasons

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    5

    " The future is here!"
    Country
    Runtime 22 min
    Premiere: World March 28, 1999
    Premiere: USA March 28, 1999
    Channel FXX (20:00, United States)
    Digital: World November 20, 2013
    Parental Advisory
    • Alcohol, Drugs & Smoking

      average

    • Violence & Gore

      average

    • Sex & Nudity

      average

    • Frightening & Intense Scenes

      few

    • Profanity

      few

    Production Companies
    Also Known As

    Description

    Philip J. Fry, a pizza delivery boy, is accidentally frozen in 1999 and thawed out on New Year’s Eve 2999.
    Season 1
    s1: e1 — Season 1, Episode 1  

    Space Pilot 3000

    March 28, 1999 8.6
    s1: e2 — Season 1, Episode 2  

    The Series Has Landed

    April 4, 1999 8.1
    s1: e3 — Season 1, Episode 3  

    I, Roommate

    April 6, 1999 8.5
    s1: e4 — Season 1, Episode 4  

    Love’s Labours Lost in Space

    April 13, 1999 8.0
    s1: e5 — Season 1, Episode 5  

    Fear of a Bot Planet

    April 20, 1999 7.7
    s1: e6 — Season 1, Episode 6  

    A Fishful of Dollars

    April 27, 1999 8.1
    s1: e7 — Season 1, Episode 7  

    My Three Suns

    May 4, 1999 7.7
    s1: e8 — Season 1, Episode 8  

    A Big Piece of Garbage

    May 11, 1999 7.9
    s1: e9 — Season 1, Episode 9  

    Hell Is Other Robots

    May 18, 1999 7.8

    Сast and Crew

    Stars

    The History of the Show

      • The U.S. TV premiere of “Futurama” aired on Fox on March 28, 1999, and it quickly positioned itself as a prime-time, adult-oriented sci‑fi animated series.
      • In the late 1990s and early 2000s it drew strong attention, but ratings fluctuated across seasons, which gradually made its position on Fox’s schedule less stable.
      • Frequent time-slot and day changes made it harder for audiences to follow live, encouraging more delayed viewing and word-of-mouth discovery.
      • Even when ratings were uneven, the show built a durable fanbase, praised for blending satirical comedy, sci‑fi concepts, and surprisingly emotional storytelling.
      • Its “smart” humor and dense pop-culture references helped it earn a cult reputation that persisted during off-air periods.
      • After Fox ended its initial run (2003), the series’ visibility grew through cable reruns (notably on Adult Swim and Comedy Central), which expanded the audience and reignited discussion.
      • Strong home-video sales and the popularity of reruns became a major driver of the show’s second life and set the stage for post-cancellation continuations.
      • From 2007 to 2009, the story continued via direct-to-video feature-length releases, a prominent example of audience demand helping a canceled animated series return.
      • From 2010 to 2013, “Futurama” resumed as a regularly airing TV series on Comedy Central, cementing its reputation as a franchise with multiple broadcast eras across different outlets.
      • In 2023, the show was revived again for streaming (on Hulu), underscoring the long-term audience interest decades after its original premiere.
      • Over time, reception became increasingly retrospective: it is often cited as a defining adult sci‑fi animated series that influenced genre tone and expectations for “smart” animated comedy.
      • The show’s mix of sitcom structure, science fiction, and melancholic drama became a reference point for later animated series aiming for both comedy and emotional payoff.
      • Its cancellation-and-revival history is frequently used as a case study in how syndication, home releases, and streaming can reshape a series’ fate beyond initial live ratings.
      • Multiple major awards and nominations (including Emmys) bolstered its mainstream credibility and helped sustain long-term interest.
      • In public discussion of the show’s success and returns, creator Matt Groening and showrunner David X. Cohen are regularly cited as key names associated with the franchise’s longevity.
      • The voice cast—such as Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio, Billy West, Phil LaMarr, and Tress MacNeille—became part of the show’s enduring recognizability across reruns and later platform revivals.

    Premise

    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 (Billy West) – Fry is an immature, slovenly, 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 (Katey Sagal) – Leela 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 (John DiMaggio) – Bender 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 for suicide booths, and is later designated as assistant sales manager and cook, 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 (Billy West) – Professor Farnsworth, also known simply as "the Professor", is Fry's distant nephew. 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 one-hundred and sixty years old 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. *Amy Wong (Lauren Tom) – Amy is an incredibly rich, blunt, spoiled, ditzy, and accident-prone 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. *Hermes Conrad (Phil LaMarr) – Hermes 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 (Billy West) – Zoidberg is a Decapodian, a lobster-like alien from the 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. *Zapp Brannigan (Billy West) – Zapp Brannigan is the incompetent, extraordinarily vain captain of the DOOP starship Nimbus. Although Leela thoroughly detests him, Brannigan—a self-deluded ladies' man—pursues her relentlessly, often at great personal risk. He was originally going to be voiced by Phil Hartman, but Hartman died before production could begin. *Kif Kroker (Maurice LaMarche) – Zapp Brannigan's 4th Lieutenant and long-suffering personal assistant, Kif is a member of the amphibious species that inhabits the planet Amphibios 9. Although extremely timid, he eventually works up the courage to date Amy. Kif is often shown sighing in disgust at the nonsensical rantings of his commanding officer. *Carol "Mom" (Tress MacNeille) – Mom is the malevolent, foul-mouthed, cruel, and narcissistic owner of MomCorp, the thirty-first century's largest shipping and manufacturing company, with a monopoly on robots. In public, she maintains the image of a sweet, kindly old woman by speaking in stereotypically antiquated statements and wearing a mechanical fat suit. She occasionally launches insidious plans for world domination and corporate takeover. She had a romantic history with the Professor which left her bitter and resentful. She has three bumbling sons, Walt, Larry, and Igner (modeled after The Three Stooges), who do her bidding despite frequent abuse, and often infuriate her with their incompetence. In Bender's Game, it is revealed that Igner's father is Professor Farnsworth. Zoidberg in the episode "The Tip of the Zoidberg" refers to Mom as Carol, which is assumed to be her first name. *Nibbler (Frank Welker) – Nibbler is Leela's pet Nibblonian, whom she rescues from an imploding planet and adopts in the episode "Love's Labours Lost in Space". Despite his deceptively cute exterior, Nibbler is actually a highly intelligent super-being whose race is responsible for maintaining order in the universe. He is revealed in "The Why of Fry" to have been directly responsible for Fry's cryogenics freezing. While the size of an average house cat, his race is capable of devouring much larger animals. He defecates dark matter, which until Bender's Game is used as fuel for space cruisers in the series.

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    Critique: 30

    87%
    26 4
    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Besides the spotty writing, the overriding problem with Futurama is that the show really isn’t satire (What are we to relate to? That the New...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Futurama makes for spectacularly conventional, unimaginative sci-fi. And it’s barely funny, even for a pilot or the more narrowly focuse...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    It whips along at a cracking pace, fueled by spanking new ideas, smart one-liners, visual gags and the obligatory cheeky references.

    New York Times December 8, 2017

    If those 15 producers and their countless associates can bolster their good intentions with some more comic fire, this richly drawn show...

    It’s not quite the revelation that The Simpsons was, but Futurama contains enough inventiveness and heart to make it a worthy follow-up.

    Empire Magazine April 19, 2018

    Still, a stream of nerdy randomness makes up for the wobbles, and at its best, it’s as sharp as the day it left us.

    New York Post September 5, 2013

    The future, you’ll be happy to know, is now.

    Slant Magazine April 19, 2018

    [Matt] Groening and [David X.] Cohen hardly envision the terrain of tomorrow as flawless, but its permissive attitude toward love of all mutant sha...

    Entertainment Weekly December 7, 2017

    It’s too bad sci-fi fan Stanley Kubrick didn’t live to see Groening’s gloriously vibrant deconstruction of 2001: A Space Ody...

    Slate December 7, 2017

    Episode 7: While making a delivery to a planet of liquid beings Fry accidentally drinks the Emperor. Drinking the Emperor? I’d say...

    New York Daily News September 5, 2013

    Most heartening, this Futurama doesn’t feel like an exercise in nostalgia, like some old rocker returning for a greatest hits tour.

    Detroit Free Press March 16, 2021

    Futurama is definitely a Groening creation. The characters have the same bug-eyed, chinless faces and the sensibility is mildly anarchic and a...

    Variety December 8, 2017

    It isn’t even quite the "Jetsons With Attitude" that we might have expected. But the animation is richly textured, and there are enough irrev...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Futurama is funny, sometimes hilarious. But you can put your brain in neutral for the whole enjoyable trip.

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Thanks to Matt Groening’s freewheeling, signature impertinence, Futurama is a fresh jolt of astute cartoon lampoon.

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Much as I’d love to despise the spawn of someone whose works intrude so rudely on what might once have passed for imaginative, individual, ci...

    Detroit Free Press April 26, 2018

    The most interesting thing about Fox’s latest animated show, Futurama, is that it’s not very interesting… The pilot is flat-out unfunny.

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    The series' success will depend less on the Jetsons-style sight gags than on the characters' personalities, which, for now, aren’t nearly as...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    This widely anticipated series falls short of The Simpsons in two respects: It isn’t especially funny. And the characters aren’t that a...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Groening again shows his talent for split-level wit which caters alternately to adults and children. Futurama will never match the international im...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Futurama gets off to a slick, fast start, with plenty of the sly asides and visual gimmicks that make The Simpsons so watchable.

    Slant Magazine September 5, 2013

    Truly, not many other shows besides Futurama could pull off something as concurrently gross and sweet as this.

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Let others drool in anticipation of the forthcoming Star Wars prequel. Force, schmorce: we’ll happily settle for the adventures of Fry and hi...

    New York Daily News October 25, 2017

    It has taken Matt Groening a full decade to create a followup series to his reliably riotous series, The Simpsons, but his new effort which is...

    New York Daily News February 9, 2018

    Mandy Patinkin, an actor not known for humor, is particularly wonderful as Inigo, a Spaniard out to avenge the death of his father at the hands…

    articles.latimes.com December 7, 2017

    The premiere has the wonderfully distinctive geekiness but not the toothy bite of "The Simpsons," which was something spectacular to behold from th...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    The wait was worth it. Although the pilot, setting up the story, seems slightly thin, Futurama promises to give Groening a new forum for his t...

    AV Club September 5, 2013

    This is a series content to muddle about in its clearly established comfort zone, knocking all the low hanging fruit off the branches, occasio...

    content.time.com December 7, 2017

    The show lacks the vision of The Simpsons, the snappy rhythm and the kind of far-reaching humor that keep it dizzyingly smart even after a dec...

    Detroit Free Press March 17, 2021

    Groening, working with David X. Cohen… shows he has learned the most important Simpsons lesson well: The more human the backdrop, the better t...

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    Quotes

    Bite my shiny metal ass!

    Shut up and take my money!

    I’m not a robot! I’m a free man!

    I don’t want to live on this planet anymore.

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    friends impressions of the animated series.

    Friends comments and ratings

    Watched

    One of the best animated series, just today I saw that they are going to release season 8 in 23

    Translated to English

    Watching

    Currently on the 6th season.

    Watched

    I watched all the original seasons (including the full-length ones) and had a lot of fun. The guys from Ren-TV introduced me to this series as a young man a long time ago and since then it has been one of my top favorites. It’s a classic, nuff said.

    Translated to English

    Watched

    This is a bomb cartoon series! And that’s all there is to laugh about and worry about the characters! I recommend watching 1010.

    Translated to English

    Watched

    Bite my shiny metal ass!