Futurama Series Finale After 13 Years….

Hello Everybody! Here is my review of the series finale to one of Matt Groening’s Emmy-winning series, Futurama.

FUTURAMA

DIRECTOR: Matt Groening

STARRING: Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio, Tress MacNeille. Maurice LaMarche, Lauren Tom. Phil LaMarr. David Herman. Frank Welker

GENRE: Sitcom, Adult Animation, Science Fiction

YEAR: 1999-2003, 2008-2013

NUMBER OF EPISODES: 140, 7 Seasons

COUNTRY: United States

I have to say, after 13 years, I am finally happy to see Futurama get a proper send off. If you don’t know, Futurama is a story set in the year 3000 (the story begins on New Years Eve 2999 and end in 3013) in a futuristic version of New York called New New York. We follow the adventures of the Planet Express crew which consists of Fry, Leela, Bender and their inept coworkers. These coworkers include: Professor Farnsworth, Amy Wong, Zoidberg, Hermes, and Scruffy. You can check out some short bios for each character below:

• Phillip J Fry:  A native to the 20th century who was cryogenically frozen seconds into the year 2000, having fallen in just as 1999 ended. He was revived in 2999, and subsequently became a delivery boy for the Planet Express Company
• Turanga Leela:  She is captain of the Planet Express ship. Originally thought to be an alien, it was later discovered that she is a mutant.
• Bender Rodriguez: He was made in Tijuana, serial number 2716057, Mexico in 2997. Bender drinks copious amounts of alcohol to recharge his fuel cells, while displaying symptoms similar to intoxication when he stops. When he burps, fire comes out of his mouth. He gambles, smokes cigars, consorts with hookerbots, had, at one point 50 terabytes of porn on his hard drive, and is constantly trying to gain attention to boost his already over-inflated ego.
• Professor Hubert Farnsworth: The proprietor of the Planet Express delivery service. Professor Farnsworth is pushing the limits of even the 31st century at the old agе of 173. Professor Farnsworth is one of six living relatives of Fry, together with his own clone, Cubert,
• Amy Wong: Professor Farnsworth’s long term intern/grad student who assists the Professor in his mad schemes. Daughter to wealthy Wong family.
• John Zoidberg: He was born on the planet Decapod 10 and moved to Earth to practice medicine after giving up comedy once, despite being a self-proclaimed expert on humans.
• Hermes Conrad: A Jamaican bureaucrat grade 34 and the accountant at Planet Express. He is afraid to make mistakes as this may demote him to a lower grade.

What I admire about Futurama is that it managed to stay on the air this long. Despite cancellations and changing networks, the show has managed to stay at least decent in comparison to earlier seasons. Some of my favorite episodes are in the later seasons. Not a single episode will be as good as “The Devil’s Hands Are Idle Playthings”, the opera is simply amazing.

Okay, well let me get back to the series finale. Warning, SPOILERS WILL FOLLOW. There is plenty of nostalgia in this episode, long term fans on the series will love the nods to the first season. The episode opens with the Planet Express crew making a delivery to the moon. Leela casually tosses the box in the delivery bin, stating”We used to try harder.” After Leela’s near death experience, Fry decides to propose to Leela, and in the course dies multiple times. We get to see this multiple times, thanks to Professor Farnsworth’s time button.

The best part of the episode is it finally wrapped up our Fry and Leela romance. After Fry dies multiple times while being stuck in a time loop, Leela figures out a way to save him. This results in Professor Farnsworth’s death and Fry crushing the time button. The destruction of the button causes the universe to freeze, allowing us to see Fry and Leela grow old together. At the end of the episode, Farnsworth reappears with a way to revert the universe back to the moment before he created the time button, unfortunately erasing all of their memories. Fry prompts a final question to Leela which then ends the episode.

I could not think of any better way to end the series. With out luck though, the show will probably be renewed again in five years when television realizes the mistake they made.

PROS:

• Final wrap-up of Fry x Leela.
• Great time travel story.
• Memorable quotes.
• Fry’s many deaths.

CONS:

• Gets repetitive seeing actions happen over and over.
• What happened to Zoidberg’s girlfriend?

SCORE: 9.0 / 10

If you have any suggestions for films/TV/Games/Music for me to review, drop me a comment!

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Brandon Stuhr

Who am I? Just some guy who decided to start writing on the Internet years ago and now operates his own brand and site. Owner/Operator of Modern Neon Media, I make all kinds of niche content to suit my interests at the time. DIY Enthusiast, Brewmaster extraordinaire, and avid freak for geek culture. Follow on my socials for a more “on” version of me.