Figure 1 - Comedy Central instead of FOX? This may be the case, only no longer just in syndication

“Huzzahs are in order! Huzzah!!!”

Cable television has once again resurrected an animated show that was given its pink slip far too early–except this time they’re taking matters into their own hands. The first lucky recipient of reanimated life was Family Guy, which had its canceling network, FOX, order new episodes after seeing the show’s reruns post impressive ratings on Cartoon Network’s late night programming block, Adult Swim.  Now, after six long years of waiting, a spokesperson for 20th Century FOX Television has confirmed that Comedy Central has ordered 26 brand-spankin’ new episodes of Futurama. While the FOX Network executives have had brain slugs on their heads for some time now, Comedy Central realized the potential of the Planet Express crew and made a lot of fans of the show extremely happy.  Huzzah!!!

“If anyone needs me I’ll be in the Angry Dome.”

According to the Futurama Wikipedia page, the show had 6.4 million viewers at the time of its cancellation.  So why was Futurama canceled in the first place?  Futurama was a show with fantastic writing, superb character development, and as creator Matt Groening had envisioned, a goofy comedy that would have underlying “legitimate literary science fiction concepts.” At the conclusion of its first season, Futurama had posted higher ratings than South Park, Family Guy, and King Of the Hill.  The writers of Futurama saw their impending doom coming placing hints throughout (Figure 1) and using obvious insinuation such as when Bender said, “Another classic science fiction show canceled before its time” in the episode Where No Fan Has Gone Before when referring to Star Trek.  So what in Sega Genesis happened?

“People said I was dumb, but I proved them!”

Figure 2 - Another unfortunate casualty of the FOX Network. There's always money in the banana stand...

Okay, so I know what happened, but revealing why Futurama got canceled in the last paragraph completely ruins the structure of my post.  People, we’re talking about the FOX Network.  If it’s not American Idol (who cares) or 24 (thank God), it’s probably going to get canceled. FOX has been responsible for the cancellation of some superb programs.  The previously mentioned Family Guy was canceled after only a few short seasons, only to be renewed years later. The resurgance of Family Guy has given life to two other Seth MacFarlane creations, American Dad and The Cleveland Show.  Quite possibly the funniest show ever, Arrested Development (Figure 2), was canceled after three seasons only to find a cult following on DVD. A feature film based on the show is in the works.  I’m also told that Firefly, a science fiction show that I need to get around to seeing, was excellent. The entire series was apparently put on DVD, sold out, and Universal Studios decided to make a movie: Serenity.  The most recent casualty has been Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which FOX, in a genius move, moved to Friday nights when nobody watches TV, then canceled it due to the ratings that followed.

The trend with FOX is pretty clear. If the executives don’t like a show, they set it up for failure, regardless of how good it is or how the audience receives it.  When said show fails, it finds even more success than it had before in DVD and syndication, and FOX swoops back in to rake in the dough with movies, spin-offs, and new episodes. For example, FOX aired Arrested Development in its third season opposite Monday Night Football, reduced the episode order from 22 to 13, then aired the final four episodes in a 2-hour block opposite the 2006 Winter Olympics’ opening ceremonies.  The beloved Futurama was given a similar fate.  FOX often pre-empted the show with sporting events, making it difficult to determine when new episodes would be on.  The erratic schedule resulted in FOX ordering no further episodes of the show midway through production of the fourth season, leaving fans asking, “Hey. What kind of party is this? There’s no booze and only one hooker.”

“Don’t you worry about Planet Express. Let me worry about blank.”

As with many other canceled shows before it, Futurama found life in syndication. Cartoon Network acquired the rights to the show and began airing episodes on Adult Swim in 2003.  In 2005, Comedy Central bought the rights upon the expiration of Cartoon Network’s contract, which ended in 2008. Comedy Central planned to put Futurama in a time slot where it could be successful, airing it before South Park.  During its run on Adult Swim, the ratings unsurprisingly peaked 20th Century FOX Television’s interest in new episodes.  It was decided that sixteen episodes would be produced in the form of four straight to DVD movies, with most of the writers and all of the voice actors coming back.   On November 27, 2007, Bender’s Big Score was released on DVD in the United States.

“So I really am important? How I feel when I’m drunk is correct?”

Though not a failed experiment like Professor Farnsworth’s “Death Clock”, I found the DVD movies to be a difficult format for Futurama to maintain its charm in. In self-contained, smaller episodes, the show’s goofy characters, witty one liners, and wealth of science fiction references stand up surrounded by even the weakest plot.  The length of the DVD movies requires the plot be more involved and complex, and I didn’t feel the plots were that intriguing for the most part. That being said, the movies themselves were still relatively good, as any Futurama is better than most of the crap on TV today anyway.  Despite their shortcomings, the success of the DVD sales and the subsequent airing of their segmented parts convinced Comedy Central to pull the trigger and save Futurama.

“Blackmail is such an ugly word. I prefer “extortion.” The “X” makes it sound cool.”

We have more to thank Comedy Central for. Too long has the FOX Network been able to reap all of the benefits posthumously from shows they themselves canceled.  Comedy Central hasn’t put an end to this, but they’ve at least found a small way to punish FOX for their carelessness. As part of the deal, 20th Century Fox still has the option to license the new episodes’ original runs on a broadcast network (I wonder which one? Hmmm…), though this would reduce Comedy Central’s licensing fee for the show.  So either 20th Century Fox gets to air the episodes slightly before Comedy Central and receives less money for them, or Comedy Central gets to air the episodes originally and exclusively.

Nicely done TV Network Execubots of Comedy Central.  Nicely done.

I leave you with the Planet Express crew’s reaction to cancellation and renewal: