Why futurama is the best show ever

Most people gave up on Futurama soon after its debut, and Fox shuttled it all around the schedule; by the time the show reached its fourth and apparently final season, episodes were being aired sporadically, with the series finale airing in the doldrums of August. Futurama was a deeply strange show. Futurama was nominally a workplace show, but since that workplace sent its characters spinning off into the far corners of the universe, each episode was really a geeked-out feast for the brain.

To me, the main divide between Futurama and The Simpsons was simple: Simpsons was an instant pop culture sensation and a massive success, while the first run of Futurama has the desperate soul of a show that feels like cancellation is right around the corner. Fear is often a great motivator for sitcoms — witness Arrested Development and the early seasons of The Office and 30 Rock — and it led Futurama to explore every nook and cranny of its cartoon universe. A big joke surrounding The Simpsons for years is that the series might not ever actually end.

In comparison, Futurama has episodes, which is a lot, but still a manageable amount. This allows Futurama to have a much higher ratio of strong episodes. This is largely true for Futurama , but there are still a collection of more important lore-driven episodes that build on each other and comment upon past continuity.

The Simpsons can be satirical and comment upon modern events with a critical eye. That being said, Futurama does become a lot more poignant since it has an ending to fall back on that nicely ties the whole series together. Futurama has actually been revived twice from cancellation and features several pseudo endings, all of which are extremely satisfying.

But it was always strange for the right reasons. Consider this snippet of conversation between Fry and his friend and occasional love interest, Leela:. Not Aliens who look like objects. Fry: So my efforts to establish diplomatic relations with the cactus people were doomed from the start. And like the best satire, it gets at a truth: our predictions of the future are, more often than not, terrible.

You can check out the Popular Science archives for proof. Which ties in perfectly with the herky-jerky trajectory of the show. Who knows.