Futurama has accidentally become a fascinating document of social change
Futurama has accidentally become a fascinating document of social change
The acclaimed adult cartoon has been brought back from the dead – and not for the first time. It’s never going to recapture the brilliance of the original run, writes Louis Chilton, but the series’ stop-start history has made it a compelling record of changing cultural obsessions
I've just found this article about Futurama on The Independent, a UK newspaper. It comments on the changes in Futurama reflecting the changes in society in general.
The satirical show has to change with the times. It's true. Some of the jokes do get dated. It's hard to write ageless satire. Satire only exists inside of a context. Which is time-bound.
I'm hopeful they're going to find a nice stride this season. The first episode seemed like a rehash of previous ideas. I'm looking forward to some deep satire and thinking coming forward
I'm hoping it gets better. The last time they got canceled and came back they made a few jokes about it then moved on. This time it seemed to be a whole episode focused on the joke.
Are they still the most educated writing staff on TV? IIRC the original writing staff had a bunch of PhD peeps.
I noticed the same thing! It seems like Hulu was really keen on making the first episode all about Hulu, which was annoying and a big red flag for me. Last time I remember they made a "we're back on a new channel" joke it was a bit more subtle and all of 15 seconds long. This new episode just felt like one long eternalized ad.
Wait, Futurama is back?!!!
Yes
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Sadly
I don't usually shit on media articles because it is almost always a case of "Here is prompt X. Money goes to whatever contractor writes the most provocative version" but.. holy crap that is a bad article that is actually contributing toward the widespread media illiteracy of the current world.
No shit? Futurama is very much a "current events" commentary/borderline satire. That inherently is going to reflect current events. And if you go back a decade later, it is going to seem a bit different/"off". Same with Simpsons, Family Guy, South Park, and so forth.
What most high school kids (and adults...) don't realize is that Shakespeare is very much in the same boat. So much of Billy's characters and even plot points are references or commentaries on contemporary events. We are just far enough out that nobody actually cares what some dipshit was rambling about when A Midsummer Night's Dream was written.
Hell, even something as banal as Call of Duty reflects this. Mostly along the lines of what western (mostly US) military propaganda is and is not cool with.
This is up there with the same stupidity that has led to any form of foreshadowing or implied plot points being "plot holes" or whatever the reaction channels call them this week.
So I understand what you are saying, but as somebody who has watched way too much Futurama then he would ever care to admit, I feel the need to make an important distinction about it that I think might help frame the objective of the article better.
Futurama is generally not a pop-culture/current events show. Any references they make to pop-culture are generally dated (intentionally)/or semi-timeless. Some episodes are the exception, like Proposition Infinity and Eye-Phone (whatever the ep is called), but these are not the norm and definitely don’t happen with as much frequency as you’d see in shows like The Simpsons or South Park. It’s part of what makes Futurama so damn good. What I find the show reflects over time is values changing. The way they stop making being gay a joke over time. The way they stop using masculinity as a joke (unless there’s a particular intent with it/commentary), things like that. The relationships between characters evolve and morph and show how society has changed. The things that bother them, even.
I’m on a plane about to take off so I need to stop there. But I think if you decouple the idea that Futurama is a current events/current pop culture show, which if you look at all of the episodes you will see is rarely the case, I think it will make the article seem less lazy and more thoughtful than it originally seemed. That being said I admit it emphasizes the current events episodes too much. But their observation about “The Gender Bender” for instance is more in line with what I’m saying.
Pretty much the only animated show that does real time commentary is south park and that is because their art style is "intentionally shitty" to allow for rapid turnaround... and even they have mostly shifted to trying to have a lot of episodes in the can. The rest tend to operate on often times an almost one year delay. And it is the same reason video games usually reference memes from three or four years before release.
Which, again, was the same with theatre. Sure there were playwrights who would make edits to scripts the morning of to reflect what the royal nonce was doing. Same as there are today. But it was always minor tweaks because you need to make sure your actors can learn their lines. The vast majority was written weeks, if not months, prior.
As for changing social values: Again, that is any media you look at. I recently rewatched The Venture Bros in preparation for the finale and was amused at how ridiculously racist, ableist, and homophobic the first season was... and that they were still using ableist slurs as of the last one (which, to be fair, was like 4 years ago). But, at the same time, being gay stopped being a joke and more just became a thing (except Shore Leave who is a treasure and more a joke about camp gay than just being gay... and is a straight up badass). And while 2/3 (probably 3/3 but she never has enough screen time) of them are complete monsters, it is kind of sweet that Action Man, Sean Connery, and Billy's Mom are heavily implied to have become a throuple with no jokes made about it at all.
You can see the same with The Simpsons in terms of what gags they think are safe or not. And even Family Guy and South Park in terms of what gags they think are "edgy" and not.
As an aside. The fantasy trope of "we need to put on a play to start a war or find our friend" maps much more to modern improv or even stand up comedy than theatre. The cliche talking puppets is basically The Daily Show or even Last Week Tonight. But having Dandelion get on stage and say "So what's the deal with airline food?"... would actually have been amazing. What was my point again?
Everytime I see headlines about documenting periods with TV productions the Simpson kick in.
A single blue collar income capable of buying a house, two cars and food for a family of 6.
Did not realize it was a fantasy show.
Homer has a union job — he was literally head of the union — and Marge got to keep all that Pretzel Wagon money after the Investorettes hired the Yakuza to take out her mafia protectors.
^^ This guy simpson
Tbf, blue collar jobs at nuke plants can pay very well. I knew a tradesman who worked at a plant near me that was paid very well to essentially just always be on call on site in case something in his area of expertise needed fixing, which really does remind me of Homer sleeping on the job because most of the time nuke plants just run themselves.
"Changes aren't permanent.
But change is."-Stoner Headbang
I just recently started rewatching and I was amused by the “gender neutral pac-person” arcade cabinet in the first season, a gag that became even more topical over time.
Zeitgeist / Hegel.
He argued that art reflects the culture of the time in which it was created.
Suspect this is especially true for larger productions, where you have numerous people influencing the production, writers, producers, actors, the studio, director, etc.
Star Trek is the same way. Look at the newer series and how many of them reflect contemporary issues.
The first episode was very meh. No moments where I actually really laughed. Not a great start to the reboot.
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The early seasons were full of jokes that were "of their time". I don't think this is inherently bad. The whole schtick of the show has been to satirize modern life by presenting a wackier futuristic cartoon version of it.
It wasn't strong, but I felt like it was to rebase the whole thing. Because it retcons part of the previous end and sort of set expectations for going forward. Like drawing a line in the sand. This is Futurama and this is Hulu's Futurama
This is a VERY good way to put it. I imagine its hard to start where they left off with so much time in between. Writing styles and comedy have changed within the last 10 years. We're in the age of attention on top of that.
Im not saying that it wont be Futurama. It will be. It just wont taking off running with the steam they left off at.
And i think thats exactly what the first episode encapsulated. It wasnt bad. But it didnt really have any juice to it. To me it felt like it was because they were more focused on shoving the 'idea' of futurama down your throat more than anything else.
With that said, I really do hope the next couple of episodes are better.
So far only one joke made me laugh in every episode. Hopefully it will get better. We need some crazy bender episode. 😇
Aha! Thank you for reminding me that the new season had started. I just downloaded the first ep (fuck hulu).