Anyone familiar with the pilot episode of Matt Groening’s Futurama knows that the mayhem started when Fry fell backwards into a cryogenic freezer, where he lay frozen for 1000 lonely years.

Then in 2003 Fox studios threw the rest of the gang on in with him. Sure, Fry may have enjoyed the company, but likely hated the pink slip. Fox’s idea there was to never ever think of the futuristic comedy again.

Until now.  Word is that resurrection is imminent. The blue, two dimensional skin is regaining some cartoon colour and Dr. Zoidberg is once again feeling the pangs of an eat-anything hunger. It seems that Fry is thawing some 900 years early.

The last episode of Futurama (DVDs) aired in May of 2003. Fox had actually
cancelled it several months before, but the odd air-it-every-other-month
game plan stretched it out for a painfully long time. As is frequently
the case, fans went berserk. Online petitions flew around the net like
a hummingbird in a flower garden, and many a nerd’s calculator short
circuited due entirely to tear inundation. 

Futurama won three Emmys during its lifetime – but even this didn’t bring in
enough viewers, hence the axe. A faint glimmer of hope shown through
the dismal abyss when Cartoon Network picked it up, and to fantastic
ratings at that. The Family Guy/Futurama team-up did wonders for the
Adult Swim programme, and Fox noticed. Then came the DVD sales, and
- again – Fox noticed. Comedy Central recently bought the rights to air
existing Futurama reruns for their all-time high of $400,000 per
episode. Those airings will start in 2008. Until then it’s still on
Cartoon Network. All this means tons of green and – yet again – Fox noticed.

They noticed Family Guy first, and re-wet it’s comic quills in May
of 2005 (That’s when the first of the new batch aired). In the
semi-recently released Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, a reporter
asks Stewie if Futurama will follow in their reborn footsteps. The
only response from the oft’ times tyrannical baby was a clenched jaw
and neck snapping, implying of course that the question must have been
a regular. Variety.com had this to say about it:

"The studio is in early
discussions to put Futurama back in production and create a limited
number of episodes of the Emmy Award-winning skein — although it’s too
soon to tell where those segs might end up. A rep for 20th Century Fox
TV declined comment."

Family Guy failed on Fox in it’s first airing, then fan response
brought it back. Now Futurama appears heading for the same alive-again
fate. The world of television seems to be on the cusp of gigantic
change, no longer ruled by ratings and commercial money, but by off-network dollars instead. 

Imagine for a second, if Fox had never cancelled either show in the
first place, but kept them purely because of the quality/cult following
of them both. The extra episodes we’d now have may have been a force
powerful enough to soothe the tumult clean out of Iraq. How could
insurgents roam the countryside if their laughing in their caves.
Makes one wonder if any other world healing brilliant comedy has been
wrongly put in the stocks down on the Fox lot. If the best predictor
of the future is the past, Fox may come to regret any other critically
acclaimed cancellations. But this is Futurama’s story, so we’ll bring
up Arrested Development another time. Again.

Read more:

Inside Move: ‘Futurama’ may get new lease on life – Variety 

[story by Shawn Lindseth]