Want to Save Futurama?

maxguy56

maxguy56

CAGiversary!
Do you want there to be new episodes of Futurama but find yourself saying, "What can I, one Person do?" Well buddy, quite a bit. Thats right there is currently a movement by the people in place to restore Futurama to it's former non-rerun glory. Everyone can lend a hand, for all the details you could ever want go to:

http://ssfuturama.wz.cz/aff.php

There you can find out what you can do to bring Futurama back. Go soon though, it all happens on the 25th of Oct.
 
You need to understand why Futurama will never come back. Unlike other animated shows like The Simpsons, Family Guy, etc. Futurama uses full 3D Models for animation. Everything is in 3D. Combine this with making a new episode every week and this gets VERY expensive. So, even if a lot of people watch the show the TV networks still won't be making much money, escpecially when they can show crap like Trading Spouses or some other brainless reality show and make a gillion dollars.
 
You need to understand why Futurama has to come back. I will die if it doesn't. I'm also sure that I will eventually die if it does, but that doesn't make the previous statement false.
 
[quote name='madmage']You need to understand why Futurama will never come back. Unlike other animated shows like The Simpsons, Family Guy, etc. Futurama uses full 3D Models for animation. Everything is in 3D. Combine this with making a new episode every week and this gets VERY expensive. So, even if a lot of people watch the show the TV networks still won't be making much money, escpecially when they can show crap like Trading Spouses or some other brainless reality show and make a gillion dollars.[/quote]

Well, that only 1/2 right since only 1/2 the show uses polys. Some of the city scapes, the traffic and a lot of the outer space stuff are done cgi, but the main characters (including Bender most of the time) and much of the backgrounds are hand drawn. Yes, they are digitally colored, but everything is nowadays.
 
As much as I love Futurama I hate to have become stale like the Simpsons is becoming. Better that we remember it for what it was and not what it could have been.
 
[quote name='dcfox']As much as I love Futurama I hate to have become stale like the Simpsons is becoming. Better that we remember it for what it was and not what it could have been.[/quote]

i just experienced futurama about 2 months ago...and bought and watched all 4 volumes....and while i share your viewpoint...right now id buy/watch anything futurama-related, because i cant even begin to get enough of it
 
[quote name='madmage']You need to understand why Futurama will never come back. Unlike other animated shows like The Simpsons, Family Guy, etc. Futurama uses full 3D Models for animation. Everything is in 3D. Combine this with making a new episode every week and this gets VERY expensive. So, even if a lot of people watch the show the TV networks still won't be making much money, escpecially when they can show crap like Trading Spouses or some other brainless reality show and make a gillion dollars.[/quote]

You really don't understand how this technology works, do you?

The great majority of animation is computer generated now. While computers are essential to producing 3D animation they've also become critical to speeding up the process of 2D production. Multi-layer processes that were once intensely laborious and reserved for high-end productions at Disney (where the mechanical form was first invented) are easily performed by students at Cal Arts with off the shelf software. Likewise, because the 2D software is usually part of a 3D product family like Maya, incorporating 3D objects in 2D shows is quite easy. A recent example was the surgery/torture machine in Supergirl's dream in a recent Justice League Unlimited episode.

Futurama died for one single solitary reason. The ratings were bad. Doing well on broadcast TV is very difficult. Show that connect extremely well with a certain audience can get a flat response elsewhere. The hope for these show is to skip broadcast altogether and go to the direct to DVD and premium cable market. This doesn't allow for material to be produced as fast as the broadcast market since cash flow becomes dependent on retail sales.
 
Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.
 
[quote name='Wshakspear'][quote name='madmage']You need to understand why Futurama will never come back. Unlike other animated shows like The Simpsons, Family Guy, etc. Futurama uses full 3D Models for animation. Everything is in 3D. Combine this with making a new episode every week and this gets VERY expensive. So, even if a lot of people watch the show the TV networks still won't be making much money, escpecially when they can show crap like Trading Spouses or some other brainless reality show and make a gillion dollars.[/quote]

Well, that only 1/2 right since only 1/2 the show uses polys. Some of the city scapes, the traffic and a lot of the outer space stuff are done cgi, but the main characters (including Bender most of the time) and much of the backgrounds are hand drawn. Yes, they are digitally colored, but everything is nowadays.[/quote]

1/4 wrong. The environment they use for rendering Futurama and many other shows treats EVERYTHING as a polygon with textures painted on it. This is what facilitates the seamless merge between the two styles. The 2D is actually an illusion. There is always a Z-plane going on for every discrete element in the scene.

It's very easy to make a 3D character look 2D just by flattening the Z-axis. You still get the advantages of CG for doing things like making Bender turn around.
 
[quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

:rofl: Tabasco? That makes a lot of sense.
 
yeah I don't think we are ever going to see the show back on TV. At the comic con last year they talked about how they make movies but your not going to see any new episodes since they are too expensive to make.
 
[quote name='epobirs']Futurama died for one single solitary reason. The ratings were bad. Doing well on broadcast TV is very difficult. Show that connect extremely well with a certain audience can get a flat response elsewhere. The hope for these show is to skip broadcast altogether and go to the direct to DVD and premium cable market. This doesn't allow for material to be produced as fast as the broadcast market since cash flow becomes dependent on retail sales.[/quote]

Part of the reason for substandard ratings was the fact that it was constantly preempted by football and fans never knew when it was actually going to be broadcast. The show being buried in a 7p.m. timeslot on Sunday with no marketing killed it. Typical Fox tactic...just look at Wonderfalls.
 
[quote name='evilpenguin9000'][quote name='epobirs']Futurama died for one single solitary reason. The ratings were bad. Doing well on broadcast TV is very difficult. Show that connect extremely well with a certain audience can get a flat response elsewhere. The hope for these show is to skip broadcast altogether and go to the direct to DVD and premium cable market. This doesn't allow for material to be produced as fast as the broadcast market since cash flow becomes dependent on retail sales.[/quote]

Part of the reason for substandard ratings was the fact that it was constantly preempted by football and fans never knew when it was actually going to be broadcast. The show being buried in a 7p.m. timeslot on Sunday with no marketing killed it. Typical Fox tactic...just look at Wonderfalls.[/quote]
I loved Wonderfalls. Damn you FOX! DAMN YOU!!!
 
[quote name='evilpenguin9000'][quote name='epobirs']Futurama died for one single solitary reason. The ratings were bad. Doing well on broadcast TV is very difficult. Show that connect extremely well with a certain audience can get a flat response elsewhere. The hope for these show is to skip broadcast altogether and go to the direct to DVD and premium cable market. This doesn't allow for material to be produced as fast as the broadcast market since cash flow becomes dependent on retail sales.[/quote]

Part of the reason for substandard ratings was the fact that it was constantly preempted by football and fans never knew when it was actually going to be broadcast. The show being buried in a 7p.m. timeslot on Sunday with no marketing killed it. Typical Fox tactic...just look at Wonderfalls.[/quote]

After Firefly and Wonderfalls I think anyobody who was a major contributor to Buffy the Vampire Slayer is wary of doing business with Fox. I've long suspected there is a high-powered executive within the network who hates genre shows.

This doesn't change the fact that Futurama was given quite a long run as struglling series go. Even Seinfeld, notorious for bein gMIA in the rating its first season, eventually found its audience. Even with an erratic schedule four years makes it clear you aren't going to reach the needed numbers. It isn't really comparable to the wretched treatment of Firefly and Wonderfalls. With Firefly they actually managed to pre-empt the friggin' premiere! I'm not sure if that has ever happened before in television history without a national emergency being involved. They yanked Wonderfalls after a mere 3 episodes even though 13 were already completed. It wasn't as if they had any decent replacements. (Buffy started as a mid-season replacement, which is why the first season is short.) They just ran Simpsons and King of the Hill reruns.
 
[quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

OK, somebody brought up Roswell. Since somebody seems to be a fan here, can anybody tell me what happened in the end? Did everything pan out? I've actually been wondering, as I watched a few shows at the beginning and thought it was interesting but somehow it dropped completely off my radar screen and quickly disappeared.
 
The problem seemed to me that nobody knew when the show was on. On the east coast, it was always pre-empted by football and I completely gave up on trying to catch it. I loved it, but sitting down to watch it and getting football every time was way frustrating. It needed another time slot.
 
Though I know that it will never come back, I long for Fox (or Groening) to make a made for video feature length (direct). Fox will at least admit that their sales of the tv sets have been BETTER THAN EXPECTED. And that would likely continue to a feature length movie.

It would almost certainly involve: The omnicronians, Bender and Flexo, and perhaps the talking nerd brains.

Groening would probably want to bring real closure to the series (unlike the holophonor concert episode which seemed forced).


I would personally like to see a BENDER (and Fry?) spin-off because he's (honestly) the main reason I like the show.
 
[quote name='evilpenguin9000']
Part of the reason for substandard ratings was the fact that it was constantly preempted by football and fans never knew when it was actually going to be broadcast. The show being buried in a 7p.m. timeslot on Sunday with no marketing killed it. Typical Fox tactic...just look at Wonderfalls.[/quote]

Same exact thing happened to Space: Above and Beyond on FOX.

Sunday Night Football - The Killer of Good Shows. Half the time the shows were a few hours late or not even on because a game went long. Since I hate proffesional sports, it was aggrivating enough to keep switching to the damn channel to find out if that last minute of play will take 1 or 2 more hours to get done.

So, the show got horrible ratings because no one was watching it and no one was watching it because it wasn't on 1/2 of the time.
 
[quote name='Repairman Jack']The problem seemed to me that nobody knew when the show was on. On the east coast, it was always pre-empted by football and I completely gave up on trying to catch it. I loved it, but sitting down to watch it and getting football every time was way frustrating. It needed another time slot.[/quote]

That's why it didn't get good ratings. Still doesn't mean it'll come back...unfortunately.
 
[quote name='saigumi']
Same exact thing happened to Space: Above and Beyond on FOX.

[/quote]

Space: Above and Beyond had a problem of being abandoned by its core audience. The producers of the show had a very standard answer for any complaint about inconsistencies or bizarre behavior by the characters: "We don't care" Well, I discovered that I didn't care either and didn't miss the show much when they pulled it.

I used to go to the Thursday night meeting of a SF club in North Hollywood. (www.lasfs.org ) There was one occasion when before the actual meeting started I got into a conversation with some unfamiliar folks who I assumed were prospective members or part of the evening's programming. I didn't notice the vaguely military cap one guy was wearing was for the flight group on a certain TV series. We got to talking about stuff and the subject came around to the difficulty of getting good SF on TV instead of the usual insulting crap by illiterates. In the course of this discussion I put S:AAB in that category for its numerous sins.

A short while later in the course of the meeting it turned out these people were a 'Save Space:Above and Beyond' group looking for our support. Perhaps his argument would have been more compelling if hadn't had that conversation with me earlier.
 
[quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

Actually the WB cancelled it, but UPN bought it at the same time they bought Buffy. UPN was desperate at the time and was hoping to get lucky. The tabasco was sent to UPN by fans. By the way, the show was cancelld after one year on UPN as well.
 
[quote name='greendj27'][quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

Actually the WB cancelled it, but UPN bought it at the same time they bought Buffy. UPN was desperate at the time and was hoping to get lucky. The tabasco was sent to UPN by fans. By the way, the show was cancelld after one year on UPN as well.[/quote]

That show was, for me, doomed before the first episode was broadcast. I've had to deal with so many idiots who've swallowed the UFO mythology that I had no patience for a TV series derived from it.
 
Well seeing as how Fox is bringing back Family Guy they might bring back Futurama. I really liked it, so I have my fingers crossed.
 
[quote name='dcfox']As much as I love Futurama I hate to have become stale like the Simpsons is becoming. Better that we remember it for what it was and not what it could have been.[/quote]

Sorry. What was that? The Simpsons are *becoming* stale? They've *BEEN* stale for YEARS. I cannot remember the last good episode of The Simpsons. Fox should have cancelled The Simpsons instead and let Futurama take over.
 
[quote name='redgopher'][quote name='dcfox']As much as I love Futurama I hate to have become stale like the Simpsons is becoming. Better that we remember it for what it was and not what it could have been.[/quote]

Sorry. What was that? The Simpsons are *becoming* stale? They've *BEEN* stale for YEARS. I cannot remember the last good episode of The Simpsons. Fox should have cancelled The Simpsons instead and let Futurama take over.[/quote]

Yeah, IMO, The simpsons were pretty good in the early season, and definitely at their best (great) in the middle seasons. After that, though, it just horribly downward spiraled. They don't make me laugh anymore nearly as much as they used to, and while it's nice that they can boast about being the longest running cartoon or whatever in history, it would be even nicer if half their stuff recently was actually GOOD.
 
dammit epobirs, forum discussions are not supposed to be based on facts. they should be based on mindless unsubstantiated rumors that are a product of extreme fanboyism...oh wait...this isn't gamefaqs?? sorry... :oops:
 
[quote name='pimpinc333']Yea Futurama was pretty gay but if u want to bring a show back it should be Family Guy ...hhahahhahahahahaha O RIGGGGGHT!!![/quote]

Family Guy is a bargain in terms of voice production cost. Three of the main characters and two of the frequent supporting characters are Seth McFarlane. Seth, as creator and part-owner of the show, has a vested interest in keeping costs down to instead see the big bucks of syndication and video sales. One of the few other creators to ever do so much of the work himself was Mike Judge.
 
I love Futurama, as with my work/school schedule I have been unable to watch tv that much during... i guess regular hours. So for the past few weeks weeks ive cought all the eps of Futurama and Family guy on AS.

When Futurama came out, for me it definetely was on at a wierd time. And I only saw an episode or two. When I saw it on CN, I was thinking....is this show still on? As much as I would like to see new material...i doubt the mailing gimmick would work. I think better support would be to buy the dvd sets and show a few friends that havnt seen the show.
 
yea, i started getting to watch it on CN, because during football season, the games usuallyt went a half an hour late, which took up all of futurama's time.........bring futurama back i say............ZOIDBURGGGG!
 
I wouldn't complain AT ALL if they brought it back. But the reason Family Guy is coming back is due to high DVD sales and CN ratings.
 
In the words of our intergalatic leader:
"Branigans' law is like Braningans' love, hard and fast"

The show is funnier and wittier than most of the crap out there. Bring back the beloved crustacean and fill the fridge with plenty of SLURM.

FOX get with the program or "Bite my shiny metal ass..." :eek:
 
[quote name='chosen1s'][quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

OK, somebody brought up Roswell. Since somebody seems to be a fan here, can anybody tell me what happened in the end? Did everything pan out? I've actually been wondering, as I watched a few shows at the beginning and thought it was interesting but somehow it dropped completely off my radar screen and quickly disappeared.[/quote]

The funny thing is, I watched that show religiously, but i missed the last episode. I downloaded it from Kazaa but I havent watched it yet.
 
[quote name='LinkinPrime'][quote name='chosen1s'][quote name='LinkinPrime']Fans actually did this for the show "Roswell", but instead of sending anchovies they sent bottles of Tobasco sauce(if you watched the show you know why). It actually worked and they brought it back for an extra season.[/quote]

OK, somebody brought up Roswell. Since somebody seems to be a fan here, can anybody tell me what happened in the end? Did everything pan out? I've actually been wondering, as I watched a few shows at the beginning and thought it was interesting but somehow it dropped completely off my radar screen and quickly disappeared.[/quote]

The funny thing is, I watched that show religiously, but i missed the last episode. I downloaded it from Kazaa but I havent watched it yet.[/quote]

The last episode was kinda dissapointing. It seems forced and rushed.
 
Well the main reason that they are bringing back Family Guy, is because the DVD box sets sold really well.

If the Futurama DVD box sets sell really good, there might be a chance that it can come back.
 
I hope they indeed bring Futurama back. To be honest I never see why Fox refuses to air comical shows on FX. Just one or two nights with a block of comedy would open their audience alot I think. I'd love for them to bring back some funny sitcoms they had like Titus or Andy Ricther Controls the Universe. Hell I'd even settle for reruns in an off primetime slot.
 
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