Has Futurama gone downhill just like Simpsons?

M

me moi

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Since the revival, they have aired roughly 16 new episodes of Futurama. 16 is a pretty decent number to start doing an evaluation of the series since it was brought back.

I feel there have been a few good episodes, but that is the problem, its only "a few." Most of the eps feel mediocre, as if they're trying to rediscover what made these characters or the concept of the show great to begin with.

I'm really uncertain but I would hate to see Futurama become another casualty of a, "good show that went bad."

Thoughts?
 
I watched a couple of the new episodes and I dunno, they just weren't very good to me. Like Leela getting together with Zap in front of Fry. I also thought the last direct to DVD movie was a huge disappointment except for the Phil Hendrie characters.
 
I don't think Futurama's really gone downhill since the revival....Granted,there have been episodes I didn't like....

The entire Beast With A Billion Backs "movie"...I didn't like how it just had Fry being in love with Colleen,with little regard for his previously established love for Leela (which was a major point of the previous movie,and kept fairly consistant over the course of the series prior to this)...

The Christmas episode...Just too dark for my tastes,and I didn't find it funny...


Then again,maybe I'm just not that critical....While I'll agree with anyone that The Simpsons has gone dowhill somewhat,I do still like the series,and don't think it's AS bad as people claim....
 
If Futurama makes more episodes like "Neutopia" then it will go "downhill." Personally I still find episodes of The Simpsons and Futurama enjoyable (and those so called bad seasons of The Simpsons I have found not so terrible) but I've noticed changes in plot structure and tone that occasionally offend or bore me. Whether a shown has gone downhill or not depends on one's own opinion anyway.
 
It's kind of early to say it's gone down "just like The Simpsons." If its gone down, it'd only be "down" as season 8 of The Simpsons was to season 7, as opposed to season 18 of The Simpsons versus season 8. In the past 16 episodes of the show, there's been 2 "best of the series" episodes (The Late Philip J. Fry, The Prisoner of Benda), 4 great ones (Rebirth, Proposition Infinity, Lethal Inspection, Lrrreconcilable Ndndifferences), a bunch of good ones, a few mediocre ones (the first two of this half-season come to mind), and 2 really bad ones (The Duh-Vinci Code, The Futurama Holiday Spectacular). So it's something of a decline from Season 4, which had several "best of the series" episodes, but it's a step up from the movies and still more entertaining at this point than The Simpsons is.
 
I have a very hard time thinking of many bad episodes from the FOX seasons. The closest I can think of are "That's Lobstertainment" and "Bender Shouldn't Be Allowed on TV", and that's mainly because they're just pretty bland and really just bumps in an amazingly consistent 4 seasons.

Out of the movies, "Bender's Big Score" was clearly the best. But IMHO they really blew everything that had with that one. "Beast With a Billion Backs" and "Into the Wild Green Yonder" were mediocre, while "Bender's Game" was great until it got to the played out Lord of the Rings parody, where it stumbled badly. As I said in another thread, the staff of this show knows their main audience is the same group who has stuck with the show since the very beginning. So they don't have to try very hard as long as they throw favorite characters in fan's faces and and continue to bring back elements such as the Globetrotters, Santabot, the Robot Devil and (ugh) Barbados Slim.

This is why we're at the point where "Manwich!!" and Scruffy - things that were funny every so often - are used all the time now. Scruffy is no longer funny because he's in every episode. But that hardcore Futurama fanbase seems to love him, so there he is. What do I know.

Then we come to the Comedy Central episodes. Yes, there are some good ones, but like South Park it's become a crap shoot on whether or not you'll get one. Out of the last 4 episodes that have aired, I've only thought "Benderama" was any good, with the Xmas special being the worst half hour of Futurama I've ever seen. Unfortunately the show is heavily relying on topical jokes, gross-out humor and juvenile sexual jokes, I suppose in order to win over the immature casual Comedy Central audience who would otherwise not watch this show. Yes, this sort of stuff appeared in the FOX episodes, but here the knob has been turned up to 11.
 
Not really, from what I've seen.

But they are doing a horrible job on the Fry/Leela relationship. Either they're together or they're not, they're still dating or not, they're interested in other people, only for status quo to come over. It's like Izzy and Owen on Total Drama, only very blatant.

They seriously can't make up their minds, though, either make them go together or not.

Oh, and let's not forget that these wrietrs are new, so that could be the reason for the quality.
 
Yes and no. Yes it has done down hill but not like the Simpsons. When the Simpsons went downhill it went from having one of it's best seasons with some of the best episodes to having one of it's worst seasons like back to back. It was a sudden decrease in quality.

For Futurama it's no where near as steep of a drop and well as you said there are still a few episodes that as as good as futurama has always been.

Really when modern Simpsons has a good episode it tends to be "good by modern simpsons standards" and still inferior to the good episodes of early seasons. With Futurama on the other hand the good episodes are as good as the best episodes of the early seasons IMO. That alone shows that yes it has gone down hill but not as far down hill as the Simpsons or anywhere near as fast.

Now I had very low hopes for the Comedy Central seasons to be honest. first the movies were IMO all pretty bad, ok Benders big Score was good and bender's game was decent. Second I feared that on Comedy Central the show would lose it's wit and be another "edgy comedy for the sake of being edgy." I was happy when they proved me wrong so really I like new Futurama much more then I expected I would.
 
Yeah,that's something that bugs me about the newer episodes...With the original run (which ended with "The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings"),it seemed like Fry and Leela were well on their way to being a couple...

Bender's Big Score reinforced that,but their relationship is completely derailed in Beast With A Billion Backs (and the really annoying part about that is that Fry's complete devotion to Leela,which was so important to the previous movie is pretty much ignored,and IMO,the way it's done makes Fry look like an inconsiderate jerk),and then in the Wild Green Yonder film(the second potential "end point" for the series),it looks like their relationship is back on track...

...and then,in the new run,the writers seem to go back and forth over the nature of their relationship... though in some episodes,it does seem like they're a couple (Rebirth,The Late Philip J. Fry,The Prisoner of Benda)....Granted,Futurama's a comedy series,so it's not surprising that it wouldn't get as much of a focus,but I do wish their relationship was kept consistant...
 
Of course not; don't be ridiculous. Don't yell that the sky is falling until this entire season is confirmed bad. Last season had some great episodes and this one will too.
 
I think a better comparison would be to Family Guy: both were shows cancelled after a few seasons by FOX although it was criminally underrated, and then came back due to strong DVD sales and Adult Swim ratings, albeit somewhat different. Family Guy's batting average definitely went down, as did the quality of the show itself. In that case, yes, 16 episodes is a good amount to judge it by. I do believe Futurama is affected somewhat, but nowhere near as much as Family Guy did. In my eyes, we still get a consistent-enough string of good episodes, compared to the FOX seasons' consistent string of great episodes.
 
I don't think Futurama's jumped the shark just yet, but the newer episodes, particularly the latest ones, are following a trend that I find a bit disturbing and off-putting.



Seconded. These are the only 2 FOX episodes of the series which I don't always feel compelled to watch in reruns. The former is just dull compared to the other episodes, and the latter likewise has an unimpressive plot, and I personally don't care for the Cubert and Dwight episodes.




:^: This is the disturbing trend I was referring to at the top. The show of late seems to be gradually becoming less ambitious and more gratuitous. It reminds me of Chowder's 3rd and 4th seasons, where the emphasis on cooking and all the whimsical wonder was all but removed and the characters' respective shticks were all cranked up to 11, when every episode began with the cast spouting how delightfully wacky and nutty the cartoon show they all lived in was and Gazpacho began turning up in every single episode. These latest Futuramas are starting to eerily resemble that series at its' twilight. Light gags, like "My Manwhich!" or Scruffy, which were funny when they only cropped up once in a while, are repeated endlessly, and shticky characters who rightfully should have been retired during the FOX era like Santa Bot and Barbados Slim, keep popping up even though they've long outstayed their welcome.

Futurama hasn't sunk to Simpsons zombie-level yet, but I fear that's it's becoming more about fan-appeasing shtick than it is about the quality sci-fi spoofing.
 
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