Futurama Season 11 Review: A Sweet, Sort Of Satisfying Return
Good news, everyone — "Futurama" is back! Again! The animated comedy series from creator Matt Groening has been canceled and revived several times now, with four different "endings," one for each time the series has been canceled or intentionally brought to a close. It's been a decade since the last episode of "Futurama" aired on Comedy Central, but the Planet Express crew is back for one more go around the galaxy. Everyone from the original cast is back, including Bender's voice actor John DiMaggio, who was in a contract stand-off with Disney and Hulu about his pay but eventually joined the revival. "Futurama" without Bender just wouldn't be "Futurama," but thankfully the gang's all here and the characters are all their usual hilarious and lovable selves. But does the show still hold up after a decade away?
Continuations of the series after its original Fox cancellation have never quite captured the magic of that initial run, but they still managed to be a great deal of fun with some truly emotional moments, and season 11 is no different. I screened the first six episodes of the upcoming 10-episode run, and as long as you've enjoyed the Comedy Central seasons of the show, you won't be disappointed. The adventures of Professor Farnsworth (Billy West), Phillip J. Fry (also West), Bender, Leela (Katey Sagal), Hermes (Phil LaMarr), Amy (Lauren Tom), Kif (Maurice LaMarche), and Dr. Zoidberg (also also West) are still a total blast, with the occasional heartfelt moment sandwiched between topical humor and poop jokes. All is as it should be.
The end is the beginning is the end
The last time "Futurama" ended, Fry and Leela were standing in front of a portal that would take them back to the beginning, and they decided to give it another go. That's how this season starts, and thankfully it doesn't do the frustrating on-again, off-again relationship that the two had in the earlier parts of the series. Fry and Leela's romance is the glue that holds "Futurama" together, frankly, and their domestic bliss is also ours. Sure, the new season throws some challenges in their path, but they handle it as a couple and their love and commitment to one another are never in question. In fact, they might have a stronger bond than ever before. That's a darn good thing because they are forced to face all kinds of new problems ranging from the dangers of binge-watching to surviving a spoof of "Dune."
Another romance that gets a bit of the spotlight this season is Amy and Kif's, as they finally get to see their children emerge from the nursery bog, growing their little family into a bigger one. Parenthood is tough enough when you're raising an infant, but several half-alien children at once? Yikes. As always, the rest of the Planet Express crew are there to help as best they know how, except maybe Zoidberg, who seems more interested in eating alien babies than raising them.
Silly sci-fi riffs and too-topical humor
"Futurama" season 11 is filled to the brim with the series' quick background jokes and seemingly off-the-cuff commentary from its characters, and these little chunks of comedy are just as great as they've always been. The series' sentimentality, which has grown over the years, also still works, though die-hard fans of the original Fox run might find some of it a bit too sweet for their liking. There's really just one major thing that holds the latest season of "Futurama" from being as good as it could be, and that's the show leaning into more topical humor. The original Fox run occasionally had topical episodes, and the Comedy Central runs had significantly more of them, but it just feels like too much in season 11. The season opener, "The Impossible Stream," follows Fry as he tries to stream everything ever made, a truly dangerous feat. There are a bunch of jokes at Hulu's expense and we're supposed to feel like the show is still a little punk rock, but pretty much every streaming service has a show that pokes fun at them directly (Netflix has the "Joan is Awful" episode of "Black Mirror," Hulu already got roasted pretty hard on "Reboot," etc.).
Of the episodes I screened, two were extremely topical and felt especially pointed, and a third was topical in that it was playing around with "Dune," which is currently having a huge resurgence thanks to the Denis Villeneuve flicks. Most of the best episodes of "Futurama" overall are timeless, centered around ideas or stories that don't require specific knowledge about Jeff Bezos, anti-vaxxers, or cancel culture in order to understand the jokes. There's still plenty of great stuff happening in season 11 of "Futurama" that keeps the ship aloft, but if we get a season 12 I hope there's more science fiction silliness and less contemporary satire. I'm here to hear a robot talk about his shiny metal ass and get emotional over a cyclops and a human moron falling in love, not be reminded that corporations are evil by a TV series produced by a corporation, please.
/Film rating: 6 out of 10
"Futurama" premiers July 24, 2023, on Hulu.