It was a sad day when “Futurama” got cancelled – Again! But at least it came back for a few more seasons after Fox canned it. It ended with a very satisfying farewell episode which left the door open for more episodes if that uncancelled door should happen to swing open once again.
Well, that door has cracked open long enough for it to squeeze out one more episode, even if it has to share that one episode with “The Simpsons.” And as I look around, I don’t see anyone here complaining about that.
According to Entertainment Weekly, the entire voice cast returns (Billy West, John DiMaggio, Katey Sagal, Lauren Tom, Phil LaMarr, Tress MacNeille, and Maurice LaMarche).
In a Terminator-like story, Bender travels back in time to kill Bart in order to prevent a future global catastrophe. Apparently, Bart blows his nose on a sandwich that gets placed into a time capsule. The sandwich inadvertently gets mixed in with Milhouse’s rabbit’s foot and some radioactive material which causes quite a mess in the future.
And how did they manage to bring both shows together? Straight from the article:
“That was a really tough one to negotiate, because I had to talk to myself,” says Matt Groening, creator of, well, both shows. “Simpsorama” is taglined in the opening credits as “a show out of ideas teams up with a show out of episodes,” and the second half of that joke is one reason for this installment. “They were going off the air, so I thought people would really love it if we had one more chance to see those characters,” says Simpsons exec producer Al Jean, adding, “We’re always looking for things that are compatible with us, and I thought, ‘Well, what’s more compatible?’ We do a joke, actually, about how similar Bender and Homer look. Like, they just erased Homer’s hair.”
And as you’d imagine, “Simpsorama” teems with Futurama inside jokes and a Simpsonized tweak of its title sequence. Adds Jean: “There’s a thing in Futurama code where if you solve it, it says, ‘Congratulations! You’re a nerd.’”
The episode airs November 9th. And on that day, I’m happy to be a nerd. Here’s the first official pic from that episode.
