Futurama fans were given cause to celebrate last year when it was announced that Matt Groening’s geek-centric animated series was on the verge of being revived. In a story that mirrors the resurrection of Family Guy, strong DVD sales convinced the Fox brass that there was still plenty of interest in Futurama, and that maybe the show deserved another shot. There was some confusion, however, over the exact nature of Futurama’s return. Some reports had indicated that 4 direct-to-DVD movies were in production (as confirmed by Billy West, the voice of Fry), but then there was a story from Reuters that said Comedy Central had picked up the show for 13 new episodes.

This week Rotten Tomatoes posted some quotes from a Matt Groening interview that should help to clarify the situation. It looks like the DVD movies are still happening, but the rumours about a whole new season were not entirely true. After the DVD movies are released, the production team will chop them up to work as separate episodes that will then air on Comedy Central. “Chopped up is an indelicate way of putting it but we are doing them as movies and then we are reconfiguring them and writing new material and narration and this that and the other so that they’ll stand on their own as episodes.” Interesting that they will write new material for them, although the mention of adding narration worries me a bit. Groening also indicated that they would be pushing the envelope a little further with more extreme humour than they would have been able to get away with if the show was still airing on Fox. Sweet, so Bender can finally shoot off his potty mouth the way it was meant to be heard!

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