“I was frustrated when it got cancelled, but Fox, 20th Television is the one who came back and said, ‘Would you like to do a DVD movie?’” Groening recalled. We said, ‘Let’s do two’ and they said, ‘Well, why not three?’ and we said, ‘Well, why not four?’ and they said, ‘Okay, four’ and then that’s it.”

After this, Comedy Central won a bid to air the films as new “Futurama” episodes. “We’re writing them as movies and then we’re going to chop them up, reconfigure them, write new material and try to make them work as separate episodes. 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.”

I’m glad that Jericho is coming back though, as I was assuming it would before this news from you that it was getting the ax. Jericho is sort of one of those shows you have to watch every week, though perhaps not as much as LOST or HEROES. I found that the main reason I stopped watching for a while in the middle was because I couldn’t find when it was on. Let’s be honest the whole mid-season break this past year was collectively stupid for Jericho, Heroes, LOST, and every other show that joined in. Mind you… I don’t think waiting until January or February 2008 is a better idea… but hey, the shows coming back, that’s good. I wonder if they’ll factor in sales on the first season’s DVD and order a proper season like 16-23 episodes.