Weekly Analysis #3

I enjoyed the TV show Futurama when it was first aired on the FOX network at the beginning of this decade. It was created by the same people that created the The Simpsons 20 years ago, it was also animated in the same style as the Simpsons. It was canceled after just a few seasons despite being a huge critical success and having many viewers.
It was announced just a few weeks ago that the show was going to be brought back onto the air by Comedy Central. Similar to the show Family Guy which was brought back to life because of DVD sales and online downloads of the show, Comedy Central has had a huge amount of viewers watching reruns of the show on their network and decided to order 26 new episodes.
When the Futurama characters come back for new episodes, they may sound different. That is because producing studio 20th TV is proceeding with auditioning new actors for the roles after failing to reach an agreement with the original voice cast: John DiMaggio, Maurice LaMarche, Billy West, Tress MacNeille and Katey Sagal. When, under similar circumstances, Family Guy was resurrected with a pickup of new episodes by Adult Swim in 2005, the show's entire voice cast came back for what is described as approximately the same salaries they were paid when Family Guy aired on Fox from 1999-2002.
The cast of Futurama, which ran on Fox from 1999-2002, are said to have been offered modest pay increases but have insisted for bumps of several times what they used to make. However, on Family Guy, creator Seth MacFarlane voices the key characters, while the entire cast of Futurama, like that of The Simpsons, consists of outside actors. Matt Groening, who co-created Futurama with David X. Cohen, knows a thing or two about voice casts standoffs. The Simpsons creator had gone through a series of bruising renegotiation with the actors on the long-running Fox series. Just like the current scuttle on Futurama, in 1998 20th TV hired casting directors to recast the actors on The Simpsons. A deal was ultimately reached. In 2004 and 2008, the series' seasons were cut short after the Simpsons voice cast boycotted table reads as part of the tense salary negotiations. Despite the salary disputes, Simpsons reached the 20-season mark with its original voice cast intact. With "Futurama," there also is a possibility that the two sides would come to an agreement. In the meanwhile, it's going to be rough for the casting directors assigned to find replacement actors who have already started to receive threats from fans of the show.