Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Futurama boxset, 11 Feb 2009
In a crate-like box, the Futurama DVD boxset is a nice little product. Each Season gets its own box; Season 1 in orange, Season 2 in green, Season 3 in blue and Season 4 in purple.
Season 1 is the one with 3 discs, and an "Owner's Manual". It is less than impressive, as it only gives a brief summary of a few major characters (Fry, Leela, Bender, Prof. Farnsworth, Hermes and Zoidberg) - I'm guessing they needed to fill space, because it's not very good, and looks to have been made and crammed in at the last minute. I was expecting a lot more than what was in it, I guess I was being too optimistic.
The boxset comes with all the special features the other boxsets come with, and it's basically the discs from the normal boxsets put into this one (not very impressive or original). The DVDs themselves are placed into a cardboard slip case, which has the list of episodes on one side, the usual DVD art on the other. The DVD box art is that of the DVD cases, and you can line each Season's discs up to make the "scene" they depict.
One thing I will say is that beware of the sticker that keeps all the seasons together - I thought it could come off (it can in retrospect), but it is very annoying, and peeling it off leaves all the sticky residue on the boxes, which you will then have to peel off.
Overall, it's a good product, but it needs a new refreshing look to really make people want this boxset.
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1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Underrated geeky sci-fi cartoon comedy series, 10 Jun 2009
I never really cared for Futurama, I was a huge Simpsons fan (not of the newer series) and always saw Futurama as the inferior ugly sister. I saw the odd episode here and there and just didn't find it funny and I had no connection with the characters. I did however one day have enough curiosity to finally watch the series from episode one in chronological order- this is when I really 'discovered' it.
Now I have a deep affection for the series and in a spectacular turn around it is one of my favourite TV shows of all time. It is rather geeky and daft,the sci-fi element brings ridiculous plots that never even pretend to make any sense what so ever. The writing is very often tongue in cheek and with a twinkle in its eye the genre allows the series to go to surreal and twisted places with the plot.
It has hidden depth Futurama, it is a long ongoing love story and in time you develop a rapport with the characters, root for them and care about them. Unlike many cartoon series there is, to a certain extent, a continuing story and as the characters grow we see real progression. I once assumed that the absurdity of the story and the characters may prevent it from having those touching, emotional moments that you so often see in The Simpsons, the moments that make it so much more than a cartoon. I was again wrong however, Futurama may very well have more of these tender moments.
We follow the hapless moronic outcast Fry. He is a guy who never fit in, a geek and a loser who couldn't find a place in life and was stuck in a dead end job as a delivery boy. When a New Years Eve prank goes wrong he accidentally falls into a cryogenic freezer and isn't defrosted until the year 3000. After the initial shock and an unwillingness to be assigned his delivery boy 'career chip' he falls into place with a bunch of misfits; these misfits become the Planet Express intergalactic delivery crew-
"What's my job?"
"Delivery boy."
"Yay! I'm a delivery boy!"
He may only be a delivery boy but he has the friends and sense of adventure he has always craved! He befriends Bender an alcoholic thieving robot who is attempting suicide when they meet, Leela the one eyed orphan who puts up a tough, cold front for protection after a life time of bullying, Doctor Zoidberg a giant lobster klutz who nobody really likes, Amy the shallow rich girl airhead, Hermies the Rastafarian Bureaucrat and Professsor Farnsworth the amoral crackpot who is Fry's great, great, great, great (could go on a long time) nephew. We follow Fry's story as he tries to come to terms with the sudden change and attempts to fit into a bizarre future and find what has been always missing in his life. Fry develops deep feelings for Leela and a continuing story is his inability to articulate his feeling and make her see they belong together. Fry is the central character but there is a fantastic supporting cast of bizarre characters. Topping that list is Captain Zapp Brannigan the famous space captain and great 'hero', a mickey take of Shatner, often popping up offering his smarmy buffoonery for our amusement. Brannigan is brilliant character who adds a lot to the episodes he appears in, he is a mythic hero and it isn't long before we see through him and his questionable tactics and philosophising:
"If we hit that bullseye, the rest of the dominoes should fall like a house of cards. Checkmate."
There is some fantastic voice acting from Billy West who takes on many of the characters in the series (including Fry, Farnsworth, Zoidberg and Zapp). The best way to watch Futurama is from the very beginning rather than randomly watching the odd episode, this way you connect with the story. It is a sublime series, greatly underrated and too often dismissed ignorantly, it has a great cult following and a special place in my heart.
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1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
From The Creator Of The Simpsons, 7 May 2009
Futurama is the sister animation project of Simpsons guru, Matt Groening. It tells the story of down on his luck pizza boy, Philip J. Fry who, after delivering a fake pizza order to a cryogenics lab on New Years Eve, he accidentally falls into one of the machines and is frozen for 1000 years. Waking up in the year 3000, Fry realises that everyone he ever knew is dead and from the looks of it, he couldn't be happier. Fry is approach by sexy Cyclops, Turanga Leela who tells him that now he's in the future he must be installed with his career chip which condemns him to being a delivery boy in the future for the rest of his life. He winds up working for his closes living relative, his nephew, Professor Huber J. Farnsworth at the Planet Express delivery company.
Fellow colleagues at planet express include the beer drinking, smoking cyborg, Bender Bending Rodriguez, the incompetent Dr. Zoidberg, the Jamaican bureaucrat Hermes Conrad and the rich and shallow Amy Wong. There is a massive ensemble cast much like the size of The Simpsons supporting cast, but what sets this apart from The Simpsons is that, Futurama's side characters are actually very interesting and hysterical in their own personal ways. Over the years, The Simpsons has started dying a death and is becoming less and less funny as the seasons progress. Futurama hasn't hid that peak yet and I suspect that they will continue to grow for many years, especially when they get a new 5th season.
The comedy of the show is broad and quite brave at times as each individual character well presented personality has the genuine ability to create episodes based solely around those individual characters. Zapp Brannigan is someone that comes to mind and is the James T. Kirk of the animated world with his pure arrogance and sex drive; he makes for purely impetuous giggles. This is also a show that has mastered the superb accomplishment of binding pure comedy with pure emotional drama. Although animated, Futurama has numerous episodes that present an emotional and dramatic ending that puts you on the verge of tears.
Some jokes featured within are very subtle, whilst others couldn't be more "in your face" humour if they tried. Each character's little quips can sometimes fly over your head and you only notice them when you re-watch the episodes. You also pick up on little things that go on in the background of a scene which just shows how much work the writers and designers are putting into making this show as good as it currently is. It's unfortunate that this shows original run is only 4 seasons long, but thanks to the newly released series of DVD movies, I can imagine a new run is imminent.
The show is a unique all-rounder in terms of both writing and animation. It contains the subtle and obvious comedy along with some emotional scenes to keep you engaged in what you're watching. The animation incorporates a lot of CGI along with traditional 2-D animation making it one of a kind for a show this popular. I would highly recommend this set to anyone who enjoys a good laugh and just likes to sit and be entertained for a couple of hours.
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