Futurama has followed a path few other shows can even imagine. After a run on Fox from 1999 to 2003, it released four straight-to-DVD films. Those films were then divided into episodes that ran from 2008 to 2009 on Comedy Central. Then, Comedy Central released two more seasons across 2010 to 2012. A decade later, Hulu stepped in, ordering up a total of four new seasons—the last of which, capping off Futurama season 14, just aired its finale last night.
An asterisk here: at San Diego Comic-Con in July, Futurama announced three “XXXL-sized,” extended-length specials are currently in the works at Hulu, with a holiday-themed installment kicking things off in 2027.
So despite that season 14 finale episode bearing the hilariously on-the-nose title “Final Ending: The Last Conclusion,” fans know they won’t have to say goodbye to Fry, Leela, Bender, Professor Farnsworth, and the rest of the gang just yet. And anyway, isn’t every Futurama fan now conditioned to expect the show to sign off… only to triumphantly return?
Futurama creator Matt Groening has learned to be optimistic, and in a new interview with Variety, he suggested that very well might happen again.
“We’ve come to an end many times before,” Groening said. “We make a joke about it with the season finale. It’s redundantly, fatalistically titled. I think we have a whistling-past-the-graveyard attitude these days because we’ve been in this situation many times before. We have lots more stories to tell. The animators and the actors and the writers all would love to do more stories, and we’ll see. You never know.”
He wouldn’t divulge much about the extended-length specials—presumably, they’re still early in the production process—but he did confirm Robot Santa will be terrorizing the Christmas installment (no surprise there).
Beyond that, though, he hinted that the specials will help tie up some loose ends from across the series’ run. “Stuff that we have hinted at from the very beginning is finally paid off, and some unanswered questions for true fans will finally be answered. But I can’t really be more specific. If you ask me again in a year, then I can talk about it.”
We’ll also be keeping an ear out for any season 15 news, too. With Futurama, you never know!
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