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Futurama Canceled Again

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Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#41

Post by bane »

hvs wrote: post #40
bane wrote: post #37

Same story, submitted hours before (by me), is the actual primary source (follow the slate links to vulture then to my story), flagged https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5592733 http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/futurama-not-renewed-comed... edit I'm not complaining, but it is a little bit frustrating to have it flagged then see a 3rd-level derived article show up. How can I prevent it in the future?

I'm going to guess that most people here will flag an Entertainment Weekly article just out of reflex. (I didn't, just saying).

Probably, just hoping the story was HN friendly enough (it apparently was) to overcome the source (I guess it wasn't)

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#42

Post by tootie »

TillE wrote: post #9
SG- wrote: post #3

Great show, but I sort of lost interest for some reason after the movies came out. Regardless it's had 7 seasons which is just as much as Star Trek TNG.

The quality never quite returned to the heights it reached during the original FOX run, so I'm not terribly sad to see it go. Better that than limp on towards true mediocrity like The Simpsons.

It was less consistent, but there some brilliant ones. The brain switching episodes is one of my all-time favorites.

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#43

Post by erre »

bane wrote: post #37

Same story, submitted hours before (by me), is the actual primary source (follow the slate links to vulture then to my story), flagged https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5592733 http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/futurama-not-renewed-comed... edit I'm not complaining, but it is a little bit frustrating to have it flagged then see a 3rd-level derived article show up. How can I prevent it in the future?

I'm the submitter (not the author) on this story. I searched for "futurama" before submitting, and didn't find anything related to this cancellation (or "not renovation", as some threads here would prefer).

I haven't flagged your submission (I've never flagged anything, around here). FWIW, though, I still find the article I linked to much more interesting that the EW one, because it focuses on the science and geeky aspects of futurama. I don't see it as "a 3rd-level derived article", but as "a scientist's take on the show and its cancellation".

Under that light, then, I'm not sure it should be prevented.

Edit: By "not sure it should be prevented", I don't mean that I think your submission should have been flagged. I mean that I think the same fact can allow for multiple submissions, and a derived article may be more interesting than the original source.

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#44

Post by leephillips »

erre wrote: post #28
nandemo wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because enough people upvoted it? I wish it was possible to downvote stories.

Well, I won't try to guess why people upvoted it, I can only tell of why I submitted it: the article (which I haven't written, only come across) is not just moaning about a cancelled series. It discusses the science that permeates it, and its geek appeal. Which I thought fitting for hacker news.

Indeed: I've only watched a couple of episodes, and never got into it. But I was fascinated to read about the "Futurama theorem".

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#45

Post by T-hawk »

steven2012 wrote: post #14

I'm as big a fan as anyone, having watched Futurama since day 1. I was lucky enough to randomly bump into Billy West at Comicon 2010 and nervously muttered how much I loved Futurama, and he was especially gracious, saying fans like me were the ones who brought it back. That being said, I felt that the new episodes never captured the quality of the original run. They tried too hard at tugging at our heart strings and…

I'll give a dissenting opinion. I've loved the Comedy Central reboot. The material is quick and snappy in a way that the earlier seasons weren't, packing in rapid-fire jokes. And it still consistently throws in bits of real science and mathematics, like the famous brain-swapping problem and solution. The movies were uneven, but season six hit a new and sustained peak starting with the fourth episode.

I often felt like the earlier seasons got too caught up in their own worldbuilding and forgot the funny. "The Why of Fry" was my personal least favorite, retconning the entire premise of the show and Nibbler's nature, and straining on a single joke of Fry's stupidity for the entire episode. Other low points included the forced Amy-Kif relationship that had little comedy content and less meaning, Leela's retconned family, and any time filled by Zapp Brannigan's one-note attempts at jokes. Futurama can't credibly do gross-out or shock humor in a world where Family Guy cranks it up to eleven every week.

Futurama is best as a joke turbine playing off the future setting, and IMO strains for misguided impact whenever it brings up how Fry's family lost a son. I never bought in to the heartstring-tugging. The characters are too broadly drawn and fantastical to care about, unlike the Simpsons. The Comedy Central seasons seem to have figured this out, realizing that it's too late in the game for any more meaningful character material. Instead, the show has seriously stressed the pacing and density of the comedy, which for me really shines now.

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#46

Post by bane »

erre wrote: post #43
bane wrote: post #37

Same story, submitted hours before (by me), is the actual primary source (follow the slate links to vulture then to my story), flagged https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5592733 http://insidetv.ew.com/2013/04/22/futurama-not-renewed-comed... edit I'm not complaining, but it is a little bit frustrating to have it flagged then see a 3rd-level derived article show up. How can I prevent it in the future?

I'm the submitter (not the author) on this story. I searched for "futurama" before submitting, and didn't find anything related to this cancellation (or "not renovation", as some threads here would prefer). I haven't flagged your submission (I've never flagged anything, around here). FWIW, though, I still find the article I linked to much more interesting that the EW one, because it focuses on the science and geeky a…

Absolutely no disagreement from me on anything you wrote here and sorry if I came across as diminishing the article you submitted. I was not, I was merely evoking a common thread in many thousands of HN articles where a great story is posted that is based off of a primary source, but somebody always asks for the link to the primary source. I think derived articles are not always "blog spam", and can usually offer interesting and unique commentary and insights above and beyond what's more or less a press release. Your submission definitely rises to that level. But it's irritating that the actual source of the news got killed (regardless of who submitted it).

In this case the opposite happened, but the primary source was killed. I know this is all a bit meta for HN, but even more meta, I'm finding it more and more frustrating to submit things as so many sites are now set to auto-kill.

Sorry if such and such news site is considered too biased, but it may be the only or primary source for a story. The autokill is also surprisingly biased in and of itself. For example, an article posted from Android Police will get killed, while an article MacRumors won't.

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#47

Post by sageikosa »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #36
sageikosa wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They happened, just in "other media" then the last part was time locked, then the whole universe was rebooted, and time restarted, and a whole bunch of other things that I forgot in silence.

I was wondering why I had these tally marks on the back of my left hand.

You should take a look at your right arm.

Re: Futurama Canceled Again

#48

Post by erre »

bane wrote: post #46
erre wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm the submitter (not the author) on this story. I searched for "futurama" before submitting, and didn't find anything related to this cancellation (or "not renovation", as some threads here would prefer). I haven't flagged your submission (I've never flagged anything, around here). FWIW, though, I still find the article I linked to much more interesting that the EW one, because it focuses on the science and geeky a…

Absolutely no disagreement from me on anything you wrote here and sorry if I came across as diminishing the article you submitted. I was not, I was merely evoking a common thread in many thousands of HN articles where a great story is posted that is based off of a primary source, but somebody always asks for the link to the primary source. I think derived articles are not always "blog spam", and can usually offer int…

Fair enough, I agree that this (subconscious?) auto-kill is silly.
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