Summary
Futuramaseason 12 continues the show’s unlikely return to the mainstream with the signature heart and humor fans have come to expect from the series. The show first debuted in 1999, making season 12 something of a 25th anniversary celebration. Fittingly, the trailer for the 12th season showcases the return of plenty of iconic characters outside of the core cast, with Zapp Brannigan, Mom, and Lrrr and Ndnd all joining the mayhem.
The most exciting thing aboutFuturamaseason 12is that all main members of the show’s talented cast have returned to once again voice their iconic characters. Billy West (Fry, Zoidberg, Professor Farnsworth), Lauren Tom (Amy and Inez Wong), Phil LaMarr (Hermes), and Katey Sagal (Leela) are all back, as are John DiMaggio and David Herman. DiMaggio is famously the voice ofFuturama’s crass but lovable robot companion Bender, and Herman is responsible for many of the series’ most-loved side characters including Scruffy, the janitor.
Futurama Season 12 Trailer
Futurama returns with 10 new episodes in season 12 of the hit animated sci-fi show.
Screen Rantspoke with DiMaggio and Herman about their return for newFuturamaseason 12 episodes. The pair discussed returning once more to the 30th century, and shared their feelings on having to navigate the series’ cancellations and returns. Both DiMaggio and Herman also feature in Matt Groening’s Netflix seriesDisenchantment, and touched on ways in which they would like to see the franchises continue to intersect.
“We Don’t Take It For Granted”: John DiMaggio & David Herman Discuss Futurama’s Rollercoaster Of A Journey
Screen Rant: Every timeFuturamacomes back, I’m thrilled, but inside I’m already bracing for it to go away again.
John DiMaggio: You and me both, my friend. You and me both.
Coming into a season 12, do you two have the same emotional ups and downs that the fans do, or are you all just taking it all in stride at this point?
David Herman: There’s not an actor that I know that doesn’t think that the job that they just ended was the last job they’re ever going to have. This is the life of an actor.
John DiMaggio: Truer words have never been spoken.
David Herman: This show has definitely put us through it, for sure.
John DiMaggio: People were like, “I’m so glad it’s coming back”. I’m like, “Yeah, me too.” But it’s nice to have confidence in the show. We love it. It’s very near and dear to all of us. We’ve been working together for so long, so it’s always great. It’s like riding a bike. It’s really something. I always look forward to getting back into these clothes, if you will. We’re just really lucky that the show keeps coming back and the fans respond to it so well. We realize that, and we don’t take it for granted.
David Herman: He literally means these clothes. He wears spandex at each recording.
John DiMaggio: I’ve gained weight too, so it’s gotten tighter. The zippers are f***ed up.
“There’s Always A New Direction To Go”: DiMaggio & Herman On Having Fun With Their Characters
Dave, are you voicing any new characters that you’re excited for people to see?
David Herman: Yeah, apparently, although I don’t retain anything. That’s part of my genius. I am doing some new guys. I mean, I hope I’m still that guy or this guy—I’m afraid to say so. [But] yes, there’ll be some new ones coming along. Robot Three. Robot Four.
John DiMaggio: Dave is to Futurama as the redshirt guy is to Star Trek. So, you know that there’s going to be a red shirt guy, but he might not make it.
John, I saw the first episode. I know we get more great Bender stuff. Is there something that you were really excited to do with him this time around?
John DiMaggio: It’s always fun. There’s always something new that Bender gets into. I love it. It’s always wacky. Bender’s always getting into new kinds of trouble. It’s a free-for-all—that’s the beauty of it. And with all the characters on the show, there’s always a new direction to go to in this universe, so anything can happen.
David Herman: Bender is the Dennis the Menace of outer space.
Dave, you voice Scruffy, who contains multitudes. He almost steals the show every time he’s on screen. What are your favorite things to do with that character?
David Herman: I do enjoy when he drops something profound suddenly, and you’re like, “Whoa, I didn’t see that coming”. Because he does seem like he’s pretty much just living in a world of pornography for the most part. So I do like when you’re just like, “Whoa, I didn’t expect that coming out of there”. The occasional juicy Tolstoy that comes out of Scruffy is not bad.
DiMaggio & Herman Talk Bringing Futurama To Life From The Recording Booth
When you two are in the booth, how much do you pitch in your own ideas, lines, and story ideas?
David Herman: I do Bob’s Burgers. There’s a lot of off-roading in that. On Futurama, the writers come in with really good stuff, and we pretty much stick to it. We’ll do our vocalizations and our quirks, but generally… John, I’m right in saying not much changes from the page, right?
John DiMaggio: Yeah. The only improv-y kind of things that I do are the Bender strut and the Bender whistle. The noises. We make those comical. It’s goofy, it’s funny, and it always cracks them up. It’s like we vocalize physical bits for them to animate that maybe they didn’t think about. We record the voices before they animate, so with those kinds of things, we give the animators a little bit more to do. But for the most part, we stick to the script. It’s really that good.
How often do you attempt to figure out each other’s voices just for fun? Do you all have a good Zoidberg or good Zapp?
David Herman: It’s not for fun sometimes. Sometimes it’s literally just in order to get through a scene. We have to be feeding each other lines and stuff like that, so if somebody isn’t there that day—
John DiMaggio: We’ll fill in.
David Herman: You should know that when there are days when John’s not recording and the rest of the cast tries to do a Bender, nobody can do a Bender. And almost everybody can do each other. We can all do each other, but everybody’s Bender sucks. John’s going to be working for the foreseeable future.
John DiMaggio: Thanks, man.
David Herman: I think that might be the first time I’ve ever complimented you.
John DiMaggio: Let me say something about Dave. Dave does these magical things that are so funny. There is only a certain amount of people that have [what he has]. When he’s on the microphone, there’s this particular thing that he hits, and it’s always funny. It’s just this funny vibration that comes through every single time. Every time. And everybody in the cast can vouch for it.
There are things that he does that just murder the room. Roberto’s stabbing noises—I think that’s one of the top five funniest things that ever happened in the show. It’s just genius. It’s just this frequency that Dave’s voice has that is always funny. It’s always funny, and there are a bunch of people who can attest to that. It’s great being in a show with him.
“It Makes Me Feel Very Good”: DiMaggio Reflects On Fan Interactions
John, I love the video from a few years ago of you reviewing people’s Bender impressions. Do you have a Bender related fan interaction that has stuck out for you over the years?
John DiMaggio: When people cosplay as Bender—when they show up and they’ve made their own costume—sometimes they’re really, really amazing. The merch stuff that people make and the costumes that they make… it’s always hilarious. People show up as the whole Planet Express crew sometimes at conventions, and it’s amazing.
People come up with these Bender costumes and there are little kids, there are adults, there’s grandpa and grandson and they help make it together… that always blows my mind. That always makes me very happy. People love the show, and they love him, and it’s always a treat. It makes me feel very good.
“I’ve Made My Requests”: Herman & DiMaggio Share Thoughts On A Futurama & Disenchantment Crossover
You’ve both been through severalFuturamaendings, and you both are inDisenchantment, which had its ending last year. What are the odds ofDisenchantmentcharacters popping up inFuturamaone day? Would you two want that?
John DiMaggio: There are Futurama characters in Disenchantment. I think that they’ll probably show up some weird way. Not a crossover, but, like, a prism, like how the Futurama characters showed up in Disenchantment. I’m not saying it’s going to happen. I’m saying that if it does, that’s how I think it’s going to happen.
David Herman: I’ve made my requests. I’ve actually said, “Chazz is timeless. Chazz can move within time and space. Chazz has no time and space”. So, I’ve made my requests and people went, “Oh yeah, we should definitely do it”. I was told, like, “Oh, no, no. Yeah, we’re going to get right on that, Dave. We’re going to right on that”. I’ve made some requests, but I’ve only been humored.
John DiMaggio: That would be great. Chazz would be great in Futurama. As long as he brings the Laughing Horse with him, it’ll be totally fine.
About Futurama Season 12
Following Hulu’s critically acclaimed 2023 revival of Futurama, the epic sci-fi series from Matt Groening and David X. Cohen returns in 2024 with ten all-new episodes. On this orbit around the sun, our occasionally heroic crew embarks on mind-bending adventures involving birthday party games to the death, the secrets of Bender’s ancestral robot village, A.I. friends (and enemies), impossibly cute beanbags, and the true 5 million-year-old story behind the consciousness-altering substance known as coffee. And, of course, the next chapter in Fry and Leela’s fateful, time-twisted romance.
Futurama
Cast
Futurama is an animated science fiction series that follows Philip J. Fry, a pizza delivery boy from late-20th-century New York City. He is accidentally cryogenically frozen for a thousand years and becomes an employee at Planet Express, a delivery service in the retro-futuristic 31st century.
