“I’m Back Baby!”: John DiMaggio Returns As Bender In ‘Futurama’ Revival For Hulu
The #Bendergate saga is over, as voice artist John DiMaggio announces he has come to terms with Hulu over reprising his role as Bender on their upcoming revival of the much-beloved ‘Futurama‘.
Hulu announced back in February that they were reviving the series for twenty new episodes, with all of the cast set to return, with the notable exception of DiMaggio. Although 20th Television Animation, who make the series, had reached out to him, DiMaggio, who has travelled the world promoting the series since it has been off-air, felt that the proposal was not competitive based on the success and name recognition of the original series. There was some back-and-forth, but negotiations stalled, leading to 20th TV announcing the series without him, saying they were looking to recast if an agreement could not be reached. Now it seems, they have found some common ground.
“I’M BACK, BABY!” commented DiMaggio, borrowing one of his character’s catchphrases. “So damn grateful for the love and support of fans and colleagues alike during this whole time (especially my wife, Kate), and I cannot wait to get back to work with my Futurama family. #Bendergate is officially over, so put it on the back of a shelf behind Xmas decorations, or maybe in that kitchen drawer with all of the other crap you put in there like old unusable crazy glue, or maybe even put it in a jar you save farts in. Whatever floats your boat, I don’t care, you get the picture. I’M BACK, BABY! BITE MY SHINY METAL ASS!”
He joins Billy West who return to voice Fry/Zoidberg/Farnsworth/Brannigan, alongside Katey Sagal as Leela, Tress MacNeille as Carol “Mom”/Various, Maurice LaMarche as Kif, Lauren Tom as Amy Wong, Phil LaMarr as Hermes and David Herman as Scruffy/Various. Like the rest of the cast, DiMaggio does not only voice Bender, but a collection of other secondary characters.
“From the moment John DiMaggio auditioned last century, we knew we had our Bender,” added creator Matt Groening. “So congrats to everyone at Futurama. We’re all back, baby!”
The cult animated sci-fi comedy follows Fry, a young Everyman, who finds himself accidentally transported 1,000 years in the future. Just like right now, life in the future is a complex mix of the wonderful and horrible, where things are still laughable no matter how wild and crazy they get. And against a backdrop of pesky aliens, exasperating robots and malfunctioning gadgets, people still struggle with the same daily anxieties of life and love… and, of course, traffic is still a nightmare!
‘Futurama’ has been through the mill when it comes to broadcast. FOX famously canned the series when it was mid-production on Season 4. It was later revived for a series of DVD movies in 2007 which were then chopped into episodes that aired on Comedy Central. That prompted the network to order new seasons in 2010, where it ran before being cancelled again in 2013.
“John DiMaggio may be a great robot, but he’s also a great human being. Not many people or machines can say that.” said exec producer David X. Cohen. “For the fourth time, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime thrill to be back with our entire original cast and the phenomenal animators of Rough Draft Studios!”
‘Futurama‘ will return to Hulu in the USA and will air on Disney+ in the UK in 2023. If you want to keep track of this or any other show, you can add it via our Never Miss system, and you’ll be notified when it gets a UK premiere date.
If you want to hear more from John DiMaggio, we interviewed him back in 2019 at MCM London in the video below.
