March Bday - 1

And now, for the cartoon, comic books and whatever characters celebrating their birthday in March…

Created by 'Mister Simpson' himself, Matt Groening, and premiering in Fox, March 28, 1999, this show follows the adventures… and misadventures… of a 20th century pizza delivery New Yorker boy, who, after being unwittingly cryogenically frozen for a thousand years, finds employment at Planet Express, an interplanetary delivery business in the futuristic 31st century owned by his descendant, an elder scientist who can create almost anything… even stuff that should never be created.

The Planet Express crew is noted as a bunch of wackos and outsiders even by the 31st century's standards; besides the 20th century guy and the absent-minded mad scientist boss, there's a cyclopean, butt-kicking mutant woman (first thought to be an alien); a kleptomaniac, conman, and beer-loving robot (made in Mexico); a Mars-raised rich girl; a crustacean alien doctor who lives in a perpetual poverty; and a Jamaican limbo-champ bureaucrat. 

The show plays with pretty much every science fiction's stereotype and plot line, with multiple references to the genre's movies, books and television series. Earth is depicted as being multicultural to the extent that a wide range of human, robot, and extraterrestrial beings interact with the primary characters. In some ways the future is depicted as being more socially advanced than the delivery boy's, and therefore the audience's, reality. However, it is often shown to have many of the same types of problems, challenges, mistakes, and prejudices as the present; the show's primary source of humor, therefore, is the satirical depiction of everyday life in the future, and its parodical comparisons to the present.

The show enjoyed critical acclaim and was quite popular, even 'returning' from cancellation once before it finally ended in 2013., with the characters returning for a Simpsons' crossover on 2014. They had also starred in comic books and video games, and, as usual, there's a lot of merchandise based on the series.

So, Happy Birthday guys and gal, and, whatever you do, don't let the professor put Hitler's brain in a White Shark's body. Again.