Press Release
Famed voice actor Billy West has been announced to appear at Meta Con, the Minneapolis Comic Con and Anime Con in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Meta Con will bring together thousands of geeks, nerds, anime fans, sci-fi buffs, and comic fans together for a three-day celebration of video games, comics, sci-fi, and anime from August 30th through September 1st, 2013 at the Hyatt Regency Downtown Minneapolis.
Press Release
Rhode Island’s first comic book convention, scheduled for November 3 and 4 made their biggest guest announcement. Legendary voice actor Billy West will be attending the comic book and media event, taking place at the Rhode Island Convention Center.
In this issue: Can a rabbit be invisible and pink at the same time? My name is Mot, thanks a lot! And wouldn’t it be cool if the Plutonian had a flying dog in a cape that is ALSO a mass-murderer… Plus: Billy West will still be getting a paycheck… Norman Osborn is makin’ his list, and checkin’ it twice… But is the podcast brutal enough that Stephen will stop erasing and starting over? And: Punk Rock Girl, you look so wild, punk rock girl let’s have a child, we’ll name her Minnie Pearl, just you and me, we need fudge banana swirl, you and me… Stephen’s store got Mojo Nixon, so it don’t need no fixin, the Major Spoilers Podcast is on the air.
Show Notes after the Jump!
For those who were very upset over the news that 20th Century Fox was booting the voice cast of Futurama off the show for money reasons, have released a statement that said the entire voice cast; John DiMaggio, Billy West, Katey Sagal, Maurice LaMarche and Tress MacNeille will return for the next season.
“We are thrilled to have our incredible cast back,” creators Matt Groening and David X. Cohen said in a statement. “The call has already gone out to the animators to put the mouths back on the characters.”
Instead of the $75,000 per episode the actors were asking, it is believed now that the cast members will receive less than $40,000 per episode.
In this day and age, where everyone is connected and news circulates the globe in a matter of nanoseconds, I am beginning to think that both the studios and actors in H’wood are using the Intardwebz to start a rumor, see how it sits, then make adjustments after that. Leading up to this announcement, it seemed pretty clear Fox wasn’t going to budge, but then following the release on sites like Major Spoilers, and the resulting Comic-Con uproar, suddenly, a week later, everything is hunky-dory. If the big wigs want to create an Intardwebz storm, and use us as the sounding board, there’s no need to go about it in a sneaky fashion, just contact Major Spoilers, put both sides on the record, and we’ll let our readers work it out for you.
This news started floating around on Friday, and it is going to be pretty bad if it’s the case, but when (and if) Futurama returns to the airwaves, it may not features the voices we’ve grown to love over the years. Why? Money, pure and simple. Contract negotiations between Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio, Maurice LaMarche and Tress MacNeille and the studio have broken down causing the cast to find themselves out of jobs. 20th Century Fox wants to pay the actors only $75,000 per episode, while the cast believes they deserve more.
As a result, 20th has put out a casting call to find replacement voice actors for the show. According to insiders, a deal could eventually be struck that brings the original voice actors back — but for now, the studio said it’s serious about finding replacements.
This isn’t the first time Billy West has been involved in contract disputes over money – his publicized exit from the Howard Stern show was also over money.
That being said, everything is still up in the air. Often news like this is sent around the press and the Intardwebz to judge the reaction to these kind of changes or to stir up fans into forcing the studio’s hand. It’s really touchy trying to do something like this as it could backfire ala Terrance Howard’s removal from Iron Man.
I’ll let your fan outrage bubble to the surface…now.
Comedy Central has confirmed that it has ordered up a new batch of Futurama episodes to air on the cable channel beginning in 2010. Twenty-six episodes have been ordered, and Billy West and John DiMaggio have both signed to return to the long running on again off again animated series.
“It’s sweet, and basically everybody who has worked on the show wants to come back,” Matt Groening said. “I choose to believe it’s more than the economic situation. People had a good time working on this show.”
While Comedy Central may look to be sitting in the cat-bird seat, 20th Century Fox does have the option of turning the first broadcast rights to the new episodes to a broadcast network (i.e. Fox) if the series takes off, or becomes financially viable again. Seems like a crappy deal for Comedy Central, but in this case, its the fans that win as we’re able to get more Bender/Fry action real soon.