I kind of saw this coming, what with The Simpsons not being very good for, oh, 15 years now, and with the later seasons of post-cancellation Futurama petering out with a whimper, but Matt Gorening's new show Disenchantment left me... disenchanted.
The core characters are really just a re-tinkering of the Futurama line-up, with Princess Bean as Leela (an ass-kicking tomboy with disdain for the establishment and a heart of gold), Elfo as Fry (just adorably dumbfounded and unfailingly good and completely naive to the new world around him), and the little cat-demon whose name I forget as Bender (endearingly ego-driven and constantly ragging on humans).
The pilot was especially rough. And, sure, a lot of pilots are - but this thing felt conceptually leaden and heavy from the outset, whereas something like Futurama was bold and fresh and new and exciting from the first minute. There's a second season coming - technically a "Part 2," which, oof, come on now Netflix, can you cut that shit out already? - and to date there's no confirmation of a third. I'm not suggesting or even hoping that means Disenchantment was always meant to be a two-season series, but at this point I'm not willing to give it a third. Let's see how that second one goes, see if there are any meaningful emotional beats or arcs we haven't seen four times already in Futurama, and judge it accordingly. Because so far, this is an easy watch, but not much else.
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