Lela, Fry, Bender and the gang will return in 2010 on Comedy Central

It’s official…Comedy Central has ordered 26 new episodes of Futurama. Scheduled to begin sometime mid-2010, we can thrill to new adventures with our favorite Planet Express team.

20th Century Fox, which produces the series, sited the incredible sales of the direct to DVD movies, along with the ratings of the reruns currently airing on Comedy Central as the reason for the station’s decision to pick up the series six years after is was originally cancelled by the Fox network.

This isn’t the first time an animated series has been pulled from the depths of cancellation hell. Family Guy was cancelled in 2000 and again in 2002 when a combination of high ratings on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim and strong DVD sales prompted the show to resurface again in 2005.

Futurama was cancelled in 2003. Starting in 2007, the studio produce a total of four direct to DVD movies, including Futurama – Bender’s Big Score, Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs, Futurama: Bender’s Game, and Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder. The popularity of these DVDs was greater than anyone expected…which is why we can rejoice in this awesome news.

Futurama is one of my favorite shows and I can’t wait for new episodes to air. What do you think? Are we happy to have new adventures of the Planet Express crew? What do you want to see in the new episodes? As always…sound off below!