5. Professor Farnsworth
Good news everyone! Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth, the nephew of the series' main protagonist, has made it into the top 5 of this countdown of the funniest Futurama characters. The old genius crackpot inventor of useless objects such as the What-If Machine and the Adolf Hitler Shark is perhaps most famous for setting up many Futurama episode's narratives by sending the Planet Express crew off on a dangerous quest that would subsequently lead to most people's agonising death. But despite Farnsworth total lack of disregard for health and safety and employee satisfaction, he is one of the funniest characters in the world of Futurama, and has more memorable moments than A Big Piece of Garbage has, well, pieces of garbage. In the season 2 episode named 'A Clone of My Own', the Professor makes a clone of himself and orders the Sunset Squad Robots to take him away to the Near-Death Star - a place where all 160-year-olds are taken to live out the remainder of their lives. It seemed to spell the end of Professor Farnsworth, but luckily, thanks to his daring crew, Farnsworth lived on right up until the series' fourth cancellation.
Voiced by: Billy West
First appearance: Professor Farnsworth made his first appearance towards the very end of the first episode of Futurama named 'Space Pilot 3000'. Once Fry becomes friends with Bender and Leela, they track down Fry's distant relative in the hope that they can mooch off of him, only then to be hired as the new Planet Express crew.
Greatest episode: This gets difficult when it comes to regular characters as there arguably hasn't been a bad episode of Futurama, at least in the first four season's that is, anyway. But the first episode in which Professor Farnsworth is pushed to the main protagonist of an episode's narrative happens in season 1 in the episode titled 'A Big Piece of Garbage'. It is here when Fry accidentally discovers a meteor of Old New York's waste hurdling its way towards New New York, and Farnsworth has to step and save the day whilst competing with his lifelong nemesis, Wernstrom.
Finest line: 'Fry and the Slurm Factory' Professor Farnsworth: "Who are those horrible orange creatures over there?" Glurmo: "Why, those are the Grunka Lunkas. They work here in the Slurm factory." Professor Farnsworth: "Tell them I hate them!"