10 Best Futurama Characters Voiced By Tress MacNeille
Tress MacNeille is one of the most prolific female voice actors alive. She began her career in voice work in 1979 with Scooby-Doo and Scrappy-Doo, and by the 90s, was involved with dozens of shows. Noteworthy examples include The Simpsons, Tiny Toon Adventures,Animaniacs, and Futurama.
While MacNeille doesn't voice any of the main characters on Futurama, she lends her voice to dozens of funny and diverse side characters. With the show returning for its eleventh season on Hulu, it's as good a time as any to look over her contribution to the series.
10 Robot Gypsy
In a dark carnival can be found a robotic fortune-teller. For the price of a nickel, she can give advice regarding technological-based supernatural events. Sadly, the quality of her advice varies from helpful to scamming.
The Robot Gypsy is a fun parody of the wise Romani woman often seen in gothic horror stories. Though her power and knowledge seem to fluctuate by the moment, when her advice is useful, it points the characters in the right direction. She also has a habit of trying to get as much money as possible from her customers.
9 The Grand Midwife
When Kif Kroker (Maurice LaMarche) becomes pregnant, he must return to his home planet of Amphibios 9 to give birth. At the birthing pond, he and the Planet Express Crew are met by The Grand Midwife. After she dramatically rises from the mud, she coaxes Kif through the process.
The Grand Midwife only has a few scattered appearances in the show, but they're always memorable. This is thanks to her bombastic habit of introducing herself and her refusal to alter her ceremonies due to learning them by rote. She also works other jobs (all of them grand), including lunch lady, priestess, and funeral director.
8 Guenter
When Professor Farnsworth (Billy West) creates an intelligence-boosting hat, he demonstrates it on a monkey named Guenter. He enrolls at Mars University alongside Fry (Billy West), where he excelled both academically and socially. However, he feels torn between his intelligence and his natural state.
Guenter starts off a bit antagonistic to Fry due to his genius intellect, but his dilemma makes him sympathetic. In a way, it reflects the struggle of many college students trying to figure out their futures. This leads to a humorous ending to his first appearance, where his hat is damaged to grant him average intelligence, and he enrolls in business school.
7 Hattie McDoogal
A landlord from New New York, Hattie McDoogal is an animal lover who owns one share of Planet Express. Her memory isn't quite what it used to be, and she replaces words with phrases like, "kerjiggers". Despite this, she can be very opinionated, especially against Professor Farnsworth.
Hattie is one of the most recurring one-note side characters on the show. Though she is crabby and frequently complains, she gets a lot of laughs thanks to her eccentricities. Her love of animals makes her a parallel to the Crazy Cat Lady from The Simpsons, also voiced by MacNeille.
6 Ndnd
The queen of Omicron Persei 8, Ndnd and her husband, Lrrr (Maurice LaMarche), spend their time at home doing typical long-term couple activities. They enjoy watching old sitcoms together and get into many arguments over petty things. When enraged, Ndnd joins her husband on intergalactic conquest and destruction, especially towards Earth.
In many ways, Ndnd and Lrrr's relationship parody the sitcoms they watch. She often criticizes Lrrr for his actions in public, especially his dietary choices. Yet no matter how much they fight, Ndnd sticks with her husband for his softer, sensitive side.
5 Tinny Tim
Programmed to be an adorable orphan, Tinny Tim is often found trying to earn money on the street by selling newspapers and other products. He manages to keep a good social life, such as with Cubert Farnsworth (Kath Soucie) and Dwight (Phill LaMarr). He also idolizes Bender (John DiMaggio), though the feeling is not mutual.
Tim is a humorous merging of two characters from Charles Dickens' work: Tiny Tim and Oliver Twist. Most jokes involve him getting abused and losing his meager possessions, usually to Bender. Yet no matter how dire his situation is, Tim maintains a plucky and optimistic attitude.
4 Turanga Munda
When their daughter, Turanga Leela (Katey Sagal) is born with the least amount of mutations, Munda and her husband, Morris (David Herman) decided to give her a better life than living in the sewers. They gave her to an orphanage with a note to make it seem like she was an alien. Munda and Morris were never too far away and would keep up-to-date on Leela's life as often as possible until they eventually reunited.
Upon their reunion, Munda acts as a supportive mother to Leela. She balances Morris' more loud and in-your-face personality with a softer if at times critical, hand. She's also surprisingly intelligent, having gained a Ph.D. in exolinguistics, which allowed her to write the note that tricked people into thinking Leela is an alien.
3 Mrs. Fry
The mother of Philip and Yancy Jr (Tom Kenny), Mrs. Fry had a hard time showing affection to her sons. She is more concerned with sports than parenting and only and was more concerned with listening to a baseball game than acknowledging her son's birth. Coupled with his brother's jealousy and his father's conspiracy theories, it's little wonder why Philip was eager to start a new life without them in the future.
Mrs. Fry definitely has some shortcomings as a mother, such as paying more attention to sports than her children, but as the show goes on, more of her positive traits are revealed. She did care about Philip enough to remember his favourite foods and said that while he might not be smart, he did have a big heart. His disappearance hit her hard in its own way, which leads to a touching moment in the season seven episode, "Game of Tones."
2 Linda van Schoonhoven
An anchorwoman for Channel √2 News, Linda, and her partner, Morbo the Annihilator (Maurice LaMarche) cover all sorts of breaking news. Regardless of the severity of the situation, Linda speaks to the audience cheerfully and laughs at inappropriate times. There's a strong chance this might be due to her alcoholism.
Though not as popular as her co-host, Linda is still a hilarious side character. Her cheerful attitude and vacant smile make the tragic news she talks about hilarious in its uncomfortableness. It also makes the rare times when she breaks from her perpetual cheerfulness all the more shocking, especially when MacNeille gets to show off her screaming talents.
1 Mom
Carol Miller, better known as Mom, owns MomCorp, Earth's primary producer and distributor of robots and robot-related products. She presents herself as a kind grandmotherly figure and wears a suit to make herself look larger and more homely. Behind closed doors, she is a ruthless and cutthroat businesswoman with the aim to take over Earth.
The juxtaposition of Mom's tender public mask and her aggressive true self, and hearing MacNeille's voice switch accordingly, is both intimidating and hilarious. The writers use Mom's ambitions to poke fun at various trends related to technology, corporate greed, and social media. She also had a previous relationship with Farnsworth, leading to a strong love-hate relationship that always comes up during their interactions.
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