Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin turns up in Futurama's far-future New New York as one of history's great names repurposed for laughs — an inventor and statesman recast among robots and preserved oddities. He carries himself with the same folksy self-regard the real Franklin is remembered for, dispensing wisdom and gadgetry with total, unearned confidence.

The joke is the gap between reverent textbook Franklin and this blustery cameo version, and Maurice LaMarche's voice — rounded, theatrical, faintly self-satisfied — sells the incongruity instantly. It's a small role built entirely on vocal confidence, the kind of bit part that gets a bigger laugh than its screen time should allow.