It’s official: Comedy Central has picked up the rights to renew 20th Century Fox Television’s Futurama for 26 new episodes, six years after getting initially cancelled by the Fox network. In a recent EW interview with a 20th Century Fox spokesman, they say the DVD sales and reruns have had a “blockbuster” performance:

“When we brought back Family Guy several years ago, everyone said that it was a once in a lifetime thing — that canceled series stay canceled and cannot be revived,” 20th Century Fox TV Co-Chairman Gary Newman and Dana Walden said in a joint statement. “But Futurama was another series that fans simply demanded we bring back, and we couldn’t have been happier when Matt and David agreed that there were many more stories yet to tell.”

Both creators David X Cohen and Matt Groening were of course ecstatic about the news. Said Groening: ”We’re thrilled Futurama is coming back. We now have only 25,766 episodes to make before we catch up with Bender and Fry in the year 3000.”

Between this mistake and the mistake of canceling Family Guy, maybe this means Fox TV will think twice about axing an animated series, or even a live action series (Could we see the resurrection of Greg the Bunny?). You can currently catch reruns of Futurama on Comedy Central throughout the week and you can even pre-order the complete box set inside of a limited Bender head from Amazon today!

Coming on the heels of the announcement that Dollhouse will get a second season, it looks like NBC is also feeling generous to their fans after a highly successful “Save Chuck” campaign at Subway franchises across the country, as they have renewed the goofball-spy series Chuck for a third season.

Though the show will return next fall, NBC had to make some budget concessions. Chuck‘s third season will now consist of 13 episodes rather than the 22 that season 2 got. Also, the show is expected to cut a few staff writers and possibly even a cast member (Not Jeffster!).

NBC will officially announce upfronts on Tuesday, May 19, but we already know that Chuck will join including Heroes, Southland, Law & Order: SVU, Friday Night Lights, and Parks & Recreation next season. Now that the 10pm time slot is taken up by Jay Leno’s new talk show, no word yet on a new home for Chuck, but if the amount of $5 footlongs purchased is any indicator, fans won’t stop watching, regardless of a new time slot.

Those who missed the epic cliffhanger in Season 2 can check it out here on HULU. Be sure to listen to this week’s episode of The Flickcast for more TV upfront news and which shows didn’t make the cut!

What better way to fill that Friday night void now that Dollhouse‘s first season has ended? Oh, how about news that Fox has picked up the show for a second season?

According to the LA Times, the network won’t make the announcement officially until upfronts on Monday, but several close sources to the show are saying that we can look forward to another season of Eliza Dushku in skimpy outfits. No word yet on whether the illustrious 13th episode, starring star of Dr. Horrible’s Sing-A-Long Blog and fellow twitter-addict Felicia Day, will get any airtime, but it will definitely be available on the DVD — which is due out July 28.

It’s true, we can even admit that we were a bit worried about a second season after the poor ratings of the finale (among other episodes), but we here at The Flickcast are more than happy that Fox is giving Joss Whedon and his gang another chance.

This means that along with Fringe and Lie to Me, which have both been renewed for another season, Fox seems to be breaking the trend of ending shows prematurely, and it only took a few dozen casualties and thousands of irate fans.

Great job, Fox! Now how about some love for Sarah Connor?