Hermes Conrad
Template:Futurama character Hermes Conrad is a character in the Futurama animated series. He is voiced by Phil LaMarr. Template:Spoiler
Background
Hermes Conrad the workaholic
He is a grade 36 (and later 37) bureaucrat from Jamaica (though Fry believed at one point that he was some kind of "outer space potato man"). He manages the Planet Express delivery business with responsibilities that include paying bills, giving out legal waivers, and notifying next of kin. In direct contrast to most stereotypical portrayals of Jamaicans, he is an uptight workaholic (Hermes is disappointed by the fact that he is anal only 78.36% of the time). This was noticed already when he was 4, when a hurricane hit Kingston, leaving Hermes in despair, for it threw his alphabet blocks out of order. More stereotypically, he is a Rastafarian, as seen by his invoking Jah in "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back". Hermes frequently admonishes the staff for not working hard enough. For some unstated reason, he strongly dislikes Doctor Zoidberg, possibly because of his extreme incompetence (though the others nearly equal the doctor's inability), including recommending him and his wife to a relaxation spa, which is in fact a disguised labor camp.
Hermes is also known to dislike labor unions, once referring to Labor Day as created by "fat-cat union gangsters" (though seconds later he exclaims "Hot damn, a day off!" upon learning that it was that very day) ("When Aliens Attack") and consulting Glurmo about firing the entire crew and replacing them with Grunka-Lunkas for half the pay ("Fry and the Slurm Factory").
Phrases
When surprised, Hermes often utters a rhyming exclamation, such as "Sweet lion of Zion!", "Sweet cow of Moscow!", and "Sweet Guinea Pig of Winnipeg!" (After his failed suicide attempt in "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back," he was too distraught to rhyme, merely whimpering "Sweet something of...someplace.") He also tends to make analogies to current situations involving green snakes and sugarcane: "Our electricity bill is climbing faster than a green snake up a sugarcane", "I'm hungrier than a green snake in a sugarcane field", "That's flatter than a green snake under a sugarcane truck". He sometimes exclaims "Haile H. Selassie", which is both a reference to Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, and a Rastafarian inspired parody of the more Christian curse, "Jesus H. Christ". He has also invoked "Ras H. Tafari."
Bad habits
Throughout the series, many of his comments implied that he smokes marijuana (one such being a "Shirley Hemple"(could also be a reference to Shirley Hemphill, actress from 70s television show What's Happening!! ) he ordered at a bar, or the time when his son stole a "cigar" from his dad - "That's not a cigar - and it's not mine"), though he tries to hide this from his coworkers. He also claims an "oregano" farm as a tax deduction. Also, he announces that he "must flush some things" before an inspection. Hermes is also the only one to react when Fry picks up a bong and relaxes in the "traditional Jamaican way". In The Sting, He burns Fry's timecard and Labarbara declares: "Husband, can't you go anywhere without lightin' somtin up?" Also on more than one occasion he hinted to be willing to kill his co workers without any reason. For example, in the episode The Farnsworth Parabox, when the ship is flying to the Sun and the crew is about to be discarded into space Hermes is having second thoughts about whether he should or shouldn't do it. Earlier in the same episode, he gives Leela a gun and tells her to 'Use it to shoot those guys" (ie. Fry, Bender and Zoidberg). Leela then responds "Right, if they try to look into the box" to which Hermes replies: "Yeah, whatever."
Hermes' love of limbo
Hermes was once an Olympic limbo athlete. He was competing at the 2980 Olympic Games for the Earth team when a little boy ran onto the field. The boy wanted to be "just like Hermes," but broke his back while attempting to limbo. This event traumatized Hermes and he could not bring himself to limbo again until decades later, when he found it necessary to slide under a nearly-closed airlock door to save the lives of himself and his co-workers. His confidence (though not his physique) restored, Hermes came out of retirement to compete for Jamaica at the 3004 Olympics, after the original team got detained at the airport for "other interests" (again, implied to be marijuana), though he was bested by longtime rival Barbados Slim, to whom Hermes' wife LaBarbara Conrad was once married.
The ultimate penalty
In the episode "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back" he suffered a breakdown, and was sent on paid vacation (considered the "ultimate penalty" in his profession) with LaBarbara. Unfortunately, the spa he chose as a vacation spot was actually a forced labor camp, with the recreational activities including pushing mining carts. Hermes, his bureaucratic bearing restored, reorganized the labor camp for greater efficiency, after which all physical labor was done by a single Australian man.
Early Character Development
During the early development of the series, Hermes' original name was "Dexter" and he was not Jamaican. His name comes from Hermes Rocket, the name of Matt Groening's typewriter. In Greek mythology, Hermes is the god of weights and measures, commerce and boundaries, as well as athletics. Hermes' surname comes from the name of the street that David X. Cohen lived on during his childhood (revealed in the DVD commentary of "How Hermes Requisitioned His Groove Back").
Family
LaBarbara Conrad
(Voiced by Dawnn Lewis) - Hermes Conrad's wife. She is considerably taller and slimmer than Hermes and is usually seen wearing revealing clothing. LaBarbara was previously married to Barbados Slim, a tall, muscular athlete (whom she refers to as "that mahogany god") who won the limbo gold medal in the 3004 Olympics. She accompanies her husband on a trip on the Starship Titanic and another to Spa 5, which turns out to be a slave labor camp. She and her husband often refer to each other only as "husband" and "wife," although in on the Starship Titanic he referred to her simply as "Hot Woman." In "The Route of All Evil," Hermes and LaBarbara's home is shown as very sumptuous.
Dwight Conrad
(Voiced by Bumper Robinson) - 12 year-old son of Hermes Conrad and LaBarbara Conrad. He has a friendship with Cubert Farnsworth. Dwight takes after his father in many ways, such as finding accounting and bureaucracy more entertaining than more conventional sources of fun. Dwight sports dreadlocks and a T-shirt with the Jamaican flag on it. In the episode "The Route of All Evil", a bully throws Dwight's lunch pack into a black hole he has made for his science project. The way in which Dwight screams "My Manwich!" is very similar to the way Hermes screams the same words when Bender uses his sandwich as fishing bait in "The Deep South".
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