I would think that the technology for cryo freezing people would have been newish by 1999, so there probably aren’t too many people from before then who woke up in 3000. There may have been a few people who froze and unfroze around the same time, so he may not be THE oldest, but I think that he’s the oldest person in the series
So when you’re frozen you don’t age. So when Fry goes into the freezer doodle at 25, he also exits at age 25.
For example when Fry, Farnsworth & Bender time travel and loop back around, we wouldn’t give them a negative age. If they spend a year time traveling, we would add a year to their age.
So I think we need to consider the oldest as someone with the most years doing something. However since time travel is involved it’s time spend doing things that they then remember.
So Bender, ignoring for a moment he is a robot, being stuck in Roswell would make him quite old since he remembers it all.
Now let’s talk about Fry specifically. In the season 7 finale, “Meanwhile” Fry plays with the time button, gaining new knowledge every time he pushes the button. Eventually Fry jumps off a building, resetting time once he sees Leela. Fry falls for a long time, but we don’t know how long he falls. Time stops, Fry & Leela live a life, but Farnsworth resets time back to when time first stopped. BUT that means Fry still remembers jumping off the building and ALL the times he pushed the button. As a quick throwaway joke when we resume season 8 we learn 10 years have passed. That means Fry remembers pushing the button to reset time FOR 10 YEARS.
So while Fry may not be the oldest, he is at least 10 years older in terms of memory, which I think is interesting to think about.
I presume we aren’t counting the people who are heads in jars? Even if they have shiny new bodies?
Yes the oldest I can recall among them is Richard Nixon
You mean aside from all the founding fathers in jars?
Yesa
Wasn’t there Lincoln in the hall of presidents?
John Adams was in the hall of presidents, and has Nixon beat by more than a few years.
https://www.oldest.org/people/founding-fathers-of-the-united-states/
Your list is oldest at time of death (IRL), not earliest born. Ben Franklin is the earliest born on that list, and also the earliest born head in a jar according to the Infosphere and Fandom wikis.
If you include his going around the long way in the professor’s time machine and completely looping the time span of the universe in the process, then he’s probably second, but the oldest organic entity. He is his natural age plus 1000 years plus one universal lifetime. The professor is technically younger than him by nine hundred years and some change, and Bender is established to be young enough that Hermes approved his QC check. Those two being the only others to take the time machine trip with him.
Edit to add: And his Lars incarnation is even older still, having gone back to 1999 and living in “our” timeline, then freezing himself again.
Bender may have him beat by doing the universe loop plus getting stranded in Roswell and waiting out having his head getting dug up in the 3000’s. Possibly at least one of his time travel duplicates wound up even older still having used the universal time code to go steal ancient artifacts and wait with them in the cellar for thousands of years. But all of them blew up, and it’s not clear if any of those were the “prime” Bender or if the original Bender even survived and the current Bender is actually one of the duplicates…
Pretty sure this is the correct answer. Bender was born in the future, but (ignoring the paradoxical time travel duplicates from the first movie) waited out the 1000 year time span two separate times (once in Roswell that Ends Well, and again the first movie). Then lived through two entire universe lifespans in the forward time machine in The Late Philip J Fry.
Space God might not have even survived the end of the universe twice like he did.
HOWEVER: If you don’t count the forward time machine stuff, I think it’s probably one of the Nibblonians who are the oldest, since I’m pretty sure they existed before the birth of the universe
If forward time travel counts, then yes by a large margin.
But is it time travel? He is just frozen, in hibernation so to say.
I think they are referring to when they took the long way to go back in time, by going forward and looping around.
Ah that makes more sense.
There were Neanderthals in the episode “Fun on a Bun” but I don’t recall if their bodies were frozen for eons or if they just lived as an isolated society for ages. Nevertheless, boneitis 80’s guy would still be older than Fry.
I also think that age should also be measured relative to the character’s perspective (or at least the perspective of their body). In essence, cryo freeze for 1000 years = 1000 years of aging, but accelerating 1000 years of time in a matter of 5 minutes from the traveller’s perspective = 5 minutes of age.
In the words of Ford Prefect, "time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so. "
My favourite litmus test for coolness.
There are/were still people being thawed out, so i assume there’s older people in cryo tubes. It’d be hilarious if theyd pull Walt Disney out of one