Hermes Conrad
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Hermes Conrad is a character in the Futurama animated series. He is voiced by Phil LaMarr. He is a grade 36 (and later 37) bureaucrat from Jamaica (and not, as Fry thought for a while, "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 claims he is anal 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).
When surprised, Hermes often utters a rhyming "Sweet (something) of (someplace)!" exclamation. Examples include "Sweet cow of Moscow!", "Sweet green-toed sloth of ice-planet Hoth!" and "Sweet llamas of the Bahamas!". 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 crushed by a sugarcane truck". He sometimes exclaims "Haile H. Selassie", a reference to Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, who was the symbol of Jah on Earth - a parody of the more Christian curse, Jesus H. Christ". Throughout the series, many of his comments implied that he smokes marijuana (one such being a "Shirley Hemple" 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.
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 friends. His confidence (though not his physique) restored, Hermes came out of retirement to compete for Jamaica at the 3004 Olympics, after the team got detained at the airport, though he was bested by longtime rival Barbados Slim, to whom Hermes' wife LaBarbara Conrad was once married.
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.
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. It should be noted that in Greek mythology Hermes is the god of weights and measures, commerce and boundaries, as well as athletics. As a possible reference to Matt Groening's typewriter, the mythological Hermes also serves as a translator who relays messages from the gods to humans, which also makes sense since Hermes works for a delivery company.
Hermes Conrad and LaBarbara have a son named Dwight Conrad. Hermes and Dwight are both fond of Manwiches.
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