At Least It Doesn't Suck As Much As The Cleveland Show: FAMILY GUY!

[Reply #240 on:]

I think it's Fox's fault more than anything.

Trey Parker and Matt Stone originally pitched South Park to Fox, but they wouldn't go for it on the grounds that it wasn't about a nuclear family, it was about 4 boys at school. Trey even offered to make it focus on the 4 boys' families specifically, as a family sitcom might, but they just wouldn't have it.

And I mean, the evidence is clear to see in the shows that Fox has produced. The Simpsons, King of the Hill, Family Guy, American Dad, The Cleveland Show and Bob's Burgers are all about nuclear families - as will be Seth's upcoming reboot of The Flintstones. Futurama wasn't, but Fox hated it and tried to crush it, and Matt Groening was a man in a position to do basically whatever the hell he wanted because at the time, The Simpsons was the biggest thing ever. To be honest, Seth MacFarlane is probably in a similar position now, but doesn't seem like one to rock the boat.

Sadly, Allen Gregory, the first of Fox's shows other than Futurama to really play with the dynamic a tiny bit, is kind of awful - which means that Fox will probably revert to not letting anything through the cracks that isn't an animated family sitcom again.


Still, The Cleveland Show is horribly lazy in every way and it baffles me that it's got to 4 seasons quite happily.

[Reply #241 on:]

The Flintstones... really?

[Reply #242 on:]

Yup...

And so, to review said Fox animation lineup...

'The Simpsons' was the best episode they've put out since 'Thank God It's Doomsday' - more on that in the 'The Simpsons' thread.

'The Cleveland Show''s "Die Semi-Hard" was the best episode of 'The Cleveland Show' ever made. I'd only give it a 6/10 or so, but to say the show is normally SO bad, that's pretty good. It had a few brilliant gags peppered in amongst the usual duds. I certainly hope they continue to parody the sequels each Christmas if they have to keep making the show.

'Family Guy' was quite weak this week, I thought. A few jokes were brilliant - I REALLY laughed hard at the cut-away with the pizza-place salad, but overall the story just felt bland and like a lot of it was re-treading material that the show has already explored. Not to mention all the jokes that didn't work.

And then 'American Dad' was decent, but disappointing by their Christmas special standards. I'll cover it in more detail in the 'American Dad' thread.

[Reply #243 on:]

Just watched 'Back to the Pilot', it was pretty funny, 'specially near the end when

Spoiler warning! Click to show/hide!

lots of Stewies and Brians start to appear everywhere.

[Reply #244 on:]

You JUST watched it?! Tssk Tssk.
I should really watch the rest of Season 10.

[Reply #245 on:]

Don't tssk me!

I don't watch Family Guy anymore, if it's on and I'm bored and nothing good is on TV I'll flick it on. That's it.

Road to the Multiverse and Back to the Pilot were just 2 episodes I wanted to see.

[Reply #246 on:]

You should also watch "The Big Bang Theory" (No relation to that TV show)

[Reply #247 on:]

Don't tssk me!

I don't watch Family Guy anymore, if it's on and I'm bored and nothing good is on TV I'll flick it on. That's it.

Road to the Multiverse and Back to the Pilot were just 2 episodes I wanted to see.

The episode form this season where they went to the south was exellent, in my opinion. the jokes were great, and so was the plot.

[Reply #248 on:]

This week's episode was bizarre. Creepy as Hell... I don't really know what to make of it. I mean, it certainly wasn't particularly great but I can't tell if I either respect them for trying to creep us out so much or if I think it's a cheap way to try and generate laughs.

[Reply #249 on:]

What happened in it turnip?

[Reply #250 on:]

I actually liked last night's episode. It was creepy to see Quagmire wanted to hit on Meg, but we saw it coming, when Glen kept asking Meg if she was 18 yet, but said no.  Also, I find it hard to believe that Lois and Peter for once give a shit as to who Meg sleeps with.  I remember when Jerome left with Meg and Peter didn't care at all.  Lois didn't care at first which was a dumb move. 

[Reply #251 on:]

It was just plain 'ol shitty. I didn't laugh once at all, except for the: "...where's that pinky going?" joke. 5.5/10

[Reply #252 on:]

What happened in it turnip?

Meg turned 18 and Quagmire made it his mission to sleep with her.

It was basically 22 minutes of rather realistic sleaze-bag seduction techniques, but animated. A strange thing to sit through, certainly.

[Reply #253 on:]

This episode makes me take back everything positive I said about Quagmire's development in these later seasons, because obviously the show just does not give a fuck. I mean god, what kind of friend would hit on his best friend's daughter and then tell that friend that it doesn't matter what he thinks, he's gonna sleep with her no matter what. Douche. And I think the show is trying to apologize for it's treatment of Meg by making Peter and Lois give a crap again. But that being said I really had no feelings towards this episode, it wasn't creepy or funny, just bad.

[Reply #254 on:]

This episode makes me take back everything positive I said about Quagmire's development in these later seasons, because obviously the show just does not give a fuck. I mean god, what kind of friend would hit on his best friend's daughter and then tell that friend that it doesn't matter what he thinks, he's gonna sleep with her no matter what. Douche. And I think the show is trying to apologize for it's treatment of Meg by making Peter and Lois give a crap again. But that being said I really had no feelings towards this episode, it wasn't creepy or funny, just bad.

The thing I consider as an improvement in Quagmire's development is that he didn't try and date rape Meg, he wanted her consent. As far as making Peter and Lois give a crap about Meg, they'll go back to trying her like shit, since MacFarlene likes to white wash stuff like that all the time.  After watching the episode again, it's lost its humor and I think the producers made this episode to make Quagmire an asshole since he was being a good before that.  They could have saved this episode if Meg decided not to want to have sex, and Quagmire coming to an understanding, right before Lois and Peter came in.

[Reply #255 on:]

That's a great point Fryfan. If the episode had ended like that it wouldn't have been as out of character. But Meg has no redemption she is just pushed around and controlled like always. Even though Peter saves her it's still really depressing.

[Reply #256 on:]

I actually liked last night's episode. It was creepy to see Quagmire wanted to hit on Meg, but we saw it coming, when Glen kept asking Meg if she was 18 yet, but said no.  Also, I find it hard to believe that Lois and Peter for once give a shit as to who Meg sleeps with.  I remember when Jerome left with Meg and Peter didn't care at all.  Lois didn't care at first which was a dumb move.  

Yeah.   Still it was nice they had an episode where they were decent to Meg.  I was kind of waiting for the part where Quagmire admits he really cares about her (like he has done in previous episodes, since he's the only character who consistently is nice to her) but they seem to have retconned that into him just seeing her as another notch on his bedpost.  

The ending joke was just... stupid.   Still, one of the better episodes of Family Guy to come along recently. 

[Reply #257 on:]

I really liked the premise behind this week's episode. It wasn't particularly clever or anything, but it was classic farce through 'Family Guy''s usual cynicism. Sadly, a handful of great little moments aside, it wasn't a particularly good episode. But I mean... it made me laugh out loud a few times...

[Reply #258 on:]

I wish we had gotten a new American Dad instead of another episode where Brian is a jackass that's disguised as a character we're supposed to care about. The end joke about him changing his voice really did it in for me. Brian is a douchebag who really doesn't deserve someone but godfuckingdammit I am still a little compelled to see him happy.

[Reply #259 on:]

I wish we had gotten a new American Dad instead of two episodes of Napoleon Dynamite (which wasn't great).

I thought the end joke was pretty funny, in all honesty. In fact, I didn't think his behaviour was too douchey this episode, in all honesty. Sure, he lied a hell of a lot for personal gain but... it was all harmless stuff except for pretending not to be a dog, and that came from a genuinely harmless place.
I suppose taking photos of the girl naked was a douche move... but I found it funny enough to let it go.

It bugged me that Peter and Quagmire were so chummy again after last week's episode, though.

[Reply #260 on:]

The Blind Side was okay, but I just can't stand Brian taking advantage of a blind person--some reason that bothers me more than what Quagmire did in the previous episode.  Also, we pretty know what's going to happen at the end.  Anyone think that Brian posing as someone else for Kate will be a continuing story or just for this episode? Peter falling the stairs was pointless.  It was funny the first two times, but it got old, I was hoping we'd know more about the deaf woman Peter works with now.

[Reply #261 on:]

I thought it was quite funny. Not the best of humor from FG, but nothing seemed bad on my behalf... 8/10

[Reply #262 on:]

It didn't bother me that he took advantage of her because I don't think he did particularly. He clearly had legitimate feelings for her and intended well, he just also took advantage of the situation in other ways.

[Reply #263 on:]

I feared it was going to be like that horrible episode where he dated that girl from "The Hills". Ugh...what a bad episode!

[Reply #264 on:]

I have similar feelings about this week's offering.

It was full of great little funny bits, but it was another of their "Family Guy tries to have a message" episodes and it just felt a bit forced and unnatural which is a shame because, you know... it had some pretty funny bits. I particularly liked Stewie and Brian's exchange over Transformers.

[Reply #265 on:]

I felt it was way overdone. The opening intro could've been much funnier, like they could've wrote 'And: This Girl' instead of having Stewie hit a rock. That part wasn't very funny at all. The list with all the checkpoints was pretty funny at first, but it became waaaayyy overdone. Speaking of overdone, I didn't laugh once at Dr. Hartmans crazy and quirky moments. But the Transformers part was absolutely horrible! It went on for to long to see a baby and a dog argue about a toy....not funny at all, .

[Reply #266 on:]

I quite liked the Transformers conversation, personally. I agree that it was a bit drawn out, but it was also pretty well observed humour that played off their characters quite nicely. Same goes for the checklist - it was a bit too long, but still very funny.

The opening wasn't funny though, you're right.

[Reply #267 on:]

I also liked the checklist, but it obviously went to far. The multiple Peters thing was funny the first time, but they did a few more times, and then it just stopped making sense and lost it's humor.

[Reply #268 on:]

Stopped making sense? It didn't make sense after the 2nd Peter.

And for my money, the best one was the Peter that didn't answer because something had gone horribly wrong.

[Reply #269 on:]

Does anyone else agree with me that Family Guy's golden age was in Seasons 3 & 4. There wasn't any bad episodes and the quality was extremely high. Too bad it was only for 2 seasons. The Simpsons had 6 seasons of gold...

[Reply #270 on:]

I'd probably go for seasons 4 and 5, myself so I half-agree.

I don't really understand the people who think that the show was only good prior to being cancelled.

Season 7 was the first noticable downturn for the show though, I'd say.

[Reply #271 on:]

Season 7 was quite funny, but ironically led to the shows downfall. The humor changed that season, and the stories gotto crazy. Soon the humor stress getting overdone and the whole show got messed up. It's like they have required things in each episode that they don't need at all.

1.) Say Bitch 5 Times
2.)Make 3 unfunny cutaways
3.)Make fun of gay people in an unfunny way
4.)Have 10 fourth wall breaks
Etc.

[Reply #272 on:]

I enjoyed this weeks' episode.  It was pretty preachy, but it was fairly respectful of religious views, even if if the subject matter was something where they could get away with dumping on the kind of people who would do that to a child.

It also had some pretty funny moments too, which didn't hurt.  So... while not fantastic, it's a sign that maybe it's too soon to start writing up the show's toe tag.   B- for effort.

[Reply #273 on:]

In my honest opinion, they don't really put any effort into the episodes any more. Beside American Dad, all of Animation Domination sorta sucks now...

[Reply #274 on:]

Family Guy still puts a lot of effort into some of its episodes - it just seems to be only a handful per season nowadays. Back to the Pilot and all of the Road to episodes for instance.

But I mean... Family Guy has always been a very lazy show by its very nature.

[Reply #275 on:]

Also that brilliant episode where they went to the South and got arrested...

[Reply #276 on:]

God, I really am getting so freaking feddup with FG/AD's ridiculously erratic airing schedule.  So they show one episode after almost a month, then they don't show another for two weeks?  I got all set to watch Wheels And the Legman tonight too...

I mean they did do something similar in the last few seasons, but this year is especially bad, when it comes to AD, and FG is having its dates shoved and shuffled around as much as well.  Is there a reason for it?

[Reply #277 on:]

To my knowledge, it is just the way Fox handles their shows. They've done this for so many of their shows (including Futurama, of course). The only shows I know for a fact that have not been messed around with by Fox are The Simpsons (their flagship series) and 24 (a very serial program).

Family Guy was ingenious before it was cancelled in the early 2000s. Seasons 1-3 are pure gold. Unfortunately, once it got revived, the quality went way down (and yet it became more popular.... Ugh).

[Reply #278 on:]

At least we still have AD.  FG had a few good seasons but the last few have been really awful.  A few of the more recent episodes show that there's still some blood in the show yet, so I actually paused in writing up its obituary.  It's too soon to say whether it's a shuffle towards the glory days, or whether it's the last feeble flops of a fish on the floor.

[Reply #279 on:]

God, I really am getting so freaking feddup with FG/AD's ridiculously erratic airing schedule.  So they show one episode after almost a month, then they don't show another for two weeks?  I got all set to watch Wheels And the Legman tonight too...

I mean they did do something similar in the last few seasons, but this year is especially bad, when it comes to AD, and FG is having its dates shoved and shuffled around as much as well.  Is there a reason for it?

It was the Superbowl that night...

Honestly, all of America is watching!