American Dad

[Reply #560 on:]

I agree.  It was a good episode, but considering the concept AND that it was a Christmas episode, it was very mediocre.  It certainly wasn't memorable the way RD and FWTSBT at all.  I was hoping it would be a sequel to Sleigh Bell, since Santa has promised he will try and kill the Smiths (and Jeff by extension) every year.

However I did like the connection to Rapture at the end, when the baby starts screeching in the antichrist's high pitched voice.  However, it was one of the worser american dads we've seen a while. 7/10.   I would say the best special we've had in a long while is Hurricane, which whilst being funny, had some genuine drama in it.  (And proved how much of a fucking badass Francine is.  Sharks?  She punches those things in the face to protect her family.)

Also, speaking of Christmas Specials: "There's a flying hooker watching you hug.  Go away, hooker!"

[Reply #561 on:]

I'd say Hurricane! is the best episode so far this season, let alone special.

[Reply #562 on:]

It's definitly on my top five American Dads, along with Shallow Vows.

It certainly helps that the other two specials sucked majorlly.  Seashell Party was a terrible episode (despite having two awesome moments like the drug trip and Meg chewing out her family, but they weren't enough to save it) and I can't even remember what happened on the Cleveland Show.

[Reply #563 on:]

No offense SGFW, but I'm not a big fan of American Dad. Originally as a Family Guy fan, I found it to be to similar, instead of finding it's own voice (which Futurama did). It feels liek the same old thing.

[Reply #564 on:]

I thought that, until I watched a few episodes, (I avoided the show for a looooooooong time because of that).  It's got it's own flavor that seperates it from Family Guy.  For a start, no cut aways, and a much much stronger focus on its characters and strong plots.  Its also much less all over the place then Family Guy, and it has less dead weight characters.  All of the core group of characters all have their own flavor and bring something to the show, unlike Family Guy which is like a scrapyard of unfunny, annoying and pointless characters.  (Seriously, I can't think of a single time Chris has made me laugh, throughout the entire show's run.  Ever.)  Plus, it just has much better jokes, plots and characters.   And its... funnier.

If you want a show that is essentially what Family Guy is, but done worse, look at the Cleveland Show.  Basically all the jokes that aren't funny enough to be on FG (which is pretty unfunny now to begin with) trickle down there.  

[Reply #565 on:]

IDK, maybe i just think that because I have a soft spot for Family Guy. But we can both agree that Futurama is the best!

[Reply #566 on:]

Yes we can.  I used to have a soft spot for Family Guy too, but it feels that just like Futurama and the Simpsons, AD gets better as FG gets worse.   I just hope this season of AD isn't a sign of things to come (though it has plenty of solid/great episodes.)

It really bothers me that AD's future is actually uncertain past 2013, yet the steaming turdpile that Cleveland Show always seems to be renewed no matter how awful it is.   Hot Tub, on the other hand, was actually written to be the very last episode at one point (Fox only renewed it at the last minute, and there is a chance it may be cancelled in 2013)

[Reply #567 on:]

SGB: I like Family Guy too, but American Dad is way better and anyone who passes them off as the same thing is something of a moron. Watch the show, gain some insight, compare Family Guy and American Dad family, and then come back and tell me why you like one over the other. You're on a Futurama board so I'm gonna assume that you prefer Futurama over all of these shows. Give me some substance to work with if you're gonna come here and talk about a show.

I wouldn't mind if the show got cancelled in 2013, I'd rather have it end sooner when it is still enjoyable and good then have it become a sad sack like Family Guy that knows it's past due but still keeps going.

Also the Cleveland Show Die Hard special made me sad. Cleveland just sucks, like god I really hate what became of his character. Why did he have to do Die Hard, I mean really, what a piece of shit episode that was.

[Reply #568 on:]

I thought American Dad was a poor man's Family Guy when it came out, but that was based on the pilot episode which sort of is a poor man's Family Guy what with its cutaway gags and everything.

Then I saw the proper episodes of the show and I love it. I still prefer Family Guy (although I'd say the last few seasons of American Dad have been better than the last few seasons of Family Guy) but I think both are good shows and worthy of my time.

[Reply #569 on:]

Cleveland Show is just a poor man's... everything.    I have a sneaking suspicion that they threw that steaming turd together, so that the rapidly declining Family Guy episodes would look better by comparison.  (A bit like that ugly girl who gets paid to hang out with Meg.)

Plus, Roger is easily Seth McFarlane's funniest character, hands down. 

[Reply #570 on:]

Honestly, Cleveland was great as a side character, boring and all. But now he has a fucking personality? BULLSHIT! And if they wanted to get "rid" of Cleveland, then why would they bring him back 3 times a season?

[Reply #571 on:]

Probably because they know the show is quite frankly, the runt of the litter.  Fox can renew it as much as it wants, no one likes it.

[Reply #572 on:]

I don't think they ever wanted to get rid of Cleveland, exactly - if anything, the fact that they gave him his own show suggests that they liked his character a lot and they always did it knowing that they could crow-bar him back into the odd episode when they wanted the old gang together and that he could just come back to Family Guy if (when) his show got cancelled.

[Reply #573 on:]

I quite like Cleveland.  He's a straight man and that characterization works for him.  He works as the Voice of Reason/Nice Guy and he works as a buffer to the rest of Peter's over the top friends.  Plus it makes the rare occasions when he does misbehave all the more memorable (such as the time when Peter sends five prostitutes to Cleveland's house to make him look bad, while Cleveland snaps: "Peter, you and three of those prostitutes get out of my house right now!")  Now he's just annoying.  He not enough of an asshole to be a funny sociopath, but he's not nice enough to be a nice guy.  He's just a very unremarkable, uninteresting inbetween now. He just distracts from the funnier side characters, like Tim and Kendra.   I would just cancel the show, and just make the funnier characters be recurring in Family Guy.   Besides, does anyone really give a shit about Roberta or Cleveland Jr or Donna anyway?

Can we have a Cleveland Show thread, so we can dump on it properly?   And hell, if there are any actual fans of the show on here, I'd like to hear their defense.

[Reply #574 on:]

I actually am really fond of Cleveland Jr, I don't know why I think his fat + idiocy + innocence is just too funny. And open the damn thread no one is stopping you.

[Reply #575 on:]

I find him really annoying.  He's a better character then Chris, but Susan Boyle is a better character then Chris.  A singing toilet in a bathroom fixtures warehouse advert is a better character then Chris.   I just found it annoying that they stuck to a formula for character types that doesn't even work to begin with (Roberta is rapidly becoming an extra the way Meg and Hayley have done for example, and Seth has said several times his writing team don't even bother to try writing teenage girls).    Mind you, his original personality on Family Guy would have got extremely annoying if you saw it for then twenty seconds.  At least Cleveland Jr is easy to ignore even though his voice sometimes makes me want to punch a kitten (similar to how Barry's voice pisses Stan off).

Well, I just wanted to know if anyone would actually post in it, since most people don't really give the show the time of day on here.   

Anyway.  What have people thought of this season this far?  There have been some pretty mediocre episodes like Season's Beatings, and some pretty amazing ones like Worst Stan and Virtual Instanity.  (I would have enjoyed Scarlet Getter a lot more, except seeing Roger's mutilated body actually freaks me out, even more then seeing Francine's acid burned face in Flirting with Disaster did.  Yes, even with the scab shedding.)

[Reply #576 on:]

The season has been ok, a little underwhelming, but I still watch it religiously.

[Reply #577 on:]

Honestly, I've been pretty let down by this season so far. Even the better episodes feel weaker than the cream of the crop in past seasons and it feels like the ratio is skewered in favour of more bad episodes than usual, this time around. Of course, there's still a lot of the season left to go, so hopefully it'll pick up - and it's still one of the best things on TV, I'm just holding it to the very high standards set by the past few seasons.

[Reply #578 on:]

Agreed.  Not so long ago the most shocking thing happened.

I actually enjoyed that week's Family Guy more then the American Dad.  Yeah. 

I know.

[Reply #579 on:]

Decent episode this week - nothing special but also much better than this week's 'Family Guy' so order has been restored somewhat.

[Reply #580 on:]

This episode was great, I'll admit the first act I found to be the funniest rather than the rest but still a good episode overall. I just LOVE that when Steve goes up to Roger, the first time we see him this episode, he is dressed up like a prince with a throne and everything for no reason other than it's Roger. Hilarious.

[Reply #581 on:]

Ah good.  I was beginning to get a bit worried that I actually found the Family Guy episode a few weeks ago more enjoyable them AD.   That like... almost never happens.

[Reply #582 on:]

I don't mind any of the shows, Family Guy, American Dad, even Cleveland was funny. Except American Dad has a base type of storyline to it, like in The Simpsons and Futurama. It's not so random as Family Guy and Cleveland, but that's what makes it funny for me. How the show just throws in really random bits and pieces. Though last time I checked Cleveland only lasted a season, and I didn't officially hear of any new episodes a while after the first season came out back then, but then the new Australian channel "11" came out and started playing more. And it also started playing Bob's Burgers....  

That other crazy show came on as well, that one that was back in the 90's or whenever. ugh. I wouldn't have any other disagreements though. All the Matt Groening's shows suited me, and so will American Dad. I don't see any other reason to complain on any show here. 

[Reply #583 on:]

I suppose that comment makes this the logical places for me to post this.

Basically, Fox now has 4 more animated TV show slots for Seth MacFarlane to play with (although the gist seems to be that they're going to try more experimental programming rather than repeating the same old nuclear-family dynamic again and again).

[Reply #584 on:]

Solid episode.  Not a fantastic one, but is much closer to the American Dad standard.  

Not sure I liked the explosion... can't make up my mind about whether it was hilarious or overly brutal.   Or both.

I especially liked Francine going off the edge, pretty much everything she said or did this week made me laugh so hard.  Lauren was a pretty good new character, I hope she turns up in future episodes.  

Only thing that bothers me: if Jeff and Hayley live in the same house, why are they in hardly any episodes?   It's hard to remember that Hayley was The Daughter at one point.

[Reply #585 on:]

I think they've basically just run out of ideas that encorporate her much like all of MacFarlane's shows seem to run out of ideas for their respective daughter characters.

It felt as if '100 A.D.' and 'Son of Stan' were something of a send-off for them trying to use her.

The same thing also seems to be happening to Klaus, which is a shame. I like Klaus.

[Reply #586 on:]

Well Hayley is an interesting character, and has enough quirks to stand on her own, and she is a very interesting relationship with Stan that can be both hilarious and sweet.   She was pretty much a Plug In And Play character in that she came with all the bits needed to make her a great main, unlike Meg and Roberta.

I agree with you about Klaus.  Jeff actually seems to have more screentime then Klaus and Hayley now, even though you forget he actually lives in the Smith house now.  I love Jeff though, and was hoping to see more of him and Hayley, but it seems she's not only taken his last name, but his status as secondary character as well.

Ah yes 100 AD... disappointing episode.  The 100 deaths thing was pretty stupid (since AD's cast isn't big enough to kill off a hundred characters, and the bus crash was a complete cop out.)   A lot of the one episode characters they killed were great, and deserved a better send off then that.  (Time for Coco to be Coco is still one of my favorite American Dad moments ever.)

[Reply #587 on:]

I loved 100 A.D., personally and I loved their killing 100 characters thing. It was just such a stupid gimmick... but I felt that that was the joke, right? The bus was something of a cop-out, though, I agree.

And I definitely agree that Hayley's an interesting character. In fact, I'd say she's far more interesting than Steve and he gets plenty of storylines and screentime. I'd still chalk her fade into obscuritiy of sorts up to a predominantly male writing staff not really knowing how to write for a teenage girl, though. I suppose there's only so many times you can use the liberal daughter vs conservative father jumping off point for an episode, too. I guess a great deal of that conflict was resolved with 100 A.D./Son of Stan, too.

But yes, I think it's a shame that she's not doing much at the minute and hopefully it's just down to Fox airing the episodes out of production order although it probably isn't.

[Reply #588 on:]

I liked the episode with the psycho cat.

"SON OF A WHORE!!!!!!"

[Reply #589 on:]

Well it's not just the Liberal/Republican clash that makes their relationship so interesting. There's also the fact that despite their polar opposite political views, they are pretty much the same  in how they express their beliefs, and they have pretty much the same character traits (they both treat their spouses very shittily a lot of the time).  As well as that, it shows that deep down Stan loves his daughter very much, and Hayley is a complete daddy's girl.  (Though Pulling Double Booty kind of added a dark spin to that, by implying Hayley has a full blown Electra Complex.) 
I agree there are so many times you can use the liberal daughter vs conservative father storyline... but then again there are so many times you can use the wimpy son vs macho father storyline, (Steve doesn't suffer for screentime at all.) 

I really hate the whole "we're male writers so we can't do teenage girls" argument that Seth McFarlane's writing teams keep pulling out.  As an aspiring writer myself, I think it's a terrible excuse, which becomes even flimsier when Seth McFarlane insists on putting a teenage girl in every one of his shows...

Son of a whorecat.  Indeed.

[Reply #590 on:]

How did I get a hole in my new sock...

[Reply #591 on:]

"we're male writers so we can't do teenage girls"

That's what she said..

[Reply #592 on:]

Wha...? Isn't it what he said?...

[Reply #593 on:]

'American Dad!' was the best of Animation Domination again, this week. Another pretty standard episode that retread a lot of the usual ground that they've already done, if you ask me.

But the whole Roger-has-a-personality-that-the-family-members-can't-see-through thing was nice and it'll be interesting to see if that ever comes back.

[Reply #594 on:]

I liked it very much.

[Reply #595 on:]

Pretty good episode, and I agree, the one persona that a family member can't see through is a great idea, though I think they should be careful with that idea.  It's a promsing one, but I can see it getting overdone pretty easily.

Though I really hope next week isn't another Stan/Steve storyline, since nearly all of them this season have been that.  Not that they're bad, but I want to see someone else in the Smiths have a turn in the spotlight.  (Francine has had some great B Plots this season so, so it's not like she's been going to waste.  In fact, a lot of the funniest moments this season have come from her.)

  I really want them to do more with Jeff and Hayley though, since them being a married couple opens up a lot of stories.  In fact, the whole family dynamic should have changed, but you wouldn't know.  At the very least, not much has been made of the Smith family gaining a son/brother-in-law, or an extra (unemployed) mouth to feed.   I know he's a stoner, but I would have liked to have seen an episode where Jeff finds out the truth behind Klaus and Roger, rather then him just accepting them without any buildup.  I mean the show hasn't even made it clear if Jeff and Hayley live there together permanantly or not.  

[Reply #596 on:]

The next episode is entitled "Wheels & the Legman and the Case of Grandpa's Key" so I think we're in for a treat.

[Reply #597 on:]

When every animated show on FOX fails us, we can always depend on the one show that's still got some engine left in it!

Still, nothing beats the first five Family Guy seasons. Oh god I miss that quality! But at least we still got that kind of quality in American Dad, right?

[Reply #598 on:]

Yes it seems like we are, though I really hope we get a Francine episode soon.   Wheels and the Legman episodes are always quite funny though.

[Reply #599 on:]

Great episode, this week! I loved it, it's probably my favourite episode since "Hurricane!"

I love Wheels and the Legman in general and at the start of the episode, I was unsure if they'd be able to sustain an entire A-plot with their antics, but they did, it was funny, well-written and I very much enjoyed it.