Family Guy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Family Guy | |
|---|---|
 From left: Brian (dog), Lois, Peter, Stewie, Chris, and Meg |
|
| Genre | Animated television series Comedy |
| Creator(s) | Seth MacFarlane |
| Developer(s) | Seth MacFarlane David Zuckerman |
| Starring | Seth MacFarlane Alex Borstein Seth Green Mila Kunis Mike Henry |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| No. of episodes | 94 (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Lolee Aries David A. Goodman Seth MacFarlane Daniel Palladino David Pritchard David Zuckerman |
| Running time | 20–23.6 mins |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | Fox Broadcasting Company |
| Picture format | 480i (SDTV) |
| Original run | January 31, 1999 – February 14, 2002 May 1, 2005 – present |
| Links | |
| Official website | |
| IMDb profile | |
| TV.com summary | |
Family Guy is an American animated television series about a nuclear family in the suburbs of Quahog (IPA [kowhɔg] or [kowhɒg]), Rhode Island. It was created by Seth MacFarlane for FOX in 1999.
Family Guy's humor is famous, or even sometimes infamous, for its use of non sequiturs, usually in the form of flashbacks. The show was cancelled once in 2000 and again in 2002, but strong DVD sales and the large viewership of reruns on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim convinced FOX to resume the show in 2005. It is the first cancelled show to be resurrected based on DVD sales.[1]
Creator Seth MacFarlane voices many of the characters (Peter, Brian, Stewie, Glenn Quagmire, Tom Tucker, and others), and works as a gag writer. Other voice actors include Mila Kunis (Meg Griffin), Seth Green (Chris Griffin), Alex Borstein (Lois, Tricia Takanawa, Loretta Brown), Mike Henry (Cleveland, Cleveland Jr, Performance Artist, Herbert, and Greased-up Deaf Guy) and Patrick Warburton (Joe Swanson). Lacey Chabert voiced Meg Griffin for the first production season (14 episodes); however, because of a contractual agreement, she was never credited, and FOX has never officially acknowledged that she was ever the voice of Meg.
Contents |
History
Family Guy's first and second seasons were made starting in 1999 after Larry shorts (its predecessor) caught the attention of the Fox Broadcasting Company during the 1999 Super Bowl commercial. Its cancellation was announced, but then a shift in power at Fox and outcry from the fans led to a reversal of that decision and the making of a third season, after which it was canceled again. Reruns later on in the decade (Adult Swim) drove interest in the show up, and the DVD releases did quite well, selling over 2.2 million copies in one year and renewing network interest. Family Guy returned to production in 2004, making two more seasons (for a total of five) and a straight to DVD movie, Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story. The sixth season is in production to air in the fall of 2007, with a seventh season airing in the fall of 2008.
Characters
Main characters
The show revolves around the adventures of Peter Griffin, a bumbling but well-intentioned blue-collar worker. Peter is an Irish-American Catholic with a thick Rhode Island / Eastern Massachusetts accent. During the course of the series, he discovers he is part African-American and has been known to have Spanish, Mexican, Scottish, and German ancestors. He is known for his trademark laugh. His wife Lois, who has a similar accent, is a stay-at-home mom/piano teacher, and is a member of the Pewterschmidt family of wealthy Protestant socialites. Peter and Lois have three children: teenage daughter Meg Griffin, who is frequently the butt of jokes for her ugliness; goofy and low-intelligent teenage son Chris Griffin, in some respects a younger version of his father; and diabolically evil infant son Stewie Griffin, bent on world domination and the death of his mother. Stewie speaks fluently and eloquently, with an Upper Class English accent and stereotypical arch-villain phrases. Even though the family can hear Stewie's talk of world domination and of Lois' demise, all but Brian (the intellectual talking pet dog) hear his speech as baby gibberish. Brian is the only family member who understands Stewie, and doesn't treat him like an infant, although minor characters have conversed with Stewie in different episodes. Stewie refers to his mother and father as "Lois" and "the fat man" respectively. Brian is anthropomorphized in that he walks on two legs, drinks Martinis, owns his own car (a Toyota Prius, circa 2004) and engages in human conversation, though he is still considered a pet in many respects. Occasionally, Brian will act in a stereotypically canine manner, usually for comedic effect (such as his inability to stand up in the back of a car, chasing tennis balls, fear of vacuum cleaners and barking uncontrollably at black people—which he blames on his father's side of the family). He does, however, object to any overly submissive domestic behavior.
Recurring characters
| Common rating | |
|---|---|
| Australia | M (MA15+ for Season 4) |
| Canada | 14+ Global Television, Teletoon |
| New Zealand | M (PGR or AO when aired) |
| United States | TV-14 (Few episodes are TV-PG, two are TV-MA) |
These characters include the Griffin family's colorful neighbors: paraplegic police officer Joe Swanson, his perpetually pregnant wife Bonnie, and sex-crazed airline-pilot bachelor Glenn Quagmire who lusts after Lois and just about any other female. When sexually enticed, Quagmire exclaims, "Giggity-giggity-goo", or "All right!" with his trademark head-bob. Other characters include mild-mannered deli owner Cleveland Brown, his wife (ex-wife as of the fourth-season episode The Cleveland-Loretta Quagmire) Loretta Brown and their hyperactive son, Cleveland Jr. (who hasn't appeared since Season 3, except briefly in the funeral scene in 'Perfect Castaway'), news anchors Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons along with "Asian Reporter Trisha Takanawa and Ollie Williams with the Weather", and mentally ill celebrity mayor Adam West (actually voiced by Adam West, star of the 1960's TV show Batman).
Family Guy has not used an especially large cast of recurring minor characters (though this has changed to an extent in Season 4, with many one-shot characters from prior episodes reappearing in new episodes), and most of the episode plotlines center on the exploits of the Griffin family.
There are also several semi-regular characters who serve as running gags. Examples include the Evil Monkey in Chris's closet; Herbert, the creepy old man who enjoys "watching" Chris; the Greased-Up Deaf Guy; Ollie Williams, the weather forecaster, who shouts everything he says in his "BlaccuWeather" forecast and appears to be an "angry black man" version of Al Roker; Jake Tucker, anchorman Tom Tucker's son (who has an upside-down face, and no 'bottom' i.e. buttocks); and Peter's nemesis the Giant Chicken (who originally poked fun at a Burger King commercial), whose fights with Peter parody Hollywood action films and usually cause huge amounts of damage to the city. The incarnation of Death (originally voiced by Norm MacDonald but now by Adam Carolla) has also made a number of appearances.
Episodes
In keeping with the humorous tone of the series, most episode titles of Family Guy are parodies of popular television shows, movies and slogans. For the first half of the first season, the writers tried to work the words "murder" or "death" into the title of every episode (e.g. Mind Over Murder and Death Has a Shadow) to make the titles resemble those of old-fashioned radio mystery shows. On a DVD commentary, creator Seth MacFarlane says that the writers stopped doing this when they realized they were beginning to get the titles confused and couldn't remember which title went with which episode. Beginning with A Hero Sits Next Door, the episodes featured titles descriptive of their plots.
Family Guy also has different ratings (In both USA and UK) for each episode. In the UK, some episodes are rated 12 and others are rated 15 (censored episodes rated PG are shown before 9 p.m.). As in the USA, they range from TV-PG (some episodes), TV-14 (most episodes) and TV-MA (two episodes) on television. Since season four has been released, some episodes have not yet been aired in full on television because of the swearing or the pop culture references. They either have to cut the scene fully from the episode or re-edit it to be aired on television.
Criticism
Rivalry with The Simpsons
Family Guy has also received criticism for what critics see as premises and humor too similar to those featured in The Simpsons, another animated series on the Fox network. In 2005, the similarities were spoofed on a cover of Mad magazine, which featured an illustration of the main Family Guy characters altered to look like the characters on The Simpsons. Under it ran the headline "We salute Family Guy: TV's most original animated series!"
(In the Australian version of this cover, the picture was that of the Family Guy family sitting on a couch closely resembling that of the Simpsons and casting shadows resembling their corresponding Simpsons character).
The Simpsons writing team has taken shots at Family Guy several times, including:
- In "Missionary: Impossible", a television is shown bearing the Family Guy logo before being turned off by guest star Betty White, who refers to it as "crude, low-brow humor".
- In "The Italian Bob", a book with a list of Springfield's criminals contains an image of Peter Griffin, above the caption "Plagiarismo". A second image in the sequence shows Stan Smith from American Dad!, with the caption "Plagiarismo di plagiarismo."
- In "Treehouse of Horror XIII", Homer obtains a "magic hammock" that clones him. One duplicate that is made of Homer is Peter Griffin.
Seth MacFarlane has stated in interviews that he and The Simpsons creator Matt Groening have a friendly relationship despite the jabs from The Simpsons writing staff. In an AV Club interview, MacFarlane commented on the controversy:
| “ | "Apparently they hate our guts. I'm not sure why. I've said this before, but that show, at its best, is up there with the best episodes of All In The Family, Mary Tyler Moore, and Dick Van Dyke, I think. I was reading a quote from one of the writers, from a lecture that he gave, that said "The Simpsons staff hates Family Guy." Who knows why? I'm not losing any sleep over it."[2] | ” |
The creators of Family Guy were able to make a couple of return jabs at The Simpsons:
- The first was in the opening credits to the season 4 (Episode 1 in season 5 for pal regions) episode 14 - "PTV" in which Stewie, as a parody of the opening credits to The Naked Gun, rides his tricycle through many scenes, ending in the Griffins' garage where he runs Homer Simpson over, followed by Peter remarking, "Who the hell is that?".
- The second was in episode 04x24 - Peterotica, Peter has a flashback about the family being featured in animated shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show, appearing the way the Simpsons did when they debuted there.
- In episode 05x02 - Mother Tucker (often referred to as 06x02), Brian references a time that Stewie sold out, which is followed by a cutaway to Stewie holding a Butterfinger bar and saying the line Bart Simpson had said in the Butterfinger commercials of the early 1990s: "Nobody better lay a finger on my Butterfinger.", followed by Homer's trademark "D'oh!".
In an April 2006 interview, Matt Groening revealed that the rivalry between Family Guy and The Simpsons is "very affectionate", complimenting MacFarlane and comparing the competition to The Addams Family and The Munsters in the 1960s.[3]
Family Guy episode Brian the Bachelor featured the voice of Nancy Cartwright, best known as the actress providing the voice of Bart Simpson.
Other Criticisms
Family Guy has been panned by certain television critics, most notably from Entertainment Weekly,[4] which was in turn attacked by MacFarlane during a scene in the straight-to-DVD movie Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story. An earlier jab in the episode "There's Something About Paulie" featured Peter wiping his anus with an "Entertainment Weekly" magazine when there was no toilet paper available.
Other cartoonists who have publicly criticized Family Guy include John Kricfalusi, creator of Ren and Stimpy, who argued that "If you're a kid wanting to be a cartoonist today, and you're looking at Family Guy, you don't have to aim very high... The standards are extremely low."[5]
The show was mocked in a two-part episode of South Park,[6] in which characters called the show's jokes interchangeable, saying that they had no place in the storyline. In the two-part episode "Cartoon Wars," the writers of Family Guy were portrayed as manatees that moved various rubber "idea balls" inscribed with random topics (such as Gary Coleman or Mexico) into a giant bin that became the jokes written into each episode. A character similar to Bart Simpson is featured in the episode attempting to get Family Guy cancelled. But later, a character mentions to Kyle that he likes the random jokes and "At least it doesn't get all preachy and up its own ass with messages, you know?," referring to the tendency of South Park episodes to have an explicit moral. The Family Guy writing staff appears to use the phrase "manatee gags" for the "like that time I..." jokes in the show, as shown on the Season 4 DVD commentary.
During his speech at the Harvard class day 2006, in character as Stewie Griffin, MacFarlane rebutted:
| “ | "You're wondering to yourselves: what can I expect from the outside world? Will I find my niche? What should I know about the vast territory that lies beyond the confines of my little subculture of textbooks, Ramen noodles, coin-operated laundry and TV shows that seem to think they can skate by with random jokes about giant chickens that have absolutely nothing to do with the overall narrative? The boys at South Park are absolutely correct: Those cutaways and flashbacks have nothing to do with the story! They're just there to be ... funny. And that is a shallow indulgence that South Park is quite above, and for that I salute them." | ” |
Music and music video
On April 26, 2005 Family Guy: Live in Vegas was released and was a collaboration between Walter Murphy and Seth MacFarlane. It features a show tune theme. Only one song is related to the show; the theme song. Also included was the music video "Sexy Party".
Title sequence
The title sequence in Family Guy does not vary, but small differences have occurred since the first episode in 2000:
- Stewie, Meg and Chris' pictures in the background originally contained outlines, but beginning with A Picture is Worth a 1,000 Bucks, the pictures have shown the actual characters.
- In Episode 5, Season 5, Whistle While Your Wife Works, they made a "Stage Gag" by having Peter tripping on a stair on the stage and crushing one of the dancers, puncturing her lung. Peter became upset that he was going to have a swollen foot for a week. This all ends with Stewie popping up in front of the camera and saying "You know we should, we should, we should probably go ahead and shut that off."
- In the three "Road Trip" episodes Road to Rhode Island, Road to Europe, and Road to Rupert the title sequence is replaced with one that features each episode's road trip.
- In PTV, the intro is replaced with Stewie knocking out Osama Bin Laden, then riding his bike back home in an action-like scene, as in The Naked Gun. It ends with Stewie somehow running over Homer Simpson.
Podcast
A free podcast is available for MP3 download from the official site or from iTunes. Twenty-eight episodes have been released. On several of the podcasts, cast members talk about upcoming episodes and joke amongst themselves.[7] However this is only available from within the United States.
Broadcasters
References
- ^ USAToday. USAToday.com. Retrieved on 2007-02-04.
- ^ Rabin, Nathan; Seth MacFarlane. Seth MacFarlane. The A.V. Club. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
- ^ Another hit show South Park has made fun of the show Family Guy with Cartoon Wars 1 and 2. Family Guy had never shot back. Rumor has it that they do not plan to and that MacFarlane likes South Park himself.Matt Groening. Retrieved on 2006-06-14.
- ^ Tucker, Ken (2005). The 5 Worst. EW.com (Entertainment Weekly and Time Inc.). Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
- ^ John Kricfalusi; "AMID" (31 August 2004). The John Kricfalusi Interview, Part 2. Cartoon Brew. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
- ^ ;"Cartoon Wars Part I, Cartoon Wars Part II". Created by Matt Stone and Trey Parker. South Park. Comedy Central.
- ^ FOXCAST. FOX.com. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
External links
- Family Guy at the Internet Movie Database
- Official Website
- Planet Family Guy
- Family Guy Wiki
- Yahoo! Movies
- Carol Burnett not amused by 'Family Guy', Hollywood Reporter, Reuters, as shown on CNN.com, March 19, 2007.
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|---|---|---|---|---|
| Characters | ||||
| Griffin family: | Peter • Lois • Meg • Chris • Stewie • Brian | |||
| Main relatives: | Francis • Thelma • Bertram • Mickey McFinnigan • Pewterschmidts | |||
| Brown family: | Cleveland • Loretta • Cleveland, Jr. | |||
| Swanson family: | Joe • Bonnie • Kevin | |||
| Goldman family: | Mort • Muriel • Neil | |||
| Other individuals: | Glenn Quagmire • Herbert • Tom Tucker • Mayor Adam West | |||
| DVDs and CDs | ||||
| Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story • Off the Cutting Room Floor • Live in Vegas | ||||
| Other | ||||
| Criticism • Episode list • Places • Quahog • Video Game • Quahog 5 • Voice Actors | ||||
Categories: Semi-protected | Animated sitcoms | Family Guy | Fox network shows | Black comedy | 1999 television program debuts | 1990s American television series | 2000s American television series | Shows on Adult Swim | Seven Network shows | Television series by Fox Television Studios | Television shows set in Rhode Island | Fictional families | Satirical television programmes | TBS network shows
