Into Fat Air

"Into Fat Air" is the first episode of the eleventh season of the animated comedy series Family Guy, a holdover from season 10. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on September 30, 2012. The episode follows the Griffin family having dinner with Lois' old boyfriend's family and climbing Mt. Everest.

The episode was written by Alec Sulkin and directed by Joseph Lee. "Into Fat Air" received mixed reviews from television critics for its storyline and cultural references. According to the Nielsen ratings, it was viewed in 6.55 million homes in its original airing. The episode featured guest performances by Elizabeth Banks and Martin Spanjers, along with several recurring guest voice actors for the series.

Plot

When Lois tells Peter of a dinner date with her former boyfriend Ross Fishman (who was previously seen in "Stuck Together, Torn Apart"), his wife Pam, and their son Ben, Peter is distressed. When Ross brags about their family vacations and that they plan to climb Mt. Everest, Peter decides the Griffins will also climb the mountain. When they return home, Peter realizes he overspoke and asks Lois to make up an excuse, but Lois is also annoyed by the Fishmans' smug attitude and proposes they actually climb Mt. Everest.

Arriving in Nepal, the Griffins find the Fishmans, who are surprised they actually followed through with the trip. While climbing, they discover they are ahead of the Fishmans. But when they reach the top, they discover the Fishmans beat them there. As they start back down, things go awry when they get stuck on the mountainside in the middle of a massive storm. Starving after Peter mistook trail mix for a mix tape, they come across the dead frozen body of Ben and decide to eat him to survive. They pass Ross and Pam, who are going back up the mountain searching for their son, and come within sight of base camp. But as Lois watches the storm clouds, she decides to have the family go back after the Fishmans to save them from certain death. They discover the Fishmans lying unconscious in a crevasse and send Peter down on a rope to rescue them. Peter barely gets Ross and Pam out alongside the rock he saved before the family heads back to base camp. Back at base camp, Ross and Pam are loaded onto a helicopter to be taken to a hospital to recuperate. As Ross and Pam are airlifted out, Peter casually reveals they ate their son.

Production and development

The episode was written by Alec Sulkin and directed by Joseph Lee. Steve Callaghan, Mark Hentemann, Danny Smith, Alec Sulkin and Wellesley Wild served as executive producers, and James Purdum, Dominic Bianchi as supervising directors.^[1]

It featured guest performances from Elizabeth Banks and Martin Spanjers, along with recurring guest stars.^[2]

Reception

"Into Fat Air" was broadcast on September 30, 2012, as a part of an animated television night on Fox, and was preceded by the season premiere of The Simpsons ("Moonshine River") and Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane's other series American Dad! ("Love, AD Style"). It was watched by 6.55 million viewers, according to Nielsen ratings and acquired a 3.3/8 rating/share.^[3]

The episode received mixed reviews. Kevin McFarland from The A.V. Club gave the episode a C, saying "The only parts of this episode that didn’t feel cobbled together from previous episodes and other shows (the mountain climbing plot, the cannibalism sequence, the family dinner gone awry) were the cutaways, which is pretty typical of Family Guy at this point. I’m of the opinion that any kind of joke that involves Brian talking out the thoughts and emotions of a dog is going to be funny, so some of that material worked for me, as did the extended tangent of Stewie slowly losing his shit in Vegas backed by Earth, Wind, & Fire’s “September.” But adding up all of those side jokes doesn’t equate to a full episode. It’s anticlimactic, like when you realize there’s about 11 minutes of action in a three-hour football game."^[4]

Carter Doston from TV Fanatic gave the episode three and a half stars out of five, saying "There were a lot of funny little lines, some cutaways that largely fell flat, and just was generally the level of humor that later seasons of the show are known for. As this was actually a production season 9 episode that aired as the season premiere, there's really not that kind of tonal shift that happens between production cycles yet, but I'm interested to see what happens soon; the show does seem to shift ever so slightly as writers turn over, so in the coming weeks the style of humor and storyline could definitely change. This was a serviceable episode: it at least took the main characters out of their suburban lifestyle, gave them goals to accomplish, and followed through on it. It wasn't great, but I've sure seen worse from this series."^[5]

References

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to: "Into Fat Air"

• "Into Fat Air" at the Internet Movie Database
• "Into Fat Air" at TV.com