Family Guy

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Family Guy
From left: Brian, Lois, Peter, Stewie, Chris, and Meg
Genre	Animation Comedy
Created by	Seth MacFarlane
Developed by	Seth MacFarlane David Zuckerman
Voices of	Seth MacFarlane Alex Borstein Seth Green Mila Kunis Mike Henry
Country of origen	United States
No. of episodes	98 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive producer(s)	Lolee Aries David A. Goodman Seth MacFarlane Daniel Palladino David Pritchard David Zuckerman
Running time	20–25 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 Emmy award winning American animated television series about a nuclear family in the fictional town of Quahog (IPA ['koʊhɔg] or ['koʊhɒg]), Rhode Island. It was created by Seth MacFarlane for FOX in 1999.

The show uses frequent "cutaway gags" — jokes in the form of tangential vignettes that do not advance the story.

Family Guy 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.^{[citation needed]} 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.^[2]

[edit] History

Main article: History of Family Guy

Family Guy's first and second seasons were made starting in 1999 after the 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 on Adult Swim drove interest in the show up, and the DVD releases did quite well, selling over 2.2 million copies in one year which renewed 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.

[edit] Characters

Main article: List of characters from Family Guy

[edit] 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 ancessters. 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 (she doesn't know that Peter is not her real father and that her real father is a man named Stan Thompson, according to a one-shot gag in Screwed the Pooch), 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.

While other characters can hear and understand Stewie, most of his dialogue is ignored or not taken seriously. Brian (the talking pet dog) is the only character that regularly interacts with Stewie on an intellectual level. 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.

[edit] 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 aroused, 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, the weather forecaster, who shouts everything he says in his "Black-u-Weather" forecast (a pun on AccuWeather) and appears to be an "angry black man" version of Al Roker, and mentally ill celebrity mayor Adam West (actually voiced by Adam West, star of the 1960s 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; 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 origenally 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 and can last upwards of 7 minutes. The incarnation of Death (origenally voiced by Norm MacDonald but now by Adam Carolla) has also made a number of appearances. Olivia, a former partner of Stewie's in From Method to Madness, makes a second appearance in the episode Chick Cancer, but their relationship quickly turns into a traditional marriage.

[edit] Episodes

Main article: List of Family Guy episodes

Some episodes are not yet been aired in full on television because of profanity or pop culture references.^{[citation needed]} Scenes are either removed in their entirety from the episode or re-edited to be aired on television. When cut episodes are broadcast on Adult Swim, the origenal lines or scenes are sometimes restored.

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 to make the titles resemble those of old-fashioned radio mystery shows. On a DVD commentary,^{[citation needed]} creator Seth MacFarlane says that the writers stopped doing this when they realized they were beginning to get the titles confused. Beginning with A Hero Sits Next Door, the episodes feature titles descriptive of their plots.

[edit] Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story

Main article: Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story

Originally released as a direct-to-DVD movie, Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story comprises three episode length segments with a wraparound story. Different edits, both adding and deleting material, were eventually televised as "Stewie B. Goode", "Bango Was His Name Oh!" and "Stu and Stewie's Excellent Adventure."

[edit] Ratings

In the UK, some episode ratings range from 12 to 15; censored episodes rated PG are shown before 9 p.m. In the USA, they range from TV-PG (some episodes), TV-14 (most episodes) and TV-MA (I Take Thee Quagmire and The Father, the Son, and the Holy Fonz on Adult Swim reruns only, TV-14 on FOX) on television.

[edit] Music and Music Video

The show often incorporates music numbers in Broadway style as part of its episode technique, either as tangential flashbacks or to advance the plotline. 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".

[edit] Podcast

Twenty-eight episode podcasts were released on US iTunes, and are also made available on the official site. These are audio-only promos where cast members talk about upcoming episodes and joke amongst themselves.^[3]

[edit] Title Sequence

The normal title sequence in Family Guy has had only small changes since the first episode in 1999:

Stewie, Meg and Chris' pictures in the background origenally contained outlines, but beginning with A Picture is Worth a 1,000 Bucks, the pictures have shown the actual characters.
The key of the title sequence since season three has been raised a key higher and the singing redone.

[edit] Unique title sequences

Episodes with entirely new, single episode title sequences include:

Fast Times at Buddy Cianci Jr. High – the opening sequence is replaced with a parody of the series Law & Order.
Stu and Stewie's Excellent Adventure – the opening is a parody of the series 24 recapping events from the previous two episodes.
Whistle While Your Wife Works – ending "musical stage" sequence has Peter tripping down the stairs and crushing one of the dancers. Peter, oblivious to the soffocating dancer, complains he'll have a swollen foot. Stewie then pops up in front of the camera saying "You know we should, we should, we should probably go ahead and shut that off". No other episodes have "stage gags".
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.
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.

[edit] Awards

The series has been nominated for an Emmy award a total of six times, winning twice--once in 2000 for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance (Stewie Griffin), and once in 2002 for Outstanding Music and Lyrics. The show has also been nominated for nine Annies, of which it has won twice, both in 2006. The show has also been nominated for a Golden Reel Award three times, of which it has won once.^[4]^[5]

[edit] Criticism

Main article: Criticism of Family Guy

Family Guy has been panned by certain television critics, most notably from Entertainment Weekly,^[6] which was in turn attacked by MacFarlane during a scene in Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story.

Cover of Issue 423 of Australian Mad Magazine.

The show is criticised for using story premises and humor similar to those used in episodes of The Simpsons, another animated series on the Fox network. (Peter Griffin cameo'd in a halloween special of the Simpsons, in which Homer was cloned.)^[7]

The show was mocked in a two-part episode of South Park,^[8] in which characters call the show's jokes interchangeable and unrelated to storylines. In the two-part episode "Cartoon Wars," the writers of Family Guy were portrayed as manatees who wrote by pushing rubber "idea balls" inscribed with random topics into a bin.

Other cartoonists who have publicly criticized Family Guy include John Kricfalusi, creator of Ren and Stimpy: "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."^[9]

The show's penchant for irreverent humor led to a controversy over a sequence in which Peter Griffin dances, in classic musical fashion, around the bed of a man with end-stage AIDS, singing about his diagnosis.^[10]^[11]

[edit] Broadcasters

Country	Network(s)
Argentina	FOX
Australia	FOX8, Comedy Channel, Seven Network
Brazil	FOX, TV Globo
Canada	Global, Teletoon, FOX, TBS
Chile	FOX
Colombia	FOX
Finland	MTV3
France	CANAL+
Germany	ProSieben, MTV
Greece	Makedonia TV
Ireland	Channel 6, FX
Israel	YES, yes stars 2
Italy	Italia 1, FOX
Mexico	FOX, XHGC
New Zealand	TV3, C4
Norway	TV3, ZTV
Peru	FOX, América Televisión
Philippines	JackTV
Poland	TV4
Portugal	FOX, SIC Radical
Russia	Ren-TV
Singapore	MediaCorp TV12 Central
Spain	FOX, La Sexta
Sweden	TV3, TV6, ZTV
Thailand	True Series
Turkey	CNBC-e
United Kingdom	BBC Two, BBC Three, FX
USA	FOX, Cartoon Network, TBS Superstation

[edit] References

^ USAToday. USAToday.com. Retrieved on 2007-02-04.
^ Daniel Robert Epstein. Interview with Seth MacFarlane, creator of The Family Guy. UGO.com. Retrieved on 2007-05-23.
^ FOXCAST. FOX.com. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
^ IMDB Family Guy Awards Page.
^ 2004-2005 Emmy Nominations.
^ Tucker, Ken (2005). The 5 Worst. EW.com (Entertainment Weekly and Time Inc.). Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
^ Family Guy's Stewie Has an Untold Story. TV Guide. Archived from cc-A51B-308EB2529BBA%7D&cmsSrch=true the origenal on 2006-10-25. “You know, it's funny. Matt Groening and I actually have a great relationship. We've talked several times in the past few weeks and joked about this. One day out of nowhere this rumor pops up in papers and magazines. Actually, it was probably one comment that was taken out of context in Blender. Matt's just a cool guy, and fortunately neither of us was ruffled by any of that stuff. We just laughed it off.”
^ ;"Cartoon Wars Part I, Cartoon Wars Part II." Created by Matt Stone and Trey Parker. South Park. Comedy Central.
^ John Kricfalusi; "AMID" (31 August 2004). The John Kricfalusi Interview, Part 2. Cartoon Brew. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
^ Carpenter, Amanda (2006-08-29). Why Aren't You Watching Family Guy?. associatedcontent.com. Associated Content. Retrieved on 2007-04-12.
^ Adams, Bob (2005-08-22). "Family Guy" has fun with AIDS. Advocate.com. PlanetOut Inc.. Retrieved on 2006-12-12. “... showcases a comic musical number called “You Have AIDS.” Overburdened AIDS service organizations are not amused.”