Rhode Island’s Griffins are TV’s real survivors

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This article was published 29/04/2010 (5980 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In this age of fragmented TV audiences, declining network ratings and increasingly skittish broadcast executives, it’s a pretty big deal when a TV show sticks around long enough to celebrate its 150th episode.

And it’s a really big deal — basically, a one-of-a-kind accomplishment — when a series that was actually cancelled by those aforementioned trigger-fingered network suits somehow manages to hit the big one-five-oh.

Happy milestone, Family Guy. Giggity giggity to you, too.

More than a decade after it premiered on Fox, and fully seven years since it was cancelled by that network and then revived, almost three years later, because of booming DVD sales and success in rerun syndication, TV’s Sunday-night celebration of rapid-fire cartoon rudeness is a legitimate prime-time survivor.

Family Guy has become the key cog in Fox’s "animation domination" programming block, providing not just a steady stream of cult-favourite comedy in its own episodes but also inspiring a successful lookalike series (American Dad) and a direct spinoff (The Cleveland Show) from the same production team led by series creator Seth MacFarlane.

Not bad for a show whose cancellation was announced twice and implemented once between its second and third seasons.

For those unfamiliar with Family Guy‘s rather unique history, here’s the short-form review: the series, originally pitched to Fox based on a short film creator/executive producer MacFarlane made while in design school, premiered on Jan. 31, 1999 and had a largely undistinguished first-season run, attracting more criticism for its crude humour than praise for its inventive wit.

In its second season, Family Guy‘s already-unimpressive ratings declined by about half; Fox execs announced they were dumping the show, but changed their minds and brought it back for a third year before finally dropping it from the schedule.

In its prime-time afterlife, Family Guy attracted a large, young following when it began airing on U.S. cable’s Cartoon Network; then, unexpectedly, the series became a huge seller in the fledgling TV-shows-on-DVD market, selling an unprecedented 2.2 million copies in its first year of release.

Fox executives, smelling money in the cartoon-coloured air, decided to give Family Guy a second look. The show returned to prime time in the spring of 2005, and the rest is slightly blue-hued history.

In an interview in January 2005, shortly before Family Guy‘s return, MacFarlane expressed outright amazement at the sudden U-turn his career had just taken.

"I really did not think it was possible, mainly because no matter how well it did (in syndication or DVD sales), a network has never picked up a cancelled show before," he said. "I think Fox deserves a lot of credit for saying, you know, ‘What the hell — yeah, we cancelled it, but there’s money to be made now, so let’s pick it up again."

Family Guy, of course, follows the cartoonish misbehaviour of the fictional Griffin clan of Quahog, Rhode Island (MacFarlane’s home state) — pudgy, politically incorrect dad Peter, long-suffering wife Lois, disaffected daughter Meg, dullard son Chris, evil-genius toddler Stewie and talking-dog pet Brian.

The 150th episode, titled Brian and Stewie (which airs Sunday at 8 p.m. on Fox and Global), finds the series’ two most-talked-about characters locked inside a bank vault together, with access to neither baby food nor martinis, which forces them to re-examine the nature of their relationship as they try to come up with an escape plan.

The series is probably better known for its frantic pace, lightning-quick cutaway gags, pop-culture references and bawdy musical numbers than it is for whatever passes for episodic storylines. Being something of an all-ages offender, Family Guy offers a brand of crude humour that ranges from basic naked-cartoon-butt images to rather sophisticated sexual innuendo and socio-political satire.

"It’s always been a show for adults — you know, we’ve always kind of shot for that audience as our core," said MacFarlane. "But certainly, it’s been very popular with teens (and) it’s been very popular with kids. It’s good and bad, I guess.

"I mean, there’s some things that kids should probably not see on the show, but when I was a kid, my parents let me watch Stripes and Caddyshack and Animal House when I was, like, eight years old, and they did their (parenting) job otherwise. So I think if the family is sound and the values are intact, nothing you see on TV will do any damage."

Two cancellations, a renewal, a couple of spinoffs, a few million DVD box sets and 150 episodes later, really, who’s to argue?

brad.oswald@freepress.mb.ca