History Creator / SethMacFarlane

Seth Woodbury [=MacFarlane=] (born October 26, 1973 in Kent, Connecticut) is an American actor, animator, writer, producer, director, comedian, and singer. He is best known as the creator of the animated sitcoms ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', and ''WesternAnimation/TheClevelandShow'', and is the director of the films ''Film/{{Ted}}'', ''Film/{{Ted 2}}'', and ''Film/AMillionWaysToDieInTheWest'', and the live-action television spin-off of ''Series/{{Ted|2024}}'' (he co-starred in the ''Ted'' films via voice acting and motion capture, and also starred in the lattermost film in live-action).

In an odd twist of fate, [=MacFarlane=] was scheduled to fly on one of the planes that hit the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, but missed his flight due to a hangover and his agent screwing up his flight plan. He decided to wait for another flight until he saw the news footage of the World Trade Center being destroyed and realized that [[FridgeHorror that could have been him]] (in an even odder twist, his ''Ted'' co-star Creator/MarkWahlberg was ''also'' supposed to be on that very same flight). He vowed never to make 9/11 jokes on his shows because of this, but, after a while, the vow was broken and some slipped through. (''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' was originally created as a reflection of the post-9/11 world, which was rife with overzealous patriotism, the desperate need to be safe -- even if it means encroaching on others' rights -- and claims that the media and the government is paralyzing people into fearing for their lives.)

* AscendedFanboy: Kinda. He's a huge nerd if there ever was one (particularly when it comes to Star Trek), and now works with Patrick Stewart (and got to dine with the entire Cast of ''TNG''). He's also (unsurprisingly) a huge Star Wars fan and got permission from [[Creator/GeorgeLucas The Man Himself]] to make [[Western Animation/FamilyGuyPresentsLaughItUpFuzzball three parodies]] (and even use the original soundtrack) because Lucas is a fan of "Family Guy".

* AscendedFanboy: Kinda. He's a huge nerd if there ever was one (particularly when it comes to Star Trek), and now works with Patrick Stewart (and got to dine with the entire Cast of ''TNG''). He's also (unsurprisingly) a huge Star Wars fan and got permission from [[Creator/GeorgeLucas The Man Himself]] to make three parodies (and even use the original soundtrack) because Lucas was a fan of "Family Guy".

* OlderThanTheyLook: He was courting 40 when he filmed ''A Million Ways to Die in the West''. He barely looked like he was courting ''thirty'' in it.

* AscendedFanboy: Kinda. He's a huge nerd if there ever was one (particularly when it comes to Star Trek), and now works with Patrick Stewart (and got to dine with the entire Cast of ''TNG'').

** Due to his history with music, there are musical numbers in his shows. Family Guy, American Dad, and The Cleveland Show have musical numbers in every season or have a moment of singing. In their current timespans: Family Guy has over 400 musical numbers, American Dad has over 200 musical numbers, while The Cleveland Show had 118 musical numbers in its 4 season run. The main characters are also shown to be talented singers and musicians, likely referencing [=MacFarlene=]'s love of music. [=MacFarlane=] even sings the song "As Time Goes By" in the Family Guy episode "Play It Again, Brian".

*** Steve Smith from ''American Dad'', Brian Griffin from ''Family Guy'', and Cleveland Junior from ''The Cleveland Show'' are all atheists and have episodes questioning God. Brian goes as far as to say that Religion is counterproductive and problematic because "What you call God is inside you, all of us, and I just hate to see people hating and killing each other over their own interpretation of what they're not smart enough to understand."
*** On ''The Orville'', humanity (and indeed, spacefaring civilizations in general) are explicitly said to have [[OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions moved on from religion once humanity got a better understanding of science and technology]] and the one overtly religious alien species are the antagonists, whose beliefs are frequently mocked.

Seth Woodbury [=MacFarlane=] (born October 26, 1973 in Kent, Connecticut) is an American actor, animator, writer, producer, director, comedian, and singer. He is best known as the creator of the animated sitcoms ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', and ''WesternAnimation/TheClevelandShow'', and is the director of the films ''Film/{{Ted}}'', ''Film/{{Ted 2}}'', and ''Film/AMillionWaysToDieInTheWest'' (he co-starred in the ''Ted'' films via voice acting and motion capture, and also starred in the lattermost film in live-action).

*** Steve Smith from ''American Dad'', Brian Griffin from ''Family Guy'', and Cleveland Junior from ''The Cleveland Show'' are all atheists and have episodes questioning God. Brian goes as far as to say that Religion is the source of all the evil in the world because "What you call God is inside you, all of us, and I just hate to see people hating and killing each other over their own interpretation of what they're not smart enough to understand."
*** On ''The Orville'', humanity (and indeed, spacefaring civilizations in general) are explicitly said to have OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions and the one overtly religious alien species are the antagonists, whose beliefs are frequently mocked.
** Due to his history with music, there are musical numbers in his shows. Family Guy, American Dad, and The Cleveland Show have musical numbers in every season or have a moment of singing. In their current timespans: Family Guy has over 400 musical numbers, American Dad has over 200 musical numbers, while The Cleveland Show had 118 musical numbers in its 4 season run.

* ReferenceOverdosed: If you have no knowledge of 1970s and 1980s pop culture, movies from GoldenAge of Hollywood, musicals, or the Rat Pack, most of the jokes on Seth's shows will go over your head.

!!Discography

!!Notable Tropes associated with Seth [=MacFarlane=] include:

Seth Woodbury [=MacFarlane=] (born October 26, 1973 in Kent, Connecticut) is an American actor, animator, writer, producer, director, comedian, and singer. He is best known as the creator of the animated sitcoms ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', and ''WesternAnimation/TheClevelandShow'', and is the director of the films ''Film/{{Ted}}'', ''Film/{{Ted 2}}'', and ''Film/AMillionWaysToDieInTheWest'' (which he also stars in). Seth grew up in New England and went to school for animation at the Rhode Island School of Design. His professor sent a copy of his senior project (''The Life of Larry'') to Creator/HannaBarbera, who gave him his first job out of school.

After spending a few years at HB, writing/animating for shows like ''WesternAnimation/JohnnyBravo'', ''WesternAnimation/DextersLaboratory'' and ''WesternAnimation/CowAndChicken'', he made a sequel to ''The Life of Larry''. Titled ''WesternAnimation/LarryAndSteve'', it featured a middle-aged guy, Larry, and his intellectual, anthropomorphic dog, Steve. Think ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' if the show just focused on Peter and Brian and was, for all intents and purposes, a children's cartoon with the occasional ParentalBonus jokes and mild sexual innuendo (read: a typical cartoon from the 1990s, or an in-house program from Creator/CartoonNetwork).

After Cartoon Network aired the short, {{Creator/FOX}} contacted Seth about creating a pilot about the characters, which would later become ''Family Guy''. Originally, Seth was hired to do cartoon shorts for their ''Series/SaturdayNightLive''-esque sketch show, ''Series/{{MADtv}}'', but plans fell through for that, so instead, they gave him a budget of $50,000 and 6 months, and the rest is history.

Seth is also a talented voice actor, providing the voices of four main characters on ''Family Guy'' (Peter, Brian, Stewie and Quagmire), three on ''American Dad'' (Stan, Roger, and Greg Corbin, the gay newscaster), two on ''The Cleveland Show'' (Tim the Bear [until season four, when Creator/JessHarnell took over] and Dr. Fist [until season three, when Creator/TomKenny took over for one episode, and Creator/BryanCranston during the fourth season]) and many additional voices. He also voiced several characters in ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'', a sketch comedy show created by his ''Family Guy'' castmate Creator/SethGreen. He made a short foray into feature-length film when he voiced Johann Krauss in ''Film/HellboyIITheGoldenArmy''. He's also had some bit parts on live-action television, appearing in ''Series/StarTrekEnterprise'', ''Series/GilmoreGirls'', ''The War at Home'' (on the episode "I Wash My Hands of You," where Hillary -- the BrattyTeenageDaughter -- dates a 33-year-old), ''Series/FlashForward2009''. But he always returns to animation and comedy. He's also a musician, singer and composer, whose work often appears on his shows (particularly ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'', which has a lot of memorable musical moments, like ''Shipoopi'' from "Patriot Games," ''A Bag of Weed'' from "Episode 420," ''The Fellas at the Freakin' FCC'' from "PTV," and ''You've Got a Lot to See'' from "Brian Wallows and Peter Swallows").

Seth has won a couple of Emmy Awards for Voice-over Work and Musical Composition. Hugely successful (To the point of becoming the highest paid writer/producer in TV history), but does have a sizable number of detractors, including MoralGuardians who find his humor to be disgusting and offensive, and dyed-in-the-wool ''Simpsons'' and ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' fans who think he's a cynical, marginally-talented hack who ripped off jokes and stories wholesale from those two shows and padded them with [[CutawayGag meaningless jokes that don't go anywhere or have any plot relevance]].

Announced in 2010 that he is developing a live-action/CG hybrid feature film which was released summer 2012 named ''{{Film/Ted}}'' where he voiced a talking teddy bear owned by a loser male lead trying to get through life. ''Ted'' got generally favorable reviews and was a huge box office hit. His second film, a comedy {{western}} called ''Film/AMillionWaysToDieInTheWest'' was released on May 30, 2014. A sequel to ''Ted'', titled ''Film/Ted2'', was released on June 26, 2015.

Hosted the season 38 premiere episode of ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' and [[UsefulNotes/AcademyAwardsCeremonies the 85th Academy Awards]]. [[http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/entertainment/2012/10/seth-macfarlane-to-host-oscars/ No, really.]] [=MacFarlane=] also voiced a henpecked husband named Ben on ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' season 24 finale "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS24E22DangersOnATrain Dangers on a Train]]" and appeared as Peter Griffin etc all in the crossover episode "[[Recap/FamilyGuyS13E1TheSimpsonsGuy The Simpsons Guy]]".

He is the executive producer for ''Series/CosmosASpacetimeOdyssey'', hosted by UsefulNotes/NeilDeGrasseTyson. [[PlayingAgainstType However that makes sense.]] This indirectly led to his next project--''Series/TheOrville'', a live action ScienceFiction series that [[AffectionateParody affectionately parodies]] the ''Franchise/StarTrek'' franchise, with [=MacFarlane=] himself playing the ship's captain.

In an odd twist of fate, [=MacFarlane=] was scheduled to fly on one of the planes that hit the World Trade Center, but missed his flight due to a hangover and his agent screwing up his flight plan. He decided to wait for another flight, until he saw the news footage of the World Trade Center being destroyed and realized that [[FridgeHorror that could have been him]] (in an even odder twist, his ''Ted'' co-star Creator/MarkWahlberg was ''also'' supposed to be on that very same flight). He vowed never to make 9/11 jokes on his shows because of this, but, after a while, the vow was broken and some slipped through. (''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' was originally created as a reflection of the post-9/11 world, which was rife with overzealous patriotism, the desperate need to be safe [even if it means encroaching on others' rights], and claims that the media and the government is paralyzing people into fearing for their lives.)

His sister, Creator/RachaelMacFarlane is also a voice actor and Seth's co-star on ''American Dad!''. No relation to Creator/ToddMcfarlane.

* ProfessionalVoiceDissonance: Seth voices [[InsufferableImbecile Peter Griffin]], [[TheCasanova Glenn Quagmire]], [[EvilOldFolks Carter Pewterschmidt]], and [[EnfantTerrible Stewie]]; none of them sound like [=MacFarlane=]'s regular voice. This is {{Averted|Trope}} by [[DeadpanSnarker Brian]], who's the only character in the show that [=MacFarlane=] uses his natural speaking voice for.

* ManOfAThousandVoices: All of which [[TalkingToHimself have spoken to each other]] at one point or another. Not only does he do many voices on his shows, but he's an uncanny mimic--he can do a perfect Creator/AdamWest, for one thing (though he used the real thing for Family Guy).

* TalkingToHimself:
** Played straight in ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' and ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', where Seth voices the father of the family (Peter Griffin and Stan Smith), the bizarre live-in guest (Brian the talking dog and Roger the alien), the next door neighbor with a sexual side (Quagmire the sex addict and Greg Corbin, a male homosexual in a committed relationship), and a newscaster (Tom Tucker and, again, Greg Corbin).
** Downplayed and subverted with ''WesternAnimation/TheClevelandShow'': [=MacFarlane=] only played two characters on the show (Tim the Bear and Dr. Fist), who were later replaced with other actors (Creator/JessHarnell played Tim the Bear during the show's final episodes and Dr. Fist was voiced by Creator/TomKenny in one episode and Bryan Cranston in the show's last episodes).
** Parodied and deconstructed on his ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' monologue where he states that the many vocal impressions he does are in his head all the time and a possible sign of mental illness.

** As an atheist, atheism is a common theme in his work.

*** The level of hostility towards religion varies from [[GodBeforeDogma the church having too much influence over people and scientific progression]] to [[BeliefMakesYouStupid the believers being portrayed as foolishly idealistic and fanatical]]. In a few brief moments of mercy, he'll say that faith can be a good comforter in dark times as long as you don't use it as an excuse to abuse others or allow it to dominate your thinking.
** Due to his history with music, there are musical numbers in his shows. Family Guy, American Dad, and The Cleveland Show have musical numbers in every season or have a moment of singing. In their current timespans: Family Guy has 470 musical numbers, American Dad has 205 musical numbers, while The Cleveland Show had 118 musical numbers in its 4 season run.

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Ever since ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' ended after 12 years on the air and ''WesternAnimation/SitDownShutUp'' flopped so badly that it was canceled after four episodes (along with other animated shows that got the shaft after a short run, like ''WesternAnimation/AllenGregory''[[note]] Though to be fair, viewer and critic opinion of that show wasn't positive at all.[[/note]] and an [[WesternAnimation/NapoleonDynamite animated version]] of ''Film/NapoleonDynamite'' [[AnimationLeadTime that came five years too late]]), the Sunday night "Animation Domination" lineup was mostly made up of Seth's cartoons (now down on just ''Family Guy'' following ''The Cleveland Show'''s cancellation and ''American Dad'' moving to Creator/{{TBS}}). Currently, the only cartoons that aren't created by him on the "Animation Domination" lineup are ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'', and whatever new cartoon that tries not be cancelled after one season.

-->''"Oh, hi there. You scared the crap out of me."''

* AdoredByTheNetwork: Ever since ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' ended after 12 years on the air and ''WesternAnimation/SitDownShutUp'' flopped so badly that it was canceled after four episodes (along with other animated shows that got the shaft after a short run, like ''WesternAnimation/AllenGregory''[[note]] Though to be fair, viewer and critic opinion of that show wasn't positive at all.[[/note]] and an [[WesternAnimation/NapoleonDynamite animated version]] of ''Film/NapoleonDynamite'' [[WereStillRelevantDammit that came five years too late]]), the Sunday night "Animation Domination" lineup was mostly made up of Seth's cartoons (now down on just ''Family Guy'' following ''The Cleveland Show'''s cancellation and ''American Dad'' moving to Creator/{{TBS}}). Currently, the only cartoons that aren't created by him on the "Animation Domination" lineup are ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'', and whatever new cartoon that tries not be cancelled after one season.