Family Guy

To me, Family Guy's a very hit-and-miss show. Some of the episodes I've seen have me keeled over laughing, while other episodes just leave me sitting on the couch feeling really disappointed. Being offensive by itself isn't nessecarily a reason to hate a show, but when it combines offensiveness with anviliciousness and weak, manatee-gag filled plots, it just loses a lot of its punch.

As a Knight in Sour Armor I like Family Guy's complete misanthropy,which rings incredibly true and I like how the shows uses the cynicism for comedic effect. And I love the cutaways

What I cannot stand is how the misanthropy is taken to Nieschte Wannabe level and the characters are Jerkass who use their Crapsack World to do what they want than the right thing.At least in The Simpsons there are characters like Ned Flanders and Marge Simpson [not Lisa,not anymore she's been Flanderized into a self-interested Granola Girl] who strive to do right.

Also Politically Incorrect and Strawman Political topics are best in moderation which it seems every epsiode save the "Road to" and Star Wars episodes have been ripe with since its revival.

Marge is slowly becoming an overprotective, nagging mother bordering on lunatic who clings to 80's and 90's values, they're letting up on Lisa by making her wrong several times this past season.

My major beef, first and foremost has always been, THESE PEOPLE, ARE JERKS. I guess that i've never understood cynical comedy, at least when it's the predominate form of Comedy to be found in a show. A little here and ther is fine, but when you base an entire show around showcasing how mean-spirited, evil and unwilling to develop this family can be, I draw the line.

I can't say exactly when since I never religiously watched it, but somewhere along the road (around the newer seasons), the show really started to go downhill. The newer episodes are really hit-or-miss. The good ones are pretty good, but the bad ones are borderline unwatchable.

I really like the older episodes- the ones pre-charcter decay when everyone besides the sociopathic baby wasn't a Jerkass. Like I said, it's just not that good anymore. Seth seems to be putting a lot more of his effort into American Dad (which is actually still good, and getting better in my opinion) and ignoring Family Guy.

I used to be a huge fan of this show, but starting with the 7th season every character took a turn for the worst Peter turned into a cruel abusive sociopath, Lois into a loudmouthed sex obsessed bitch, Stewie lost all traces of evilness and was now full on gay and in love with Brian, Brian into a politically obsessed douche-bag who has sex with human women all the time and all traces of his dog side are gone, the Meg abuse was crueler than usual,etc., and the show became more mean spirited and very offensive making cruel expenses at diseases, deformities, and disabilities, rape victims,etc. I feel the show is not funny anymore, the writing is terrible, and should end very soon.

Brian still shows his dog side, but it's integrated with his human side in some funny ways...like when he tries to profess his love for Lois and it goes something like "whenever you leave the house, I'm almost positive you're gone forever, and when you come back I realize I have no idea how much time has gone by and am just so happy to see you at all." There's a lot of other, more subtle instances of them slipping real-world dog instincts/psychology into his "human" behavior.

edited 23rd Jul '11 9:37:38 AM by scythemantis

I love Family Guy. Haters just blow some of the "offensive" jokes way out of proportion. On the D Mo S page there are tons of entries that are just "This happened. THAT'S NOT FUCKING FUNNY! :("

I doubt half of the stuff on the DMOS page of the show are real DMOS's and more along the lines of "this offends me or isn't really funny to me, so I'm going to put it on the DMOS page as a complaint". I'm surprised the South Park page, despite having more episodes/moments, has only a few moments of suck. Although a few of the ones on the Family Guy page actually do qualify as DMOS's.

edited 23rd Jul '11 4:58:54 PM by WolfMan16

One of the biggest complaints that I have is the liberal use of overly long gags. It's nothing more than filler to take up space and drag the episode up to a half an hour. The most ridiculous I think is the Conway Twitty thing - there's no way that a comedy writer thinks that someone is going to sit and laugh at a random cowboy singing for five minutes straight. It's lazy, absolutely lazy and betrays the lack of creativity behind the scenes from which every other problem stems.

edited 23rd Jul '11 5:17:20 PM by TheBatPencil

Reading through the first page is hard, not because I'm some avid fanboy of Family Guy by any means, but most of the complaints are hugely inaccurate or apply to which ever cartoon their trying to make seem better (which is always The Simpsons or South Park, both of which are series that "attack" Family Guy).

The show was brilliant when it first started, but that's my opinion. It definitely had a really good run for a few seasons, but eventually the animation became choppier/cheaper, the jokes were more or less just Running Gags, plots were less interesting and often more political than they needed to be, and I thought there was too much focus on Brian and Stewie, not enough on Peter. It decayed much like any cartoon would when given enough time, especially The Simpsons and South Park.

I don't understand why people seem to think that the Cut Away Gags are so offensive though. As if, because they use that as its main system of joke-making, it's awful because it doesn't stick to the plot constantly. That's like hating South Park entirely because it has explicit humor and visuals. If you don't like that style of humor, that doesn't automatically make the show objectively bad.

And calling the show a blatant rip-off of The Simpsons seems... irrelevant, because first off, it's not, and second, The Simpsons is a "blatant rip-off" of The Flinstones and Honeymooners, which it even acknowledges.

I really don't watch the series anymore due to such decay, but the first few seasons are still great to watch, especially back in the day where they parodied/subverted a lot of tropes most series hadn't touched upon.

I don't like the show for its style of humor, it is just my taste. I'll have to admit though that the DMOS and Wall Bager pages are rather hilarious in that they are full of people overreacting.

I actually liked the starwars special and the dog becomes atheist episode. It only seems like a straw man until you learn the sort of Hate Dumb that atheism gets. I am not one but I've seen that hatedumb up close and it is not pretty. The worse than Hitler is more accurate than you may like to think.

edited 24th Jul '11 6:06:14 AM by nabaduco

From the DMOS page:

"The "Guy in a coma" gag from Brian Writes a Bestseller. It wasn't funny, it was overly long, and it was just uncomfortable to watch. I don't even know what the hell they thought they were going for, but neither the premise nor the material was funny and two wrongs do not make a joke. I mean seriously."

It wasnt even that bad

Family Guy's always stunk IMHO and the only reason it's still going is because of the money its viewers and fanbase unfortunately and apathetically feed it.

Its creators and anyone who has anything to do with it are hacks and are only aiding in the downfall of Western Animation and Animation in general. Nobody like animated sitcoms once one finally wakes up (LIKE I HAVE) and analyzes them for what they are - things with overused stereotyping and cliches, and pop culture references that always age badly! Simple as that.

Cartoons in general should not stoop to this show(And any show like THIS)'s level. Shows that have only SUCK MORE for it!

Peace.

Well honestly I just dont see the point, why would you hack those, hack the money maybe? I mean,lik, seriously...

^^APPARENTLY you didn't read my massive tangents about how wrong this attitude is and how anyone who feels this way should be embarrassed. No show is ever "ruining" animation, no matter how bad you think it is. Family guy's existence causes no harm whatsoever. Your opinions are paranoid delusions and your hatred for a work of fiction is unfair, wasteful and obnoxious.

Every generation has had some pretty shitty cartoons on the air...like all the carbon copy Hannah Barbera crap in the 60's and 70's. Their characters were interchangeable and their cheap corner-cutting animation set back in the industry decades. Ten times fucking worse than all of the Mcfarlane shows.

edited 24th Jul '11 12:34:54 PM by scythemantis

There are very few D Mo S entries that can't be disputed by saying "That's the point".

edited 24th Jul '11 2:46:17 PM by Sabertooth1000000000

My problem with the show is threefold.

1) The political/religious filibusters. Not only are the character's arguments for whatever flavor of generic liberalism they want this week horribly reasoned and all opponents mere strawmen, but they're undermined by the gags themselves. Look at Brian's cousin: they wheel him out for a gay rights episode, but fail to see that he's every single negative gay stereotype in existence. Let's not get into the church of Fonzie or "a bag of weed". These issues are treated with all the maturity and respect of a ten-year-old, but they act as if their characters have proven something through them. There's being irreverent and then there's just being insulting.

2) The characters. They've been flanderized to the point where it's next to impossible to like them, let alone empathize with them. They're all shallow, horrible people. Peter's a sociopath, Brian's a self-absorbed whiner , Lois is either boring or insane at the moment, Stewie's a stereotype, and Meg and Chris barely exist.

3) The humor. The jokes that don't involve politics are either overused running gags, old pop culture references, or just plain cruelty. Refuge in Audacity works well from time to time, but the show's become so dependent on it that it's nearly misanthropic.

The series just isn't fun anymore. What appeal it did have has been exhausted by over use. It's worn out its welcome. For all the Simpson's faults, at least they've managed to vary the experience from time to time. I don't (completely) hate the show, but I'd be glad to see it go.

You pretty much summarized my opinion. The humor to me is hard for me to get. I didn't grow up in the 80's, so I don't get 80's humor. They seem not to have figured out that a large chunk of their audience is people who were born in the 80's and 90's.

"Nobody like animated sitcoms once one finally wakes up (LIKE I HAVE)"

Wait, is this a joke? Are you parodying the general Family Guy hater? I can't tell, but this line sure does split it for me. You're pretty much saying "I'm the only thinking mind in a herd of sheep."

You know, all these animated shows are in it for the money... right? All of them. I can't think of a single animated show in the past 50 years that wasn't made for some kind of profit. Not a single one. In fact, most cartoons are canceled because they can't score a good merchandising deal. I don't see what's so wrong for a show like Family Guy to want money. That's typically the dream for every working person, especially those in the writing department.

Again, the rest of your complaints seem to file under "not my cup of tea," so that's not really a good reason to say it's "ruining animation." In fact, because the show is so popular, it's actually improved the life of animation! It's given animators who want to appeal to a more mature demographic (re: those older than 13) a fair chance of making themselves a name. Family Guy kept Adult Swim alive long enough to crank out original animated shows like ATHF, Superjail, etc., when before, they were basically stuck with... Space Ghost: Coast to Coast, and... maybe the Brak Show.

In fact it's hilarious how you think it's ruining animation considering those details.

This show causes me to say some really stupid things thinking about how weak it is, IMHO. Either that, or I simply overreacted thinking about all the negative things this show does overall. Someone before this mentioned it for me threefold.

YES, there are worse shows out there, especially from the 80's era, but still!

Then again, I have been exposed to much worse shows than this with same formula, despite changes to it. Ever heard of a Kind of Magic?

I may not like Family Guy, but I like that show I just mentioned a whole lot less.

I also apologize for my crack on Family Guy being a pox on animation in the Western part of the world in general. I went too far...

edited 25th Jul '11 12:27:30 AM by S3

It's interesting to note that the characters Seth voices (Peter, Stewie, Brian, Quagmire) have much more screentime than the other characters voiced by everybody else (Lois, Meg, Chris).

I like Family Guy.

Sue me.

Seth has a pretty good range

Great voice actor. Kind of wish he just stuck to that.