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Family Guy

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For the franchise, see Family Guy (franchise). For the recent season, see Family Guy season 22.
Family Guy
GenreAnimated sitcom[1]
Created bySeth MacFarlane
Developed by
Showrunners
Voices of
Theme music composerWalter Murphy
Composers
Country of originUnited States
Original languageEnglish
No. of seasons22
No. of episodes424 (list of episodes)
Production
Executive producers
  • Seth MacFarlane
  • David Zuckerman (1999–2003)
  • Daniel Palladino (2001–02)
  • David A. Goodman (2005–12)
  • Chris Sheridan (2005–12)
  • Danny Smith (2008–present)
  • Mark Hentemann (2009–present)
  • Steve Callaghan (2009–present)
  • Alec Sulkin (2011–present)
  • Wellesley Wild (2011–15)
  • Cherry Chevapravatdumrong (2012–19)
  • Kara Vallow (2012–present)
  • Richard Appel (2012–present)
  • Patrick Meighan (2018–present)
  • Tom Devanney (2018–present)
  • Alex Carter (2023–present)
Producers
Running time
  • 20–27 minutes
  • 33–88 minutes (select episodes)
Production companies
Original release
NetworkFox[N 1]
ReleaseJanuary 31, 1999 (1999-01-31) –
February 14, 2002 (2002-02-14)[2][c]
ReleaseMay 1, 2005 (2005-05-01)[2] –
present
Related

Family Guy is an American animated sitcom created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series premiered on January 31, 1999, following Super Bowl XXXIII, with the rest of the first season airing from April 11, 1999. The show centers around the Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter and Lois, their children, Meg, Chris, and Stewie, and their anthropomorphic pet dog, Brian. Set in the fictional city of Quahog, Rhode Island, the show exhibits much of its humor in the form of metafictional cutaway gags that often lampoon American culture.

The family was conceived by MacFarlane after he developed two animated films, The Life of Larry and Larry & Steve. MacFarlane redesigned the films' protagonist, Larry, and his dog, Steve, and renamed them Peter and Brian, respectively. MacFarlane pitched a seven-minute pilot to Fox in December 1998, and the show was greenlit and began production. Family Guy's cancellation was announced shortly after the third season had aired in 2002, with one unaired episode eventually premiering on Adult Swim in 2003, finishing the series' original run. Favorable DVD sales and high ratings from syndicated reruns since then convinced Fox to revive the show in 2004; a fourth season began airing the following year, on May 1, 2005.

Since its premiere, Family Guy has received generally positive reviews. In 2009, it was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series, the first time an animated series had been nominated for the award since The Flintstones in 1961. In 2013, TV Guide ranked Family Guy as the ninth-greatest TV cartoon.[3] Although highly satirical in nature, the series has also garnered considerable amounts of criticism and controversy, ranging from storylines and character stereotypes, to allegations of racism, homophobia, and sexism.

Many tie-in media based on the show have been released, including Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story, a straight-to-DVD special released in 2005; Family Guy: Live in Vegas, a soundtrack-DVD combo released in 2005, featuring music from the show as well as music created by MacFarlane and Walter Murphy; a video game and pinball machine, released in 2006 and 2007, respectively; since 2005, six books published by Harper Adult; and Laugh It Up, Fuzzball: The Family Guy Trilogy (2010), a collection of three episodes parodying the original Star Wars trilogy. A spin-off series, The Cleveland Show, featuring Cleveland Brown, aired from September 27, 2009, to May 19, 2013.

On January 26, 2023, Fox announced that the series had been renewed for seasons 22 and 23, taking the show through the 2024–25 television season.[4] Season 22 premiered on October 1, 2023.[5] Family Guy moved to Wednesday nights beginning March 6, 2024, marking the first time the show airs on a weeknight since 2002.[6]

Premise[edit]

Characters[edit]

Main article: List of Family Guy characters
The Griffin family. From left: Chris, Peter, Stewie (in baby carrier), Lois, Brian (dog in front), and Meg.

The show centers around the adventures and activities of the dysfunctional Griffin family, consisting of father Peter Griffin, a bumbling and clumsy yet well-intentioned blue-collar worker; his wife Lois, a stay-at-home mother and piano teacher (in early episodes) who is a member of the affluent Pewterschmidt family; Meg, their often bullied teenage daughter who is constantly ridiculed or ignored by the family; Chris, their awkward teenage son, who is overweight, unintelligent, unathletic, and in many respects a younger version of his father; and Stewie, their diabolical infant son of ambiguous sexual orientation who is an adult-mannered evil genius and uses stereotypical archvillain phrases. Living with the family is their witty, smoking, martini-swilling, sarcastic, English-speaking anthropomorphic dog Brian, although he is still considered a pet in many ways.[7]

Recurring characters appear alongside the Griffin family. These include the family's neighbors: sex-crazed airline pilot bachelor Glenn Quagmire; deli owner/mail carrier Cleveland Brown and his wife Loretta (later Donna); paraplegic police officer Joe Swanson, his wife Bonnie, their son Kevin and their baby daughter Susie; neurotic Jewish pharmacist Mort Goldman, his wife Muriel, and their geeky and annoying son Neil, and elderly child molester Herbert. TV news anchors Tom Tucker and Diane Simmons, Asian reporter Tricia Takanawa, and Blaccu-Weather meteorologist Ollie Williams also make frequent appearances. Actor James Woods guest stars as himself in multiple episodes, as did Adam West, prior to his death.[citation needed]

Setting[edit]

Main article: Quahog (Family Guy)
Three buildings, two of the same stature, and one smaller than the others
A cartoon version of the previous image
The skyline (right) references Providence, Rhode Island (left), as viewed from the northwest looking southeast, from left to right: One Financial Center, 50 Kennedy Plaza, and the Superman Building.

The primary setting of Family Guy is Quahog (/ˈk(w)oʊhɒɡ/ K(W)OH-hog), a fictional city in Rhode Island that was founded by Peter's ancestor, Griffin Peterson. MacFarlane resided in Providence during his time as a student at Rhode Island School of Design, and the show contains distinct Rhode Island landmarks similar to real-world locations.[8][9] MacFarlane often borrows the names of Rhode Island locations and icons such as Pawtucket and Buddy Cianci for use in the show. MacFarlane, in an interview with Providence's Fox affiliate WNAC-TV, stated that the town is modeled after Cranston, Rhode Island.[10]

Episodes[edit]

Main article: List of Family Guy episodes
SeasonEpisodesOriginally airedRankAverage Viewers
(in millions)
First airedLast aired
17January 31, 1999May 16, 19993314.12[11]
221September 23, 1999August 1, 20001146.74
322July 11, 2001November 9, 2003[d]1255.61[12]
430May 1, 2005May 21, 2006687.90[13]
518September 10, 2006May 20, 2007717.20[14]
612September 23, 2007May 4, 2008847.94[15]
716September 28, 2008May 17, 2009697.46[16]
821September 27, 2009June 20, 2010[e]537.13[17]
918September 26, 2010May 22, 2011566.78[18]
1023September 25, 2011May 20, 2012635.65[19]
1122September 30, 2012May 19, 2013625.39[20]
1221September 29, 2013May 18, 2014784.65[21]
1318September 28, 2014May 17, 2015943.84[22]
1420September 27, 2015May 22, 20161113.09[23]
1520September 25, 2016May 21, 20171162.76[24]
1620October 1, 2017May 20, 20181362.54[25]
1720September 30, 2018May 12, 20191312.35[26]
1820September 29, 2019May 17, 2020107[27]1.80[27]
1920September 27, 2020May 16, 2021120[28]1.55[28]
2020September 26, 2021May 22, 2022111[29]1.25[29]
2120September 25, 2022May 7, 2023104[30]1.19[30]
2215October 1, 2023April 17, 2024 (2024-04-17)115[31]1.03[31]

Production[edit]

Development[edit]

MacFarlane conceived Family Guy in 1995 while studying animation at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).[32] During college, he created his thesis film titled The Life of Larry,[32] which was submitted by his professor at RISD to Hanna-Barbera. MacFarlane was hired by the company.[33] In 1996, MacFarlane created a sequel to The Life of Larry titled Larry and Steve, which featured a middle-aged character named Larry and an intellectual dog, Steve; the short was broadcast in 1997 as one of Cartoon Network's World Premiere Toons.[32]

Executives at Fox saw the Larry shorts and contracted MacFarlane to create a series, titled Family Guy, based on the characters.[9] Fox proposed that MacFarlane complete a 15-minute short and gave him a budget of $50,000.[34] Several aspects of Family Guy were inspired by the Larry shorts.[35] While MacFarlane worked on the series, the characters of Larry and his dog Steve slowly evolved into Peter and Brian.[9][36] MacFarlane stated that the difference between The Life of Larry and Family Guy was that "Life of Larry was shown primarily in my dorm room and Family Guy was shown after the Super Bowl."[35] After the pilot aired, the series was given the greenlight. MacFarlane drew inspiration from several sitcoms such as The Simpsons and All in the Family.[37] Premises were drawn from several 1980s Saturday-morning cartoons he watched as a child, such as The Fonz and the Happy Days Gang and Rubik, the Amazing Cube.[38]

The Griffin family first appeared on the demo that MacFarlane pitched to Fox on May 15, 1998.[39] Family Guy was originally planned to start out as short movies for the sketch show Mad TV, but the plan changed, because MADtv's budget was not large enough to support animation production. MacFarlane noted that he then wanted to pitch it to Fox, as he thought that it was the place to create a prime-time animation show.[37] Family Guy was originally pitched to Fox in the same year as King of the Hill, but

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