ALL IN THE FAMILY
Rude and crude still reign
Family Guy Season 16 debuts Sunday, City/Fox
As everyone must know by now, Fox’s animated series Family Guy lives to lampoon human nature and human frailties, and does so without fear or favour. There’s something bracing about Family Guy as it blows its whistle on a society that seems to grow ever coarser and more meanspirited, while individuals squawk at any hint of disrespect directed toward them and wilt at every trigger word.
For anyone weary of today’s reflexive correctness, the show, with its deft blend of the ingenious and the rude-and-crude, provides a counteractive safe space where no low blow, regardless of how low, is inadmissible. And so it carries on, as porky patriarch Peter Griffin and his family and friends begin their 16th season on Sunday on City and Fox.
With that in mind, showrunners Rich Appel and Alec Sulkin recently shared some details of what lies ahead — including the series’ 300th episode, which won’t be just a milestone, Appel promises, “but one of our best.”
The season première, said Sulkin, “will be our shameless grab to win a (best show) Emmy” — an itch so far unscratched by the Television Academy.
As Peter embarks on his own For Your Consideration campaign, he will make Family Guy more like proven Emmy-winning shows, including not just comedy but also dramas and reality. Guest voices include Sofia Vergara, Ty Burrell, Julie Bowen, Louis C.K., Bill Maher, Christina Pickles and the late Adam West.
What else?
“We’ll have a special episode where (precocious toddler) Stewie is in therapy for the entire halfhour,” said Sulkin, “with the therapist played by Sir Ian McKellen.”
“Stewie actually learns something about himself,” said Appel — “as opposed to everyone else’s therapy.”
Another episode, titled Three Directors, will tell the same simple story — Peter losing his job — within the half-hour, “but each version is told in the style of Quentin Tarantino, Wes Anderson and Michael Bay,” Appel said.
“We have an episode where Brian (the erudite, articulate family dog) and Stewie go back to Victorian England and play Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson,” said Sulkin. “That seems like something we might have done before, but we actually hadn’t.”
The series, which premièred in 1999, was created by Seth MacFarlane, who handed over the reins as showrunner in 2010, to pursue other projects, including the two Ted films and, currently, his new Fox sci-fi series The Orville, which he created, wrote and stars in.
But he continues to voice a number of favourite Family Guy characters.