The A.V. Club - Animation

TV: The Simpsons, The Cleveland Show, Family Guy, American Dad:"Bart Gets a Z"/"Da Daggone Daddy Daughter Dinner Dance"/"Family Goy"/"Moon Over Isla Island"

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 00:37:00 -0500

It’s the second week of Animation Domination, and most of the night’s shows are already coasting. Been hoping you might get to see a Simpsons episode that gives a tertiary character what seems like a promising storyline, then devolves into weak satire? Wondering just how The Cleveland Show would try to forge its own identity while also pretty much copying its parent show? Looking for Family Guy to wander into a half hour of broad, politically incorrect “jokes”? Then tonight was probably the night for you. Thank goodness, then, for American Dad, which came up with something pretty ...

TV: The Simpsons, The Cleveland Show, Family Guy, American Dad:"Homer the Whopper"/"Pilot"/"Road to the Multiverse"/"In Country ... Club"

Mon, 28 Sep 2009 00:13:00 -0500

Is there anything left to say about the Fox animation bloc at this point? Somewhere along the way, we’ve all decided if we’re Family Guy fans or if we think The Simpsons is still worth keeping up with or whether or not we’re down with American Dad, I think, and now that the four shows making up the animation bloc show off less divergence in worldview than they ever have before, without King of the Hill there to offset the gradual MacFarlanization of the universe, whether or not you watch the whole thing basically comes down to ...

TV: Other Shows:The Cleveland Show

Sun, 27 Sep 2009 17:11:00 -0500

The Cleveland Show debuts at 8:30 p.m. EDT tonight on Fox. Spinoffs need to justify their existence in a way a regular show just doesn’t. When Family Guy debuted, it was only really judged for its own purposes and against Fox’s other animated shows at the time. But even if The Cleveland Show were much, much funnier than it is, it’d probably still deserve a low grade simply because it hasn’t made a case for why it exists in the first place. After Family Guy and American Dad, do we really need another Seth ...

TV: The Simpsons, The Cleveland Show, Family Guy, American Dad:King Of The Hill: "The Boys Can't Help It"/"To Sirloin With Love"

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 21:00:00 -0500

At its core, King Of The Hill has always been a show about manhood. Hank Hill is the main character, an Arlen, Texas resident simply trying to get by in the world—support his family, run a successful propane sales branch, do what he believes is right by his friends. The other characters have problems that come and go, but throughout it all, Hank is there to comment. And comment he does. It's been argued to death (including on this website) that King Of The Hill is repetitive; it is, yes, but I don't think it ever cared ...

TV: Newswire:Limbaugh, Rove to guest star on Family Guy

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:01:00 -0500

Family Guy will soon be teaming up with some of the biggest laughmakers in recent history—conservative Republicans. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Karl Rove and Rush Limbaugh are among the Republicans set to appear as themselves next season. The episode will feature family dog Brian, upset that he no longer has anything to complain about with Obama in the White House, listening to Limbaugh and becoming a Republican. Limbaugh previously lent his voice to Family Guy in the season-six Star Wars parody "Blue Harvest." Rove’s comedy experience is mostly limited to short films about President Bush’s Scottish ...

TV: Interview:Matt Groening

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 00:00:00 -0500

2009 is a year of milestones for Matt Groening: his 55th birthday, The Simpsons’ 20th anniversary, and the fourth (and possibly final) Futurama movie, Into The Wild Green Yonder. The year demands a certain amount of reflection, though it takes little effort to see the effect of his work. The Simpsons has had a seismic impact on pop culture; it redefined the television landscape after it debuted as a series on Fox in 1989, and it’s become one of the most important and successful series in history, with a legion of dialogue-quoting fans that outnumbers the world’s armies ...

DVD: Review:Futurama: The Beast With A Billion Backs

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 23:03:00 -0500

The first direct-to-DVD Futurama movie, Bender's Big Score, sagged under the weight of audience expectations and the pressure to shoehorn every beloved minor character into a coherent 90-minute narrative. So perhaps it's best to think of the disappointing Big Score simply as a warm-up, a way to shake off the rust that inevitably accrues when a beloved cartoon franchise lies dormant for four years. Good news, everyone! With The Beast With A Billion Backs, the sleeping, nerdy giant that is Futurama truly awakes to kick ass. Beast's twisty plot finds the perpetually lovesick Fry infatuated with a ...

TV: The Simpsons, The Cleveland Show, Family Guy, American Dad:"Treehouse of Horror XVIII"/"Stewie Kills Lois"/"Big Trouble in Little Langley"

Sun, 04 Nov 2007 22:36:00 -0600

Well, now that the Red Sox have won the Series, we can all get back to the important business of dissecting the minutiae of animated prime-time sitcoms. Not that baseball isn't important (really, it's not), but come on, a Simpsons Halloween episode AND a Family Guy retrospective, AND a major Family Guy "event" episode? There is much to discuss! (Oh yeah, American Dad was in there too.) So when did "Treehouse of Horror" become Simpsons code for "slapdash movie parodies"? And when did the writers give up even attempting to relate those parodies to Halloween? Seriously, E.T ...

TV: Newswire:Family Guy's "I Need A Jew" Song draws lawsuit

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 08:38:00 -0500

One of Family Guy's most infamous episodes has sparked a lawsuit over a parody song, "I Need A Jew." The episode, "When You Wish Upon A Weinstein," was never broadcast on Fox. It's basically one long running Jew joke--Peter seeks the help of a Jew to handle his finances, and of course believes that Jews have magical accounting powers (sample line: "Is there nothing you people can't do, except, you know, manual labor?"). The publishing company that owns the song "When You Wish Upon A Star"--best known from the innocent Pinnochio--is suing Fox, arguing that ...

TV: Crosstalk:Crosstalk: Is It Time For The Simpsons To Call It A Day?

Thu, 26 Jul 2007 00:01:00 -0500

Steven Hyden: I hate to be that guy, Nathan. I feel like the Dr. Kevorkian of A.V. Club Crosstalks when it comes to classic television shows about loveably dysfunctional families. First I sparred with Scott over The Sopranos, now I'm picking a fight with you over whether The Simpsons—bedrock of my adolescence—has overstayed its welcome and should be put out to pasture. Before I say anything else, let me state some important facts for the record—The Simpsons is one of the best sitcoms ever, if not the best. Its impact on pop culture has been ...

TV: Inventory:Inventory: 15 Simpsons Moments That Perfectly Captured Their Eras

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 00:01:00 -0500

1. The Krusty vs. Gabbo ratings war ("Krusty Gets Kancelled," 1993) In early 1993, show-business headlines were dominated by the battle for late-night TV talk-show supremacy, as Jay Leno took over The Tonight Show, David Letterman prepared to make the jump to CBS, and former hot host Arsenio Hall saw his ratings plummet. The Simpsons spoofed the whole phenomenon with an episode that has heavily hyped ventriloquist's dummy Gabbo becoming a Springfield sensation and torpedoing the venerable, vulnerable Krusty The Clown. Bart and Lisa help organize a comeback special for Krusty, featuring Red Hot Chili Peppers, Johnny Carson in ...

TV: Interview:Matt Groening

Wed, 26 Apr 2006 11:14:00 -0500

Does Matt Groening really need any introduction? His evolution from cantankerous Los Angeles underground cartoonist to the creator of one of the most beloved and influential comic institutions of the past century is already the stuff of legend. In 1977, Groening began writing the long-running comic strip Life In Hell, a cult favorite about the misadventures of various angst-ridden neurotic rabbits, plus Akbar and Jeff, a pint-sized duo who operate or shill for an endless succession of disreputable businesses. Life In Hell eventually caught the eye of producer James L. Brooks, who commissioned Groening to create animated shorts to run ...

TV: The A.V. Club Blog:Simpsons V. Family Guy

Sat, 07 Jan 2006 16:45:00 -0600

Hey all you bloggers out there (to quote Hilary Duff in "A Perfect Man") A little while back me and the big home slice Kyle Ryan got into an animated conversation about the long-simmering feud between The Simpsons and Family Guy. The catalyst was yet another ham-fisted satirical swipe The Simpsons took at Seth McFarlane in the form of a throwaway visual gag once again condemning the Family Guy's patriarch as a rip off of Homer and American Dad's titular father as a knock off of a knock off. It was, by my counting, the third and fourth ...

DVD: Review:Family Guy Presents Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story

Wed, 05 Oct 2005 14:42:00 -0500

Can anything kill Family Guy? Since its 1999 debut, it's survived numerous time-slot changes, cancellation, critical pans, unwanted hiatuses, and the withering contempt and satirical jabs of The Simpsons, a series that creator Seth MacFarlane openly cites as a primary influence. Somehow, it's only emerged stronger than ever as a DVD phenomenon and a hit on several stations, including Fox, Cartoon Network, and TBS. MacFarlane's cult smash about a wildly dysfunctional Rhode Island clan has shown a resilience and genius for rising from the dead that a slasher-movie franchise would envy. So it's perfectly understandable that ...

TV: Interview:Seth MacFarlane

Wed, 26 Jan 2005 15:00:00 -0600

In the first of many signs that it would follow an unpredictable path, Family Guy was originally conceived as a series of bumpers for Mad TV, but it was rescued from obscurity when that plan fell through. Fox let Seth MacFarlane launch his series as a half-hour show that evolved into a pop-culture-savvy comedy about a loutish father, his practical wife, their three children, and their boozy, urbane talking dog. When Family Guy premièred in 1999, some derided it as a crass knockoff of The Simpsons, but it was always more whimsical and less derivative than its harshest critics ...

TV: Interview:Harry Shearer

Wed, 23 Apr 2003 15:00:00 -0500

Harry Shearer started out in radio and continually returns to it; he's dabbled in virtually every medium, but radio seems tailor-made for his smooth baritone and eclectic arsenal of voices. A child star on The Jack Benny Program, Shearer worked in television and radio throughout his childhood and teenage years. In the late ’60s, he joined The Credibility Gap, a radio comedy group that included future collaborator and Spinal Tap bandmate Michael McKean, and in the late ’70s, Shearer became one of the first additions to the original lineup of Saturday Night Live. He also co-wrote Albert Brooks’ prescient ...

DVD: Review:Futurama: Volume 1 (DVD)

Tue, 08 Apr 2003 00:00:00 -0500

Futurama premiered in 1999 to hype and anticipation that seemed fitting for the first new series created by Matt Groening since The Simpsons. But even before the show reached the air, Groening was describing his Futurama-related dealings with the Fox network as the worst experience of his adult life. What happened next couldn't have made him feel much better. While Futurama struggled to connect to its audience, Fox first moved it to a new time slot, then constantly preempted it for sports broadcasts, a pattern that continues today. Officially, Futurama is still on the air and in its ...

TV: Interview:Mike Scully

Wed, 23 Feb 2000 15:00:00 -0600

For 11 seasons and 250+ episodes, The Simpsons has been synonymous with television's sharpest and funniest satire, a body of work with some of the best moments in the history of the medium. In recent years, the show has grown increasingly unpredictable, periodically lapsing into outright absurdity rather than running the risk of recycling old storylines, but it remains a treasure thanks to some of the best writers and voice actors in the business. Appearing in Aspen for the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival--where he appeared with Matt Groening as a host of "The Simpsons Live," the first-ever public ...