The unbridled stupidy of Fox

[Chris K.]

Yes, I noticed Peter Griffin in THE SIMPSONS Halloween episode (considering that Peter Griffin's character was not created by the same team behind THE SIMPSONS, but he is in that bit part). Still, how many would remember him in FAMILY GUY? Now, he will just be remembered for that little cameo appearence and nothing else.

[Chris K.]

I do admit their were some funny bits in FAMILY GUY, but technically it was a MESS (both due to the networks re-tooling and it's "suprise pop-ups" to fill in some slots). True it was indeed more over the top than THE SIMPSONS, but to me the humor was just somewhat 'blah'. I do agree with you about Stewie trying to kill his mother; that's funny. But to see Peter Griffin act like his own version of Homer Simpson just doesn't cut it for me. Oh well, everybody has their own tastes be it FAMILY GUY or THE SIMPSONS.

Again, GREG THE BUNNY had it's moments as well, but it still categorizes as a MEET THE FEEBLES rip-off. And the fact that the critics claimed it was "original" is just hysterical to believe.

But looking at these two shows, what were the chances of FAMILY GUY and GREG THE BUNNY actually not getting canceled? And remember, this is the Fox network I am talking about here.

[Creepozoid]

John wrote:
>
> >How many people remember Peter Griffin
>
> In the most recent Simpson's Halloween special, he was among
> the army of Homer clones. Real subtle message there...

Yeah. That was hella funny.

[Creepozoid]

TITUS was axed for BERNIE MAC. That ain't right. That ain't right at all.

on another note, no show is too "bad" for Fox. These are the people who forced Ally McBeal, Bachlorettes in Alaska, American Idol, and the god of all unintentionally hilarious shows-BOSTON PUBLIC down our throats.

[J.R.]

The first season of the Simpsons needs to be burned and forgotten. Homer talked funny, everyone acted out of charcter and it wasn't very funny. Barney was blonde and I swear I saw one where Smithers was black. Season two and onward is where the show got great, but for the past several years only the last five seasons or so have been shown in syndication.

There was a rash of joke-a-second "outrageous" cartoons like Family Guy, The Oblongs, God, The Devil And Bob and several others for a few years that tried to be The Simpsons. But they were missing something- the heart.

[frannie]

i think that if family guy had a fixed timeslot (say on sunday nights with the rest of fox's animated shows) it could have done very well.  if memory serves, FG got bounced around on tuesday and thursday nights when NBC was grabbing nearly every viewer.

as for GTB, I still just don't see it.  hell even mr rogers and sesame street had the "puppets as living characters" theme so it could be claimed that feebles wasn't original either.  GTB and Feebles just threw in more adult subject matter which most people hadn't seen before.  "original" can be a very subjective word.  for all i know there could have been some program produced in communist russia (which you and I haven't seen)  featuring "adult puppetry" that peter jackson got his ideas from

[Dano]

I swear I saw one where Smithers was black.
*****  Matt Groening has said that Smithers was black in the first episode in which he appeared, but as his character sort of evolved into a servile toady they decided to change his race - I guess because it is a well known fact of PC canon that only white people are servile toadies.

[Fearless Freep]

Homer talked funny, everyone acted out of charcter

Umm, actaully  you could say that they act out of character *now* compared to how they originally acted :)

Homer's voice changed because the voice actor had problems getting that voice to do much, so he had to modify the voice to get it to be more flexible.

[Squishy]

Sweet Zombie Jesus! Dano managed to work the ongoing "white male = eternal victim of the Grand Conspiracy of Political Correctness" routine into a discussion of "The Simpsons," for crying out loud.

The real story, according to Matt Groening: Smithers was colored incorrectly--a weird purplish shade, actually--in his first appearance due to a miscommunication with the production in Korea. (In this episode, Smithers was depicted as a company spokesman, in denial, perhaps, but not servile in any way.)

Additional References:
"Smithers did appear to be black in one episode ("Homer's Odyssey"). He was not, though. It was a coloring error. If you look at it, it's sort of an off-black, somewhat akin to "a Caribbean sunburn."
--Eye On Springfield

"During production of this episode, Smithers was painted a dark color, almost black, rather than yellow.  The mistake was entirely the fault of Klasky-Csupo, the animation company."
--Animated TV's "Simpsons" Bloopers

[Dano]

Haha!  I was trying to outdo your SNL connection to the "Republican=Racist" routine.  Whether it was an accident or not, I read in a TV Guide article on the Simpsons' secondary characters that MG changed it because he expected flack for making a black character "servile."  I can't find an online version of the article, sorry.  But www.snpp.com/episodes/7G03.html talks about how some un-named source from the show felt it ruined the "white sycophant" persona they were going for.  Why does the sycophant have to be white?  I'm not offended or angry about it as you'll no doubt insist in blowing what I said out of proportion, but I was a little disappointed in a show that has an otherwise solid record of scoffing at (or at least ignoring) PC twittering.