- Network: FOX
- Series Premiere Date: Jan 31, 1999
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Critic Reviews
- Critic score
- Publication
- By date
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"Family Guy" stands to become the best satire of all-American dysfunction next to "The Simpsons." [29 Jan 1999]
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Sunday's premiere episode is one of the most cleverly outrageous half-hours of TV I've seen in a while. [28 Jan 1999]
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It's all raucous nonsense, but the debate will rage as to whether "Family Guy" contributes to, or merely reflects, the demise of civility. As with most TV fare, it's doing a little of both, and it's doing it with a sharp eye for detail. [9 Apr 1999]
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"Family Guy" isn't for everyone. Obviously. It's also not as fully-realized or intelligent as "The Simpsons." It's extremely fast-paced and obsessed with a nonstop stream of jokes, jokes, jokes. And the humor is often hit and miss. But when it hits, look out. [29 Jan 1999]
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If such quickie pop-culture jokes are the show's strength, its current weakness is the stories that revolve around the Griffins themselves and characters that, even when they're amusing, aren't very interesting. They certainly don't suggest the kind of richness that the characters of "The Simpsons" do. [9 Apr 1999]
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Crass Peter's couch-potato tendencies give MacFarlane the pretext for one quick TV spoof after another, and some of them are hilarious. I find these satirical flights far funnier than the frustrated schemes of Stewie Griffin, a sinister baby bent on world domination.
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Does it work? Mostly, but only if you can handle what is now commonly called "edge." [29 Jan 1999]
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Clever, slightly twisted and occasionally very funny. [30 Jan 1999]
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Both subversively funny and sophomorically silly. [11 Apr 1999]
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The show is fast-paced, and it's often genuinely funny. Dastardly Stewie is a break-out character if ever one was drawn. But "Family Guy" isn't a bolt from the blue. The crude edge that separates it from, say, "The Simpsons" only drives it deep into "South Park" territory. [12 Apr 1999]
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"Family Guy" is occasionally quite funny -- but only occasionally. And it's often rather crude -- quite often. ... "Family Guy" does have possibilities. But the writing needs to improve -- it's nowhere near as clever as its producers think it is. [29 Jan 1999]
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Even if you find the show odd, awful or freakish, at least it won't bore you. [29 Jan 1999]
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Both undeniably clever and utterly bizarre --- not always for the better. [28 Jan 1999]
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We fear [Family Guy] already may be out of material. [9 Apr 1999]
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Oft-funny but problematic. ... {The] humor ranges from inspired to cheap and sophomoric. [29 Jan 1999]
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"Family Guy" ... consists of almost nothing but pop culture references. ... Now, some of these gags are side-splittingly funny ... but there are way too many of them. [9 Apr 1999]
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Family Guy aims to be outrageous, but the frantic farce veers to the tiresome and mean-spirited. [11 Apr 1999]
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Family Guy's asinine asides are thuddingly predictable, inserted roughly into the thread of the cartoon sitcom narrative as a kind of cry for attention, in complete contrast to the organic satire that runs through The Simpsons. [28 Jan 1999]
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The Family Guy is worse than dumb; it's not funny. [30 Jan 1999]
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Family Guy ... is The Simpsons as conceived by a singularly sophomoric mind that lacks any reference point beyond other TV shows.
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Nasty without being particularly amusing, cynical without being perceptive, and ugly as sin. [29 Jan 1999]
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A mean, miserable, nasty-minded excuse for a comedy. [29 Jan 1999]
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Utterly excremental. ... May the room in which "Family Guy" is drawn be sacked, emptied, disinfected and burned to a cinder. Anything to keep them from making any more episodes of this smug and amateurish tripe. [30 Jan 1999]
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 309 out of 406
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Mixed: 39 out of 406
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Negative: 58 out of 406
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Nov 17, 2010
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Aug 18, 2010
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Sep 2, 2010