Monday, September 24, 2007

I find your lack of humor disturbing

I was looking forward to the Family Guy Star Wars special. I like both Family Guy and Star Wars and one would think the combination would be enjoyable. It was not. How could a combination that had so much potential end up being a boring mess?

I think the main problem was that the parody of Star Wars forced the Family Guy team to follow a plot. This is definitely not their strong suit even when the story is already written for them. It undercuts the only way that they generate laughs-- the complete non-sequitor. Chaining them to an actual plot led them, for the most part, to obvious old jokes (we know that the parsec is a unit of distance not of time but how is it funny pointing that out?) and that and a few groaners (that foul stench isn't Governor Tarkin, it's a "Darth doody"? Really?).

I watched the episode last night and can only come up with about 5 funny lines/scenes (the best of which was probably the "request" of the next song in the cantina scene and the Red team check-in before the Death Star attack). That just isn't enough to sustain a one hour parody. The Start Wars Universe is rife for parody but I think they shackled themselves with the faithful retelling of only episode IV rather than allowing themselves to make fun of the entire mythos.

I would go back and watch it again and write in more detail, but two things are keeping me from doing that: (1) after watching it, I promptly deleted it from my DVR, and (2) even if I hadn't deleted it, I wouldn't want to watch it again.

Robot Chicken did their Star Wars special a few months back and packed more than twice as many laughs in half the amount of time (for all you math wizards out there, that is more than 4 times the laugh density). They were wise enough to do what Family Guy should have done and stayed with the random, disjointed scenes rather than a retelling.

This is Family Guy's most desperate hour. Help them, manatees, You're their only hope.

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