Family Guy - "Tales of a Third Grade Nothing" - Talkback [11/16]

Originally Posted by Kazuya Prower
Also, they should make more episodes focusing on Meg, Lois and Chris. This show has pretty much been "The Peter, Brian and Stewie show".


Respectfully, I disagree. Simply writing characters off as "just not being any good" is merely laziness on the part of writers. Lois, Chris and Meg could easily be breakout stars like Peter, Brian and Stewie, if the show's writers would only give them a chance. There are no uninteresting characters, just writers who are unable or unwilling to do interesting things with them.




How can Frank Sinatra, Jr. be your favorite character? For one thing, this is only his 2nd appearance on the show, and for another, Frank isn't a fictional character, he's a real person. If anything, Frank, Jr. is a caricature, not a character.
 
You're acting as if this show is new or something. The writers already did try that back in the day. Go back to the beginning. There was ATLEAST a dozen Meg centered episodes. The character was nothing special. Chris hasn't had as many, but he's been in the spotlight as well. And Lois a little bit more than them two. And neither were that special either. Like South Park said, "The Simpsons did it first." That's why Stewie was the show's break-out star. He was actually original. And Peter's extreme silliness and childish behavior made people turn a blind eye to him being a Homer Simpson rip-off. As for Brian, he's a fantastic straight man. So, that's why those characters are beloved while the other three are basically ignored. They offer something to make themselves stand apart from what The Simpsons has been offering since 1989.
 
How is my stating that all characters have the potential to be interesting "acting like the show is new or something"? I honestly don't get that correlation at all.

And so the writers have tried with Meg, Chris and Lois before; their (alleged) lack of success doesn't automatically mean that said characters just aren't any good, but that the writers didn't try hard enough, or that maybe they need to bring in some different writers.

Most characters evolve. Bugs Bunny started out one way, then over the years, he evolved into something else. When Disney was producing theatrical shorts, they didn't want to do a lot with Scrooge McDuck, because they felt at the time that a character whose sole motivation was to go wild over money wasn't interesting enough to carry an animated cartoon; Carl Barks and the producers of DuckTales have greatly disproven this notion. Few characters end up exactly the same way they started. Stewie started out as an infant version of a Bond villain, not the effeminate weirdo that he is is now. Peter was originally more or less an idiot Archie Bunker; he too underwent an evolution. Peter, Brian and Stewie aren't innately superior characters to Lois, Meg and Chris; they've merely become favorites of the writers. It's like what happened with Butters on South Park; he went from being an extra on the show to one of its' top players, because Trey Parker took an interest in him and began to evolve him, running with the character as often as possible. If one of the FG writers took that same interest in the other Griffin family members, give them tons of cutaways, have them break the 4th wall, etc., they could likewise emerge as top players.

As a writer, I refuse to accept the notion that some characters are just innately uninteresting. To me, that's just fanboy-perpetuated BS and an excuse for laziness on the part of writers. We'll just have to agree to disagree there.
 
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"Oh, NAGGERS. Of course..."
 
I figured out the reference, but just chose not to say anything (and by the way, that's the only part of that episode that I paid attention to).

I started wondering if that user meant "I Dream of Jesus" after I asked which episode it was where Peter sang a whole song throughout the episode. But when it was said that Peter once sang a song for a whole epsiode, I thought he meant literally.
 
Not to take this Family Guy thread too far off topic, but I just watched that episode last night after seeing that pic, and it was hilarious. "I know the answer, but I'm not sure I want to say it", the assistant ever so slowly revealing the "A", and "Can we cut to a commercial- can we c- [COLOR BARS]" had me rolling.
 
The new episode was great

The Jurassic Park Reference, Peter Burning the Children Hospital ,a piano falling on Peter and his comment about fortune cookies, Quagmire entering the class rooms and find kids looking like him, Cleveland bath scene part 3,Peter going Jail for 7 days were great

but i found the Brian stuff boring.
 
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