While Family Guy Season 14 Episode 1 doesn't exactly break new ground, I still loved it.
Family Guy fans usually fall into two distinct categories: Those who thought the show had its best days in the early seasons and watch it begrudgingly, if at all, and those who think its only gotten better over the years.
I fall firmly into the latter camp. The show's brand of cutaways and scattershot humor has only gotten better over time, in my opinion. So what, exactly, went down in the Family Guy Season 14 premiere? Let's take a look!
Stewie's teacher suggests to Lois that he be put on ADHD medication after he has trouble paying attention and bothers a little girl at nap time.
Hey? You up? Guess where I have a crayon?
Stewie (seductively to a little girl at nap time in school)
This sets the B plot in motion. I love the Stewie/Brian relationship, so I was happy they decided to resurrect Brian after his death a few seasons ago. These two are like an old married couple still coming to terms with the fact that they are stuck with each other and it's brilliant.
Meanwhile, after being disgusted by the tacos the Clam is serving and talking up his cooking prowess, Quagmire decides to cook dinner for the gang.
Ugggh! This tastes like Ani DiFranco after a bike ride!
Quagmire (referencing an awful Korean Taco)
It turns out he is a pretty marvelous chef, for sort of obvious reasons. Spurred on by the group, he decides to audition for a local cooking show and Peter will come along for support.
How do you think NBA players get all those chicks? They're all great cooks. Except Kobe Bryant. His secret is different.
Quagmire
Brian becomes enraged that Stewie has been given prescription medication, especially when he finds him wide eyed and high on top of a pillow fort in his room. But he changes his tone once Stewie informs him that the medication makes you "more productive". No doubt with dreams of writing the sequel to his passion project but ultimate failure "Faster Than the Speed of Love" in his head, Brian begins taking the meds as well.
Quagmire ends up impressing the station manager at the audition, but Peter stands out so much that he wants them both to star in a new show. Quagmire is always a source of hilarity, but in this instance he gets to play the straight man to Peter, who in the first episode they film, steals the show by performing the Cinnamon Challenge and completely ruining the dish. Quagmire becomes enraged, and fires Peter, but the station offers him his own show.
Brian meanwhile, high on meds, writes a 2000 page fantasy novel and builds a model village of the city within it in the basement. Much humor is derived from Stewie's laid back delivery and Brian's red eyes and rapid fire talking. Emboldened by the drugs, Brian decides to travel to Hartford where author George R. R. Martin is attending a book fair so that he can pitch him his novel.
Peter's show, Butter Sluts, in which he covers frozen food with the dairy product and then dunks hot female assistants into a vat of it debuts, much to Quagmire's chagrin. Peter is always good for jumping the shark in any situation, and Butter Sluts was still making me giggle an hour later. Quagmire threatens to quit so the station decides they have to have a cook off with a secret ingredient.
Brian and Stewie meet George R. R. Martin.
God he must be the coolest fat guy in a train conductor's cap in the world!
Brian (referring to George R. R. Martin)
Brian pitches him his book, but he hates it and tells him he knew he was on medication when he wrote it so both he and Stewie decide to stop taking it. The B plot was a little weak but good for several laughs, especially at George R. R. Martin's expense.
Of course, by the end and after Peter disgustingly eats the entire meal he created out of butter, both he and Quagmire decide they don't want to be on a cooking show anyway. This has never been a show that was bogged down by continuity (unless it can make a rapid fire joke out of it like tonight's reference to Joe's once presumed dead son Kevin) so next week will no doubt have a new adventure and the cooking show will be forgotten.
That is one of the strength's of Family Guy: You can pretty much watch any episode from any season and you're guaranteed to laugh at something. This episode was no exception. It cracked me up as usual.
Obviously on a show like this with the jokes a mile a minute, seeing it yourself is important so watch Family Guy online to find out which ones didn't make my review.
