Family Guy (TV Series)

***Family Guy*** is an American animated sitcom originally conceived and created by Seth MacFarlane for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series premiered on January 31, 1999, following Super Bowl XXXIII, with the rest of the first season airing two months later beginning April 11, 1999. The show centers around the Griffins, a dysfunctional family consisting of parents Peter and Lois; their children, Meg, Chris, and Stewie; and their anthropomorphic pet dog, Brian. Set in the fictional city of Quahog, Rhode Island, the show exhibits much of its humor in the form of metafictional cutaway gags that often lampoon American culture.

It aired on the British Pirate TV channel, CSN, from the channels launch in March 2022 until its closure in January 2024. CSN usually aired new episodes before the main networks for the series in the UK, Disney+ and ITV2.

## Synopsis

The show centers around the adventures and activities of the dysfunctional Griffin family, consisting of father Peter Griffin (Seth MacFarlane), a bumbling and clumsy yet well-intentioned blue-collar worker; Lois (Alex Borstein), a stay-at-home mother and piano teacher (in early episodes) who is a member of the affluent Pewterschmidt family; Meg (Mila Kunis), their often bullied teenage daughter who is also constantly ridiculed or ignored by the family; Chris (Seth Green), their awkward teenage son, who is overweight, unintelligent, unathletic and, in many respects, is simply a younger version of his father; and Stewie (Seth MacFarlane), their diabolical infant son of ambiguous sexual orientation who is an adult-mannered evil genius and uses stereotypical archvillain phrases. Living with the family is their witty, smoking, martini-swilling, sarcastic, English-speaking anthropomorphic dog Brian (Seth MacFarlane), though he is still considered a pet in many ways.

Recurring characters appear alongside the Griffin family. These include the family's neighbors: sex-crazed airline pilot bachelor Quagmire (Seth MacFarlane); deli owner/mail carrier Cleveland (Mike Henry) and his wife Donna; paraplegic police officer Joe (Patrick Warburton), his wife Bonnie (Jennifer Tilly), their son Kevin and their baby daughter Susie (Patrick Stewart); neurotic Jewish pharmacist Mort, his wife Muriel, and their geeky and annoying son Neil; and elderly child molester Herbert. TV news anchors Tom Tucker (Seth MacFarlane) and Diane Simmons, *Asian reporter* Tricia Takanawa, and *Blaccu-Weather* meteorologist Ollie Williams also make frequent appearances. Actor James Woods guest stars as himself in multiple episodes, as did Adam West, prior to his death.

## Broadcast

In the United States, the show currently airs on FX, FXX, Freeform, and The CW in some regions. The show was syndicated to Adult Swim and TBS from 2003 to 2021, sharing the rights to the first fifteen seasons. In April 2019, FX Networks began airing reruns of season 16 on FXX, with season 17 debuting that October, and shared off-network rights to both seasons with sister channel Freeform. After Adult Swim and TBS' rights expired on September 18, 2021, FXX and Freeform began airing the first fifteen seasons. The show also joined FX's lineup that month. These deals did not affect the syndication rights held by local broadcast stations. The series is available for streaming exclusively on Hulu.

Internationally *Family Guy* is available to stream on Star on Disney+, except in Latin America, where the series is exclusively available on the standalone service Star+.

In the United Kingdom, *Family Guy* premiered in September 1999, originally on Channel 4 and Sky One. In January 2005, Fox UK (then known as FX) began broadcasting the show. From October 2005, BBC Two started screening *Family Guy* before the show moved to BBC Three in September 2006. Beginning with season 14, the show moved to ITV2, premiering on February 29, 2016, while the BBC would continue to hold the rights for past seasons until 2017.

On Pirate TV, the show aired on CSN, while it also aired on RTV and Plus. CSN premiered new episodes as they release starting in 2022 with Season 21, when CSTV gave up the rights to CSN, who'd already been repeating the show. RTV and CSN would simulcast 5 episodes in the middle of the night on 1st May 2023. On 5th August 2023, CSN simulcasted a Behind the Scenes special of Family Guy by the BBC, with RTV and newcomer channel, Plus. Season 22 started on CSN on 7th October at 11pm, alongside Season 3 of Chucky, which aired new episodes in the slot before Family Guy at 10pm. Season 22 would air its first half on CSN until the Christmas special in December 2023, the show will continue on other channels but not on CSN due to its impending closure in January 2024.

## See Also

* List of programmes broadcast by CSN
* Solar Opposites
* Breaking Bad
* Chucky
* Resident Alien
* Killing It
* CSN
* FOX