The Super Bowl is tonight and with it come a number of traditions. There are the parties where fans get together to watch the game, the commercials and trailers for upcoming films, the halftime show and finally the traditional premiere after the game.
Often times networks will put series episodes after the Super Bowl to get an increase in ratings. In 1999 the Fox network decided to premiere the pilot episode of an unknown animated series titled Family Guy.
“Death Has a Shadow” was the first episode of Family Guy, and unlike a lot of other comedy shows which usually take a while to find their footing, I think Family Guy was one of the few to start off with a pretty clear understanding of its characters. If anything, Family Guy is one of those series where people would probably argue that it has lost its identity the longer it went on, but that’s a discussion for a different day.
READ: A Brief History Of ‘Futurama’
In the opening scene we already get what will become future staples of the show. The pop cultural references with The Brady Bunch parody and Peter being the lovable idiot husband and father. The main plot of the episode revolves around that with Peter losing his job after drinking too much. The montage of him trying other jobs is one of the funniest bits to me, particularly when he’s the sneeze guard at the salad bar.
Eventually Peter gets an increase in money due to an error and eventually tries to make things right by dumping the money during the Super Bowl from a blimp which leads to the best exchange in the episode in my opinion.
Brian: Amazing you can barely drive a car, and yet you were allowed to fly a blimp?
Peter: Yeah America’s great isn’t it, except for the South.
I think what works best in this episode and most of earlier Family Guy. Is the fact that despite all the over-the-top stuff that’s happening the characters still feel relatable in a way. Peter is dumb but not in the annoying way he became later on. He still means well and does genuinely love his family. The brotherly dynamic between him and Brian is fun, with Brian working as a classic straight man and voice of reason to Peter’s stupidity.
A subplot for this episode is Stewie trying to kill Lois for taking his mind control device. Now, obviously Stewie evolved quite drastically as the show went on. He always remained a genius, but him being evil ended up being toned down significantly. Currently the main joke surrounding his character revolves around his sexuality. While I do understand the choice to move away from the evil genius trope as it would’ve gotten stale, it is fun to look back on these earlier moments with his character.
“Death Has a Shadow” isn’t the best episode of Family Guy. But it did serve as a great introduction to the series and it’s a fun piece of nostalgia to look back on now. If it’s been a while since you rewatched it, perhaps you can check it out after the game tonight for old times sake.
About Post Author
Leave a Reply