Family Guy

Post by **Tyler_Legrand** » September 29th, 2009, 9:40 am

It's a wonderful day for pie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BldId1BSdo

Post by **estefan** » September 29th, 2009, 12:33 pm

I have lost interest in Family Guy, but when I heard about the Disney universe, I watched this episode and it was pretty okay. The whole Disney universe bit was great (even if the style reminded me of John K more), up until the Jew gag, that is. McFarlane can't seem to tell a Disney joke without throwing a "I think Walt is anti-Semitic" statement in there.

Otherwise, some of the other universes were funny. The Robot Chicken bit was very funny and I liked the stab at crude Flash animation. The Flintstones universe and real-life universe were also quite funny. Then again, I have always gotten a kick out of parallel universes.

Post by **Ben** » September 29th, 2009, 2:08 pm

Funny that Macfarlane just popped up in Flash Forward, the new mystery action show from ABC, owned by...Disney!

I was like "what the heck is going on!?" when he turned up as one of the FBI advisers in the opening scenes.

GeorgeC · Post by **GeorgeC** » September 29th, 2009, 3:12 pm

I saw the first episode of "The Cleveland Show" on Fox on Sunday.

I have to admit I was only half into it and found it to be very derivative and about as funny as an average episode of Family Guy.

Big pass from people who are not fans of Family Guy; Family Guy fans will probably like it, though, and the pro-MacFarlane crowd outnumbers his detractors at this point.

To me, it's plagued by more of the same writing weaknesses that Family Guy already has (segues for no reason, pop culture cliches and too many flashbacks, overdone stereotypes) and there really wasn't any new material there. There's still probably going to be at least a year of this show. We'll see if it holds on and survives or gets cancelled by Year Two.

Certainly not my cup of tea...

Post by **Dacey** » September 30th, 2009, 8:57 pm

The whole Disney universe bit was great (even if the style reminded me of John K more), up until the Jew gag, that is. McFarlane can't seem to tell a Disney joke without throwing a "I think Walt is anti-Semitic" statement in there.

Which is one of the reasons that I really don't care for the show. I watched that clip mainly out of curiosity, and it was admitably fairly funny, but that gag just ruined it for me.

Post by **Ben** » October 1st, 2009, 7:41 am

Y'know...I didn't get that at all from the clip. It's clear the emphasis was on the more modern Disney animated musicals, and I thought the joke was that some of the sidekick characters were voiced by Jewish people. It's still a sideswipe at that religion, but I certainly didn't get a "Walt is antisemitic" vibe from it. Do I need to watch it again?

Post by **Dacey** » October 1st, 2009, 11:58 am

Well, from my understanding, the series has done a number of those gags in the past. And this short article more or less seems to confirm what Macfarlane was going for with the episode:

http://scifiwire.com/2009/09/you-wont-b ... ere-fa.php

GeorgeC · Post by **GeorgeC** » October 2nd, 2009, 4:00 pm

The Seth McFarlane's and Seth Green's of this world are pretty ignorant about their Disney facts.

They also have agendas, too, whether they're aware of it or not. (McFarlane's a king of cheap shots and knows what he's doing.) I find the anti-Disney people tend to be those with some kind of personal axe to grind or those who feel they have to elevate themselves at the expense of others. Generally not good people to hang around with.

There were quite a few people in animation who were Jewish or had some Jewish heritage during the Golden Age of Walt. Disney was aware of this and while there were some off-color jokes made they were never intended to be as mean-spirited as anything McFarlane and Green have had in their shows. Off-color ethnic humor was very common back then and just about everybody participated in it whether people today acknowledge that fact or not.

Disney went out of his way to have a whole section of "Three Little Pigs" redone because he didn't want to offend Jews. The scene in question featured the Wolf disguised as an Orthodox Jew and speaking with a pronounced Yiddish accent. The revised version of the short is was gets distributed now with a few notable distribution mistakes (the infamous Three Little Pigs laserdisc).

One of Walt Disney's right-hand men at Imagineering was Marc Davis who started out in animation. He was Jewish and I never read any interviews with him that stated any problems from Walt over that.

Even Art Babbit --- who didn't get along with Walt --- stated he never felt Walt was anti-Semitic, either. Babbit was Jewish, too.

It's so easy and cheap to smear someone when he's no longer alive to defend himself.

Post by **estefan** » October 2nd, 2009, 10:29 pm

Yeah, not to mention the Sherman Brothers had an excellent relationship with Walt and they, too, were Jewish.

But, yeah, the whole "Walt Disney was anti-Semetic" legend has grown so massive that people don't even bother to research whether it's true or not. Whenever people say he was and I ask them to explain how they know, they can never back it up.

I think it all stems back to "Der Fuhrer's Face", which is a massive attack on Hitler and the Nazi Party, yet all people see and know of the short is Donald in the uniform saluting.

Post by **Dan** » October 4th, 2009, 2:15 pm

Well, it's not like they're simply throwing it in because that's how they feel about Walt. The way I see it, there needed to be a reason for Brian and Stewie to not stay in the universe as it shows they clearly love the place. I'm sure there were a bunch of ideas thrown about, but in the end they felt the play on the anti-semetic legend was the way to go.

Post by **Ben** » October 4th, 2009, 4:57 pm

Did you guys also know that Walt was cryogenically frozen in order to be brought back to life when doctors would be able to cure him? Apparently he's lying in wait under the Pirates Of The Caribbean ride at Disneyland California...

GeorgeC · Post by **GeorgeC** » October 5th, 2009, 12:25 am

Now I know you're joking, Ben!

Repeat me after -- cremation. That's what they did to Walt after he died.

He does have a tombstone in a cemetery in California but his ashes were scattered a long time ago.

*************

Cryogenics is one of the biggest scams being played now on the dearly departed.

I know a bit about biology (one of my undergrad majors) and I'm pretty sure freezing with liquid nitrogen will kill any living tissue. It's nasty stuff that makes materials brittle. The technology just doesn't exist to indefinitely freeze human tissues/cells without causing permanent damage... if we even know how to freeze human tissue without causing any damage, period. Definitely not good for nervous system tissue.

They freeze people after they're dead anyway so the whole freezing the body is kind of moot, no?

Post by **Ben** » October 5th, 2009, 6:56 am

I love how you said you knew I was joking but then told me anyway!

Walt actually doesn't have a "tombstone" exactly...just a mention of where his ashes were scattered at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in LA. It's a quiet, private area that I was very lucky to visit back in 1998 during a business stay in Hollywood.

By the way, I never heard of a religion <I>named</I> after the 32AD guy...

GeorgeC · Post by **GeorgeC** » October 5th, 2009, 7:23 am

I know you know, Ben.

I have sadly encountered people who DON'T know about the "32AD/33AD guy" (dates are in dispute even in religious circles) who went through public school. That's only the start of the basic facts people should be taught but aren't.

I went through public school in a small town which is a world of difference from a large city... My extended relations in larger cities have all went through parochial/private schools through at least middle school which made a huge difference in what they learned.

Besides that, people just don't read. I find a lot of sports and videogame nuts but hardly anybody knows anything about history, politics, or basic government civics. When they do, half the time they sound so politicized it's like talking to a Martian.

That's the world we live in.

Post by **Ben** » October 5th, 2009, 8:40 am

Wait...are we talking about...<I>Brian</I>!?