I'm a
Family Guy fan. Ever since that very first episode FOX aired after the Super Bowl a few years back and the Kool-Aid guy jumped through the wall of the Quahog court house, I was hooked. The show has its detractors, and gripes that
Guy is non-plot centric and that the jokes are uniformly random are valid, but a comedy's supposed to make you laugh, and more often than not that's what
Family Guy does. When
American Dad came on to the scene, it just felt like a lesser
Family Guy, a vehicle for all of the parent show's rejected jokes,
Family Guy's B-sides, the minor leagues. I never got into it.
Family Guy was enough. However, when we got the chance last week to be present for a special
American Dad table read at the FOX Fall press junket in LA, featuring the entire cast in person, I jumped at the chance. How could I not?
All the online media members and local FOX affiliates gathered in a large conference room last Sunday for the table read. We were given the script that the cast would be reading (called “The 42-Year Old Virgin”, which will air early this season) and granted access to a buffet and open bar. Eventually, the cast rolled in. Seth MacFarlane, Wendy Schaal, Rachel McFarlane, Dee Bradley Baker,
Scott Grimes, Mike Barker and a couple other writers and producers sat around the table and the read began.
If this episode is any indication of
American Dad's quality, I might have to start watching. The episode is about
Stan Smith's dirty little secret: he is a killing virgin. That is, he has never killed anyone in his life, and all his buddies spend the episode encouraging Stan to pop his killing cherry. It's a dark episode, but really funny. They give a nice homage to the poker scene from The 40-Year Old Virgin, but the parallels to the episode's namesake end there.
It's fun seeing Seth MacFarlane do his voices in person. There were many times, because he does multiple characters, where Seth ended up having conversations with himself, but unless you're watching him do it, the dialogue is seamless. Wendy Schaal and Scott Grimes were also very impressive, and they really get in to their characters and voices.
It was an awesome little treat from FOX which might actually force me to tune in to tonight's
American Dad season premiere. Mission accomplished, FOX.
-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer (Image Courtesy of FOX)