BACK IN TIME FOR 'FAMILY GUY's 200th EPISODE!

Meltdown! The Griffins celebrate in style for the upcoming FAMILY GUY Season Eleven. Images: FOX.

Classic comedy moments from the the past get a brand new twist for fans of FAMILY GUY, what with its well-deserved celebratory 200th episode, titled Yug Ylimaf and airing tonight in the US, as Brian and Stewie Griffin's time machine usage goes into world altering meltdown in the wackiest What if Christopher Nolan's INCEPTION hit Quahog? scenario, after Brian breaks it whilst impressing the most recent of his "skank" girlfriends. Look out for time in fast reverse Peter/Chicken fights and the infamous vomiting scene where our Griffin family stars get an absolute internal stuffing!

Sneak Peek: 200th Episode | Family Guy | Animation on FOX - YouTube

The classic vomiting scene gets an even grosser new spin!

KOOL TV can't wait to see the episode-part of the series eleventh season- when it eventually airs on either BBC 3 or FX HD sometime next year in the UK, alongside other future plots including Brian becoming a meth dealer, Meg falling for her brothers look-a-like, Quagmire accidentally marrying a hooker, and the Griffins deciding to climb Mount Everest! In another fun time travel spin, two versions of Brian and Stewie may end up on a road trip adventure to Las Vegas towards the end of the season. Voice guest stars this year include Johnny Depp, Ryan Reynolds and, in the ultimate series crossover, Dan Castellaneta as Homer Simpson!

Climb every mountain! The Griffins do Everest in an upcoming episode.

KEEP IT IN THE 'FAMILY GUY'!

It's Griffin time!  FAMILY GUY Season Ten is here! Images: FOX.

One of the few US import shows to escape the wrath of dreaded BBC TV cuts, the tenth series of the Seth MacFarlane created hit comedy series FAMILY GUY arrives with the full force of one of Peter Griffins farts for its exclusive first UK transmissions weekly double bills from tonight on BBC 3. (But what happened to the BBC HD screenings? Beeb, if you're going to pay a lot of money for a new series you might as well show it in the best picture quality possible!) Its creator may have intimated to overseas press that the show has gone on five seasons too long, but, let's face it, FG is still miles funnier than pretty much any other show on TV at the moment (how anyone thinks "comedy" like THE BIG BANG THEORY is funny is beyond me!).

Quagmire, Peter and Joe try to bring down the government in Tea Peter.

Meg is kidnapped in Europe in Leggo-My-Meg-O.

Stewie and Brian don their French disguises in Leggo-My Meg-O.

A nightmare ride for Brian, Quagmire, Joe and Peter in The Forget-Me-Knot.

Delighting children everywhere! Peter creates his own kid's TV show in You Can't Do That on Television, Peter.

New season highlights include Peter winning a $150 million lottery, being an absolute scrooge and incurring the wrath of his friends in the process, then befriending a dolphin (voiced by Ricky Gervais) and developing a children's TV show from hell!, precocious and put upon Meg falling for an Amish boy and then turning 18 (much to the delight of pervy Quagmire)!, Lois cooking a Thanksgiving Dinner that goes pear-shaped and later having to find a new care home for her bitter millionaire daddy, chubby teenage son Chris having to go to fat camp and unexpectedly taking on a serial killer, sophisticated alcoholic dog Brian gets a Blind girlfriend (who's unaware she's dating a canine!), and so too does dear sweet megalomaniac psycho-baby Stewie in the form of Penelope, who's just as corrupted and in to high-tech weaponry as he is (in an excellent guest spot from movie actress Cate Blanchett). There's also some anthology story-esque tributes including an upcoming episode where Peter, Joe, Brian and Quagmire wake up one day with amnesia in a deserted Quahog, whilst the film parodies continue to delight with a dead funny homage to the Liam Neeson European action hit Taken, which sees Meg kidnapped whilst travelling abroad, with Brian and Stewie to the rescue!

Love is in the air for Stewie and new friend Penelope (Cate Blanchett) in Mr. and Mrs. Stewie.

Other great voice guests in what looks to be a very fine season return to form include Ryan Reynolds (as himself!), Juno's Ellen Page, Jon Cryer, Marlee Maitlin and the always funny James Woods.

And, oh yes, that Chicken is back for one more epic fight!

FAMILY GUY: SEASON 11. OUT NOW ON DVD!

Watch out DOCTOR WHO,  Brian and Stewie Griffin are following you! FAMILY GUY returns for more antics on DVD. Image: FOX DVD.

"Good lord! Am I a... porn baby?!" - Stewie Griffin


Wife or lover, brother and sister, friend or foe. None of that makes a difference whatsoever if you can't treat yourself to a few laughs this Christmas via Seth MacFarlane's superb adult animated series FAMILY GUY, whose brilliant Season Eleven antics involving the legendary Griffin family have just hit the UK stores for fans of bawdy and downright below the belt (and possibly even lower!) Yuletide belly shakes!

Fourteen uncut episodes comprise the new set and there are some real classics here to savour, including Brian Writes a Bestseller, which is exactly what happens to our favourite literary canine, who then goes and mucks it all up by having psycho baby buddy Stewie as his publicist!, Road to the North Pole-which sees the lovable duo encountering all kinds of seasonal obstacles, and partaking in the odd musical number, whilst on their way to kill Santa!, And I'm Joyce Kinney, in which mum Lois's porno film-making past comes back to haunt her!, German Guy, in which pervie old Herbert down the street gets a German rival for young slob Chris Griffin's affections, and who may have had prior connections to Hitler!, The Hand That Rocks The Wheelchair, in which Stewie creates an evil clone of himself (set up via a fun re-imagining of the opening sequence of STAR TREK's classic sixties episode The Enemy Within!) whilst Meg helps to look after wheelchair bound ex-cop Joe and soon becomes dangerously infatuated with him, and The Big Bang Theory, in which Brian and Stewie travel back in time to stop the latter's half-brother from killing Leonardo Da Vinci!

Trailer (Warning: contains rude words!): Family Guy Season 11 Trailer - Would You Rather... - YouTube

With top celebrity voice guests this year including Anne Hathaway, Hugh Hefner, Will Ferrell, Kiefer Sutherland, Dan Aykroyd and even the legendary rock group KISS, alongside special 'Too Rude for TV' DVD extras to waggle the controversy factor the pop culture phenomenon show always enjoys, why not give your festive season that additional "out there' boost that it deserves!

RETURN OF THE GRIFFIN! "FAMILY GUY: IT'S A TRAP!"

Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia escape an exploding Sail Barge in FAMILY GUY's final STAR WARS spin: IT'S A TRAP! Images: FOX.

Having made its previous successful appearance on DVD and Blu-ray at the end of last year, the sadly final STAR WARS homage by the FAMILY GUY team-IT'S A TRAP!- based on the final Classic Trilogy film RETURN OF THE JEDI (Y’know, the one that gave us those cuddly-bear Ewoks and killed Darth Vader, but also, more importantly, heralded Princess Leia in THAT Gold Bikini!!) and brilliantly transferred for further comedy exploration to the FG universe by its talented super fan writers and animators- makes its way onto exclusive terrestrial viewing on the UK's BBC THREE and BBC HD channel this Sunday at 10pm. Also that evening, BBC 3 will be showing the previous two equally funny specials devoted to STAR WARS and THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK - BLUE HARVEST (the best of the three) and SOMETHING, SOMETHING, SOMETHING DARK SIDE (Darth Stewie rules!)- for further Seth MacFarlane created viewing delight....

Comedy Forces of evil! The Emperor (Mister Pewterschmidt) confers with Darth Stewie!

Joe is the perfect Jabba the Hutt!

The classic Speeder Bike chase goes Raleigh!

The STAR WARS FAMILY GUY cast, re-united for one final time.

The entire trio of FAMILY GUY STAR WARS adventures are also available separately and in box set special edition form from FOX DVD and Blu-ray.

KOOL TV DVD REVIEW: ROBOT CHICKEN: STAR WARS III

Darth Vader goes Disco Fever! It can only be ROBOT CHICKEN: STAR WARS III. Images: REVOLVER ENTERTAINMENT/ADULT SWIM.

ROBOT CHICKEN: STAR WARS III

Available on UK DVD from REVOLVER ENTERTAINMENT

Reviewed by Scott Weller

“Y’know, looking back, it all make sense. Dream big. Live big. Love big. Fall to your death down a fucking giant hole!”

Emperor Palpatine

It may be their last venture into the realms of STAR WARS comedy via the ADULT SWIM universe, but Seth Green and Breckin Meyer’s third and final ROBOT CHICKEN dedicated to the iconic characters, environments and classic scenes from all six STAR WARS movies goes out with an hilariously extravagant and overwhelmingly funny bang, well worth the wait in seeing, and may rank amongst their finest work a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

In fact, it was pretty wizard! And had more belly laughs than last year’s FAMILY GUY JEDI parody-so its one up there for Mister Green. I think!

The Emperor (voiced by FAMILY GUY'S Seth MacFarlane) gets to show off his new song and dance number!

See-Threepio (voiced by Anthony Daniels) gets a new take on learning Spanish!

Once again, there’s lots of brilliantly observed new spins on classic scenes, mostly around RETURN OF THE JEDI and the life and career path of old hemorrhoid head Emperor Palpatine (once more brilliantly voiced with neurotic, paranoid, quirky and greedy observation by FAMILY GUY’s Seth MacFarlane) – additionally, the Prequels seem even more ripe than ever for mining comedy gold and brilliant what if? moments for humour that we’ve all been longing to see. Rib-tickling highlights include a whole new look at EPISODE II’s courtly love relationship between Padme and Anakin, as the former shows off her pole dancing skills to the latter, all the while declaring her reasons why they shouldn’t become an item! Anthony Daniels back in Threepio voice mode testing his communication skills in Spanish class, Prune Face finally getting the mega star action hero quality time he deserves, Yarel Poof questioning the prophecy and skills of his fellow Jedi Council members, and his ultimate fate during ORDER 66, what really happened to Owen and Beru Lars at their Tatooine homestead, the JEDI Finale celebration gets a whole new spin, the one armed Wampa trying to get some gas for his car at an intergalactic stopover, just as Luke shows up!, and, capping it off, there’s an alternate version of the skiff battle the way Boba Fett would have liked it to have ended, linked to a reason why Tauntauns have long memories…

Darth Vader's cape gets him into trouble in an hilarious scene.

Mace Windu enjoys some quality ice cream time inside the Jedi Temple!

Plus, running alongside the Emperor’s story-arc, there’s the obligatory classic Vader scenes (notably a laugh out loud moment when the Dark Lord gets used to his suit against the musical backdrop of the classic MEGO Records Disco funk version of the STAR WARS theme!), old fish-face himself, Admiral Ackbar, and the final adventures of Gary the Stormtrooper (where things get a bit too gruesome regarding an Ewok!).

Oh, and though the original programme already had unintentional comedy unwittingly built into it, the 1978 HOLIDAY SPECIAL gets a short but superb look-in, too…

As well as the aforementioned Daniels, other WARS veterans returning include CLONE WARS Tom Kane who always gives good Yoda and FAMILY GUY/AMERICAN DAD’s Dee Bradley Baker. Plus Billy Dee Williams and Ahmed Best, all clearly having a blast with their respective roles…

Outside of the main production which is funny enough, there’s a whole host of other enjoyable bonus material on the DVD including several fun audio commentaries, multiple behind the scenes animatics, informatic Chicken Nuggets, deleted scenes, trailers, a truncated look at the 2010 CELEBRATION V convention panel for the episode, Skywalker Ranch premiere footage, and, the icing of the cake, a sequence showing a playful George Lucas with the ROBOT CHICKEN writers in conference, in which, in a great scene, he throws one of the team out for bringing up the name of his non-created Mara Jade from the Expanded Universe! Classic stuff!

Boba Fett finally gets to take Han Solo on a killer ride!

Even without the expansive extras, ROBOT CHICKEN STAR WARS III is a tremendous achievement, one you can watch and re-watch and never get bored with. A special note of thanks must also be said not just to the writers and artists but to the incredible work undertaken, I’m sure in rapid time and limited budgets, by the set designers, puppet and costume makers, whose devoted recreations of the STAR WARS movie universe have been nothing short of superb, and surely helped the programmes in their attention to detail and realism to make it even more gag-tastic.

The STAR WARS Prequels prove a goldmine for brilliant comedy moments!

A delivery for the Fett household!

It's first rate laughs all the way that continue to be both a wonderful homage and celebration to the STAR WARS saga, by a group of enthusiastic celebrity fans that clearly love and enjoy the source material as much as we do. 

KOOL TV RATING: A well deserved 5 out of 5.

Get it from AMAZON here: Robot Chicken Star Wars Episode 3 Adult Swim DVD: Amazon.co.uk: Film & TV  Or why not pick up the entire ROBOT CHICKEN STAR WARS TRILOGY here: Robot Chicken Star Wars Episodes 1-3 Box Set Adult Swim DVD: Amazon.co.uk: Film & TV

SUMMER MADNESS WITH "AMERICAN DAD!"

Another prime example of the American Family? We hope not! The cast of AMERICAN DAD! Image: FOX.

They might not have caught the public's imagination, or their funny bones, in quite the same way as their Quahog resident forebears in FAMILY GUY, but Seth MacFarlane's other out there comedy series about a dysfunctional family-AMERICAN DAD-has its fair share of equally devoted fans clearly enjoying its fine belly laughs alongside its well-written, often controversial, political and subversive humour.  Lead character/father Stan Smith is the ultimate square jawed plonker family man/CIA Agent whose patriotism and pure stupidity in the dedicated pursuit of keeping the country safe, and its stars and stripes flying, lead him into some of the most incredibly silly situations, watched and sometimes goaded on by his equally zany family, including petulant wife Francine, liberal daughter Hayley, cocky wannabe cool son Steve, and, how could we not forget him, the campily ego-centric, Paul-Lynde-type (cowardly, yet in your face at the same time) alien "rescued' from AREA 51, and now living the high and low-life with his human family, Roger. Oh, and there's also their resident little anthropomorphic goldfish with the brain of an East German Olympic Ski Jumper: Klaus!

Memorable episodes on this sixth volume, available on a special features packed DVD from 27th June, include Stan getting involved with a horse in "Don't Look a Smith-Horse in the Mouth", then getting hooked upon Crack Cocaine in "A Jones for a Smith", Francine hitting it off with Jesus Christ, who's now obviously defected over from FAMILY GUY, in the Biblical end of days tale "Rapture's Delight", plus Roger, clearly the star of the series these days, revealing his past as a steroid abusing Olympics hockey player, then becoming a policeman, a crime scene photographer and, finally topping it all off, a Che Guevara wannabe dictator on a tropical island!

And you thought your family was strange?!

 

Get it here: American Dad! - Season 6 [DVD]: Amazon.co.uk: Seth MacFarlane, Wendy Schaal, Dee Bradley Baker, Scott Grimes, Rachael MacFarlane, Mike Kim, Joe Daniello: Film & TV

Volumes 1-5 of AMERICAN DAD are also available on DVD from FOX.

JURASSIC LARKS! THE RETURN OF "THE FLINTSTONES"

Rolling back for a new audience: THE FLINTSTONES. Image: HANNA-BARBERA.

Still iconically great after fifty years, and surviving several terrible live action or made for DVD spin-off movies, the legendary 1960's Hanna-Barbera stone age family comedy THE FLINTSTONES will be returning back to the past, but also with, courtesy of FAMILY GUY creator Seth MacFarlane, a brand new modern day cultural spin...

Original titles:YouTube - "The Flintstones" Opening

Coming in 2013, FOX (who own the rights) and WARNER BROTHERS (the home of so much hit animation these days) certainly know a good idea when they see it, and joining forces with MacFarlane and his team for this new series (which sounds intriguing) makes very good business sense. To his credit, he has long been a fan of the classic series and characters from Bedrock, which have often made unexpected cameo appearances in FAMILY GUY, so his respect for the original source material will no doubt show in the upcoming animated hit, which certainly gives it a very good chance of success in capturing a whole new generation of fans.

Yabba-dabba-do!!!!

More news on THE FLINTSTONES as and when we get it...

NINE TIMES THE FUN WITH "FAMILY GUY"!

Neighbours you really don't want! The Griffin family return in FAMILY GUY! Images: FOX.

I never get bored watching re-runs of FAMILY GUY on the UK's BBC 3 and FX channels but any chance to get some new episodes is sooo "frickin' sweet!" Cheers for 3 in their exclusive screenings of new episodes (finally made in HD) from Season Nine starting this Sunday, starting off with what looks set to be an hilarious murder/mystery: And Then There Were Fewer, in which our Seth MacFarlane version of a normal American family become embroiled in a series of murders at James Woods mansion, and featuring guest star voice contributions from semi-regulars Woods, Patrick Stewart and Drew Barrymore.

Stewie meets his evil clone in The Hand That Rocks the Wheelchair!

Lois becomes a boxing champ in Baby, You Knock Me Out!

Chris meets the German Guy!

Watch out for future episodes (featuring voice guests including Shelly Long, David Boreanz and Laura Vandervoort) in which Brian and Stewie (who is determined to be more evil this year) go trick or treating on a Halloween night to remember, followed by a road trip to the North Pole and then time travelling to meet Leonardo Da Vinci, Lois becoming a championship boxer, pervy Herbert getting a rival for Chris's affections, Peter needing a new kidney, Meg finally losing it big-time, and Mayor West getting married! All this and a guest appearance from Barack Obama, too!

Live the American Dream with the Griffin family!